Look, everyone knows the reality: the companies that make games are businesses. Their (legally-enshrined, if they’re publicly traded) purpose is to make money. Microsoft has been very generous with sponsoring tournaments like Hidden Cup and T90 Titans League, but we all understand the purpose behind this is to generate more sales. Without more sales, we don’t get more tournament prizepool money.
This isn’t sustainable. We joke about the average age of AoE2 players and viewers being over 30, but it’s true: younger people tend to go more for games that run on smartphones or that are based more on fast reflexes than deep knowledge of a complex, poorly-communicated system of counters or how to place farms and fish traps correctly.
This shouldn’t mean tournaments are doomed. Look at all the real-life, physical sports that have mostly older players or audiences, don’t make money from selling access to the sport, and yet still hold big events with big prizes. The money for these events comes from fans with a strong, enduring affinity for the game (*and ads targetting these people), not from people who are just trying it out for the first time.
Now I’m just copying:
I propose some little icon when you play online, that indicates whether you pay money to fund tournaments. One icon (like a silver crown) for a lower level of support, and another (like a gold crown) for a higher level support. It’s totally fine if most people don’t have a gold crown: remember, some people spend over US$20,000 for a single ticket to a physical sporting event. You could offer any amount in between, or over as well; it’s just that your icon would only change at those breakpoints.
I suggest US$20 per month for a silver crown, US$500 per month for a gold crown; Microsoft keeps 20% of the sales as profit, another 10% goes towards Microsoft’s administration of the program (E-sports manager salary etc.), and 70% goes towards funding tournaments. This 70% might still end up with a similar distribution of costs as the NAC tournaments: so it might be that a third of the 70% will go towards prizepools or something, with the rest being used for other costs in some cases. (I believe a major cost in NAC was flying players out and accommodating them.)
I was going to post on AoEzone as well to get perspectives from a different audience, but the Reddit poll has lots of votes:
https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/comments/1b4qjy0/should_microsoft_offer_a_subscription_for/
21 voted, They should do this, I would be a sponsor
27 voted, They should do this, but I wouldn’t be a sponsor
48 voted, They should not do this
Why Microsoft should do this instead of people donating directly to tournament organizers: well, people can already donate to organizers, and still most of the money from tournaments comes from sponsors. Do people who play AoE2 make less money, and have less free income, than people who buy $9000 Superbowl tickets? (Ok, yes, maybe, because not all American football fans can afford those..) Or have they just felt, up till now, that donating $1000 in support of <insert tournament name here> was not something they cared to do?
There are people who care about things like a free T-shirt from donating to a charity; not one week ago, I saw an ad on YouTube for St. Jude saying you’d get a T-shirt for $20/month. Giving players who sponsor tournaments an icon when they play the game is sort of like this. I don’t know where or when that icon would show up; maybe it wouldn’t even show up in the middle of a game, but just in lobbies or in the post-game statistics or something. The difference is that actually wearing a T-shirt, instead of other clothes, can have negative value, because there are many things better than a T-shirt that one could wear. But the icon thing could always be a positive.
Without involving Microsoft, there would be no icon, as small as this reward is.
Some people think that, well, I’ll just quote EpicGamesStoreSucks:
People pay more for in person events vs streaming events for a lot of reasons. The Superbowl isn’t about sports fans anymore, but ends up being business owners and marketing professionals going to make networking connections or celebrities trying to get some national camera time. Other sports events people pay to experience the atmosphere that makes you feel like you’re part of the game. You don’t get that watching a stream at home. Very few people will pay $20/month for an icon next to their name. This would need something extra like live lan tournaments with an audience and subs get priority access to tickets. Something extra to draw in the buyers. Even wealthier people still want some real value from their purchases.
A lot of people say they would be a sponsor. I think it makes sense. I remember a post from 2011 or 2012, about how a middle-class person had basically the same quality of life as a rich person: they may not be able to put down $2000 or $5000 or (now) $9000 for a Superbowl ticket, but they can still sit down in the comfort of their home with a surround sound system, 55-inch plasma TV, all of their snacks readily accessible, etc. To people who enjoy AoE2, a good tournament is at least as enjoyable as the Superbowl experience is to American football fans.
Now let’s discuss it more and maybe Microsoft can talk about whether they should do this: “wow, people want to give us free money without even getting a DLC in return?”
Should Microsoft let people give them free money?
- They should do this, I would be a sponsor
- They should do this, but I wouldn’t be a sponsor
- They should not do this