True, but they won’t have to fish for stolen credit cards anymore.
I think between the 3 common models, f2p makes the most sense for this demographic and model. It simply provides the most money to develop additional content.
If its P2P, there won’t be enough consistent players because the grindy nature of the game will only keep the top 5~10% of players subscribed, whereas everyone else might plug in for a month or 3 every year (assuming nothing new in their preferred genres is released) to fill in their time.
B2P works, but it has a lower adoption rate then. This happens even if the price is $10 or $1. This is especially true for new players who likely won’t commit to a B2P game without some great reviews, streams, or friends in it. There’s just this psychology that makes us take a closer look and ponder an item’s worth when we’re confronted with a price tag. Even then, the b2p price is only used to offset initial development costs and loans/investors, so you still need a cash shop to fund additional content and patch updates.
Less money is made off B2P, not to mention the game would have to be overhauled and have the cash currency replaced with something else so all features are free. If they tried going the Black Desert route I guarantee you players would be furious and the bad reviews would keep coming. We’re also at the point where they’re reconsidering the perks Tokens give and not making the game a paywall which is an amazing thing.
However when I see people say RMT isn’t a thing in B2P games I really think those people have never played a B2P game. Ever.
RMT will exist no matter what you do, what it comes down to is how the developer and publisher cooperate to make efforts in eliminating their effort and make their gain not worth the resources they have to drop into the game. (Going to Freelancer websites, hiring freelancers to level multiple accounts for them to use for the purpose of trading in game currency.) Right now they’re making enough money to justify these transactions if the fact that it’s fairly simple one of their own employees can do it in their spare time. (Do the marketplace suggestion someone made and they’d literally have to start hiring freelancers.)
You also can’t compare a game meant for single player having a one time fee to a MMORPG that is constantly getting updates.