So I just bought an Alpha Vial yesterday with my author rewards. This is my small contribution to the development of the game, and my commitment that I'll try it out when it gets released. For now I'll be a happy owner of this one Alpha Vial 😅
It's great to see my vial accruing ZING tokens, paired with a small amount of delegated HP and growing a small nest egg to use later in the game!
I will keep an eye on other worthwhile purchases in the future, but I'm looking at my participation in this game on the lower end of the spending scale. I want to be a part of this community and enjoy the experience, but from the perspective of someone who made a modest investment and will have to work hard to progress through the game.
This stance made me start thinking about other players who may not be able or comfortable spending large sums in the game and how that will affect their experience. Will they feel frustrated and quit? Will there be a gap in power and success that can only be overcome by making a large purchase?
What needs to happen to strike a balance between rewarding patrons that support the game development and making sure F2P or low spending players also find the game enjoyable enough to stay engaged for a long time?
There are mobile games with a clear strategy of appealing to a very small percentage of people who are willing to spend a lot of money on a game. Here's a quite popular video explaining this phenomenon. I put these tactics in a morally grey zone, especially with the false advertisement. But in a web3 game like Holozing, any spender will have the possibility to recover at least part of their investment if they decide to quit the game, with the potential upside of actually making a profit if the game does really well.
But what should be the experience of a F2P or a modest spender in a game? Should the people who actually support the game by directly spending money on packs and other offers have a privileged advantage in the game? They are the ones supporting the development, after all. Where does that leave those F2P players in terms of enjoyment and competitiveness, compared to people who spend money?
I would argue that yes, paying customers should benefit from their patronage. They should get rarer items, nicer skins, and more convenience. But the rest of the players can play a role in the economy, too. Especially in a web3 game where people expect to earn tradeable rewards for just engaging and playing the game.
My perspective is that F2P players can still contribute to the economy in a web3 game, if there are strong enough incentives to spend their earnings towards their progress and their ability to generate better earnings, become more competitive, unlock more content and overall have more fun. This is the crucial bit for me: is a web3 game able to carve an appealing progression path for the F2P player that feels tangible and fun, enough to make them spend their in-game earnings back into the game? In other words, does the game get better for the F2P player if they spend their earnings back into the game, instead of just doing the minimum and cashing out?
If a F2P player is content with generating modest rewards and extracting continuously from the game, the game's economy won't go very far. But a F2P player who spends their rewards to enhance their experience is transferring those rewards to someone else, perhaps a paying player who was able to use their premium assets to generate items that the other players require for their progression. And this player would in turn sink their earnings to enhance their own game experience, perhaps with rarer pets and skins.
In such a system, a F2P player would have a clear path of progression, where they feel noticeable improvements over time and get a palpable sense of accomplishment with every gaming session. Those improvements are rewarding in themselves and help with retention. All the while they are funneling their earned resources to other players, who in turn can use them to improve their game as well or get a return for the investment they made into the game.
In this scenario, every player contributes to the economy, from the big spenders to the F2P players. While the latter may not contribute much individually, their much larger numbers may very well make up for it.
While googling on this topic I found one particularly interesting article that dwells on the economics of F2P games. I would argue that web3 challenges some of the rules applied to scarcity and inflation in web2 games, and I will be very interested in seeing how Holozing game designers tackle this puzzle.
To sum up, here is a breakdown of the most significant benefits a P2P player can bring to a game:
Increase of the player base and expansion of the network effect. They populate the game, create interactions, and the buzz helps keep the paying players around as well.
A portion of these players may engage in content creation, sharing their experience on social media sites - driving organic marketing and creating a positive feedback loop of new players.
They create and consume resources, stimulating an active game economy and providing liquidity.
If the game collects a fee for every trade, this would become an additional revenue stream for the game development (ex.: Immutable X marketplace fees). And F2P players by their sheer numbers would contribute to this in a significant manner.
They serve as competitors or allies to paying players, contributing to an engaging environment for all. F2P players can indirectly encourage paying players to spend by providing competition and a reason to invest in better game assets.
If mobile ads are introduced in the game, these players would become a source of revenue when watching those ads in return for rewards.
Over time, some F2P players may convert into paying players, especially as they become more committed to the game.
