Rumor: Star Trek Online Might Boldly Become Free
- Thread starter vansau
- Start date
I've never played it, but know a couple people who do. It's basically Guild Wars-esque in that you go around instances (dungeons) with a party that you find in specified "hub" areas.vansau said:
However, I'm pretty sure that DDO is now completely free if you choose it to be (it used to have a subscription fee / purchase price, but Turbine recently made it free-to-play). There's no initial purchase, even. There are microtransactions and optional subscriptions if you want better items, but it's possible to play the entire game for free. Obviously, this separates it from Guild Wars in that the latter still requires a fee to buy the game, even though there's no subscription fee afterwards.
I wouldn't even bother if it was free. MMOs are the devil's plaything. THE DEVIL'S PLAYTHING!
WoW withdrawals are a ***** :/
WoW withdrawals are a ***** :/
At least the option is there to get everything without having money. Paying is just an alternative. It's not like it's restricting content. Also, who the hell actually needs all the elite skills? Know what build you're going for, look the skill up on the Guild Wars Wiki, find the boss and grab it.Starke said:Then you turn around and get suckered into spending $70 on the real money store to unlock all the new skills because you don't have time to keep doing the ascension missions over and over to unlock all the elite skills...Mr. Mike said:
It's the only MMO I've played so I can't really compare it. Basically, aside from towns, everything is instanced. You can only take with you a maximum of 8 skills and usually have a party of 8 or so. Equipment, both weapons and armor, have maximum stats and a max-stat item is easy to find. Max level is 20, which is very easy to reach. You have a primary and secondary class, each with attributes and skills that get more powerful based on the level of the attribute. So the focus of it all is the combination of skills you bring to the table. Also, respec-ing is very simple, you can take points out of 1 attribute and put them into another.vansau said:
That was a little convoluted. And yeah there are your standard PvE, PvP, dungeons of sorts and a few other things. And campaign missions. I don't know if other MMOs have that, but since everything is instanced there is like a main mission line you can follow, doing so allowing you to access new areas.
This was more snark than anything else. The game's the game's online store does seem to undermine a huge chunk of the game, though.Mr. Mike said:At least the option is there to get everything without having money. Paying is just an alternative. It's not like it's restricting content. Also, who the hell actually needs all the elite skills? Know what build you're going for, look the skill up on the Guild Wars Wiki, find the boss and grab it.Starke said:Then you turn around and get suckered into spending $70 on the real money store to unlock all the new skills because you don't have time to keep doing the ascension missions over and over to unlock all the elite skills...Mr. Mike said:
I think more MMOs need to do something like that. The biggest barrier for getting into an MMO is that they ALWAYS require a monthly fee. That was fine when there were only a couple MMOs to choose from, but now-a-days it seems that every-other game is an MMO. Allowing for free accounts, but restricting access to the game in some way (be it not allowing certain things, or limiting game-time per week or day, or whatever) is a good way to draw-in more players who are interested in playing the game casually, but don't want to have to be tied to a monthly fee to do so.
As someone else said on this thread, Ragnarok Online's Valkyrie servers are probably one of the best free to play implementations ever, that and Runescape of course which lets you transfer your Free character to Member servers and back at any time.
Though now that I think about it, I'd rather not touch Star Trek Online, Cryptic mean well but they cannot design a proper MMORPG if their life depended on it.
I mean I love some of their game's concepts (City of Heroes/Villains which is not owned by them anymore) but their horridly repeated instances,grind fest galore and in CoH's case the complete degradation of all their so called super hero archetypes due to crippling monthly nerfing makes other mmorpgs look like heaven on toast when it comes to content.
Though now that I think about it, I'd rather not touch Star Trek Online, Cryptic mean well but they cannot design a proper MMORPG if their life depended on it.
I mean I love some of their game's concepts (City of Heroes/Villains which is not owned by them anymore) but their horridly repeated instances,grind fest galore and in CoH's case the complete degradation of all their so called super hero archetypes due to crippling monthly nerfing makes other mmorpgs look like heaven on toast when it comes to content.
Even if it takes a few years to become f2p, that should give Cryptic a lot of time to actually finish making the game. I tried out the trial period and it seemed awful, in its current state that game should be free to play anyway, with the disk replacing the toy you get in a Happy Meal
IMO a lifetime sub is for suckers. I'm not trying to insult anyone, but just take a step back and look at it this way....
If the game can grab, and maintain your interest enough to keep you playing for years, they are better off NOT allowing a lifetime sub. However, if the game isn't panning out that well, they can offer a lifetime sub for those who think it's going well as a kind of bailout, or trying to salvage something by having something of a "permanent" community.
How much would WoW have lost if they offered lifetime subs? I don't play it but it's been around long enough that the loss could have been substantial.
If the game can grab, and maintain your interest enough to keep you playing for years, they are better off NOT allowing a lifetime sub. However, if the game isn't panning out that well, they can offer a lifetime sub for those who think it's going well as a kind of bailout, or trying to salvage something by having something of a "permanent" community.
How much would WoW have lost if they offered lifetime subs? I don't play it but it's been around long enough that the loss could have been substantial.
