MMO Gaming

I played a little bit in the Fury beta a while back. It was enjoyable. Not the greatest game I’ve ever played, but enough fun that I am thinking about buying it. My problem is not so much with the money, spending $50 on the game isn’t going to kill me and it is free to play. My problem is that I’m not sure if I’m going to end up getting my $50 out of it.

I look at Guild Wars as an example. I own Prophecies, Factions and Nightfall. I’m struggling to decide if I should get Eye of the North. My problem is I only really have a character up a few levels in the Prophecies campaign, and even he isn’t at the (very low) max level for the game. I just don’t play it that often (mainly because of a lack of jumping ability, but that’s a different story I think.) I got those three because I do enjoy the games, and want to support the alternate business model, but at some point I guess it is hard to decide if it is really worth it.

The same thing with Fury. I want to support what they are doing. They are trying something different and going with a different business model along with it. I support that…in theory. But should I support it with my wallet even if I won’t really be spending $50 worth of time in the game?

I look at the Orange Box for a point of comparison. That’s five games, 50 dollars. That is probably the best deal available in gaming today. The only thing I can see topping that deal is if Square Enix released Final Fantasy 1-9 in a single “Mega Collection” or perhaps the complete Dragon Quest/Warrior Series as it’s own collection. If they sold something like that for $50 it would certainly be the best deal ever…perhaps I’ll have to write them letting them know they should do this.

I digress. The point of all this is at what point should we, or should we not, spend money on games? How much time in game do we have to spend to make each dollar “worth it?” Has anyone come up with a good formula for this? Any decisions on game buying you made that you regret now? Let me know.

games, fury, orange box, final fantasy, dragon quest, guild wars, mmorpg, mmog, mmo gaming, money