Dungeons & Dragons Online Goes Free-To-Play

Dungeons & Dragons Online developer Turbine has announced that they'll be launching a new version of the game, called Eberron Unlimited, which makes it free to play, with the option of using micro-transactions to buy certain items and customize characters. Players will also be able to earn points through normal play that they can spend in the DDO Store. There's an additional option to pay a normal subscription fee for priority access to servers, a monthly allotment of points for the store, and extra character slots. Further details and a sign-up for the beta are available at the game's website.

Comments

Last-ditch effort

[Anonymous Coward]

DDO has never had the subscriber base to really support the game. This is a last-ditch effort to make the game profitable. Expect the whole thing go down the crapper if it doesn't fly.

If Turbine would only understand that people reject their otherwise fairly competent MMOs because both DDO and LOTRO suffer from terrible animation quality, clunky animation system and poor client-side prediction (leading to stutering and warping of characters). Their current MMO engine just doesn't cut it. Doesn't matter how good content you have on top of the unsound foundation.

Re:They let anyone on these days...

[Spazztastic]

Having just pay-for-play sets a threshold. You'll still have annoying players, but not as many. I'd want a "Play at +1, ignore Anonymous Cowards" option for the "VIP" (for-pay) accounts.

I'm a dick to people in WoW only because it's the last fun thing to do. Raiding? PVP? I'd rather just grief. Even with pay-to-play, you spend your $15 a month to play how you want, I spend mine to camp people, troll the realm forums, and do old content with friends.

I, of course, do not ninja loot like some people or interfere with a guilds progression. That's where I draw the line.

They Made D&D Online?

[kenp2002]

Wow, it must have really sucked to fly under my radar...

Anyway, I should contribute something to the discussion.

The whole point why successful dating services (yeah who would have throught MMOs and Dating Services had something in common) charge is to create a cost-of-entry that separates serious participants from the rest of the population.

By making a game free-to-play you are inviting disaster as many /.'ers have pointed out.

In fact game studios would do far better to charge MORE for certain options.

I know at least 400 VN board members that pleaded with Mythic for a 21+ and over server for DAOC. We were so damn sick of the 10 year olds playing...

Same with the hard core role players. They were willing to shell out $20 a month for a hard core, RPG server.

I'd wager you would also get some people to kick in $5 extra a month for say 40 and older servers also for people that still remember how to spell OKAY.

Seriously free-to-play means every idiot and their cousin can get on. Remember how pissed the techie crowd was with AOL and COMPUSERV for bring ever no-nothing to the Internet?

Seriously look what happened to WoW when they started their free trial program. First week alone on Tichndrius there where 200+ people spamming Gold ads in Ironforge forever renaming it LAGFORGE and SPAMFORGE.

Even after the tweaks to shut up folks on trial accounts you still had to contend with starting an alt and have 100 level 1 bots camping every spawn with some level 40 (at the time) telling you that if you want to kill stuff you had to play him 10 gold. (We had a big problem with Cross Realm extortionists back then...)

Seriously D&D Online must have sucked pretty bad for flying this low under the radar and making a free-to-play version sounds like a really really bad idea...

But hey I love being proven wrong. It happens once in a while and I find it refreshing.

Re:They Made D&D Online?

[Vohar]

Yeah...Age of Conan supposedly had an older player base, but people still seemed to think "mature" meant "Be a dick all the time. Also, and nipples and blood."

The most disconcerting reality checks came in groups where based on the player's chat and performance I'm -positive- they're a kid...Then they say they need to go afk "cuz my kid's crying."

Re:They Made D&D Online?

[Chris Burke]

Also, and nipples and blood.

O_o Eeeeewww!

The most disconcerting reality checks came in groups where based on the player's chat and performance I'm -positive- they're a kid...Then they say they need to go afk "cuz my kid's crying."

The tragedy of teenage pregnancy strikes reaches even into the online world!

But seriously, it's funny how some of my best WoW-only friends have been actually kids in the 10-15 range. Sure they think Chuck Norris jokes are hilarious no matter how many times you spam chat with them, but otherwise were reasonably intelligent, polite, and generally not a demonstration of the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory like so many "adults" prove to be.

BTW, in my experience, the best way to get rid of stupid isn't with age-restricted servers/services, but by simply putting the initials "RP" after the server name. It's exactly the kind of 30-year-old man-child-idiot who thinks they're too cool for an RP server who you want to exclude, and they do it all by themselves!

Re:Stop asking for the other kind of free

[dyingtolive]

Apologies for replying to myself, but something else I thought of that would be awesome is a network game where some hacks are allowed. It could have a relatively complex goal that is hard to obtain doing it by hand, but the "real" purpose of the game is to write a hacked client that tries to fool the server into thinking its legit that performs this task. Sort of a honeypot MMO.

Obviously, this idea is incompatible with the goals of the above idea. Just something that popped into my head.