Apologies in advance, but I'm just gonna list all the things I've noticed over the past few weeks into a single post.
Revenue Model:
Seems like the majority of the players are probably attracted to the game because it's free, it has low (flexible) system requirements, and they are bored. However, much of the revenue model seems to be based on selling back players their free time via acceleration bonus thingies. The diseconomy in this is that most of your playerbase appraises their free time at a fairly low value, or all of them do so most of the time.
Clearly, there must be some customers that are amenable to this goal, but if I had to guess, most of them would fall more than two standard deviations out from the population pool.
Know your market - It's possible that a slightly larger number of players, ignoring overlap, would be more enticed by a focus on cooperative contribution. If a player could accrue advantages to his new acquaintances, he may be willing to part with liquid assets in the furtherance of social promotion. Any developmental direction taken in the embellishment of cooperative play and group competition, especially where the end-game is concerned could enhance this. Please keep in mind that 0.30-0.50USD per day per account seems to be the norm for most subscription based mmos, and they generally allow transactions between players by default.
If you are content to rely on outliers for revenue, and on the interest of competitive people composing their ranks, I would also recommend a sort of auction system for maximizing sales volume. In a perfect sellers' market, the seller would attempt to establish a distinct price for each customer. If you want to sell say 100 ingame widgets per hour, and want maximize sales rather than scarcity, a dutch auction is ideal. In such an auction, the 100 highest bidders gain their product, and buyers find their place in the queue.
Another thing that springs to mind from freshmen economics class is "elasticity of complementarity." Given that browser based gaming is a focus for you, perhaps it would be lucrative to investigate partnership with browser-based VOIP services. Ingame tie ins, perhaps based around the buddy list, would give your partnership an advantage over third party competitors. ( Caution. The extent of my knowledge of how software is implemented is: "a wizard did it.")
I don't know enough about the end-game yet to really comment on it, but presumably, constantly generating content as provided from developer to player has to be costly. Models which embrace content in the form of social complexity as generated by the users can be much more cost effective once they hit a critical mass. (f.ex. CCP/EVE-Online) Forcing certain key content to be the domain of obligate predators is a strong motivation to coop gameplay, which in my experience, will constantly seek to adapt to the competitiveness of other players. This competition is always an uphill endeavour for all parties.
Advertisement is another venue that seems ideal for a browser based feature, but more involved for the client-based approach. Aesthetic considerations are inevitable, but if you stop and think about your customers, creative advertisement can actually enhance immersion. I personally would not be perturbed to see signboards in the virtual worlds scrawled with adverts from a contemporary insecticide company with a chronologically ironic slogan from earth that was. (Presuming of course that Mantis are closely related to members of the Arthropoda kingdom.)
In conclusion, I think you have a good core product here, and most importantly, it works. I don't think the blockbuster model of mmo development is going to work out for you, but you are in an excellent position to start capitalizing on enhancing player community involvement for the long haul.
Revenue Model:
Seems like the majority of the players are probably attracted to the game because it's free, it has low (flexible) system requirements, and they are bored. However, much of the revenue model seems to be based on selling back players their free time via acceleration bonus thingies. The diseconomy in this is that most of your playerbase appraises their free time at a fairly low value, or all of them do so most of the time.
Clearly, there must be some customers that are amenable to this goal, but if I had to guess, most of them would fall more than two standard deviations out from the population pool.
Know your market - It's possible that a slightly larger number of players, ignoring overlap, would be more enticed by a focus on cooperative contribution. If a player could accrue advantages to his new acquaintances, he may be willing to part with liquid assets in the furtherance of social promotion. Any developmental direction taken in the embellishment of cooperative play and group competition, especially where the end-game is concerned could enhance this. Please keep in mind that 0.30-0.50USD per day per account seems to be the norm for most subscription based mmos, and they generally allow transactions between players by default.
If you are content to rely on outliers for revenue, and on the interest of competitive people composing their ranks, I would also recommend a sort of auction system for maximizing sales volume. In a perfect sellers' market, the seller would attempt to establish a distinct price for each customer. If you want to sell say 100 ingame widgets per hour, and want maximize sales rather than scarcity, a dutch auction is ideal. In such an auction, the 100 highest bidders gain their product, and buyers find their place in the queue.
Another thing that springs to mind from freshmen economics class is "elasticity of complementarity." Given that browser based gaming is a focus for you, perhaps it would be lucrative to investigate partnership with browser-based VOIP services. Ingame tie ins, perhaps based around the buddy list, would give your partnership an advantage over third party competitors. ( Caution. The extent of my knowledge of how software is implemented is: "a wizard did it.")
I don't know enough about the end-game yet to really comment on it, but presumably, constantly generating content as provided from developer to player has to be costly. Models which embrace content in the form of social complexity as generated by the users can be much more cost effective once they hit a critical mass. (f.ex. CCP/EVE-Online) Forcing certain key content to be the domain of obligate predators is a strong motivation to coop gameplay, which in my experience, will constantly seek to adapt to the competitiveness of other players. This competition is always an uphill endeavour for all parties.
Advertisement is another venue that seems ideal for a browser based feature, but more involved for the client-based approach. Aesthetic considerations are inevitable, but if you stop and think about your customers, creative advertisement can actually enhance immersion. I personally would not be perturbed to see signboards in the virtual worlds scrawled with adverts from a contemporary insecticide company with a chronologically ironic slogan from earth that was. (Presuming of course that Mantis are closely related to members of the Arthropoda kingdom.)
In conclusion, I think you have a good core product here, and most importantly, it works. I don't think the blockbuster model of mmo development is going to work out for you, but you are in an excellent position to start capitalizing on enhancing player community involvement for the long haul.
