7 replies to this topic

[Jason Clement]

We all knew that this would happen eventually, but it looks as if Star Wars: The Old Republic developer Bioware Austin is now investigating a free-to-play model for the 7 month old MMO.

Unfortunately, this isn't shocking at all to hear, especially since the game lost 25% of its subscribers recently, and the company has been hit with layoffs as well.

"The MMO market is very dynamic and we need to be dynamic as well," lead designer Emmanuel Lusinchi commented.

"Unless people are happy with what they have, they are constantly demanding updates, new modes and situations. So we are looking at free-to-play but I can't tell you in much detail. We have to be flexible and adapt to what is going on."

It should be noted that a clear decision has not been made about going free-to-play yet, so for the time being the game will still remain subscription-based. Hopefully when it eventually does go free-to-play (and it will), the transition will help keep the game competitive with other great F2P games out there.

Do you hope Star Wars: The Old Republic will go free-to-play soon?

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[Leah]

I really want to play TOR and it would be extremely awesome if it did go FTP.
The sooner, the better. Subscriptions aren't working out for them.

[sirdan357]

This is the way every MMO is going to go from now on. Nobody wants to pay a monthly fee to play one game. The only upcoming MMO I could see surviving as a paid service is Blizzards WoW followup.

[Ludono]

This is going to hurt future MMO's when less people buy them at launch because "they'll just be F2P later"

[Shin GenX]

I will definitely check this game out if it goes F2P. Well I think Blizzard does it well. F2P until level 10 or 20 etc is not a bad idea at all.

[TYLERxDURDEN]

My brother has been trying to get me to play SWTOR for some time now and F2P would go a long way to get me online.

[Skychrono]

My favorite MMO model is the Guild Wars model - pay enough money to buy the game and make it "fully featured," and sell more features via expansion packs. I'd be much happier paying $50 then $30 every six months for big content packs than, say, $15/month - not even for the savings, but for the promise that you always have a nice full game instead of intentionally staged content.

I would buy a copy of SWTOR right now if I could just treat it like a single player game and play all the (supposedly great) storyline content.

[SeveranceZero]

I understand that it's unfortunate that they have lost a lot of business but I personally like the F2P model, when games have a monthly subscription, it kind of compells the player to put that time in so they are getting the most bang for their buck, so to speak.

I for one, was interested in SWTOR but wasn't keen on the monthly fee because that sucks me in to play all the time just to get my money's worth. However, if it was F2P, with some kind of vanity cashshop (Something akin to what GW2 is going to do), then I'd gladly give it a shot. That way I could just play as I please and not feel obligated to always be on it.

Much like the others above me said, it would be nice to be able to play the game like a single player game and enjoy it casually. It also might increase the longevity of the game because if people aren't forced to shell out money every month, they all might play more casually as well. Consequently, they wouldn't rush through all the content as quick and burn out of the game. Obviously, there are always people who want to be first and all that but just another way to look at it.

Also, if they are worried about making enough money to sustain the game, just look at WoW...people spent millions on silly pets and mounts and other gimmicky items, just add in those (via cash shop or whatever) and they will surely keep their revenue high + expansions and such.