Hey there!
Now that the Kickstarter is over and falls a bit short of funding the entire AM, I think it's a good moment to brainstorm and find possible, ethical ways Muse could milk us out of our hard-earned dollars (and other people of course).
I'm not an expert in virtual business models but I know what I would spend my money on, as a consumer. I think the best way to look at this is from the example of a successful funding campaign, and one that I have a lot of respect for is Path of Exile.
For those who haven't tried it, PoE is an indie ARPG in closed beta that took a donation-based approach to funding, offering several funding "packs". This is nothing new by itself but one of the deals (the Diamond Supporter pack) has been quite successful, despite being $1000 a piece! As of today, more than 200 players have purchased a Diamond Supporter pack, which is a lot of money for an indie company!
But... Why are Diamond Packs so popular? Well, the selling feature (aside from being recognizable in the forums as a great supporter of the company, and some in-game and IRL swag) was the ability to design a Unique Item, which as you may imagine is the soul of any ARPG. Of course the Unique designer wouldn't get a copy of the item, since GGG are strictly against Pay to Win (as I expect Muse to be) but the possibility to design anything from flavour to mechanics does indeed give the donor a feeling of impact in the game, and the possibility of designing a Unique that complements his/her particular build is tempting.
Now, I think once AM starts kicking in and more RPG elements are added to the way we build our ships, GOIO would benefit a lot from a business practice like this. However, it's clear that it's just not viable to offer players the possibility to design a ship, and even though Muse has taken steps in this direction (designing NPCs and costumes) both of these aren't that exciting to be honest.
So, what GOIO needs is a game mechanic that has an impact, is flavourful and easy to iterate upon, so that at a reasonable cost players can contribute by designing.
This is an example of a possible implementation: Emblems.
Ship Emblems
Emblems are a piece of ship equipment that could be obtained in Adventure Mode in a variety of ways. Sometimes randomly, sometimes as part of a quest... They feature a particular symbol, and a ship may have one emblem equipped at a given time. Think of them as coats of arms. Installing an emblem of the ship will make the symbol appear at certain locations, such as the flags, and the balloon will display the symbol and change colour accordingly.
These emblems may be generic or faction-specific, and be restricted for that faction. For instance all Emblems featuring a vulture would be part of the Arashi League.
Aside from aesthetic changes, Emblems give passive bonuses to the ship that tend to be conditional. All of them should of course be superstition/morale based, since we don't really have magic in this game. Note: This is only for AM. In Skirmish you can also use Emblems but they will just be aesthetic.
Some examples:
Phoenix: +10% to Max Speed. Whenever the Armour is repaired, if the hull HP was 20% of lower, the Phoenix emblem will boost the ship damage and armour by 50% for 20 seconds.
Sand Phantasm: (arashi only +10% to Maneuverability. When close to the sand, the ship displaying the Sand Phantasm will be camouflaged and very hard to see from above (It becomes translucent when seen from above).
Blazing Sun: +20% to Fire Damage. During daytime, that bonus is doubled.
Note this is just an example of a possible mechanic, the core idea is offering players something they can help design in exchange for a hefty donation (I think anywhere from $250 to $500 to design an Emblem would be nice depending on how complex they are) but any other mechanic would do. This would cover many different motivations, such as players wanting to design an Emblem just to make their ships look cool, to people wanting to complement their favourite build with the Emblem of their choosing. This could be paid by individuals or clans, and clans would naturally want to imprint their legacy into the game lore by designing their clan Emblem (of course they would have no advantage in the process of actually getting it, but they could be mentioned in the related lore or flavour text).
What do you think? Would you like to see anything similar to this in Adventure Mode? Would you donate more happily if it gave you the chance to design an item that impacted gameplay?
