Lord of the Rings Online To Go Free-To-Play

darkwing_bmf sends word of Turbine's announcement that Lord of the Rings Online will become a free-to-play game this fall. 'The move is another validation of the free-to-play business model, where gamers can play for free and pay real money for virtual goods such as better weapons or decorative gear for their game characters. The business model has been popular in Asia but only recently took off in the US. This move shows the pressure is building on game publishers to shift to the new business model or face declining audiences.' According to a post on the official website, LotRO's micro-transaction system will be "very similar" to how Turbine's DDO store works, and current subscribers will maintain all of their privileges.

Comments

So rich persons get an edge?

[migla]

Fuck that shit. I don't want to escape the real world run by the rich to a virtual fantasy world where a realworld rich person can just buy a BMFG and pwn me.

Re:So rich persons get an edge?

[dward90]

This has always been the primary issue with microtransactions, and I've personally never been a fan of them either. The problem is that the investment required to develop, and more importantly maintain, quality MMOs necessitates making some money off them. Unless your game is out-of-the-box good enough to warrant thousands or millions of players paying subscription fees, microtansactions are the best known alternative as a profitable business model.

Re:So rich persons get an edge?

[tattood]

From the free-to-play FAQ:

Q: Will I still be able to play and enjoy the game without buying items from the LOTRO Store, or is that my only option for gaining weapons, armor, potions, and other goodies such as premium loot?

A: The purchase of items in the LOTRO Store is entirely optional. While items in the Store are designed to immediately enhance your in-game experience, premium loot and rare gear are the rewards of adventure and are only obtainable through gameplay.

So no, a real-world "rich person" (as if rich people play online games) will not be able to gain an edge and pwn you.

Re:So rich persons get an edge?

[zero_out]

Except that this is far from the case in LOTRO. You can buy access to things like character slots, unlock the ability to carry more money (5 gold limit is extremely small), and yes, buy some gear. The difference is that the gear is nice, but not nearly as nice as the stuff you get from dungeon instances or raids. Besides, LOTRO doesn't have PVP. It has PVMP, which means that you can either play on the side of the Free Peoples (human/elf/hobbit/dwarf) OR the side of the creeps (warg/uruk/orc/spider). Creeps don't get gear, are always max level, and can't leave the one specific PVMP zone.

On top of all this, having more money than me doesn't mean anything if we're both pay-subscribers. The ceiling that you can pay is $15/month, as it has been for 3 years. You can't spend $50 to get something better than me, who pays $15/month (if I wasn't a lifer). All this does is add a lower-class player to the already existing middle-class (everyone else ATM). It doesn't add a rich-class who can spend wads of cash to be better than someone who only pays $15/month. And again, even if it did, there is no PVP, so the rich-class can't pwn the middle-class.

Re:So rich persons get an edge?

[Pharmboy]

If I have a club and can't afford to buy a regular longsword .. and you would be rich enough .., you could beat me just because you'd be "rich"

Then again, in an old fashioned game, you might get pwned because the other person has more skilz, but you still play even though you aren't the best player on the block. This is just another metric. Keep in mind that people that rely on spending money to buy bigger guns are generally NOT going to be the best players. There are exceptions, yes, but just like with cheaters, they will be below average players on average.

I get your concerns, but how fucked up it is depends on what you can buy and what you must find instead. Time will tell, and best of all, if you don't like the game, it cost you exactly zero. If the system is *THAT* fucked up, then only 'rich' people will be playing anyway. Personally, I'm glad to see someone trying something new in games, besides more and more restrictive DRM, that is.

How much is a ring?

[Animats]

So how much is a ring?

Warhammer Online could use something like this...

[VGPowerlord]

I'm half surprised that Mythic/EA doesn't do this with Warhammer Online.

Warhammer Online currently lets you play for free up to a level 10 character... but you can't get any rare loot items or leave the starting areas or Norsica and Nordland.

I had bought a copy of the game when it first came out, but only subscribed to it for a few months...

I played a trial character for a bit, then found out that I had a free 14 day thing for my normal account. I played that for a bit and found out that as soon as you leave the areas that the trial characters can visit, the place is a gigantic ghost land, with a handful of people in each zone. This also applies to the other two starting zones (trial characters are limited to Empire vs Chaos starting area, the other two are Dwarf vs Greenskin and Elf vs Dark Elf) and the two cities (Altdorf and the Inevitable City).

P.S. Did I mention there are only 4 North American servers for Warhammer Online?

Re:Validation or desperation?

[vux984]

Much like Everquest ( yes it is still around ), they charge a monthly fee, but you can also purchase ornaments and other items that don't majorly change the game dynamics. It's not like you can buy a sword of awesome +5, just something that makes your sword look more awesome.

If it was just ornaments I wouldn't ever have objected. I do find it offensive that they do affect the game dynamics, its enough that one can feel compelled to use them for the extra edge.

Will this include a Pando stealth torrent client?

[Delusion_]

A stealth torrent client for game updates is fine the way WoW does it - informed consent and the app isn't hiding on you when it's running.

DDO's version of a torrent-based client updater starts up with Windows and operates silently, not even a system tray icon.

I wrote more about it on http://www.unhelpful.org/2010/02/15/underhanded-and-sneaky-pando-ddo-online-and-turbine/ when I discovered it, and did get a reply from Pando. Rather than risk traffic my host's server can assuredly not take, I'll just paste it here.

If this is useful, great, if it's overly spammy, just mod it down and accept my apologies, but I personally consider a stealth torrent client whose only visibility to the user is when they click on a boilerplate EULA for something called Pando Media Booster, and one that operates behind the scenes, on startup, without any icons or program windows to be malware in the loosest terms. I don't mind an MMOG providing an option to get (and obviously, provide) files to and from other users to speed up the overall update process via torrent client. Turbine's, or Pando's, is utterly unacceptable. A bit of quick looking confirms that PMB is part of the LotRO install.

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Underhanded and sneaky: Pando, DDO Online, and Turbine

Wherein the author takes Turbine to task for running a stealth torrent client on users' machines.
Date: February 15th, 2010 @ 10:39
Author: delusion

A lot of us are familiar with software companies leveraging the BitTorrent protocol. World of Warcraft comes to mind; every update is, if possible, sent to you via the torrent protocol. This is fine, because once you close the updater, the torrenting ceases. You are aware and informed.

I found something a lot more underhanded the other day while investigating some issues. A program called PMB.exe wanted to access the internet. PMB is another torrent client (Pando Media Booster) used by some other pieces of software to share data (in my case, it was from trying Dungeons & Dragons Online for free for a few weeks).

The key difference is that, unlike the WoW patcher, PMB was operating without my being aware, and was not making any attempt to keep me informed. As I have quite enough torrents that I deliberately seed, the last thing I need is another client fighting for bandwith, sharing files that I’m not interested in sharing. It was only sharing game data files, nothing of mine, but it’s still an extremely unethical thing to do without my knowledge.

I don’t have any expectations for Pando to live up to; they make stealthware and sell it to other companies. I do, however, have expectations for DDO’s publisher Turbine to live up to. When Asheron’s Call was popular, one of their practices which set them apart was their approach to their customers. At the time, the big massively multiplayer online games were Ultima Online and Everquest. Ultima Online’s developer, Origin (now Electronic Arts) were best known for a rather brain-dead approach; problems with the game were often hand-waved as something the players should sort out, and there was insufficient attention to detail to the ramifications of software changes and how they would be exploited. Everquest’s developer, Verant (now Sony Online Entertainment) was better known for being downright hostile to its users; you were playing their game, according to their vision, and if you had a problem with that, well, you didn’t know what you were talking about and frankly you could go toss off if they didn’t ban you first.

Turbine was the first of the more popular MMOGs to treat its customers like customers. They were neither ignored nor actively treated like the enemy. Their customers weren’t always right (and anyone who ever played an MMOG is going to cringe at the notion that the customer is always right), but they weren’t talked down, patronized, or insulted.

This respect for the customer is precisely why this inclusion of Pando Media Booster feels like a bet

Re:Lifetime subscriptions?

[McBeer]

They will continue to get access to everything they have already and get a crap ton of credits for future stuff. A friend of mine has a lifetime subscription and doesn't seem to feel slighted by the changes.

Re:Lifetime subscriptions?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a lifer, and I don't feel slighted either. And no, that's not just the fear and the agony rationalizing. We get all the content we currently have, plus perm status as VIP (their word for the subscription based services). We get a lot of bonus credits starting off just for being Lifers, plus a stipend of 500 free points per month until the game closes. Seems to me like they actually put thought into those they had already taken money from.

Re:Validation or desperation?

[secolactico]

Depends on where you played. There are times when you feel there's almost no one else logged on. You could possibly have entire zones for yourself in the less populated servers.

I hope this move increases server population. This is a fun game (not groundbreaking, tho) even if you are not a Tolkien fan.