Bioware looking to make SWTOR Free to Play

[MelodieOctavia]

Back in December, Bioware swore up and down they weren't looking into F2P for their fledgling MMO. It seems their tune has changed after a few botched updates, and a good chunk of their player base moved on to greener pastures. In a recent interview with lead designer Emmanuel Lusinchi, he spilled the beans that he's looking into making SWTOR a F2P MMORPG.

He is quoted as saying "The MMO market is very dynamic and we need to be dynamic as well," he says. "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."

Can't say I didn't see it coming.

Source

 

[Satangel]

So wait, this is that MMORPG that has been out for about 6 months now and they had to pay for, and now they are willing to make it F2P? MMO-world really is changing fast then if you look at it.....

 

[Rydian]

Unless people are happy with what they have, they are constantly demanding updates

Oh jesus fucking christ.

Tell me they didn't expect to put out a static MMO with no updates.

Somebody please tell me that wasn't their plan.

 

[RupeeClock]

Unless people are happy with what they have, they are constantly demanding updates

Oh jesus fucking christ.

Tell me they didn't expect to put out a static MMO with no updates.

Somebody please tell me that wasn't their plan.

They had no clue what-so-ever about how to handle an MMO.

Right now they have a legacy system, where characters receive benefits from other characters on your account, sort of a family tree thing.
Anyhow they recently announced character transfers from servers to pre-determined servers. You don't get to choose which server to transfer to.
The first day they had server transfers to the most active server on the site, The Fatman.
Many people already re-rolled on The Fatman, others wanted to go there anyway because they'd actually be playing with other people.
Anyhow the next day, none of the server transfers available were to The Fatman, but another server. Apparently people who had planned to transfer all their characters to The Fatman now can't and this breaks the legacy system.

Oh and another thing, apparently coming later will be paid transfers.
Yeah that's right, apparently you have to pay a fee just to have a character on a server that is not dead, can you believe that crap?

 

[Clarky]

I remeber Patcher was going on about this on saying how he couldn't see this going f2p due to it being the Star Wars name and how Lucasarts wouldn't go along with it still if it did i may be encouraged to look into it

 

[Skelletonike]

I only played the game for like 3 days on a trial, it's not the kind of MMO I'd pay to play, but if it goes F2P, I might very well play it. =3

I'm all for F2P games as long as they have proper micro-transactions.

 

[DarkStriker]

Why dont we all just go and watch the movie and enjoy it more than this MMO.

 

[chartube12]

Ugh. They should do buy to play instead. Where you buy the game but there isn't a month fee. Make players have to buy expansion packs like Guild Wars. F2P with the alcarte shit is really expansive to the players wallets.

 

[C-Kronos]

Why dont we all just go and watch the movie and enjoy it more than this MMO.

Okay.. Do you know anything about KOTOR and TOR...? The KOTOR story was a lot more epic than the story of the movies. What do you mean by the movie, as there are 6 movies..

 

[DarkStriker]

Okay.. Do you know anything about KOTOR and TOR...? The KOTOR story was a lot more epic than the story of the movies. What do you mean by the movie, as there are 6 movies..

Lol umad bro? I played and finsihed both KotOR 1&2 on my xbox and PC. And hell i was raping everyone. KotOR1 is the friggin game that made me like bioware and especially DA which should be obvious. Let me tell you this. I wouldnt bother to play through a game with crappy wow-like gameplay just for the story. I might as well go to a dedicated wiki site and read the damn lore there. Way more enjoyable. I was referreing to the movie because really.. that game is damn crappy and i rather watch a good old 1977 movie than play this game while having to pay for it..

EDIT: Okey its not really that crappy lol.. But its no different in WoW once played. You just live in a more awesome universe with lighsabers(Who doesnt like lightsabers anyway?!?)

 

[Izzy011]

I guess the TORtanic really will sink

 

[Gahars]

It's a changing market out there, and developers have to adapt and change with the times if they want to keep up. Free to Play seems to be the wave of the future; not even this game could withstand the tide.

Still, it would be nice to see if a move to a F2P model could get the MMO back on course. One of my friends really loves the game, and I'd hate to see it flounder so quickly.

 

[AlanJohn]

Woah, it's flopping even faster then I expected.
This should be interesting.

 

[Deleted User]

Woah, it's flopping even faster then I expected.
This should be interesting.

Actually, This "article" is bullshit, The game is NOT going free to play.

While I don't play anymore because I, moved over to D3. The game is doing really well right now.

They just unlocked server transfers, and there's about 10 FULL servers on US now, 10 people I know that quit are now playing again, PVP is shining, and subs have been going back up.

Ranked PVP is coming out soon, Revised Raids, New planets, Races, Levels, Story etc are coming soon, So no, It's not failing.


Last but not least, Even if it WAS true, F2P doesn't mean the game is BAD, There are a lot of GOOD free to play games.

 

[Minox]

Woah, it's flopping even faster then I expected.
This should be interesting.

Actually, This "article" is bullshit, The game is NOT going free to play.

While I don't play anymore because I, moved over to D3. The game is doing really well right now.

They just unlocked server transfers, and there's about 10 FULL servers on US now, 10 people I know that quit are now playing again, PVP is shining, and subs have been going back up.

Ranked PVP is coming out soon, Revised Raids, New planets, Races, Levels, Story etc are coming soon, So no, It's not failing.


Last but not least, Even if it WAS true, F2P doesn't mean the game is BAD, There are a lot of GOOD free to play games.

I'm not quite sure how you can claim this without knowing how their incomes and expenses for the game in question looks. Sure, there might be quite a few people playing but if it's not profitable then even if the players that do play it enjoy it then that doesn't necessarily mean it's working out in the long term.

 

[Deleted User]

Woah, it's flopping even faster then I expected.
This should be interesting.

Actually, This "article" is bullshit, The game is NOT going free to play.

While I don't play anymore because I, moved over to D3. The game is doing really well right now.

They just unlocked server transfers, and there's about 10 FULL servers on US now, 10 people I know that quit are now playing again, PVP is shining, and subs have been going back up.

Ranked PVP is coming out soon, Revised Raids, New planets, Races, Levels, Story etc are coming soon, So no, It's not failing.


Last but not least, Even if it WAS true, F2P doesn't mean the game is BAD, There are a lot of GOOD free to play games.

I'm not quite sure how you can claim this without knowing how their incomes and expenses for the game in question looks. Sure, there might be quite a few people playing but if it's not profitable then even if the players that do play it enjoy it then that doesn't necessarily mean it's working out in the long term.

MMO's take years to profit, but as of the "Right now" The game is doing great for a 'NEW' mmo.

It made more sales in its first month, than most mmo's do in YEARS.

That alone is a success.

 

[Rydian]

MMO's take years to profit, but as of the "Right now" The game is doing great for a 'NEW' mmo.

It made more sales in its first month, than most mmo's do in YEARS.

That alone is a success.

Er, "income" =/= "profit".

 

[DSGamer64]

Unless people are happy with what they have, they are constantly demanding updates

Oh jesus fucking christ.

Tell me they didn't expect to put out a static MMO with no updates.

Somebody please tell me that wasn't their plan.

They had no clue what-so-ever about how to handle an MMO.

Right now they have a legacy system, where characters receive benefits from other characters on your account, sort of a family tree thing.
Anyhow they recently announced character transfers from servers to pre-determined servers. You don't get to choose which server to transfer to.
The first day they had server transfers to the most active server on the site, The Fatman.
Many people already re-rolled on The Fatman, others wanted to go there anyway because they'd actually be playing with other people.
Anyhow the next day, none of the server transfers available were to The Fatman, but another server. Apparently people who had planned to transfer all their characters to The Fatman now can't and this breaks the legacy system.

Oh and another thing, apparently coming later will be paid transfers.
Yeah that's right, apparently you have to pay a fee just to have a character on a server that is not dead, can you believe that crap?

And? Blizzard has been charging for server transfers since they started doing them for WoW. It isn't free labour to move character data from one server host to another you know.

And if people want to cry about not being able to play on a specific server, that is their problem. There is nothing in the terms of use about being able to transfer characters to a high population server. And why would Bioware let people continually overload one server just because EVERYONE wants to transfer to it? That isn't how MMO's work and you would kill servers with extremely high populations, long queue times just to get in and far more lag then is bearable and that is going to turn people away from the game. Free to play but having paid services like character transfers makes a lot of sense, I always felt that Blizzard was gouging WoW players with having a subscription fee then paid services on top of it which are horribly overpriced by the way.

SWTOR isn't going F2P either, up to level 15 won't require a subscription but after that you have to pay. That seems like a reasonably smart marketing tactic, if players like the game enough they will pay the subscription, too bad WoW never offered that unless you put in your credit card information, something SWTOR would be wise not to have.

 

[Rydian]

I like Runescape's handle on the whole server thing, where character data is stored in one huge database and temporarily sent to whatever server you decide to log into. Then you can swap around (with a one-minute delay for the transfer) to join your friends on whatever server, no manual intervention needed. When you log out, the server you were on sends the data back to the main database so you can log back onto whatever other server.

 

[AlanJohn]

Woah, it's flopping even faster then I expected.
This should be interesting.

Actually, This "article" is bullshit, The game is NOT going free to play.

While I don't play anymore because I, moved over to D3. The game is doing really well right now.

They just unlocked server transfers, and there's about 10 FULL servers on US now, 10 people I know that quit are now playing again, PVP is shining, and subs have been going back up.

Ranked PVP is coming out soon, Revised Raids, New planets, Races, Levels, Story etc are coming soon, So no, It's not failing.


Last but not least, Even if it WAS true, F2P doesn't mean the game is BAD, There are a lot of GOOD free to play games.

I'm not quite sure how you can claim this without knowing how their incomes and expenses for the game in question looks. Sure, there might be quite a few people playing but if it's not profitable then even if the players that do play it enjoy it then that doesn't necessarily mean it's working out in the long term.

MMO's take years to profit, but as of the "Right now" The game is doing great for a 'NEW' mmo.

It made more sales in its first month, than most mmo's do in YEARS.

That alone is a success.

Every month the number of subscribers and online players drop drastically.
Yeah, maybe the beginning of TOR was good, but the future doesn't seem very bright.