SWTOR Free to Play ?

[Hostagecat]

Obao, I'm not even gonna bother to respond to that comment, its just not worth it to sink myself to your level, I'm better than that.

/peace



Yep. Someone who gets it.

A: This is not confirmed, they simply said they are considering it. Even blizzard, owners of the greatest, mightiest, and most successfull MMO of all times (which I still play and love BTW) has also gone on record that at some point in the future they "could" go Free2play. It wasn't a confirmation, nor something written in stone, they were simply saying that they've considered the possibility. Nothing more, nothing less.

B: Even if it was true, a game not charging a monthly fee isn't equal to it rolling over and dieing like Star Wars galaxies or Matrix Online did. An MMO is dead when it no longer sparks player interest regardless of whatever features they've added. That is NOT the case with SWTOR. There's plenty of stuff planned for the future, and tons of people are interested in it (Cathar for one, HK-51 for another). There's lots of free multiplayer games out there that not only enjoy a healthy population, but also a nice influx of content.

C: This thread (As well as that one called "I told you so" are nothing more than troll-bait, done by people who just wanna spew their bile and vent their frustrations at others who are just trying to have fun. I sincerely hope they close them both soon.

Well reasoned responses, and i agree, plus EA still is charging for UO and WAR. I think one of those 2 going free to play would happen before TOR.

[jvbastel]

Don't get me wrong, I played GW for a long time and enjoyed it immensely, but honestly, very little of what they released was actual content. Sure, they did a good job of continually balancing stuff, and occasionally they'd add a few new green weapons into the game, new b-day minipets, and such, but in terms of actual CONTENT, not a ton was added outside of actual expansion packs. Sure, they did start adding more post-EotN, but even that was mainly to hold player interest and keep GW in their minds until GW2 hits...

Well GW isn't really the best example anyway, since it's not an mmorpg per se. I myself look at it more as an evolution of diablo 2.
As for content, they had a lot of it but as you said, it was released with the expansions. Those were A LOT bigger than wow expansions, though.

I look at it this way: while wow releases smaller expansions, they update them ever so often with new content.
GW Just throws everything at you at once.

Content-wise, GW probably had the fastest incremental updates of any online rpg I've ever seen.

[Kaiser499]

I wish they had a constant free trial going, it's dumb that you have to be invited for it.

[jvbastel]

I wish they had a constant free trial going, it's dumb that you have to be invited for it.

The first 15 levels will be free soon, iirc

[Vewen]

no one said there are no good f2p games out there. but If you look at other sub based MMOs that went f2p, I dont see how you can blame people who think this is not the best thing that can happen to a game.

F2P is the best thing that ever happened to DCUO. The game became a lot more popular.

[sawier]

its not free to play, its more like trial, since you cant get more than 15 lvls

[Kuuri]

This doesn't fill me with a great deal of optimism.

I'm aware that F2P models can, and have worked out well, but when you consider the vast resources that went into the production of this game without it being designed with alternate monetisation methodology in mind, it seems fairly unlikely that they will be able to 'tack on' a workable solution to provide the income necessary to maintain such an ambitious project.

I played the game at launch for just over a week, and decided it wasn't my cup of tea, but I sincerely hope they manage to make it work; competition in the MMO genre can only ever be a good thing.

[Stormcall]

Well GW isn't really the best example anyway, since it's not an mmorpg per se. I myself look at it more as an evolution of diablo 2.
As for content, they had a lot of it but as you said, it was released with the expansions. Those were A LOT bigger than wow expansions, though.

I look at it this way: while wow releases smaller expansions, they update them ever so often with new content.
GW Just throws everything at you at once.

True, but that's not the same as "Free 2 play" either, since each of those xpacs cost the same as buying a new game. As I said, GW I enjoyed(still do, to an extent), just not sure it's a great example of how F2P frequently adds content like P2P games do, since the majority of it's new content you had to pay for(though you are right, you did get more of it, since each xpac until EotN was capable of being played as a standalone game).

[voidillusion]

I just love the subtelty of MMO-Champ. The first news i see on main page about SW about it going free to play!

Regarding the news itself, they are lost and clueless. And keeping like this ofc the game will sink definitively.

[jvbastel]

True, but that's not the same as "Free 2 play" either, since each of those xpacs cost the same as buying a new game. As I said, GW I enjoyed(still do, to an extent), just not sure it's a great example of how F2P frequently adds content like P2P games do, since the majority of it's new content you had to pay for(though you are right, you did get more of it, since each xpac until EotN was capable of being played as a standalone game).

Well tbh, I could have seen a similar model working great for SWTOR, b2p with just box costs for the game and any expansions.

I don't think that's an option now though. They'll probably go freemium, with people still having the opportunity to pay 15 a month for added storage space, character slots, free transfers, xp potions. Stuff like that.

[Capt Froggy]

Bioware or EA announced that if they got 300k subscribers, or something close to that, then they would make a profit. At the moment they are at 800k subs. So if they take another big loss then you can say the sky is falling.

Unfortunately, they released SWTOR to early, it was still a Beta product. I bought the Collectors Edition on July 22, got into the pre-lease Dec 13 and just played out my time, because my computer couldnt really handle the game and it had to many bugs (I still loved the story and wanted to play still). I came back to get the Founder medal and the game played a whole lot better, but it still had a lot of bugs and still missing many features it should have started with.

I bought a month and my Brother bought me another month for my birthday. I left again do to some of the same bugs, some new bugs, and the nerfing of my classes (I still loved the storylines).

I just wished they waited another year to fine tune the game before release. I still think the storylines are awesome. This is the first game that I liked grouping with people and actually tried to group with people outside of dungeons or whatever they are called.

[vizzle]

I would play this game again if it went F2P.

I probably wouldn't buy anything from the cash shop though.

[jvbastel]

Bioware or EA announced that if they got 300k subscribers, or something close to that, then they would make a profit. At the moment they are at 800k subs. So if they take another big loss then you can say the sky is falling.

They actually said 500k would break them even, and 1 mill would be profitable but nothing to write home about.

Are there any sources for what you said? would be interesting to see updates on the sub numbers. Last official one we got was the 1.3 mill, right?

[Twiddly]

I bought it day it came out, played two months off and on, and will never pay for a month of this game again, but I LOVED the single player aspects of the questing/campaign and would definetly play it and possibly even buy things in the cash shop if it was free to play, and that is what I said in the goodbye letter thing they make you fill out when you unsub.

---------- Post added 2012-06-15 at 04:54 AM ----------

F2p doesn't get real players back, it only gets players looking for a super casual style MMO and who don't really care what they are playing.

Not true at all, I was pretty hardcore in TOR and I am in WoW Currently (Inc flames probably) and I would come back if it went f2p.

[Stormcall]

I don't think that's an option now though. They'll probably go freemium, with people still having the opportunity to pay 15 a month for added storage space, character slots, free transfers, xp potions. Stuff like that.

Most likely.

[Elite Peon]

AWESOME GAME ..but they really messed up the end game and pvp . The leveling is awesome much better then any game IMO but they should have know the end game keeps people playing and they really screwed up on that .

[jvbastel]

When I think about all old topics about how SWTOR will kill WoW I just cant stop smile.

"SWTOR the WoW killer", ye right, keep dreaming.

he term 'wow killer' hardly ever gets mentioned by the actual fanbase of a game. want proof? check the gw2 forums, the game is in beta, and will be a direct competitor to wow, so all the fans should go "AMAGAD WOW WILL DIE", right?

Except they don't, and neither did 99% of the swtor fanbase, or the rift fanbase. or AOC's, or aion's, or WAR

[Venziir]

he term 'wow killer' hardly ever gets mentioned by the actual fanbase of a game. want proof? check the gw2 forums, the game is in beta, and will be a direct competitor to wow, so all the fans should go "AMAGAD WOW WILL DIE", right?

Except they don't, and neither did 99% of the swtor fanbase, or the rift fanbase. or AOC's, or aion's, or WAR

Must've been a very VERY vocal last percent then....

[Chronos80]

We all knew it was gonna happen, the question is when. My bet is early to mid next year.

[Padoing]

it was only a matter of time all the people that jumped over from other mmo's would jump back once they hit max level with not much to do, i mean lets face it nomatter how many times its said about wow killers the only real wow killer would be wow2, Or some other materpiece from blizzard like titan maybe.