After 13 Years, Eve Online Supporting Version of Free-to-Play

[sativa green]

One of the oldest MMOs that features a monthly subscriptions model is addressing falling subscription numbers by offering a version of free-to-play to access to core features of the game.

I wish UO embrace this model try to rework the "Trial Accounts" to "Free Accounts" by extending the trial accounts to remain active indefinitely keeping similar restrictions they do now but with the intention to allow new users to build lasting accounts. The idea would be to remove "Trial" in the name and allow the company to market a "Free" to play option.

Obviously this isn't a new idea by any stretch of the imagination, just relevant with even older MMOs turning toward a "free" to play option. I would hope this would help drive new player traffic and with restrictions in place to entice subscription model.

This would give room to further reward subscribers over "free" accounts beyond more than just being able to own a house, or say use powerscrolls for example.

Original article here: Introducing Clone States and the Future of Access to EVE Online - EVE Community

Video from Eve devs here:

 

[CovenantX]

We'll see.... soon™

I'd be surprised if some form of Free-to-play isn't what they have planned to announce by the end of this year, the addition of an in-game store suggests it.

As far as UO being released and usable through Steam, I'm not sure if that would ever happen. Mainly because of the Origin platform. It would help UO, but it would reflect negatively towards EA....not that they seem to be doing anything to fix the problems they have already... ha... *sigh*

 

[sativa green]

After reading a few of your posts and their overall focus of the in-game store, I wouldn't be surprised either. It really needs it. Hopefully that gives them the funding they need to work on core systems that desperately need it.

 

[Drakelord]

That was a very young looking young man or woman, no clue, sound female yet there were no other ID markers saying female. I love to see something like this in UO, my grandkids have always loved watching me play the game, yet their parents were not ready to shell out a monthly payment. It would be a good way to show them the world of UO for a longer period then the 14-Day Free Trial. Maybe if they cap the skills at 90 and did not allow them houses since only a paid subscription can hold a house today. If they did pay the monthly fees but a lapse in payment pushes the skills back to 90 caps.

 

[THP]

TFP is the way forward ,,were u have ti buy the better stuff like housing or powerng up to 120 skills... etc etc. Lots of game work on this principle

alas the doom mongers and such will be at it like hammer and tong to say not....whatever....imho ....it will

 

[Capt. Lucky]

A lot of "Eve speak" in there lol. What the hell is she talking about

 

[Uvtha]

A lot of "Eve speak" in there lol. What the hell is she talking about

Limited characters (from what I can tell, limited ship access, skills and slower skill gain) for free, if you subscribe everything unlocks, if you at any time you unsubscribe you keep all of your progress but revert back to limited character, making all of the "unlocked" stuff inaccessible till you reup.

Correct me if I'm wrong EVE players.

 

[Capt. Lucky]

I really wanted to try Eve. It sounded very cool and I like space. So I got the free trial, tried to fly. My ship was going like upside down and sideways (there might not be "up" in space but my monitor has it) for about a half hour so I gave up lol Plus I think a person can really only do 1 MMO at a time and be good at it.

 

[Drakelord]

I really wanted to try Eve. It sounded very cool and I like space. So I got the free trial, tried to fly. My ship was going like upside down and sideways (there might not be "up" in space but my monitor has it) for about a half hour so I gave up lol Plus I think a person can really only do 1 MMO at a time and be good at it.

Ya someone gave me a WOW account (they quit to go there) all paid for a month level 90 char and all. I hated it. Oh don't get me wrong the art was great, I just got tired of seeing the Butt of the character I had while running, running, running, running, running, running.

 

[Capt. Lucky]

Ya someone gave me a WOW account (they quit to go there) all paid for a month level 90 char and all. I hated it. Oh don't get me wrong the art was great, I just got tired of seeing the Butt of the character I had while running, running, running, running, running, running.

I actually got into DAoC for awhile. Got up to like level 50 or something. I'm really particular about art and that game didn't offend me lol

 

[Drakelord]

I actually got into DAoC for awhile. Got up to like level 50 or something. I'm really particular about art and that game didn't offend me lol

Ya I was so lost with a level 90 char there, start a new one with same skills to just learn the game, once that char hit level 25 I was ready to work the level 90, but it was still the same, watching the butt run down the road.

 

[Capt. Lucky]

Ya I was so lost with a level 90 char there, start a new one with same skills to just learn the game, once that char hit level 25 I was ready to work the level 90, but it was still the same, watching the butt run down the road.

When Ever Quest came out my kids wanted to try it so i got a couple boxes. I was gonna be an elf. So I treated it like UO and clicked on an NPC who got mad and kicked me outta the elf tree, I couldn't figure out how to get back up there and said screw it lol Patience has never been my strong point lol

 

[Capt. Lucky]

It was always better to let the kids play whatever game for a month first, then they could show me how it all worked So much easier!

 

[Lex Darion]

I hope that someone from Broadsword takes time to read through these wall of texts.


My vision of UO is the following (to begin with):

Two tiers of gameplay:

Free tier with following limitations:
- no x-shard transfer of characters
- no housing
- no vet reward "claims"
- can't use portals / teleport skills (why you ask? see below *)
Other than that, they are free to play as normal characters.
- excluded from playing on the top 97 percentile populated shards so that much needed playerbase is established on the "dying" shards.

In the future, free tiers might get housing as well. but with the original house decay rules from 1999. (No automatic refreshing, very quick IDOCs).

Paying tier:
- As today.
- The monthly subscription (equal amount of money will give some points to spend in the UO ingame shop).


* Free tier should require help from paying characters for many social aspects of the game.
(storage, travel etc)

This helps interacting with new and old characters. They will seek out "veterans" of UO who play, and even be enticed to subscribe in the future.
Storage will be used up quickly even with bank boxes. Perhaps let new players only place houses in Malas and those ghost town facets.


UO is a great game, even with the added work of traveling by foot.
As a longterm roleplayer, that was how we did it. Us roleplayers provided the random encounters you saw everywhere on many of the shards as we didnt teleport or gate around as much.

Roleplayers might just be "lame" people who arent as "leet" but we brought a lot of activity to the shards with a vibrant living community.
Many of my fellow roleplayers feel today that UO isnt worth paying for. In the long run, they feel they have paid more than enough for the game over all these years.
I'm on my 19th year myself.. and yes, it's adding up. In my guild of more than 500 players (one of Europas largest at a time) , less than 5 are still login on weekly basis. 10-15 sporadically.


I've used what I learnt in UO over the past 19 years and applied it to the game projects I've been involved in.
And cant be thankful enough to UO and how it has helped shape me.
That's why it'd be great to see UO become a vibrant community once more (on more than one shard).

 

[arkiu]

If UO were to go this route, please no caps on skills - that just limits so much of the game. There are other things that can be limited as insentive to go with a sub i.e. housing, xsharding, vet rewards, ethys, expansions etc. Limiting skills just gives a player a reason to quit after a certain point if they refuse to sub, I feel.

 

[Drakelord]

If UO were to go this route, please no caps on skills - that just limits so much of the game. There are other things that can be limited as insentive to go with a sub i.e. housing, xsharding, vet rewards, ethys, expansions etc. Limiting skills just gives a player a reason to quit after a certain point if they refuse to sub, I feel.

Well, we could go with a 100 cap, 700 total points, that what we all had years ago before the 720 cap and Power Scrolls and we did just fine, no access to Expansions, no housing, no x sharding, no vet rewards. Since the Ethys are allowed regardless of the age of account today I would say go for it, let them have it if someone gives them one.

 

[arkiu]

Yea man but that was over a decade ago and the game has changed a lot since then. I believe that limiting a characters progression would burn the motivation to keep playing for no subs. If it were me and I didnt want to sub, I would think the game is pay to win which could suck for player retention.

I once strongly opposed UO going f2p but now think its the only way this game can survive if done correctly. There has been zero population growth and only decline in the last... who knows how many years. I doubt any new content is going to draw in new players.

Its time for a big change in UO. Hopefully the devs or EA wont prevent this.

 

[Poo]

That was a very young looking young man or woman, no clue, sound female yet there were no other ID markers saying female. I love to see something like this in UO, my grandkids have always loved watching me play the game, yet their parents were not ready to shell out a monthly payment. It would be a good way to show them the world of UO for a longer period then the 14-Day Free Trial. Maybe if they cap the skills at 90 and did not allow them houses since only a paid subscription can hold a house today. If they did pay the monthly fees but a lapse in payment pushes the skills back to 90 caps.

thats funny, i thought the exact same thing.
im like.... female...... male...... hermaphrodite????
is there an adams apple?

 

[petemage]

FTP with Mesanna as producer. Just wait for the finger pointing at everybody but her when she messes the concept up.

 

[Merlin]

Leave everything as is.

"Free to play" will ruin UO.

 

[arkiu]

Ahh man common lets not deny the obvious here. Walk around any shard not named Atlantic and tell me UO in its current state isn't just a big empty online world. Ruin UO? Can't get much worse than this bud.

But petemage brings up a valid point. Could easily be so poorly executed by the dev team that the game finally keels over. I'd say risk it for the possibility of revitalizing a dying game.

 

[ambrossia]

They could, at the very least, start by getting rid of the 14 day free trial and making it something like 60 days.
I couldn't even imagine how long it would take a completely new player to learn the game.....

 

[Stubentiger]

You normally have 30 minutes I think to catch the attention of a player.
FTP for UO would help maybe to get older players back, but no new ones.

Will try eve again I think, the 14 day trial of eve did not keep my interest before, maybe now?

 

[Uvtha]

that just limits so much of the game

Yup. That's the idea. The whole point of f2p is just to get people past the entry barrier.

 

[Val-Tur]

I started playing MMO's under the standard pay model during the early days of UO & EverQuest (original). I have also played dozens of F2P games over the years. I can honestly say I am personally not a fan of the F2P model for rebuilding a player base. I think the F2P model & the micro transition system (pay to win & shiny in-game baubles) that comes with it, is an abomination. Real money transactions have ruined so much of UO, and the micro-transaction system (that inevitably comes with F2P) is the same thing under different management. It pretty much kills future content. The company is so worried about milking the player base out of $, they design all future content with that mentality. You are nickled & dimed around every corner of the content. It is difficult to explain here how bad this system takes over a game, but if you ever played Lineage 2 or Perfect World (and their clones), you already know 2 of the worst examples of how this system is.

UO needs marketing exposure. But before it does that, it needs to support new players without holding their hands. Every other MMO I have played has official forums in which you know where to go to ask questions or get tech support. This game? I cannot get an in game GM to respond when I need them. I almost lost 100 blackthorn artifacts that I spent 2 weeks grinding for because no GM was available during prime time. I had to go to UHaul and get help from the 10 people who happened to be browsing at that moment. One of them knew what to do.

UO needs to adopt the philosophy of easy to get started but hard to master the game. UO is a complex game with many conflicting systems. It needs a lot of easy to access guides. The Imbuing system, reforging system, making suits, etc - all of this stuff veteran players know where to go to get help. New players who did not grow up with the hardcore older mmo's are at a distinct disadvantage. They get frustrated if they cannot figure it out in 30 min & leave. A new player should be able to jump right into a game & start moving in some direction. New opportunities should open up fairly quickly to move in different directions. That requires support (easy to access & understand guides). They also need someone to talk to. Look, I am about as old school as it comes to UO. I got dropped into this game as my first MMO & had no guidance whatsoever. I simply learned by asking people really dumb questions like, will someone buy this ore I just mined? I got laughed at and told, no idiot go smelt it and then sell. To which I asked how do you smelt it?

Engaging content. Some of the best content in UO were the year long story arcs that had several plot twists every few weeks. Kotl while new, is just another kill till you get x amount of drops system. After we get our toys, we will stop going. Players want to remember being a part of something. Inu the Crone story arc was one of my most memorable. I felt a part of something. I remember "being there". I think "live" content was one of the best parts of UO's history and its past popularity.

14 days is also not enough to see if you want to spend years invested in a game. 30 days at a minimum.

With its current population, UO is a very lonely game to get started in. When I started, hundreds of people wanted to be your friends or lure you out & kill you. Sometimes they did both =p. I have a hard time seeing just what a magic combination of things will be to bring new people in. I will play off and on no matter how many people are around.

 

[Aran]

Oh good another free to play thread, just what we needed

 

[Flagg]

Core of the problem has to do with how UO already is a free to play game for huge portion of the people playing it. ( freeshards..)

At the same time, with in-game shop implemented, Broadsword is now running one of the core structures of any modern F2P game. Beyond the new shop it has, for over 10 years, been possible to officially buy in-game items with RL cash. Sum of all parts is that UO basically feels like one leg towards F2P already.

Frankly, I feel housing would be only hard limit necessary to introduce to freeloaders. Besides and beyond that, give em the full game. Maybe some form of cash trade restriction too. Gold cap at 50 mils etc.


That said, tis hard to say if UO could, even in theory, ever make the leap. I recon it'd require bit more solid code; exploits of any nature should be way harder to pull off.

You normally have 30 minutes I think to catch the attention of a player.
FTP for UO would help maybe to get older players back, but no new ones.

I'm quite certain there is nothing anyone could do to bring some notable flock of brand new players in. Any and all F2P initiatives, marketing and other hopes reside among people who have had UO on their radar for decades as it is. Either they have played it in 90's/early 00s or at least remember coveting it as kid, etc. Almost every " new player" is actually an old player.

I'd purely guesstimate that concept and possibility of trying UO on a Broadsword shard is on radar of like 300k people. (current free sharders+people who have played UO in past, have since quit but have not forgotten + people who remember 'always' wanting to try UO)
If we'd get 10% of those 300k in with F2P that would be 30k new players. That would be huge.

 

[Uvtha]

I have a hard time seeing just what a magic combination of things will be to bring new people in.

The only thing that would majorly impact the new flow of people to this game would be to offer a free option. It's a game with a niche appeal regardless, but the easier it is to get in the more new players you will get.

There's no need to nickle and dime anyone either. It should just be what is now a trial account with no time limit, and regular subs, and the item shop with stuff exactly like it has now. Subbed players would see zero change in game other than there being more people around.

Basically, just like EVE is doing.

I also, personally would love if they started offering a service to run your own shard. It would take some development time to make it right, but offering people a personal shard with fully developed tools (basically house design on a world wide scale, with some simple spawn managers, and ruleset options etc.) and maybe even a hosting service, would make nice money I think. Add a network to make these personal shards available to others, sort of a UO version of "Shards Online" and I think you have a good idea brewing. It would be a project, for sure, but...

So people who want to play UO the way they wanna play it can turn to BS for their "free shard" experience, rather than just doing it themselves. There's absolutely a market for personal UO shards.

 

[Uvtha]

Core of the problem has to do with how UO already is a free to play game for huge portion of the people playing it.

F2P would do this. Free shards are great, but there's the issue of corruption, and of stability. There would be plenty of people who would take their zero dollars back to a shard they know won't disappear overnight.

Or like I say, offer people the ability to purchase personal shards with a UI tool suite directly from BS.

 

[arkiu]

All valid points. Despite me personally wanting a f2p model, you make good points @Val-Tur. It would be really nice if the devs could actively chime in on this. I know it has been discussed before with the devs but feel as though when brought up it is usually quickly shot down. I would really just like to know what they think, or maybe f2p is just being gated by EA. Whatever the reason I would just like the massive decline in player population over the last decade to be addressed far more actively.

 

[Val-Tur]

I also, personally would love if they started offering a service to run your own shard. It would take some development time to make it right, but offering people a personal shard with fully developed tools (basically house design on a world wide scale, with some simple spawn managers, and ruleset options etc.) and maybe even a hosting service, would make nice money I think. Add a network to make these personal shards available to others, sort of a UO version of "Shards Online" and I think you have a good idea brewing. It would be a project, for sure, but...

A lot of the newer Western MMO's are doing something like this. Games like ARK, Minecraft, etc. The Eastern games are largely hardcore F2P models. I do not think that UO intended to become the freeshard experience that has split our population. IMO, that was quite honestly an accident or a bad decision by former developers releasing the source code. The freeshard model for a classic MMO like UO should only have been an option later in its life to keep it going when the development staff was cut so drastically. The fact that it started so early in UO's history has led to our population being so spread out. Instead of people staying and fighting for the game they love, they just left for a "greener grass" version of UO.

100's if not 1000's of players have offered to help make the official UO better over the years. Examples such as the high resolution art project that is now disappeared. But that problem is one of a legal nature. I wish UO could somehow find a way to allow the player base to participate directly in UO's developement. Much like a modding community that has grown up around the Elder Scrolls games. But in an official capacity. But companies like EA are so paranoid about the intellectual property rights. That player who posted recently about a UO addon project he was developing is another good example of what could be if the legal hurdles could be overcome.

 

[Lord Frodo]

F2P = Lifting the 15 day limit on trial accounts, problem solved.