Why am I noticing so many garbage looking free to play coming out of nowhere on Steam? Is it because that is what the gaming industry wants for us or is it because they are in high demand?

thats how the industry develops, microtransactions in f2p games can cash in more money than a single purchase of a game per player

Because why fish for fish when there are larger things to be found in the sea of gaming?

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/8942-Monetizing-Whales-For-The-Retention-Of-Virality

Another good video that answers my question.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/9075-Salt-Of-The-Earth-A-Steam-Fail-Story

Well at least it's nice to see the F2P scene is a bit more diverse than 5 years ago when they were all World of Warcraft clones, now there are race, sci-fi, tank, airplane and mech based F2P MMO's.
Yeah they still suck though most of the time. =P

HAWKEN is good, but TF2 is where it's at.

Another good video that answers my question.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzthXKu8lJw

I'm starting to not want to use Steam anymore... Steam is starting to = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inzkJ34VMfk but with no genie's lamp...
Fortunately, there is GOG...

I really don't think F2P is inherently bad. Yes, 99% of F2P games are crap, but there are a few that get it right. I think F2P is a viable model IF done right. It obviously won't work for every kind of game, for example, i can't see how to fairly monetize a single player game. But i think it works for multiplayer-only games if done properly.

For me the biggest example of F2P done right is League of Legends (and Dota 2, for that matter). The only items that require you to spend real money are skins which are purely cosmetic. Champions can be purchased wieh either in-game currency or cash. The only items that can make characters stronger (runes) can't be bought with money, only with the in-game currency. I'm not a fan of MOBAs, but i have to admit that Riot did a good job with LOL. The good thing is that it proves that F2P games can be profitable without extorting players.

Another F2P game that i enjoyed was DC Universe Online. You can play the game without spending a single cent on it. Free users do have some limitations (for example, you can only carry up to a certain amount of in-game money), but they aren't annoying at all. In fact this is the only F2P game i spent money on. Not because i felt i had to, but to support the game.

War of Tanks and Tribes Ascend are also great F2P games i can recommend that are not pay 2 win.

I haven't played them yet, but everyone says that DDO and LOTRO are also great F2P games that are not pay 2 win.

World Of Tanks is not pay to win but it's pay to have fun after some weeks.

If I got you right, you feel a F2P game is "done right" if you don't have to use a cent on it to enjoy it fully?

But from the publisher point of view, that sounds like an awful model, in case you want to make (maximum) profit with the game. If people can fully enjoy the game without paying a cent... why then would anyone use any money on it? Wouldn't it be much better to e.g. make a F2P game that first gets you hooked, and then starts charging when you don't want to stop playing it anymore? EA seems to agree, at least according to Plants vs Zombies 2 and Dungeon Keeper mobile.

I can understand why the companies want to venture to F2P games market. You can get lots of people try out your game because it is "free", and you can try to make it less obvious for the player that he has already used insane amounts of money on the game, as he is paying of it bit by bit. A bit similar model as with slot machines, where you don't realize how many coins you've inserted during the day.

I am sure he meant "done right" for the gamer. :) And when a game is done right for the gamer, it attracts more gamers. A game designed to make maximum profit is not going to attract a lot of people. And without a lot of people playing, I highly doubt that game designed to make maximum profit is going to make a lot of money. Being too greedy can sometimes back fire on you.

Yes, you're right, for me the F2P games done right are the ones in which you don't have to spend money to properly enjoy them.

It's not an awful model. If it were, Riot wouldn't have been so successful as it was with League of Legends. Same goes for Valve and it's Dota 2/TF 2. The thing is: people ENJOY buying cosmetic items. Most people have those skins in League of Legends. It doesn't make them stronger in any way, but it does make them look bad ass and different from the normal skin. People buy these things. LoL is probably the most popular PC F2P game in the world right now.

Another thing that i'm ok with is charging for more content. I think this is the model that LOTRO uses. You get the base game for free, but if you want the expansions you can either grind to get the in-game money needed to buy them or just pay with real money.

What i can't accept is charging for items that make you stronger than other players. Games should be about skill, not who has the deepest pocket.

By the way, watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mhz9OXy86a0

Yeah, it's a lot easer to "lose" $2 a day for several months than $50 up front once or twice. You generally keep track of teh larger purchase, but the smaller ones just keep piling up higher.

I guess you could try to look it the other way around: which kind of F2P games are the most profitable?

I see "Clash of Clans" and "Candy Crush Saga" being mentioned a lot, so they probably qualify (Clash of Clans made its Finnish makers filthy rich, and more money seems to be coming their way every hour). I've never played Clash of Clans so I don't know how feasible it is to keep playing it without paying a dime, but I know one 8 year old boy who is apparently playing it a lot, and had gotten his dad to pay for the microtransactions. No idea what he has bought there, and for how much.

Candy Crush Saga, which my wife is playing, doesn't outright demand you to spend money, but it is one of those games that try to make it feel more irritating if you don't pay. Like having to wait x minutes or hours after game over, before you can play again... unless you pay.

The game is also designed so that it is more about luck than skill, so everyone will end up failing more and more they progress in the game, and hence every freeloader will end up waiting a lot to play the game again.

The game also incorporates social features where you are competing with your Facebook buddies who is further away in the game, which also pushes you to pay to skip waiting, just so that you can proceed faster in the game than your friends. "Pay to win", in case you care how good you are doing in the game compared to others.

From publisher's point of view, I guess those two games made it right, as they produce maximum profit.

Personally i like star trek online's free to play - access to all content and you can even make money to buy stuff from the store in game and the limits it has are very minor (though i had a account well before free to play)