I see what you’re saying, it is a lot of memberships taken out of the game, but I would argue no one running a bot farm is paying for membership with Earthly currency. They wouldn’t want to tie legitimate credit information to any of those accounts, and so they obtain membership through bonds purchased with in game gold.
It’s in part what has driven the cost of bonds from 5 million gold to 15 million. As a result, I’m of the opinion that bots aren’t a revenue source for Jagex.
Honestly for an MMO it’s still a good price. MMOs in particular people sink a tonne of hours into, so it’s pennies per hour which (like gaming in general) is a pretty good rate for entertainment. That doesn’t mean huge mark ups like these are anything but infuriating.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Runescape should have tiered membership for multiple characters. For example, one character for $10, three for $20, ten for $50, etc. This would make it easier on player’s wallets, and frankly it would encourage people to play the other game modes.
Having said that, I think the larger problem is that the people that develop the game get peanuts for pay. Most of them are fans of the game and just want to work on it, but doing so shouldn’t trap them to a low income. It’s not a good sign when developers can leave the company and earn a higher salary streaming Runescape content.
What can you expect when the company is owned by an investment group.
In terms of revenue per employee, Valve is extremely well set to weather almost any storm. Beyond Microsoft or Google. Nintendo’s probably also stable, given they own the most valuable IP created.
Gabe Newell is probably trustworthy - as much as a man of his wealth can be anyway. The problem I think Valve could face one day is a rogue board of directors taking the company public after he dies.
Steam does suffer from the ‘purchase a revocable license’ issue, which is always concerning, but the larger issue might be their stance on license revocation on death. For now, passing your login information to next of kin is the workaround, but I wonder if there will come a day where they send emails saying an account has been terminated and licenses voided as the date of birth on record exceeds the average lifespan of a citizen in your nation.
I’ll never know the answer to that, but if capitalism has taught me anything, it’s to distrust corporations making decisions. Maybe Valve could become an employee cooperative of some variety. That would alleviate my concerns.
Gone in less than a month, yet not discounted to 1¢. They could do it, just don’t care.