Lego Universe - RIP?

[Aanchir]

The "freemium" model where you get to play for free but pay for some of the higher level stuff might work.

Also, I like the idea proposed earlier in this thread where you get credits you can apply to the game every time you buy a real set.

Of the two, I prefer option #2.

Most of LEGO's explanations for the monthly-subscription plan stated the reason they did that was specifically to avoid the "freemium" model. They want everyone's play experience to have the same level of opportunity, and the "freemium" model doesn't work quite so well for that.

In a sense, the fact that the game is targeted towards kids might also have something to do with that. If a fee is required for any sort of gameplay, it's easy for a parent to see why they need to pay the fee. On the other hand, if the kid can play the game just fine without any of the premium stuff that costs money, the parent isn't going to cash in on that stuff and thus the kid will not be satisfied with their gameplay experience.

The complaint I tend to see a lot of places from parents tends not to be that they have to pay for the subscription, but that they have to pay twice: once for the game itself, and again to actually play it. LEGO seems to be alleviating this to some extent by giving the game away for free at various opportunities and reducing the cost greatly. But perhaps the strategy LEGO should pursue is to have a "package deal" with the game and a 1-month subscription, so that you pay one flat rate for the game and get to play right away (with the first subscription activated when you first log in). If that's a possibility, it might be a good option.

I don't understand why they don't give you more payment options - I would buy credits of playtime over a monthly subscription model, I just don't have the spare time to justify a charge that's going to go relatively unused each month. They should have a $10/month unlimited plan, and a $0.50 per hour plan or something.

This is also a good idea, even though of course it might confuse parents, which could be a problem. On the other hand, the per-hour option could have the benefit of letting parents limit their kids' play time, something I know a lot of parents like to do to keep their kids from becoming "addicted" to video games.

In any event, LEGO hasn't yet made any indication that they're giving up on LEGO Universe, so I'm hoping that means that they have better payment options in the works and not just that they're going to lower the amount of money spent on developing new content. That would be a quick way to drive the game to an early grave.

[Blondie-Wan]

Well, I guess now we know, alas. Sadly, they've decided that the game indeed just isn't successful enough; I'm guessing that given the steps they took that were discussed earlier in this thread, months ago, the gulf between the number of paid subscribers they were actually getting and the number they'd need for the game to be sustainable must have been greater than anyone outside the company realized. It's a real shame - the game is quite fun, and has an awful lot of potential.

I'm personally pretty frustrated, as I've only just recently been able to get around the computer issues that were keeping me from playing it regularly for a year after it opened, and just days after I finally got back into the game, they announced it would close. Blast.

Such a shame. I really wish there were something that could be done to keep it going, but apparently any solution would have to boil down to getting a huge number of people to sign up for it in a very short time, and that's almost certainly just so unlikely that it's not worth bothering to try, or at least the powers-that-be behind LU have decided as much. I don't think they're even accepting new subscribers now that they've publicly announced their intention to close it, alas. It's truly a shame.

How many of the people who got those free copies ever gave the game a shot, I wonder?

[Superkalle]

Ah, you found this old topic Blondie-wan. Good, because it's defintely relevant now. How ironic that the "?" in the topic name now could be changed to "!".

For LDD users, the questions is how this will affect us. For example we have the LU Mode in LDD, and up until now, Lego Universe game development has paid for many of the bricks we have in both LU Mode and even Extended Mode.

[vynsane]

For LDD users, the questions is how this will affect us. For example we have the LU Mode in LDD, and up until now, Lego Universe game development has paid for many of the bricks we have in both LU Mode and even Extended Mode.

I, too, had this concern. Hopefully we can prove to LEGO that development of non-DbM LDD is a strong business venture. If not, we could see development of DbM mode only in future versions with LU and LDDX languishing in development limbo.