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Free-To-Play Switch Going Well For D&D Online
babboo65 writes "Dungeons and Dragons Online is enjoying a second life in terms of player count and buzz, all thanks to its new business strategy: giving the game away. Turbine is making their MMO as accessible as possible, and that includes making players who don't pay anything as happy as possible. Subscriptions are up 40 percent. Ars explores how free can be very profitable."
Second Life has been doing this for years and years, relying soley on microtransactions.
From all accounts, they're still doing very well.
Players that have more time than money can grind everything,
Unfortunately, due to how the currency system is setup, that grind involves repeatedly creating and deleting characters, as the amount of a currency a single character can earn is limited.
Your problem isn't the game, it's that you want to be 'in the top players'.
Most people don't care about that.
That you do, is nobody's fault but your own.
I don't know about Travian, but, most "free" games I've played have content that's not available except for the Top Players. Well, sure, it's available but the second you enter the dungeon or get to the boss or whatever, you're squished pretty soundly. That's because these top tier events are balanced for those at the top, who get there using in-game paid help. To me, that's just as good as locking people out for non-payment.
It's the right of the game developer to do that, of course. But they shouldn't really be billing it as a "free" game if you can't fully play it without paying. They should be honest and admit that if you're not prepared to pay, you're not going to play it all.
If I wanted to play a game where chance of winning is directly related to the money I spend, I'd play Magic again. At least WotC doesn't pretend it's a free game.
More Twoson than Cupertino
After reading this story on Ars (Slashdot is always days late), I tried out the free account system. Three things that really made me happy:
1. They never asked for a credit card. I just created an account like I was signing up for a forum.
2. The download was quick and painless (maxed-out my 25Mbit connection, was playing in 30 minutes).
3. I felt so free that I didn't even feel bad about not getting the chance to play it last night.
I've been itching to try one of these MMOs, but couldn't stomach the monthly fee (I don't often have lots of time to play, and I also tend to put a game down after a couple months, then pick it back up later). For me, a monthly fee would be wasted. I like this pricing structure because I won't be forced to pay for anything, but if I really like the game I could see myself making small purchases here and there. If I find I really like this, and get worried about spending too much, I still have the option to upgrade to the VIP account for the normal $15/month.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.