Originally Posted by
Ferocity
That article was very vague and obscure. They failed to make convincing examples, and didn't even touch such subject as - f2p games only exist thanks to microtransactions and cash shops.
I can make examples too, I won't name the games, though if you played many of them - you would know what I am speaking about.
So Game A - subscription based game. Game B - f2p cash-shop based game.
In Game A - each time you happen to die on some challenge, you have to grind various ingame resources, such as gold, various buffs, and so on. Preparation stage before doing challenges also includes completing daily objectives for a prolonged period of time. Rewards are purely RNG-based.
Game B - same as Game A, but you can buy gold from "free-riders", buy buffs from cash-shop instead of farming them, and cut out on most of daily objectives grind. You can also buy things, which otherwise are hard to farm, which would allow you more chances within RNG-based system.
It's simply entirely different approaches. If you think that f2p game "pushes" you to buy things from cash-shop, some p2p games push you into sacrificing time while doing tedious, and often - soulcrushing, ingame tasks without providing cash-shop alternative, meanwhile you pay subscription fees.
Unless type A games will change their paradigm, they will become unsustainable in close future, because you can't have both - paying for game by money, and paying for game by investing lots of time doing uninteresting activities. F2p gives the facts straight: pay if you want such-and-such thing. P2p plays it other way around: pay, but we will make sure you will have to pay us next month, and month after that, so we will try to extend your game experience by all artificial means possible, however unappealing those would be.