Starcraft 2: MMORTS?

[IronStorm9]

I just bought a copy of Starcraft 2 today and I noticed it came with 2 "guest passes." These allow the recipient to have a battle.net account for Starcraft 2 for about 7 hours. This, combined with the fact that only one person can have a specific CD key at a time and the file I noticed the game installing called "BILLING.XML" or something, makes me nervous. What if Blizzard starts making us pay to play a game we already bought? What if the "Guest passes" are like WoW's "14-day trials"? Am I paranoid, or does this represent a more profit-hungry paradigm in the games industry?

 

[Grigori361]

No idea, but if it is I WILL boycott SC2, since I have yet to get it.

 

[Gxas]

I'm pretty sure they give two people a chance to try Starcraft out for a few hours to see if they like it.

I'm pretty sure that it has already been stated that Battle.net 2.0 and all the games on it, save WoW, will be free to play.

 

[guardian001]

I don't think you know what MMO means...

The term you're looking for is "Subscription Based." And although it wouldn't exactly be surprising, I doubt Blizzard would ever try to make it subscription based. They'd lose all of their customers. People don't want subscriptions to things that aren't constantly getting new content.

The guest passes are identical to WoW's 14 day trial, in that they give you the game free for X days, and hope that afterwards you buy it. But I doubt they'd try to push subscription based after release. It'd just be a bad business decision.

The file probably just lets you buy the game immediately after your trial runs out. I doubt they'd include it at all if it weren't going to be used right away.

 

[IronStorm9]

Yeah, but you can only have the game on one comp at a time. Even if both computers are yours you can't use the same code twice

 

[mad825]

Yeah, but you can only have the game on one comp at a time. Even if both computers are yours you can't use the same code twice

this has been in the news

so really the fears should be over now

 

[Cherry Cola]

Yeah, but you can only have the game on one comp at a time. Even if both computers are yours you can't use the same code twice

That's DRM, not a sign that Starcraft 2 is becoming subscription based.

As for the trial, that's just the same thing as a demo, only timed, and it's a much better way to give out demo's for online multiplayer games than simply limiting customizable choices and maps.

Blizzard aren't exactly that desperate for cash

 

[TerranReaper]

The guest passes are basically for whoever wants to try out Starcraft 2 for a certain amount of time.

 

[TsunamiWombat]

I just bought a copy of Starcraft 2 today and I noticed it came with 2 "guest passes." These allow the recipient to have a battle.net account for Starcraft 2 for about 7 hours. This, combined with the fact that only one person can have a specific CD key at a time and the file I noticed the game installing called "BILLING.XML" or something, makes me nervous. What if Blizzard starts making us pay to play a game we already bought? What if the "Guest passes" are like WoW's "14-day trials"? Am I paranoid, or does this represent a more profit-hungry paradigm in the games industry?

Let me explain.

You have nothing to worry about subscriptions, the billing file relates to two different things:

1. Blizzards D2D Download service - you can download and buy the game digitally from Blizzards website.

2. Different regions have different price schemes. It was announced a while back that regions like Korea, China, Etc, would be able to buy the full game at 60 dollars like everyone else, OORRR, pay 30 dollars, get the singleplayer campaign, and pay subscription/buy time for multiplayer and battle.net. The economics simply are that in most parts of the world dropping 60 usd on a vidya game is IM-FORKING-POSSIBLE. Now, Blizzard is a GLOBAL company. They don't just sell in the US/Canada/Mexico/EU/Western Hemisphere. Hell, their biggest fans are in Korea.

So, they offered alternative pricing schemes in these regions to better tap that demographic, which doesn't necessarily have large chunks of liquid income but are more readily accepting of subscriptions and microtransactions.

This is also why the game is region locked.

In any case, if you pay the straight 60 quid price, Battle.net is free forever and ever, amen. So no worries.