Good News for EverQuest Marketing

Two days ago Omeedd Dariani left Sony Online Entertainment. Omeedd was the Senior Brand Manager of the EverQuest franchise. I mean no disrespect to Omeedd as a person -- none…

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Landmark’s Massive Discount

Okay, so this happened. Some people are miffed. Some people are laughing. Some people wonder what the early adopters think. Hey there, I'm Keen -- I'm an early adopter of EverQuest…

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What makes a good founder’s program?

The ‘buy your way into beta’ or ‘crowd-funding’ or ‘founders programs’ out there are quickly becoming a norm. For the sake of this post let’s call all of them founders programs.   I have purchased several of them.  Personally, I do not think they are necessarily a bad concept when handled properly.

These founders programs can get expensive.  I’ve paid $10, $20, $40, $50, $100 for them.  I’ve even supported some games as a founder that I think are still three years away, and I supported them over a year ago!  How much is too much?  Realistically, I have yet to see a founders program show me a true return on the investment.  I give the money in exchange for access, which I suppose has a qualitative value.  I give the money to support a team or IP (which I suppose also has an odd sort of value to it).  I give in exchange for trinkets, tchochkes, baubles, etc., that I use for probably 5 minutes in-game then replace or put in my bank because I feel too guilty to delete them.

What games should, realistically, have founders programs?  The business side can argue any of them when players are willing to pay money today for a game tomorrow.  It’s finance 101.  But should they?  The consumer advocate in me wants to say that sometimes it’s not always a good idea to take money from people so quickly.

Let’s look at an example of a good founder’s program.  This has nothing to do with the game itself being good, bad, or the final product being worth the money. I simply like how they handled their program. (more…)

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Update on my Landmark Life

It's been a while since I've written about Landmark.  Yep, I'm still playing!  I'm eagerly awaiting the upcoming patches, though.  Right now the game is still all about gathering some…

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