LEGO Universe subscription costs

mmm... very expensive

I'm not paying that! Almost £10 for something that lasts a month! I'll just stick to buying proper LEGO

7.49 What? i'd pay £5 tops...

At least it's not as bad as what Iv'e heard for World Of Warcraft... $15+ USA for 1 month! So this is actually quite a good deal!

wow!!!! $40 for the disc and $90 for a year!!!!! so not gunna happen :(

LEL...

I'll spend my money on the real thing, unless they give a good discount to the beta testers. My 7 yr old son was Beta testing last night for the first time. I was not overly impressed. Visually it is really cool, but it was a little difficult for my son to get around and complete various tasks, but I guess it is recommended for ages 8 and up.

Oh! That's expensive! :O

Psh, I bet its just another walk-around-and-pretend-your-hitting-the-character-and-actually-getting-hit type of MMO. Looks like ill just be playing the freeware version...hopefully there is one.

yeah thats expensive im beta testing and i dont think its worth that much

@knuclear200x: actually, I must disagree with you. as a beta tester, I can't say much, except that it is a really fun game, and something I will definitely buy, no matter the cost... [suddenly notices the price} uhh, looks like I'll have to save up for this one. but I'm still getting it!

You won't see me in the Universe then. WAY too expensive. AND... parents don't want to pay for a MMOG for their 7+ kids. Sorry LEGO.

Pretty steep...a shame as well as I've been following news of this for almost two years, and now probably won't want to/can't afford to play on it now...

$50 for six months!? I actually have a game (TrackMania United Forever) that charged only half that amount for six months, and also had a $40 lifetime option. I even got my lifetime copy during a limited sale for half the price of the lifetime option.

Of course, I downloaded TrackMania from the Internet, which means there was no cost to produce and distribute DVD-ROMs, so that might explain the lower cost. Oh, and there's also a free version--TrackMania Nations Forever.

If I want to play a LEGO adventure game, I would stick with LEGO Island 1, LEGO Star Wars, LEGO Indiana Jones, or LEGO Racers 2 (LR2). (OK, LR2 isn't technically an adventure game, since it focuses on racing, but it does have an Adventure mode with the ability to explore each of the game's 5 worlds.)

LR2 (for the PC and PS2, the GBA version wasn't so good) gave me many hours of fun over at least half a dozen full Adventure campaigns, plus many hours in Arcade mode and Battle Mode. I also had fun designing custom vehicles in that game.

I haven't played LEGO Island as much, but I still think the first version is the best (Island 2 had slow transition times between scenes and was a little confusing, while Xtreme Stunts only worked on a few PCs).

LEGO Star Wars' (I have both I and II for PC, and CS for PS3) and LEGO Indiana Jones' (1, not 2; for PC) entertainment value seem to be self-evident, based off all the positive reviews I've seen. However, those games require powerful graphics cards. Fortunately for freeware lovers, both of those games have free demos--look around the Internet.

Conclusion: There are cheaper subscription-based games out there, as well as many great subscription-free LEGO games. Universe is not for me.

-Toa Of Justice

I was really expecting it to be 14.99 a month. For 10 a month I may actually give it a try for a couple of months, even though I haven't really enjoyed playing the Beta.

Hmmm........I WOULD Buy This for Less Than $10 Bucks a Month, But The Real Bummer is The $40 For The Disc Alone. Not Gonna Happen.

i subscribe to EA games POGO.COM and only pay $40.00 a year. there are hundreds of games.
lego has no idea of what is really going on in the world.
income going down, prices doubling, disposable income dissapearing.
will save my money for the real thing.
you mind gets a better work out from the real thing not some computer game.
lego please get in touch with reallity. prices must drop!!!!!!!!
let (disney, george lucas examples) come to you and that way you don't pass on the liecence fees to your customers.
if they are going to rip you off for playing online they had better give you VIP POINTS like 400 points a month for haveing ripped you off. wish they would sell stock because i would sell the house for shares of lego.

Also, this will backfire: You see, parents don't like to spend for a MMOG for their kids. SO... who'll buy them? Adults. In the end, there'll be more adults than children playing LEGO Universe, something LEGO does NOT want AT ALL. I think, if this happens, LEGO will make LU free, just to get more kids to play it, so the kids would outweigh the adults. BTW, any info on how many people pre-ordered already?

Those prices are waaaaaaaaaay too high. Not to mention the discrepancy between some countries. Seriously, $30 difference between Canadian and US? It doesn't cost that much to ship! Not to mention there isn't that great of a difference between the dollar. Where are those extra thirty dollars coming from? There is a WAY bigger difference between the Euro and the US dollar, but they have the same prices!

I beta-tested this and even though it was a bit buggy it still left a sour taste in my mouth. Its very shallow. Talk to this character - go whack some baddies until they drop 'insert randomitem here'.

To charge this much is insane - but their was a MMO made by Cartoon Network a while ago. While it did charge ridiculas prices, no one was paying so it has now become completey free! I imagine the same will happen here.

Great! Now i know everything i need to know about the game, and i will probably buy it on monday if that is possible!

@Pencoin: So... it DID happen that someone charged a fortune for a MMO, no one buyed it, and then made it free? I'll pray that this will happen!

Not happening! I figured it would be expensive!!! but that's CRAZY!!!!!!!!!

I bet they end up lowering the price because obviously nobody's going to pay this kind of money and especially in this economy.

So let me get this straight... You'd all pay £8/$10 for a nice lunch out but not for 30 solid days of gaming? These prices seem fine to me. Yeah i'd love to see them lower (this is true for anything) but they are far from unreasonable

I don't care how expensive it is! I just want them to release the subscription models in Australia! DX OMG, they better!

$90 for the yearly subscription?! I'd rather spend that on Boba Fett's spaceship when it comes out... I mean, ninety bucks for a video game? That's ridiculous....

The first time I heard of the game, I thought thats sounds kind of neat, and since its a Lego game, that the price wouldent be too bad after the game has been out for a few months, I could probably find it in a bargain bin as per usual.

Now, after seeing the pricing I feel betrayed.

As you can see I live in Canada. As some may know the CDN dollar is pretty darn close to the USD, we are about $0.03 below the USD. Yet, Lego still charges us insane markup on lego they sell here, which they say is as a result of the extra cost of shipping it to Canada.... right... ok, thats semi believable, but I will let it slide since I love Lego, and I now only buy it when its on sale, or off of Bricklink from some of my US neighbours to the South. To compensate for that insane pricing.

So tell me, if the only reason why we pay more for lego is the shipping cost...

WHY ARE WE PAYING $120.00 CDN A YEAR FOR THE SUBSCRIPTION?! DOES IT COST THAT MUCH MORE TO TRANSMIT DATA TO US? THAT $90USD IS EQUAL TO $93CDN. Give your head's a shake Lego..

Huh, there really should be an unlimited gameplay option for $50 USD max. No parent would spend about $100 a year on a game that doesn't allow you to play if you stop forking in the cash. :|

Uh, Huw, do you know if LEGO is selling some of the DVDs? I have a suspicion that not many will buy it...

.................NO! Come on!! Three or so years ago (I think) I started to hear about this. I couldn't wait! Then we started hearing about the pre-order.. 'oh no! It's not free??' Then 'well, I suppose I can manage to pay $20-30 for such a cool game...' Well, LEGO.. Now I'm not gunna buy it. EVER. Unless of course they make it a one time price, or maybe even FREE. ARGH! I'm frustrtereteded.

@Huw: Heh, if they had been developing the game for... 3 years, payed LOADS to NetDevil to make it, made it an expensive subscription-based game, despite the pleas from fans to make it free, and then it doesn't achieve success because no one buys it... well, it's LEGO's fault for not listening to fans! Heh, just like Wikipedia's new logo... But anyway, let's hope LEGO has enough "backup" money in case LU is a flop... Let's hope their wallet can sustain a blow...

That is so expensive!

I won't be buying it unless it is lowered in price to like $30-40 USD for use forever.

Mmm, I think that I know now why Lego have excluded Australia and New Zealand from this it’s possibly because of the crazy prices they would have to charge and there wouldn't be two many parents or adults paying a high prices for this.
With the new Harry Potter Game coming out (in which you can pre order from Big W in Australia now if you want for the 30/6/10) I am surprised they want to charge this amount for it.
This should be used in conjunction with by-products for other things eg. Lego Universe play sets, universe collectible minifigs etc. after all they are a toy making company not a software gaming company. They need to obtain interest in the product before trying to charge big $ for it and even then it should not be some thing that costs a lot to play especially if its intended for kids and parents are expected to pay and any parent that’s going to pay this amount has to have an interest in it to.

Good idea! Poorly executed.

i'm really disapionted in lego, just disapionted. lego has turned into a money-grubbing company, all they seem to care about is big bucks. lego needs a reallity check, so i'm goin' to help 'em. this is to you lego.
''THE WORLD IS IN A ECONOMIC DEPRESSION AND YOU DONT SEEM TO CARE! PEOPLE DONT HAVE ENOUGH MONEY TO PAY FOR THINGS LIKE THIS, AND YET YOU RAISE THE PRICES"
'sigh' any way im not gonna buy this, i just feel bad for all those fans that actually wanted to get this. im saving up for the death star (saving 400 is NOT easy, and now its backordered and hard to find) so i wasn't expecting to buy this anyway. the lego universe subsription is what got me, and how unfair lego treats other countrys, like canada and austrailia. a XBOX 360 full gold membership for 12 monthis is 50.00 and is almost ALWAYS on sale for 40.00.
and from what i've read it isn't even a great game. seems like lego has been more succsesful with lu lab then the game, pretty sad. dont know how lego is going to stay up when they have ended, Bionicle, Indiana Jones, castle, and maybe star wars AND LU has turned out to be a flop, the only thing that's gonig to save them now the collectables.

Disappointed, but not unexpected. Given the target audience, you'd think the prices would be more in line with something like Club Penguin. Free, but you get more stuff if you pay US$6/mo US$30/6mo ~US$60/year. The box should have come with 3 mo. included. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. Maybe they could include codes/credits for LU in larger LEGO sets....

What i really want is a console/handheld that allows u to build fighting mechs, that include ball joints. but if it still is an MMO by then...maybe...JUST MAYBE...ill pay that much.

which reminds me...that these are typical lego prices.

Very disappointing. I was going to get this until I saw the price. $130 for one year? Not going to happen! Maybe if it was a one-time fee, but this is outrageous. The game isn't good enough to be worth that much.

I thought will pay for the game ones, but subscription ? NO WAY !!! won't spend over $100 for the game just to pay back lego !

somebody start a survey on this subject. to buy or not to buy. what should a proper price point be.

They're charging for playing the game??? WHAT THE HECK!!!! No one's gonna pay THAT much for just a game that they've been running their mouths about for months now. I see Lego Universe as being a total financial failure. And with them getting the gull to charge that much, I can honestly say it serves them right.

Very disappointed. The costs are far too high. I'm a Beta tester, and although I've found it average at best, not even in the same league as their other games (Star Wars, Indy, Batman, even Racers) as far as gameplay is concerned. To charge THAT amount of money for the priviledge of playing a game you've already paid money for is rediculous.

As a counterpoint to the majority of the doom sayers here, I don't think it will be a failure. Too many times over the years a Pay-to-Play MMO has appeared along with thousands upon thousands of people complaining about it... but years later, those games are still being played. Usually by those very people. To date, I have refused to play any game I have to pay to play. Final Fantasy being top of the list of 'I want to but i'm not going to'. Lego will join this list. I, for one, will not be paying twice for a game, but there will always be a core of people, fans, who WILL pay.

On a side note, I think companies that charge in this manner should implement a particular system, which might go down better with fans. i.e. You pay for a month, how much of that month will you actually be in-game? You might feel to get your moneys worth, you'll be on it for five+ hours every night! There should be a system where you pay for a month, then thats what you get... a month of being in-game. Really what you are paying for just now is a month of your stats being stored on their server, whether you're playing or not.

Just to say all the people here. Middlerealm, I reckon there will be alot of paying customers for this game. Do you have any idea how many under 7s play World of Warcraft or Runescape? It will shock and maybe disgust you I'm sure, so I expect this to not go well at all. (For the customer that is! TLG has gone really money-grabby lately. Likely because of the plastic prices. Gotta make a profit somehow, even if you're ripping people off.)

Well... I can see why they were reluctant to release the prices.

If you stop your subscription, I wonder do your characters etc. go into suspended animation, or do you have to keep paying to avoid your characters/acheivements being deleted?

If it is the latter, then those saying it's little to pay for a month of gaming are missing the point, because if you have to pay to keep your progress, then you pay for nothing once you've used up all the interesting content and are waiting for more. Lets face it, even if they do a great job on the game design, I think for anyone but the obsessed, it is unlikely there would be much new to do after the first month or two until new content is released.

if enough people dont pay then the game will close, lego need to reduce the monthly cost i think.
£5 per month tops.

What? Those prices are crazy. It's terrible to see that LEGO Universe, which 3 years ao looked so promising, is a hideous, overpriced game, that isn't even that good. I can see this nosediving spectacularly, and LEGO having to slash the prices. £70 for 12 months? Rip-off.

I think the bottom line is this. I have several options for my money:
1. Pay $130 upfront for the game and 1 yr subscription
2. Buy the new Lego video games coming out which usually last 6 months of playing at about $40 a piece
3. Buy actual physical Lego at the store which have infinite playing time given the number of combinations that various pieces and sets can be combined in.

Really, for me the real draw of Lego has been the ability to continually create new things from the excellent building sets. The basis of Lego was "play well". Well sitting on your duff in front of a computer for hours every day IMO is not playing well. You may have some interaction with the others playing in the MMOG, but it is not the same as having your friends over and building spaceships and flying them around the house.

The Lego Group should leave video games to the video game industry and focus on their core values.

So, in short, LEGO has ruined what already was an average game(I'm a Beta Tester, but I haven't yet played with it). LEGO has not listened to fans, made NO surveys about it, and LU is destined for a financial flop. It's just too expensive. I mean, £30 just for the DVD?!? Ridiculous...

@rainstorm26: That's exactly right! I'd so much rather spend the $90 I'd be paying for the game subscription on some new Lego sets that will last not only me, but also my younger brothers and future kids many years of fun building and playing...

I Pre-ordered LEGO Universe! I have enjoyed my Beta Testing experience thoroughly, and I can't wait until the Live 1 launch! :-)

HMMM.. I've been playing MMORPG's for years, and I think the prices are reasonable if the game is good. WOW is more expensive and EVE is twice as expensive per month to play. £7.49 is nothing for a months play if you can put the time in, most other leasure activitys will cost you alot more than this, and the initial cost of the game is inline with any other new release PC game. I do agree that Lego are going to get alot more adults playing, (myself included) than children, but again in EVE and WOW the communities are generally friendly for all age groups, except perhaps the really young, guilds and corps tend to take their gaming very seriously. I've preordered it, I hope it measures up. You get 30 days free play with the game, so you can get a feel for it before subscribing.

It cost's $60 dollars for a Xbox 360 game and you get it for life! LEGO want's $130 for a year's worth of ONE GAME that probably gets tiring in about two months!!!!!!!!!!!

What! £30 for the disc and then £70 to play it afterwards for a year! That's a rip off! I was about to pre-order this but I think I'm not going to now!

Worker Joe, i agree with you! You might not be reading this since there's a whole lot of comments coming in here already, but you're right. Lego has been working on this very long, and i'm gonna buy it, because i'm a beta tester and even though i'm not that rich or well equipped, i really want to give the game a chance because when it finally comes out there's time for training and, that minifigure you get... awesome! So i will buy it even though it might cost alot. I will hopefully see you in the universe by then!

But what's going on with Australian availability? In this day and age it just seems ridiculous.

Gosh, well I could spend my money on an Xbox live gold membership for 50$ a year instead, cheaper and COD MOD@ and Halo Reach when it comes out, but it really should be a one time thing instead of 10$ a month=$120 a year

NO...WAY! I have to buy the game, and then waste ninety bucks??? for a YEAR?! not happening for me, sorry.
And I get the sinking feeling that if a one time buy version came out, It would cost $200.95! and a monthly check to cover updates! I wanted to get the game, but now that I see the absurd pricing, I probably won't get it.

High prices High quality? So far from what I see LEGO universe is awesome. I won't buy it mostly because I wouldnt have the time to play often to make a difference of how often I would pay.

If this is how Lego is going to treat Australia I'll just forget LU and stick to Roblox. At least it's fun AND FREE...

Somehow, this is 1 on Lego Shop @home. Before I saw the prices, I was going to buy this! :(

to all who think it isn't expensive compared to other games: true, other games may have higher prices, but LU is meant for KIDS. even IF 7 year olds play WOW that game wasn't meant for that age group, as Lu was.
TeamEnergy: yeah, it doesn't make ANY sense, lego is a kid company, yet they charge big $, and X box games are geared more towrds adults, and they have lower cost! (yay Halo:Reach)

I ordered it this morning!

itsaturkey: I totally agree, this geared toward younger audiences who shouldn't necesarrily be computer geeks at that age so they probably wouldn't spend there money on monthly payments and they probably wont be sitting at the computer all the time so $10 a month is very expensive for the age group not including the actual game, but they could play LEGO Racers which is still really fun, you make your character and car and race so you ghet the building portion, I might buy it, but a minifig isn't going to convince me to buy it even thoguh the minifig is pretty cool
I priobably wouldn't have much time save for summer to play and having to pay $10 to not play it for the rest of the year isn't what I am interested in doing

Yes, but you need people willing to pay that money. It would be better to get more people to play with a lower price point.

EDIT: My post is too long, lol. So, the conclusion disappeared with the most important points. Long story short, what Worker Joe AND what rainstorm26 just said. You might as well ignore my post. @Huw, can you limit the entry box so that it won't accept more than it will post?

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Well, the reaction in the comments is quite negative towards the prices (despite a few comments here and there from beta testers saying they really like the game and will be getting it). I can understand why people feel ripped off. However, I tend to think of things from a business perspective and it seems that this whole LU thing is a big challenge for LEGO.

Why is LEGO bothering with video games? Well, it's their competition. There were no video games when LEGO was first started. As video gaming was introduced and has become more popular over the years, kids played with traditional toys less. So, to continue successfully as a business LEGO needs to stay relevant to today's youth who are more accustomed to video games. Video gaming is a very different style of play than playing with bricks. Making LEGO video games is a way to bridge the two styles of play, the two worlds of video games and LEGO. Hopefully, by having LEGO video games the bricks will become more appealing to today's youth.

Ok, by why does LEGO want a MMOG? Well, LEGO has always been about using creativity to build things and using your imagination to create a play world with LEGO. So LEGO is looking for video games that really mesh well with that kind of thing and a MMOG has a lot of potential. You can really incorporate building things and creating a virtual world. I mean, its called LEGO Universe.

So what's the challenge? LEGO is good at making plastic bricks and sets out of plastic bricks. They're not good at video games. They need help. So they get an outside company to make the game. But that's not the only disadvantage. You also need to make a good game, you need to be able to distribute it effectively, and market it so that people want to buy the game. So it

If the product is worth it, then people will be willing to pay for it. I think the outstanding question (which everyone who has said they refuse to pay the high price for it have sort of posed), is the game worth the prices they are charging. The people who have been beta testing have the best feel for this at this point (I helped my son with beta testing this morning). So, having seen it, I would say they have priced it too high. It sounds like others think that it is worth what is being charged and the fact that it is listed as the top selling product on lego.com US, would also suggest that people feel that it may be priced appropriately. So I think the jury is still out on this one. Let the debate continue.

nope not happening i just got a new console so i need to stack my lego games again. so id rather get those instead of this. not to mention the new lego harry potter game and lego starwars III (which i think should be 1 1/2): clone wars. a minimum of 60 dollars is not the way to introduce a new MMOG. you can get 2 or 3 old lego games that is equally of more fun then this with the same price

the only reason i would by this game is for the minifigure. than sell the game to someone else. the price is to much. every one has a very ggod point but only time will tell if the game servives. wish there was an offline version of the game.

Look at it this way; not only are you paying to play Lego Universe, YOU'RE ALSO BUYING A LEGO SET IN THE PROCESS!

Too much expensive for kids and their parents.

Jon Anderson: they don't NEED more money, but they're a business and businesses like to make LOTS of money, even if that means ripping off little kids who have waited 3 whole years for this game and then relize that they cant buy a lego game they have been waiting for in anticipation for years (if lego wants to get more customers they should have made this have a offline mode AND online mode, and you pay can pay either 10$ (or 5 euros) for a month of playing online or 60.00 for the whole year of online. AND they should have made the beta testing for everyone not just a select few. not to mention lego's continuing to ignore austrailia.

Ok, this is weird: In the LEGO Universe site, under the article stating that pre-order has started, I noticed that in the comments, the MAJORITY of users actually said they HAVE pre-ordered, whereas here, the majority said that they WOULDN'T pre-order or buy LEGO Universe!

Ok, if there's anyone who pre-ordered the game already, please let me know, because i pre-ordered, and i want to know if there's anyone else who did, or if I will be almost alone in the universe...

I agree with Brickmatic. Even though LEGO Universe might seem to be pricey to you, you have to look from the perspective of The LEGO Group and Netdevil.

Besides, with all those Non-LEGO games, you probably don't get to actually create anything besides your avatar. You're forgetting that LEGO Universe will be a place for imagination to run wild, where you can make almost anything out of virtual LEGO bricks (are you guys pure gamers, or are you builders as well?) Also, you're forgetting that new content is introduced over time in an MMOG, which is one of the reasons why customers have to continuously pay for it. Another reason LEGO Universe is a continuous payment game is because of moderation. To make sure the game is safe, moderators must be payed! You might want to substitute free/one-time-payment building MMOGs for LEGO Universe, but LEGO Universe is the best place to build and meet up with other LEGO fans! The other games are good, but if you're a hardcore LEGO fan, then LEGO Universe is for you. :-)

I just want the minifigure - not the game. So I might try to get that figure of eBay or BrickLink. I'm not getting the game because you have to pay for that DURING you play that. :-(
But I would still believe that lot's of people who play that game say that this is awsome. ;-)

@Huw: Are you going to add that game into the brickset database?

i dont understand why people think the minifig is SO awesome, its an orange minifig with a gold visor like space police, what lego SHOULD have done is if you pre-order you get one of the nexus force members, which are picked randomly, THAT would have people buying that set like crazy!!