It's becoming hard to count how many MMORPGs have gone head to head with World of Warcraft and then quietly faded away. BioWare's The Old Republic, with the combination of a prized license and respected developer, is one of the few expected to stand a chance in the marketplace. But as more and more developers retreat to a free-to-play model, BioWare's Dr. Greg Zeschuk told Videogamer.com that he can see it becoming the more common sales approach for games.
"I think you do actually see [free-to-play dominance] in Korea," he said. "But even there it's not fully dominant. Even while there's a lot of free-to-play games there, there are still subscription MMOs in Korea. It's one of the elements, it could even become the dominant one at some point, but at the same time it doesn't preclude other opportunities."
He also suggests that subscription and free MMOs need to be defined in the design stage, so the developers can follow through with the chosen model. "The expectation is that for a subscription it will be deeper and have other longer-term benefits that perhaps would be as significant in a free-to-play game. Or maybe the free-to-play game will offer the exact same thing, but it's going to cost you the exact same thing anyway [via micro-transactions]."
This doesn't mean that The Old Republic will be free-to-play, of course. Though BioWare hasn't outlined its pricing model, all indications so far -- including Zeschuk's comments about game depth -- point to a subscription model.
And while not a direct cause or response to Zeschuk's comments, this comes as interestingly timed in light of recent remarks by Bigpoint CEO Heiko Hubertz and reported by IGN. Hubertz expressed doubt that The Old Republic could turn a profit using a subscription model, claiming it would need over a million active subscribers over an extended period of time. We'll see whether it hits that target when it launches next year.
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