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SOE Launches Planetside Fodder Program
RobinH writes "Sony Online Entertainment hopes to recruit more players to its aging MMOFPS title Planetside with the launch of its new play-for-free version Planetside: Reserves. According to a story in Gamasutra, 'The freeplay option limits players to a "battle rank" of six, with higher ranks only available to those with a paying account. PlanetSide is already part of the Massive in-game advertising network, and has been running billboard and other adverts since August 2005, presumably helping to fund the game's continued operation via this alternative model.'"
Not entirely. The Reserves play on the same server as everyone else. They can continue to play until the end of the demo period (March 24, 2007 -- no matter when you start).
All of the areas, vehicles, and weapons are available to the Reserve players. The BR 6 limitation just means they won't be able to "learn" more than a handful of certifications at any one time. But, you can "forget" a certification every 6 hours, so you can re-cert (almost) as often as you want.
You start with 7 cert points at BR1, and you'll get an additional one for each BR until BR6. At BR6, you get your first "implant" instead.
The only real handicap for a Reserve player is that paying subscribers will go to the head of the queue (in front of Reserve players) when a zone is population-locked (i.e. there are already 133 players from your empire in that zone).
You can find a torrent here:
http://www.mininova.org/tor/262474
This was posted elsewhere. I can't vouch for its reliability.