Quote:
Originally Posted by greldor
http://www.runesofmagic.com/us/index.html
This looks alot like WoW. Anyone have any experience with it? The thought of a free MMO with full support and a large community has its benefits.
Your thoughts. . .
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My thoughs? The Asian MMO industry is a pile of garbage, with some hidden gems in them that get no respect, and they get tossed away and never seen again because of the behemoth of simplistic, casual games takes over them. (See: Runescape and Maplestory, two games of terrible quality with large playerbases, normally with simpleminded elitists and little to no pvp.)
The other issue with this type of game is that free games only work if 1) They are FPS games, not MMOFPS games though that is what I am hoping one of them sees works, and 2) They have some depth to them OTHER than kill enemy, receive loot.
Most of the free games these days are very simplistic, and are hack'n'slash. If you add a level of complexity but not too complex that you start to lose the depth of the game, that would be a fun game.
An example of a game that does this from launch: EverQuest II
While not being free, there is more to do in the game than kill mob, finish quest, receive loot, and sell loot, turn in quest, go back to game. The game's quests normally are not kill quests, deliver quests, but many of them have an intriguing storyline that goes along with them that ties into the lore. It's the reason I played the game, the quests had more to them that kill or deliver quests.
Why isn't EverQuest II as popular as say, Runescape? The main barrier there is not the content, it is the concept of it being free. I am pretty sure if you added station cash items that make the game not unbalanced but free to play, SOE would lose its core customers and gain about 500,000 more on top of that.
The simple reason? The game would be free, the people that can't handle a 4 gigabyte download are probably going to be stuck playing runescape anyway, and have a terrible connection speed to be even connected to it as well.
I'm just sayin' that yes, the free business model is right, however they're doing it wrong. Yes, charge people for item shop items. No, do not make the game pay to play. No, do not make the item shop items gamebreaking over high-end raid content, Yes, include fluff items with the paying options.
Someday people will get it right.