The article is from MMOsite Writer Club member oliase.

Kwari

Kwari was released not too long ago, and it was a game that caught my eye. I have been a fan of shooter games for a long time, and competitive gameplay has always been a plus in any shooter. From games such as Unreal Tournament to Team Fortress, I have been a fan of them all. This is why when I heard of Kwari, I was intrigued. A game that pays players if they're good, and is basically pay to play if you're bad. But I had my doubts about the game, especially after doing an interview with the community manager before it went into beta. After finding out the pricings of ammunition and such, I was skeptical to even try the beginner part of the game. Some people think it was a totally new type of business model for online games, but to be honest we've seen this for years. Even MSN has a section for there games where you can pay to play against others online, with the winner earning money. But now that Kwari has shut down, is it really even a surprise?

The entire business model of Kwari is built to fail. When developers make a game they try to reach out to a specific audience that is as broad as they can get it. This is why the developers of Dekaron made the game adult-themed. They reached out to mature gamers because they felt it was a broad area with the lack of games targeted to this audience. But when you look at Kwari's model, it's basically targeting those who are really good at shooters. We've all seen them before, whether your getting shot in the head everytime you spawn in Call of Duty 4, or if you're being stabbed in the back by a spy in Team Fortress 2, some people are just naturally good at this type of games. But how many people are actually that good? Normally, there's not room for many great players. In Team Fortress 2, you hardly ever see six people on a team with 200+ points after a couple rounds, usually there is one person with that amount and then a bunch with a much smaller amount. Whether it may seem like it or not, there's a lot of casual gamers that enjoy shooters, making the percentage of great players to everyone else have a huge difference.

That would be like if I made a game that was only for people ages 18-19 with a birthday in June. Why would I possibly do that? I should be trying to reach a large audience to increase revenue. That's why I didn't think Kwari would be very popular. A lot of gamers will lie, say they are so amazing at a game, etc. I mean, why shouldn't they? They can easily refuse to play a game against someone, and just keep talking trash. But when real money is put into the equation, people are a lot less willing to lie about there skills. No one is going to be talking trash and buying tons of ammunition to play when they know in reality they are not very good. Thus, they just won't play. They might try it by spending ?2 on the game, but then they'll probably quit if they don't win. To be honest, the entire system behind it will, in the end, reward few players while, to the rest, just be an extremely expensive game to play. Kind of like a pay to play game, but the time limit can be altered depending upon how much you play.