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Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By kaldo
2/13/2024 1:42 am
It's not much of a game without other players. And people playing several leagues are the most dedicated players. Will new people join if every league is mostly vacant?

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By amalric7
2/13/2024 4:59 am
Well some warning this was coming would have been nice (for as many leagues as I'm in, I don't often check the community forums, so if there was forewarning perhaps an email to all users would have covered this better).

I have no objections to paying a subscription, especially after enjoying MFN for free for years, but its almost like closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Two years or so ago there were FIVE pages of leagues, and users galore. Now we're down to just two pages and many of the same users populate the busier leagues - and there are several leagues that barely hang on to the 50% user population requirement.

And now you're asking for payment? I think there's every chance you may have just holed MFN below the waterline, and now it will sink (and perhaps quickly at that).

Like I said I'm happy to pay up (and am fortunate to be able to do so), especially as I play in probably every league going, but pay-to-play obviously isn't for everyone and I have grave misgivings for MFN's future. I do hope I'm wrong.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By IoanBlood
2/13/2024 5:02 am
I have 6 - 7 months out of my credits. If there is no road map and no visible improvement in known bugs or in general by then, I will leave the game with a heavy heart.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By JB90
2/13/2024 5:28 am
Surely you should release updates and improve the game then ask for payments as we can all see the direction of the game going. I left the game about 6months - a year ago and the interface was being worked on and it’s still only at 75% ????

I’d be happy paying for the game monthly if I seen constant improvement but I’m not paying for something that has a dwindling player base . My leagues will be going from 5 to 1

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By Waitwut
2/13/2024 9:09 am
Kickjess wrote:
Yo, big fan, but economically and from a marketing standpoint these changes don't seem to make much sense.

You went for pretty crazy prices compared to what I would have expected for a casual football game people spend a couple minutes per day on. Your ad income per player has to be tiny, so even if you make a $2 or even $1 per month tier to remove ads you would earn way more money and keep it way more accessible to way more people. (How much money did you earn from ads last month and how many people still play the game?)

Joining leagues should always be free because it's the only thing keeping the game alive. Unless you want to decrease the amount of players to decrease server cost I don't get why you would cap the amount of time people can spend on this site (It's even bad for ad revenue because now people are only opening new tabs with ads for 1 league instead of the 4 or 5 leagues they are in).

Full customization features you can of course ask more money for but it should really be only like $10 per month max. After that people start comparing it to other entertainment expenses this game can't compete with like streaming services or other games.

I also think that giving the option to pay for a whole year instead of only a monthly option is bad because:
1. People see a way larger number and could realize it's too expensive.
2. Nothing in the past years has guaranteed that the game will get any better or even still exist in a year time, so people paying $150 up front are taking a huge gamble.

I really love the game and thanks for making it, but please god next time at least discuss these kind of things with owners of the leagues so you can better know the sentiment, adjust things and prevent haphazard changing of things like the sudden addition of ad free tiers.

If you respond to this please respond to everything and don't avoid any of the things I said.


Good post, hope to see these addressed. The scale is intended to maximize individual transactions but that odds fools gold based on last few years of non maintaining or progress.

No real goals defined or milestones set.

Cheaper subscription model would appear more honest to JDB effort prior to release of subscription model. You said no more Nicole and dime - you’ve instead turned to highway robbery.

Give the people something tangible to look forward to. UI in 2024 is baseline when most exisiting users questions are not based on the visuals. Seems like a deflection to not address users concerns directly or with this demand for money.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By BelichickIsGod
2/13/2024 9:59 am
The game just isnt good enough to justify this. This will end up being the death of MFN.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By kaldo
2/13/2024 10:01 am
Just a cost analysis regarding the price for ad-free and what you actually get from ads. I can only use myself as an example, so that's what I'll do.

I visit the site three times a week, I check the results of my game, gameplan, and then check league forums, which aren't very active. I usually spend less than 5 minutes on the site at a time.

You get what, $10 CPM on the ads? If I'm visiting the site 125 times a year, it's going to take you 8 years to make $10 off me. But you want me to pay $30 a year? If you get $1 a month off me that's a lot more money than you would be making from ads. And far more people are going to be interested in a $1 a month cost than $2.50 a month.

When I bought credits I viewed it as donating, but with a subscription I view it as paying. Once I'm paying for something it becomes a matter of value. This is the way it works in people's minds. By doing this you have changed the way a lot of people view your service, and the value proposition has just dropped off a cliff.

It has been mentioned elsewhere but bears repeating: what are people paying for? There's no proof that you will continue to improve the service, I've been playing for a year and a half and the only update has been removing a single play.

A major concern for everyone; What if the money you get from all of this is not enough to justify you working on it more? Knowing that it might not mean any changes to MFN, I'm very reluctant to spend my money to support the site. I'm very apprehensive to spend money now. You really should have waited until you at least released a new update before considering a change like this. People have absolutely no confidence that you will make real updates to the site and the engine because your track record isn't great. And now you say you need more money to justify working on it, and everyone here realizes that most people aren't going to want to pay in the first place, which just compounds the idea that you aren't going to be getting enough money to warrant updates, which makes everyone wonder what they're going to be paying for - they're going to believe that to be nothing. That strongly discourages the people who want to support you from supporting you.

I want to support you, but I can't justify it. I don't customize my team often, I'll have my admin do it. I'll use an adblocker because $30 a year for ads is astronomical. I only play in my one league as most of my league does (we make up about 10% of your player base btw) so the free tier is fine for me. A UI update will be welcomed, especially for mobile, but that's not a real update to the game. You need to make paying worth it. Add more features for a paying customer, and stop paywalling existing features.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By Action-Jackson
2/13/2024 11:10 am
I just want to add my general support for this amidst the criticism. After all I'm on a monthly plan and I can always leave when I want to. David deserves to make money on something he's spent time on. I'm just hoping to see some subtle improvements in the near future.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By TheWitchHunter
2/13/2024 12:00 pm
Can I still use Tickle Me Elmos as footballs during team practice under the "free" model?

Only thing i can add is i stayed free and 1 team, as i was.
However, My adblocker still does the trick.

If paying for no adds for 1 team is to be of any benefit to the game owner then, there needs to be a way to make players turn off their ad blockers.
Like any news site for example (looking at you nbc news..) forcing the disabling of adblockers can be done.
I would like to suggest taking advantage of dev tools available (I assume they are if corperations use them) to force disabling of adblock apps.

Personally, i believe the 2.50 tier is going to be where the most money comes in - sorta like end-cap impulse buys in a box store and the long lost dollar menus of yesterdays so long ago.
:)

Keep on keeping on with the plan, JDB. Haters gonna hate.

Re: Announcing New Subscription Tiers!

By kaldo
2/13/2024 1:15 pm
TheWitchHunter wrote:
Can I still use Tickle Me Elmos as footballs during team practice under the "free" model?

Only thing i can add is i stayed free and 1 team, as i was.
However, My adblocker still does the trick.

If paying for no adds for 1 team is to be of any benefit to the game owner then, there needs to be a way to make players turn off their ad blockers.
Like any news site for example (looking at you nbc news..) forcing the disabling of adblockers can be done.
I would like to suggest taking advantage of dev tools available (I assume they are if corperations use them) to force disabling of adblock apps.

Personally, i believe the 2.50 tier is going to be where the most money comes in - sorta like end-cap impulse buys in a box store and the long lost dollar menus of yesterdays so long ago.
:)

Keep on keeping on with the plan, JDB. Haters gonna hate.


The ads on this site are far too annoying to endure, and $2.50 a month is too much to remove them. If a successful adblocker blocker is implemented, I'm done with this game.

Now if $2.50 got you adblocking and customization for a single team, that's a much better prospect and I'd be willing to pay that. I'd LIKE to be able to change my player's names after TC though so I don't waste a good name. Not a deal breaker though.
Last edited at 2/13/2024 1:50 pm