PlaneShift and the future of it's "alpha testers"

[Moniker]

Greetings;

     Here's a question I haven't been able to find the answers too. PS is in "alpha" testing and the
players are the alpha testers. Is Planeshift going to always remain free to the public ? Or is the
eventual aim to charge a monthly subscription as do other MMOG's ? If this is the aim what will
be the fate of the "alpha" testers ? Would we be charged ? If so will we get a break ? Or will
we get to continue to play free, since we helped during alpha/beta etc ?

                                            May the Gods Protect Us !

[Karyuu]

PlaneShift is meant to be fully, forever, free

[Moniker]

Greetings !

    That is just GREAT, I'm speachless ! Other than the satisfaction, progress in all areas of IT, Software Development
and how to something like this (and the future of the personel for paid jobs)  The whole team does really deserve
something from us !
    How about a way for the players to contribute so the team can get free take-out, or get together in real life
and thow yourselfs a PARTY !! ?

                                    We really do appreciate everyone involved, and it just keeps getting better and better !!!!

[Karyuu]

Wow, your enthusiasm is truly appreciated Thank you for your kind comments.

[zanzibar]

Is Atomic Blue registered as a non-profit organization?

[Karyuu]

Link

Atomic.Blue is a Non Profit Corporation , built by a group of game development enthusiasts, to protect and promote the free and Open Source game, PlaneShift.

[Moniker]

Greetings

    Zanzibar, and input from Karyuu, Are you implying that there is a way to contribute to a non-profit corp?
Would it be difficult to set something up for players to contribute via paypal or other (european/world) means
as well as by check, money order? If so I bet you would get overwelming support from the player community !
If not now when, if not now why ?

                                                      Just a Thought !

[Xordan]

http://www.planeshift.it/donate.html

[Vengeance]

We're hoping that with another year or two of donations that we'll be able to order a pizza for Luca.  :-)

No seriously, the big donations that have made a huge difference for us are the donations of bandwidth and server(s) from Fragnetics.  We and the community are all indebted to them for their generosity.

- Venge

[Erisnas]

well several games that are free have some very successful donation systems. often it is to buy a rare item that you cannot get otherwise, such a potion that would temporarly increase the health of all your guild members etc.  Another is advertisements for money can help a lot but can only take you so far.  Another solution is creating a partner bussiness that raises money only for the original.  The creators would make this and then use it to fund it, it could be like a store etc.  Or since dev are often coders they make other software and sell that as well.  In theory it could stay free but server space would start to be an issue once the game becomes more popular.

[Karyuu]

We don't want players paying for content - any content, especially that which could give those who donate benefits. We're not dying for any donations right now, and if we run into problems when the game grows to a player base of several thousand players (quite a ways away in the future), we'll deal with it closer to the time

[Mhyrage]

We don't want players paying for content - any content, especially that which could give those who donate benefits. We're not dying for any donations right now, and if we run into problems when the game grows to a player base of several thousand players (quite a ways away in the future), we'll deal with it closer to the time

You could always make a really effective item mall. Something that no MMO has ever done very well. Say, most have uber pets in item mall, well that's just unfair. Just put ones that aren't considered awesome in as an option for paying customers. Other things too maybe, say like maybe a bit more inventory space, or packages so you don't have to buy several things separate. Other MMOs always have things like double experience and whatnot, nothing of that nature either. Just a few things people might be willing to pay for but don't give them any kind of significant advantage and isn't awesome enough to make other people mad about it.

Anyway, I doubt it's going to happen. If you guys did have some sort of income though I'm sure things could go a bit more smoothly. I'm really cheap, but I wouldn't mind putting 10 dollars in for say 5 more inventory slots, a slightly more unique pet and etc. There's also the options of just purely cosmetic changes to characters for a very cheap price. Say unique colors for races, odd or funny skins for pets would work too.

Anyway, if you'd ever consider an item mall don't screw it up!

[Karyuu]

We're not going to consider it If you guys want to donate, you can do it already. But everything in PlaneShift will always be free.

[Mhyrage]

We're not going to consider it If you guys want to donate, you can do it already. But everything in PlaneShift will always be free.

Well, here's how I look at it. If you guys could say hire a few employees, or invest the money somehow to help out the game, it'd be nice, right?
This is the only good free MMO I've found, the only other one I was bored of after 3 weeks, and there were many issues with the PvP. -.- I like the ideas of Darkfall, but I don't think it will come out for quite some time soon, and even I'm starting to think it might be vaporware. It also doesn't exactly look very appealing to the eyes.

As I said, this is the only good free MMO I've found, and don't doubt that I do a decent bit of searching. I like this game, so I want to see it go somewhere.
I almost want to hand you guys 20 dollars as a gift, but I'm cheap so I won't. Hehe. Anyway, I see nothing wrong with giving people the OPTION to pay you guys a bit for some content that makes nothing unfair etc as long as you do it RIGHT.

[Karyuu]

Hire employees to do what, exactly? :) We get everything done. The problem is we don't get it done as fast as commercial projects - and this isn't going to change unless we get a full-time development team, which is going to cost more than anyone can offer.

I'm really excited to hear that you're so fond of PS already - it's always a motivational boost. But the very goal of this project, ever since it began, was to make everything completely and entirely free. We can't change that :)