Killzone 3 Free-To-Play?s Most Important Lesson

[Dennis Scimeca]

Killzone 3 Free-To-Play?s Most Important Lesson

Hopefully the Killzone 3 free-to-play will lead the way for separately sold multiplayer shooters.

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[TimeLord]

What about Warhawk?

It's was a completely multiplayer game on the PS3 and I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that the same studio are releasing a sequel to it too.

Warhawk worked because it had no story, was MP only, was cheap and was eventually practically given away on PSN.

 

[Vault101]

I actually really like the Idea of multiplayer and single player being seperate

because then you know what your getting, you dont have to put up with frustratingly short single player

like buying a can of lemonade only to find half of it is filled with coke

 

[TheSapphireKnight]

I hope that this is indeed the path many companies will choose to take in the future. I think many people would have given Halo 3: ODST less flak if at launch you could choose to buy the single player/firefight separately for at less than $60 dollars if they were already done with H3 multi or vice-versa for someone who just rented ODST single player.

 

[The Random One]

They're not really the only. If you subscribe to OnLive's How About You Pay Us Every Month package, you get access to Homefront's multiplayer only. In theory it would essentially mean Homefront's multiplayer won't be wanting for players for a long time. (In practice I don't own it so I don't know how well its multiplayer is doing.)

There's a slightly poisonous idea amongst devs/publishers that people will not buy games unless they have single player. I guess it's another part of Modern Warfare's heritage; that is a game that I can see 'come for the single player, still for the multiplayer' actually being true. But I only played Bad Company 2's single player for two levels, because that's how long it took me to realize it sucked, and I resent every single bit of space it took on my hard drive, as an unwanted tumor stuck to the game I really wanted to play.

Most multiplayer-only games are either free with microtransactions or $15 dollar affairs, and if companies aren't making back their investiments with $60 AAA games their reluctance to publish things that are even cheaper is understandable. I doubt a $15 dollar game would cost less money to produce than and a $60 title and it's not certain it would sell more.

I would enjoy such games coming out more often, but I doubt I'd find one who would have me abandon TF2.

 

[Zen Toombs]

I like this idea. Although I will go out on a limb and say that Mass Effect 3 should be worth ~$60 for EITHER singleplayer or multiplayer, assuming the singleplayer is at all to par with the last two and the multiplayer is as good as the demo was.

 

[Waaghpowa]

The lesson I hope publishers learn, if standalone Killzone 3 multiplayer is successful, is that decoupling single-player shooter campaigns from multiplayer modes and selling them both separately a la carte could be a viable model

Oh for Zombie Christs sake please let this happen. I'm so sick of the prices for games that I'm going to play single player when, inevitably, they design the game to focus on multiplayer since all publishers and devs seem to assume that's all anyone wants these days. Syndicate is the most recent example, why the hell should I spend 60 dollars for a game, a PC game mind you, which apparently had more focus on co op than the single player, which apparently wasn't that good? I would gladly pay 20 or 30 bucks to play only the single player. Hell, I paid 30 dollars for Hard Reset when it came out and it was roughly 5 hours of gameplay.

Call my a cynic, but despite my hopes, I don't see this happening. Why should they cut down their game and sell it in cheaper parts to people who only want to play single player when they can charge the whole package for 60 dollars regardless of which you want to play?

 

[Puddleknock]

Well I tried the Killzone multiplayer yesterday and I'm now really tempted to buy it, so the I'd say I can see the potential in this approach.

I hated it for the first half an hour but by the time I reached level 10, the end of the demo, I wanted more. It did help that I was posting scores like I never have on fps. Going 25-6 and best score in the match is a first for me in my long time in gaming, I'm simply terrible at all shooters bar this apparently. Though I'd put it down to most players being on the trial and I happened to get to grips with the mechanics quicker.

But I do hope this approach works, nice to see something other than "buy our full price game". This approach is likely to get people like me, who casually play fps online multiplayer and care not for FPS singleplayer, to get buy their game.

 

[Eggsnham]

Wait. Killzone 3 multiplayer is a free, standalone product now?

Of all the times for my PS3 to break, it HAD to be now?! WHY, GOD?

 

[Leg End]

Wait. Killzone 3 multiplayer is a free, standalone product now?

Of all the times for my PS3 to break, it HAD to be now?! WHY, GOD?

More of a trial, but yes.