Lots of great questions in chat about subscriptions, and some answers too. Let's get some questions here so we can answer them and everyone can see. Plus, we can discuss!
Referendums will proposed from time to time to allow subscribers to decide on feature or content priorities for the game. You can save up your votes, and, if you choose to sit out a particular referendum, you can still apply your votes to the next one. There is no referendum currently, but maybe soon.
When you upgrade subscription levels, you are charged the difference in the two levels, and receive the difference in the subscription privileges (credits, tokens, etc) immediately. You receive benefits at the higher level every month for the duration of your subscription.
I'm trying to decide between subscription levels and so far I'm not spending a lot of credits on clothes. Once additional items are offered that might change, so I'm curious about the teleportation tokens. Since we haven't used them yet, it's hard to decide how often I would use them during a month. Will Teleportation Tokens be offered for sale as a stand alone item; if so, would they be available to everyone subscriber or not? Also, is there any thought towards allowing Facebook credits towards the purchase of credits or if available Teleportation Tokens. Also, will credits be available for stand alone purchase?
Thanks for offering a special deal to all of us who also get the benefit of testing.
1) Yes, teleportation tokens will be offered for sale as an a la carte/stand alone item.
2) No, it will not require a subscription to buy them.
3) We would like to accept Facebook credits, but we can't yet: they are only allowed for "apps on Facebook" at this point (ie., games/apps that run in a page on facebook's site). We are friends with many people at Facebook though and when they get around to support off of facebook.com, we will likely hook it up.
4) Credits are available a la carte/stand alone already: https://beta.glitch.com/checkout/
If I buy clothing that's subscriber only, then I'm not a subscriber anymore, will that clothing be locked away until I'm a subscriber once again? Or will it be mine for good?
I'd also like to know, to expand on Mocha's question, if you have subscriber features on your character (eyes, hair, color), supposing you don't purchase a subscription right away or at all, will those stay on the character until you change it again? Or will your little Glitch go completely blank (well, in the case of subscriber eyes) until you choose new features?
Mocha, if you spend credits to buy a piece of clothing that is subscriber-only, you can keep it after the subscription lapses (however, if you recycle it, you wouldn't be able to buy it again without a subscription). On the other hand, you will lose the free subscriber-only items once your subscription lapses.
Little Miss Giggles, if you have subscriber-only features (hair, skin color, etc.) when your subscription lapses, you'll be notified that the subscription lapsed and that they will be removed. And then there will be a grace period so you can change it. But, if you never change it, they will revert back to normal free features/colors.
"what about family accounts?" — this is a possibility (but, if we did offer something like that, it would probably be package deals or a more general discount for purchasing multiple subscriptions since we don't know where people live or how they are related to one another).
"will a single household be required to buy a subscription for each member of that household?" — no one, regardless of their home address, is required to buy a subscription.
"will it be possible to have multiple characters per subscription?" — we haven't decided yet whether one account can have multiple characters, but if we did it, it would be a subscriber-only feature (and the subscription is at the account level, not the character level, so all characters on a given subscriber's account would have the subscriber-only options, etc.)
I want to begin by saying how excited I truly am about the future of Glitch! I've had a great deal of fun playing and have been very impressed by how consistently active the developers are in the game.
I dearly love that Glitch can be played in many different ways by different players. I for one have really enjoyed mostly ignoring the quests and instead exploring the world and focusing on the survival aspect of the game.
Finally I am most impressed by the player base that Glitch has earned by producing a superior world with great imagination and true creativity.
I hope my questions don't step on anyone's toes or offend anyone, if they do I sincerely apologize.
I have a number of questions concerning subscribing:
- How much of a warning will we have that the game is leaving beta, ie a warning that we will no longer have access to the beta subscription offers?
- I would like to know the answer to striatic's question concerning refunds for us if the game's price turns out to be lower than what we see now.
Many similar games offer beta testers a year to take advantage of the best deal on subscription prices as long as they buy into one of the lower levels before the game goes live. For example: If a beta tester purchases the Tin or Copper level now they would have one year from the time the game goes live to purchase the Copper or Molybdenum level. Has Tiny Speck considered this and if they have will it be an option?
While I have dearly loved my short time in this game my decision to subscribe and recommend subscribing to my friends and family hinges most on what the game will become.
- Most importantly I need to know how a larger population will be handled. Will we be given tools to protect our game-play from players that purposely go out of their way to hinder it? What will those tools be specifically and how effective will they be?
For example: I've already been repeatedly followed by a number of players who have discovered that "splanking" another player causes enough lag so as to be able to disrupt them from mining, harvesting, donating to projects and donating to giants. By the end of my first day in Glitch I had 4 different people follow me around for more than an hour doing this making it impossible for me to mine or harvest at all.
While occasionally this is simply an annoyance and we can just focus on another task, once the game has a far greater population this behavior could become frustrating enough that playing Glitch might no longer be enjoyable. The same players followed me around while I tried to harvest trees on a public street as well. As an aside - this happened to me before I had had a conversation with any player nor was I mining a rock someone else was already mining or harvesting a tree that was not fully grown. Consequently timed quests became nearly impossible to complete.
As a result of these repeated negative experiences I've primarily taken up farming and cooking as I can do that in my own house without having to deal with griefers. I must admit that I'm not especially thrilled that my options of game-play have been determined for me by difficult players and look forward to a time when we all be able to play this wonderful game as we choose.
This leads to my next question:
-Will these very negative interactions remain a part of the game and if they will, will we be provided with a way to protect ourselves from them?
As a final note:
If any of these questions cover ground that Tiny Speck is not interested in becoming public at this time I would appreciate being told that rather than a "cute" answer, having the question be entirely ignored, or receiving what has become the stock answer of "probably". I make these requests as it has become uncomfortable to ask question concerning subscriptions in the game as these are the responses most commonly garnered. Many people have expressed a fear of posting their questions and opinions here on the forums as a result of these types of answers.
Thank you for reading my wall of text and for taking the time to consider my questions and provide answers to them.
@Dandilion- Sorry to hear you have had these experiences. I myself have not had a single occurrence of such behaviors. I am not sure if the blocking feature works for in game situations such as these, have you tried it ?
Warning for the end of beta: players will get some warning, but it is not possible to say exactly how much: maybe a week? Maybe two? We have a lot to do, and we don't know exactly when we'll be done.
Refunds if prices lowered: Prices will not be lowered. If they were, we'd probably extend player's subscriptions for a matching length of time.
Subscription tier upgrades: Subscriptions will be upgradable from one tier to a higher one (you can't do it yet, but will be able to). This will be true for monthly subscriptions in the future and the yearly ones we're offering now: if you subscribe with, say, seven months remaining on your subscription, you'd pay the difference for those seven months (however, this will probably not be possible if you have less than a month remaining on a yearly subscription).
People acting like jerks in the game: We can say with some certainty that there will be people acting like jerks in the game.
Tools to protect non-jerks from the jerks or otherwise separate some players from others: There will absolutely be tools and we consider this to be one of our biggest challenges in scaling the world. But, there's no way to tell you right now what we will do in the future to solve problems that we haven't yet experienced, so there's no way to answer "What will those tools be specifically and how effective will they be?"
There's a great saying which is especially true, we think, in the context of software development: "Don't borrow problems from the future." Until you experience and understand the problem, it is foolish to try to design a solution.
Having said that, one of the bigger projects currently underway (group halls) is designed to give players much more flexibility in how they play together with the hope that the capability for players themselves to organize and structure how they interact with each other will prevent some problems from happening in the first place.
Finally, I'm sorry to hear that you're uncomfortable asking these questions and I'd love to learn more about why. I'm not sure who you were asking in the game (but you are probably better off asking in the forums anyway ... game chat is not a great medium for getting answers).
And I'm sorry that some of my answers contain "probably" — that's just the way it is. No-one has ever done exactly what we're doing before, so there's simply no way to predict exactly how things will turn out (and that will remain true six months from now, a year from now, two years from now, and so on).
Dandilion, I am sorry to hear that you had such a bad experience playing. Like Divine, I haven't had that happen and hate to think that people got together to purposely keep ano player from enjoying the game. If you haven't been out recently, why don't you try again and if you experience the same behavior you can make note of the players and try talking to them. Perhaps they find that behavior funny and don't understand that others find it annoying. There are usually some staff online and I'm sure if you couldn't get the players to stop keeping you from playing a staff member could talk to them.
Thank you. I have tried the blocking feature but it seems to only stop people from IMing someone else. I tend to just log out for a while when things like that happen.
Mostly I just wanted the developers to know that it is happening and that it can be quite discouraging.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful answers! I greatly appreciate them and look forward to subscribing when paypal becomes available.
Thank you also for not minding my seemingly endless questions.
Knowing that you are concerned about and are working on ways of dealing with difficult players is wonderful to hear and puts all of my fears to rest on that front.
Group halls sound like a great idea and I'm looking forward to them.
Your being willing to constantly interact with all of us and answer our questions goes a long way to making me feel comfortable providing feedback.
Dandelion's question makes me wonder. What exactly does the "block" option do when you use it on a player? In this case, would blocking the troublesome players prevent them from being able to splank the person who blocks them?
I always do ask the troubling player to stop but it has no effect. Luckily only one of the players has continued to play the game at all that I've noticed. I imagine that harassing other players gets boring after a while when they are simply ignored. At least I hope it does :)
I've considered asking the staff for help but it is so easy to teleport home that I just let it go. I learned long ago that not engaging with difficult people tends to frustrate them and they give up. I do say something when I notice it happening to other players though.
The happy consequence of all of this has been making friends of the people I ask about mining rocks or harvesting trees that they are near.
There are so many more wonderful and friendly people in the game than troubling ones thankfully.
I wanted to let you both know that I had very similar experiences with what I call *griefers* earlier today. I was *splanked* by various players a number of times.
Then, when I was mining, what I had mined was taken by another player before it was sent to my inventory. First, I asked the player to give it back, which he did, explaining that it was his first day and he didn't know not to do that. So, I politely asked if I could help him - he told me he was hungry - I gave him some food and went on my way.
I continued to mine and he re-appeared and again took what I was mining by trying to mine at the same time on the same rock. He then told me that he owned a house which led me to believe that it could not possibly be his first day in Glitch.
So, these things ARE happening - the frequency has increased greatly today. So, I too hope that there will be ways that are developed that allow players to stop this from happening, especially by the same player as it did in my case today.
what I had mined was taken by another player before it was sent to my inventory.
Are you describing someone mining the same rock as you? Or are you describing mining, and dropping the rocks, and someone else picking them up before you could?
Hi Windborn,
I am describing someone coming up while I am mining, beginning to mine the exact same rock and not allowing me to finish. How is that ok? I asked the person to stop, please and they just kept right on doing this - this has now happened twice in the past 5 minutes.
Sand Dollar, they can't stop you from finishing — you just can't mine at the same time. So, if you are (actively) mining, they can't mine. And when you stop in between, they can start.
I guess this thread is no longer about subscriptions ;)
I have a question. None of the games I know support this, but is it possible to give someome 'x' number of hours subscription. Example, parents can gift their kids 'x' hours based on their school performance.
Hmmm — that's an interesting idea. But, probably not related to subscriptions, per se, right? More just like a limit on play time in general.
I don't think we'd ever to it (it'd get very complicated). But, it wouldn't be that hard to show how many hours people have played her pay and leave enforcement up to parents (or spouses ;)
But then it might freak some people out to see how much they were playing!
Maqui's post brings up an interesting question, I think. I've already purchased my subscription. If you do add additional feature benefits to the subscription, for example, subway passes, would we get those benefits added or an option to add for a nominal fee? (Or would we use credits to purchase the pass?)
Hi Stoot,
Am I reading this right. As a beta tester we get a special offer of 6 months free. So for example Molybdenum is a one off cost for a year of $89. So after my first year + as a alpha tester I get another two months free sooo after 14 months [ for me] or twelve for a beta. The cost to play glitch, for a year of subscribing to the top tear, will cost me $178. Granted I can pay per month by then but that seems a lot to me.. Is this the usual going rate for this type of game play. I have never even looked at a mass multi player game before testing here? :)
VickyAlice139: right now, only annual subscriptions are available, so you would be paying the price for a whole year. (After launch, we will make month-to-month subscriptions available.)
Tofu Casserole: there may be some sort of expiration on votes (like a year after granting, or something) but you will be able to save them and spend them even after your subscription lapses.
AlmostSilver, re: "If you do add additional feature benefits to the subscription … would we get those benefits added or an option to add for a nominal fee?" Yes, you would get them automatically. And we almost certainly will add more features/benefits to subscriptions — there are several things under consideration that we don't yet have a clear enough plan for —and those would all automatically be given to any existing subscribers.
Misha: I'm not sure if I'm reading the question right, but if you are asking if the eventual non-discounted price of subscribing at the Molybdenum level would be $178, then: yes, at the monthly rate, to be precise, it'd be 12 * $14.99 or $179.88 (though there will still be a more modest discount available for annual purchases post-beta).
$15/mo is pretty much the standard rate for subscription-only MMOGs (like World of Warcraft or Eve Online). However, it is not directly comparable, because (i) you don't need to have the subscription to play Glitch and (ii) if you wanted to play as a subscriber, you could still subscribe at the lower tier: the only reason to subscribe at the highest tier would be to get the additional credits, etc. (On a monthly subscription, you can switch tiers each month, if you wanted.)
Forgetting about all the current discounts for a moment: 150 credits, purchased individually, costs $10. The Copper subscription includes 150 credits (and everything else it includes) but only costs $9 per month — $1 less than the credits by themselves. So, subscriptions will be a better deal for those who want the subscriber-only options and the things that credits will buy you.
Okey so I subscribed and it said"something to the effect I would get special wardrobe to show"well it looks the same to me ,So very sorry for help here but seems like nothing changed for this account.
Hallowed Spirit: I believe that is because all testers are subscribers, so we have a full range of options to test. When the testing period ends, people who don't subscribe will probably lose their subscriber-only items. Personally, I will be bald, and possibly naked. I will change my nickname to MoleRat, and hide in my cave.
If there are clothes that I did not buy with tokens (but I don't know if they are simply free or free for subscribers), the wardrobe says I own them so do I keep them even if I did not "Buy" them?