BioWare To Take The Old Republic Free-To-Play This Fall

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_EQPUBED7JUPX5RBEQSBVRBXX7E Gramis

I really just wanted to hear the story aspect of the game, and i can do that now. I would love more warzone/flashpoint access, but i guess i can understand them wanting to limit that. My downside is that i might not get to play the race/class combo i want to.

DoctorOverlord

Me too, the storylines were really the only thing I was interested in seeing in this game. It looks like Bioware is actually making that fully accessible which is pleasantly surprising. Perhaps EA doesn’t realize it yet and we’ll see the storylines get gated with cartel coins before the F2P version is released lol.

Mark Ince

Why do people think F2P is the end of SWTOR??? F2P ISNT
THE BE ALL AND END ALL OF MMO GAMES. Look at LOTRO, its the 3rd most
successful MMO atm with active subs, its free to play, it has expansions
left right and centre and the company is making a packet!!! I think this will be a good thing for SWTOR, just like it was for LOTRO

http://www.facebook.com/people/Michael-Johnson/1353890372 Michael Johnson

LOTRO didn’t cost 200 million to make and isn’t fully voiced

Don’t expect much in the way on content for SWTOR here on out
http://twitter.com/THRILLJO Jordan Powell

The quality of LOTRO has fallen drastically with the introduction of F2P. Turbine might be making money, but that has never translated into the content added to the game.
Makeitso GW

FTP is not the end of SWTOR. SWTOR is doing that all by itself.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Phil-Thompson/1646123599 Phil Thompson

Didn’t see that coming.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1317392920 Casey Stavish

They want you to pay for operations and the operations are one of the main problems of this game…. lol Tortanic is right

http://www.facebook.com/domingo4th Domingo Cardona

this made me laugh so hard my ribs felt like they were breaking apart….let’s see how biodrones defend this now.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=670665157 Steven Barker

They are only doing this to try and keep a hold of any players since TSW and GW2 is out in mere weeks. Sadly it seems like this is the end for SWTOR. Had some fun times.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Nae-Bodee/100002134184112 Nae Bodee

Hahaha.

http://twitter.com/Luke_Malcolm Luke Malcolm

We all knew it was coming, I will be playing, I enjoyed it just didn’t wanna pay the sub. They are keeping the sub model though, just limiting the free gameplay.

http://www.facebook.com/jonathan.hornsby.7 Jonathan Hornsby

This is going to fail. Not because of the f2p, but because
it is the wrong kind of f2p. Pay to win isn’t the only kind of bad f2p, content
gating is also bad. No one likes that. So this will be just like Champions
Online; they’ll pick up a few new casual players and keep the old subs who won’t
admit the game is going downhill, but they won’t ever climb back up to where
they were.

When will developers learn that the proper way to go free to
play from a sub isn’t to gate content to force people to pay them? That is only
going to piss off the people who used to pay but left and are not thinking of
coming back. The proper way to go free to play is to create perks for people
who do pay. Like bank slots and character slots and auction slots. You don’t
freaking lock content; all that is going to do is piss people off.

You want to give new content out for free only to the paying
players, and make free accounts buy it like DLC? Fine; that’s cool. That’s
fair. But you don’t start your free to play business model by locking existing
content. Just don’t do it. You’re only going to upset people.

DoctorOverlord

Well said! A good MMO should be designed with the business model in mind from the start, not just have a new one slapped on because the pointy-haired, upper management bosses say so.

This whole things smells too much like EA trying to cut their losses. They are not interested in the game succeeding, they just want to do anything to make the numbers temporarily look better this year so the execs can collect their annual bonuses.

One has to wonder if Bioware is beginning to realize that who they made a deal with when they let EA into the picture.

http://www.facebook.com/davidallmighty David Cohen

F2P wont take out the numerous bugs in 4 mans or take the unplayable lag in the operations. Unless the game gets more stable and content comes out that isn’t buggy and laggy as well, then this won’t bring back any of us who take MMOs more serious.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Michael-Byrne/100001642673542 Michael Byrne

I laughed that the B-Roll here was an Operation…something you cannot do in the Free Model at all lol. Hey, if you wanted to check this game out for the story this is great for you. The software drops to 14.99 on August 7th. If you want to raid (even though the endgame is light right now) you’ll be keeping your sub up. Dead on news hit though: Great for story fans or casual players, no benefit to hardcore PvP ers or Raiders that have been on the fence by going f2p. Nice hit GBTV.
-Magicman

http://profile.yahoo.com/TEIKKTC24GBE63XZULR7YNYPFE Ron

While I feel that something had to change with SWTOR, suddenly shifting free to play isn’t totally surprising, but it iss kinda unexpected partially because, as Mr. Winter said, I frankly don’t see this model really being very beneficial for this game because the core of this game is just the main story mission, which would be free, and the stuff they want to charge for (mainly flashpoints and operations) is still – in the eyes of most – lacking.

But hey, as long as leveling and Huttball is free, they’ll get me back… for a while.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac

It depends. If this draws in people and gives the developers time to focus on content expansion, it might be pretty beneficial. The question will be the rate at which the game expands. And how much certain options appeal to free players insofar as paying for access.

http://profile.yahoo.com/THJWE4XEXAMAPW3CUGPFYCUDHE Prime

THis game was doomed we know it. Jason is on crack. WE all knew EA fails. Bioware failed and didnt put out content THEY DIDNT PLAN THIS.

And JASON they didnt make a 400 mil game for CASUAL players stop trying to spin this….holy hell be a jouranlist!

http://twitter.com/MikeSchaffnit Mike Schaffnit

I think Jason was being the best jouranlist he could be. But thats just my two cents.

As for being a journalist, a true journalist doesn’t let petty emotion get in the way the facts. The news here is that SWTOR went F2P, not if SWTOR is thriving or not because I’m pretty sure a F2P shift after 7 months proves it’s not doing well.

It would be an INCREDIBLY false statement to start outlandishly claiming that this is the death of SWTOR, because it’s not.
- http://twitter.com/Jayeluu Jason Winter
  
  And here we thought I was too harsh…
- http://profile.yahoo.com/YSVAPKVBUPTX6YS3W2DLPOBNN4 AlokP
  
  Replying to the rabid mouth-frothers is pointless, in the end. Reasonable people can see the criticisms Jason brought up and the possible benefits for casual players.

Eggers

This is great Rift, TSW, and Tera are all doing fine with a sub model and now EA and BioWare have either mismanaged this game so bad(which they did 300 million for a game is too much), or are so greedy that they want in the microtransaction market. But really this EA failed by mismanaging this game and going FTP won’t change that. And Origin is fail. EA needs to change it’s attitude towards their customers.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1260066056 Steven Diaz

$300 million IS too much for what they presented. With that amount of money, I would have expect an insanely large MMO with massive amounts of content WITH voice over and cut-scenes, some amazing crafting, free roaming space exploration AND a much better social aspect. Secret World is a tiny fraction of the price and still managed to have voice and cut-scenes with a good story. Can you compare? No, but SWTOR doesn’t stand out in any way. If you took all the games that have better features than SWTOR and add them together they STILL wouldn’t match SWTOR’s price. They squandered that money either by over-paying people or buying better office chairs. I don’t see where any of that money went, I’ve seen MMOs with better graphics, better guild features, better combat, muuuuch more content, much better world story, and waaaay better crafting. I like the idea of companions but the fact that I can barely do anything without the companions makes me feel like I NEED to be a pet handler. If I wanted to be a pet handler, I’d have played a ranger in any number of games. To top it off, we have to deal with a specific pet whether we like it or not because it’s the only one that completes our build. The game doesn’t let me feel like I matter in any way.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac

“…
300 million for a game is too much”.

I swear, each time I hear someone mention the development costs of TOR, it gets bigger and bigger. Like that fish my friend swears he caught.
- Old Ben
  
  Considering it took mankind 5000 years of (monetary) history to be able to produce this game, I think it’s fair to add up all the money that has ever been in circulation and use that value as the total cost involved in the making of SWTOR.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac

I actually thought we’d see TSW make this move first to be honest. It’s the more underwhelming of the two games.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Kris-Yeisley/554290488 Kris Yeisley

Another one bites the dust.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Steve-Connors/636500420 Steve Connors

Uggghh, hope it all works out

M H

This isn’t so bad. Now I will get to play of the character stories that I always wanted to but didn’t because of a EA tag.

http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr

Hmm, not sure if I’ll have time to comeback and finish my Trooper and Jedi storylines.

All depends if GW2 can keep my interest to level an Asura to level 80.

So many 85s to level to 90 in MoP. Those battle pets aren’t going to catch themselves. Someone got to pull those weeds or I’ll never get the goat mount. The undead monk and panda hunter are really calling to me. (level me, level me, gear me, gear me, here’s your BOAs and go ruin peoples day in the level 19 BGs)

http://twitter.com/Deadalon Deadalon

So… No new content untill fall next year ? Sounds like it. They really are messing this up.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac

”
The first of the new updates are expected to hit in August.”

Didn’t read the article, did you?

http://twitter.com/borded nathan law

SURPRISE! (but not really)

http://www.facebook.com/stradus.woods Stradus Woods

This is sad to me. Feels like the designers and game developers failed to do there job. So many little fix’s to the game that are all on just how things flow not content would have made this game 3x better.

I agree with DoctorOverlord feels like they just cut there loses on the game.

O-well maybe some day I’ll get back to the game long enough to complete all the class story lines in the game the only thing I enjoyed. Some how probably in between gw2 stuff. Its hard to justify paying for any sub anymore when GW2 is just so good (my opinion for me).

DoctorOverlord

Thanks for the mention

There were definitely some failures here on the design side (did they really think that space combat would be acceptable in a SW game?) but Bioware’s management deserves some blame as well. MMOs are such massive projects you need really competent people guiding everyone and working closely with the designers to decide what can be done within the budget.

The business side and the creative design side of MMO companies need to closely work hand in hand otherwise – well just look at the string of MMO failures we’ve seen in the last few years. You really have to wonder if maybe Bioware is thinking they should have cut back a bit on the voice-overs and shunted that money to other areas.

I’m reminded of the cutscenes in GW2 since you mentioned that game. They may be somewhat retro but they’re functional, they do the job and ArenaNet has explained they have a system for doing them efficiently. They’re not as cinematic as the Bioware cutscenes but I’ll take a game that has spent its money on game balance and other more critical aspects over something like that.

http://twitter.com/Nin3r Richard Martin

The day after The Republic? Lol, waiting 6 days for them to talk extensively about it.

Matt Korneffel

AHAHAHAHA! Wow… ok yea, “CALLED IT!” — This is literally the death of SW:TOR (don’t stop reading..)

Here is why! BECAUSE IT IS EA BEHIND IT!

No, SW:TOR IS NOT GUILD WARS 2… BDF (Bioware Defence Force), do not try to muddle this issue and compare it to GW2.

Have fun with:

1) DLC — EA loves DLC
2) Paying for PvP — Want into this Warzone? $2 Please!
3) Paying for OPS — Yes, this will happen (If your response is pessimism, guess what… you wouldn’t have believed that it’d be F2P if I told you this last week)
4) Paying for Content/Quests — Read Above
5) Pay to Win — Ok, maybe not 100% to win… but 99% advantages. Again, this is EA… stop being in denial.

You know what, I tried “a lot” for SW:TOR. I sympathize with you if you’re “me” 4 months ago. Please, for your own sake… stop being in denial about SW:TOR, I don’t care if you love/hate WoW but please, just leave SW:TOR… before you regret it more and more down the line. EA is just “THAT” bad.

P.S.: Bioware, meet Westwood… you can now join them in the EA Dungeon.

http://twitter.com/Darkdrakke Alberto

You do realize that a sub fee of 14.99 is paying for content as well????? Anyway Now I can Play Gw2 and SWTOR for free..score!
- http://www.facebook.com/jonathan.hornsby.7 Jonathan Hornsby
  
  That is actually a good idea. I’ve long wanted to try the post-beta version of SWTOR, but my experiences within said beta didn’t exactly inspire me to get the game. So yeah, score.

DarthNoir

Baaahahahahahahahahahahaha

http://www.facebook.com/elias.rowan Elias Rowan

I really don’t see this working for them. They will, most definitely, get more people playing 1-50. No doubt about it. Forcing people to pay to be able to raid, though? Operations… one of the key areas they’ve failed in up to this point.

Someone please take their crack pipe away.

http://profile.yahoo.com/CPCXUABGFWCXJ4SBX6NLLLP7O4 Christian

Lololololol. Oh my god i knew it. The most expensive game to ever be made is now F2P.

Voiced23

The story is phenomenal but the end game can just get boring after a while aka dailys dailys dailys if you are not a raider I can’t help but thinking they should have done this at launch with all this pr junk but either it would just be the same with more bad pr because they spent so much money to make the game sigh.F2P at the begining might have been more encouraging though, what they need to do now is try to get back to what they do best the class storys it is story driven.I hope they can keep up the raiding content but they need to get to more solo based story content soon.

http://www.facebook.com/krister.holmberg Krister Holmberg

I think this is the future for the mmo market. I will go back and play for sure when it is free-to-play. Still one of the best mmo games out there. Especially the leveling content was great.

http://www.facebook.com/stradus.woods Stradus Woods

I hope you mean story content not leveling content.

Bestow

Are you finally going to start throwing SWTOR boxes at each other?

Jay

Was the Hero engine free too? Seems like it…

I’m not even playing it for free until they have time to finish polishing the game.

CCLemon77

They can’t stop the bleeding so it’s damage control at this point.
Yes, there’s bleeding. If there wasn’t, they wouldn’t have needed server merges and transfers.
To try to help keep population in the game, they’re going F2P. With the approach that, even if they(customers) don’t pay a subscription, they’re in the game and have the option to buy stuff. So at least we’re(EA/Bioware) keeping up population and make some money rather than lose our subscribers outright.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1260066056 Steven Diaz

I doubt even this will make me go back. With one character at 50 and two others at 20, I feel like I’ve experienced just about everything this game had to offer. I haven’t seen any new content and I haven’t heard of any plans for new content in the near future so this is pretty much done for me. They did a great job of borrowing from WoW right down to the long wait for content. The mistake was thinking that anyone but WoW could get away with it. You don’t just copy a game that’s been out for 7 years without making significant changes and improvements. I love seeing sabers touch but it doesn’t happen often enough for it to be all that enticing. Adding voice to each and every quest made me get bored half way through the game especially since the main parts where I wanted other people to play with me, I wasn’t able to (personal story). The entire game is a single-player game and after 2 months of playing, I feel like Skyrim does it better especially with mods.

Noxdus

I might go back to finish all the stories, in the event I manage to get bored in GW2 after a few years. At the very least, playing through the story quests should be unrestricted. After i finish all the stories, I’ll probably just go back to WvW.

http://profile.yahoo.com/KHPZTPGVBYFPZSC2QLRVIYVE6M Tom

I wonder with going to F2P so early will this actually allow Bioware to build a more horizontal system verse the vertical which is a gear base and allow Bioware to pull away from gear base treadmill especially if they see GW2 do well without the gear base treadmill? This might give Swtor the flexibility to adopt some features found in GW2 if they feel they are well received in GW2??

http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac

I’d say more likely, it would affect how they release content. If, say, they have smaller but semi frequent updates (ie. a quest pack here or a Hutball map variation there), those things can be added at relatively smaller cost while building up the experience. It also sort of lets the rest of the team say “Okay, you make that small thing and release it. We can work on this flashpoint”.

That is to say, that this might fuel a potential shift in their philosophy towards content and how they implement. More sequential implementation and not, say, (for lack of a better term) clumps of content. That we’re supposed to see the start of new content implementation this next month might hint at that. I dunno.

http://www.facebook.com/ryanmdv Ryan Martin-DeVries

well they are making the same mistakes as lotro has so I probably wont even play when its free. limiting the number of flashpoints and warzones free players can do and locking them out of operations and the ah and forcing them to walk every where is so insulting I won’t play based on principle, nice going ea.

Old Ben

I don’t think your principles would pay their salaries or bills.

jgelling

The only downside to being unsubbed to SWTOR is I can’t go back and tell the fanboys, “I told you so.” But actually I suspect even a lot of those people gave up on the game.

It’s an OK RPG. It’s a terrible MMO and Bioware doesn’t know what they’re doing. Going free to play is just a way to gracefully let the game wind down while milking some more Star Wars fans and minimizing EA’s loss on this deal.

Bioware will never be allowed to make another MMO again. I doubt they’ll even be given the budget to make a real expansion, instead of a few lame add-on packs in a cash shop. EA has pulled the plug.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Joshua-Osmer/100002680014995 Joshua Osmer

I’m still subbed, was about to get ready to log in and pvp some. I still like the game but this is disheartening. When I first heard Bioware, the makers of Knights of the Old Republic, was making a new SW MMO I was geeked. As a long time SWG player, up to and slightly after the NGE (when I left for WoW) I’ve missed playing in the SW universe. I can admit they didn’t deliver on their “revolutionizing the mmo genre” one bit.

From what I understand though, for Bioware this was also a case study on whether or not they could produce a quality MMO so that they can take their other very successful franchise in that direction…IE: Mass Effect Online.
- http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1260066056 Steven Diaz
  
  After this, I doubt they’ll go anywhere.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Michael-Byrne/100001642673542 Michael Byrne

EA Earnings call today was all about Battlefield 3 making up for SW:ToR’s lack of performance. They didn’t give exact sub numbers but said it slipped under one million subs but was still well over the 500k break even point they gave out before. At minimum that means another 300K drop from the last call.
-Magicman

Depravity

Hah, just noticed that if you were a subscriber in the past and want to switch to F2P, you will have to pay to unlock all your characters (meaning there will be limited character slots available to F2P users… even if you have level 50s leveled up in the sub period). You know what, fuck that!

http://profile.yahoo.com/KHPZTPGVBYFPZSC2QLRVIYVE6M Tom

Im wondering what happens to Subs who go to F2P and their legacy unlocked characters species? Will we get to keep them since we did get them before F2P? Also how does Legacy work with F2P???

MMO_Doubter

SWTOR doesn’t HAVE any ‘advanced features’.

http://twitter.com/Darkdrakke Alberto

yeah so many people didn’t read or listen to the video more content incoming starting August

http://twitter.com/cipero Matt Cipriano

many lulz to be had

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jason-Quinn/504633100 Jason Quinn

Shhhhhocker. Maybe I’ll look into it now, hah!

Cyclops07

Clearly this isn’t something that EA/BW had planned on. This is a last gasp effort to squeeze a few more bucks out of the game and extend its life for a few more months. Does this mean that Swtor is dead? No, but its definetly the beginning of the end(well..maybe not the beginning). But the F2P model isn’t going to fix the bad end game, static environments, bad pvp, lag and more other issues that I have time to mention. And this is not even counting the hit it may take when GW2 comes out next month.
Just as surely as the the Titanic hit those deep murky waters, the Tortanic has split in half and is starting that rapid descent to the bottom. Shame, I like others had high hopes for it.

MMO_Doubter

EVERY new P2P MMO launches with a F2P business model already planned.

They would be oblivious fools not to.
- David Alcon
  
  SWTOR was not launched with a F2P business model or it would have launched with the infrastructure for in-game transactions like The Secret World. This is, as previously mentioned, a reaction to dipping sub numbers. They kept saying 500k would still be profitable, so either they lied, something changed, or they have less than 500k subs.
  - http://www.facebook.com/bothand.nether Bothand Nether
    
    or all 3.
    - http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac
      
      Potentially none of the above as well. Having a baseline for profitability and then adding an alternate means of monetization isn’t necessarily indicative of a failure of the first means of generating revenue. It just means the addition of another.

http://www.facebook.com/bothand.nether Bothand Nether

this will maybe mean a blow to tera and wow, methinx

JJGlyph

What is tera? =P

Makeitso GW

I dunno. The reason I stopped playing / paying for SWTOR was because it just wan’t fun. I had every intention of playing SWTOR for years like I did EQ (5 years) and WoW (6+ years) after that but after I hit 50 the game turned into a total dog. Give me a MMO that is fun to play from 1 to max level and just as fun after max level and I will throw my money at it GLADLY.

http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P

gw2

http://www.facebook.com/bothand.nether Bothand Nether

i hear the sound of a Guillotine being drawn upwards slowly………
who’s next inline, BW?

H S

On August 20th, the majority of 6 month subscribers are up for renewal. In Feb of 2012, Ritticello revised his remark that 500k would not be profitable, but a break even point at the margins(ie cut staff and budgets). His exact quote was, it would take 1 million subs to be profitable, but nothing to write home about.

So it looks like EA has forecasted that they would be at or under the break even point in the next few months, and had to take immediate action. Not hard to do when you consider, 2.4 million boxes were sold, and somewhere between 1.5 to 1.9 million have stopped playing since December.

This game will go down in history as the biggest MMO failure of all time.

Sharuko

The fact still is that the biggest and most successful MMO in the West is based on a subscription model. No other model can support the content players yearn for in MMOs. If a MMO goes F2P after it launched with a subscription model it is considered a failure. If a game launches with B2P or F2P it means the game won’t have enough content to last a month.

I would like to see games have both options available on separate servers. Instead of PvP or PvE servers they should make F2P and Subscription servers. Let the community decided what model succeeds and adjust from there.

I don’t see how this fixes the issue. The reason people left still remains. People didn’t leave SWTOR because it had a subscription fee.

MMO_Doubter

It’s not a bad Idea at all, but these companies are SO greedy, SO addicted to the easy cash shop money, that they can’t convince themselves to limit access to the gouging.
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Brian-West/100001366383261 Brian West
  
  Greed is what keeps the game coming to you. Honestly i prefer for any game to be i buy the box, the game is F2P and i only pay for things, or content i want and i dont have to pay or play the parts i have no interest in. Like WoW i don’t like raiding or the pvp so the sub isn’t worth it to me for just the PvE in the game if it was F2P and you had to pay to unlock PvP and Raids it would be different for me that’s why i like Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2, I play Rune-scape, LOL and other F2P games because what i spend is for exactly what i want not paying a sub for years on a game i like, but only use about half the game.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Brian-West/100001366383261 Brian West

have you ever heard of LOTRO, LOL,Rune-scape, they have plenty of players and still put out expansions, make money, and have a lot of people who enjoy playing them, they don’t have to be WoW sized to be considered a success, if they weren’t making money they wouldn’t even be there for you to play F2P or not, if they were not successful as a company with the game they would close up shop and shut down the servers.
Shogunz

>>No other model can support the constant content players yearn for in MMOs

Unsubstantiated. Further, as a counterpoint: it’s been the better part of a year since any new content has been released for WoW.
Spammerbam

Tera was a P2P, it didn’t really last at all.

GW1 has a B2P model, and that went strong for 7 years.

I don’t see what you’re trying to get at here..
- Sharuko
  
  Tera is the second most played MMO in the West and the 8th most played PC game this month. (Source: Raptr) It is doing fine, and laughing at its haters.
  - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
    
    tera doesnt even have 1 mil subs in the US… its not doing fine here
    - Sharuko
      
      The only MMO to have a million subs in the West has been WoW. So according to your logic only WoW did fine in the US.
    - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
      
      More than a few mmo games in the US have had over 1 million subs at one time or another. As far as I know Tera isnt one of them.
      
      even EQ made it at one point, I am pretty sure.
    - http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr
      
      aw, guess SWTOR is falling off the above 1m subs/aa chart.
      
      Leaves WoW and maybe Aion. Everthing else has fallen off.
    - Sharuko
      
      But even SWTOR’s numbers of 1.7 million at peak was North America and EU not NA alone.
    - Sharuko
      
      Yeah you are totally wrong, EQ peaked at about 500K worldwide. Only WoW has had 1 million subs in NA. Now if you think WoW is the only success based on your logic, more power to you!
    - http://www.facebook.com/stradus.woods Stradus Woods
      
      I doubt they need very many to be successful. However I do wonder if there model will ever switch. I liked the game my self its just not good enough that I would be willing to pay a sub for.
    - Old Ben
      
      I doubt they have even half of that, but that doesn’t mean the game isn’t profitable; depends on their their running costs.
    - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
      
      When I was checking into Tera for a 7 day trial I found out they had about 700k subs. That was a week before they came out with tha tera-ble demo and then came out with a real 7 day trial.
    - Old Ben
      
      If they have 700k subscriptions, and considering the majority of their player base is in Korea, that would suggest under 400k in the US and EU combined.
      
      Anyway, how you “find out” about that? From any official source, that can actually be held responsible by shareholders? Or from some guy using an alias in a 3rd party forum?
    - Sharuko
      
      Actually the 700K was posted by En Masse so it is North America only. I don’t think it is close to being that high but I know the screenshot Leo is referring too.
    - Spammerbam
      
      2nd most played MMO in the west with 700k subscriptions, huh.
      
      Interesting.
    - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
      
      yea 700k in US alone, not counting Europe or Asia.
      
      I think Tera should go f2p, the game doesnt have enough to it nor does it have the quality for monthly fee.
    - Old Ben
      
      > yea 700k in US alone, not counting Europe or Asia.
      
      Got a link to that?
    - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
      
      Sharako already linked a pic. Although it could be wrong of course.
      
      One reason that makes me wonder is, there around 10 servers for Tera in the US… (I am pretty sure thats how many I saw when I did my free trial)
      
      Can 10 servers handle 700k people? Doesnt seem likely imo. But I am far from an expert on this subject.
    - Old Ben
      
      > Sharako already linked a pic.
      > Although it could be wrong of course.
      
      That’s not an official (or even very credible) source. No real name, no guarantee that it’s even a real screenshot, and in any case doesn’t say anything about US subscriptions. The guy asks “How many subscriptions does TERA have”, and the other guy (supposedly) replied with the (suspiciously “precise”) number “717458″.
      
      If I had a testicle for every time a GM told me something completely false in an MMO, I would need a very strange seat on my chopper.
      
      I doubt a GM would have access to that information anyway; I’m sure Blizzard doesn’t let its GMs access that kind of data (i.e., exact regional subscription numbers – or even global ones) about WoW, and I doubt En Masse would allow it for TERA. GMs don’t need it to do their job and it can lead to all sorts of legal and financial issues. The company will either make the numbers public (which it hasn’t) or restrict them to management.
      
      > Can 10 servers handle 700k people?
      
      It’s perfectly possible to code a game to handle a million players in a single “shard” (which can be coded to run on multiple physical servers, if necessary), the issue is how that will affect gameplay. If players tend to flock to only a couple of cities, 70k players per server would result in horrible performance.
      
      For comparison, the busiest WoW shards have around 40k characters (which probably means around 8k players). Most are under 20k characters.

http://twitter.com/TheOpapanax Most Morbid One

Unfortunately this outcome for SWTOR was written in the stars..

Although I don’t see myself returning to the game even after it goes F2P. It’s cool to see them still trying to keep the game afloat.

F2P within the first year is not going to look good for Bio / EA. It will take some time for them to gain any real confidence from consumers in the future…

Old Ben

> Unfortunately this outcome for SWTOR was written in the stars..

In yellow letters, slowly scrolling up and away from the camera?

lee long

Some WoW Killer kill itself. what a disgrace! i wonder why WoW players laughing at other MMO

http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P

Only people who will be laughing are the ones playing a free game while others pay 15 bucks a month for a 10 year old game.
- http://twitter.com/cipero Matt Cipriano
  
  Lol you’re really trying to throw a punch at wow? That 10 year old game has the sub industry on lock, don’t hate.
  - http://twitter.com/Mantose Leo P
    
    Not hating it… just pointing out the truth.
    - http://www.facebook.com/nik666 Nikolai Tzolev
      
      Ironically, most of the people ARE paying 15 bucks a month for 10 years old game.
    - Old Ben
      
      The world has 7 billion people. Most aren’t.
    - http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr
      
      WOOT, WOOT, WOOT MoP has 16 raid bosses and two World bosses in the first tier.
http://twitter.com/MrSunrock Sunrock

WoW and SWTOR is basically the same game. Way people still play WoW and not SWTOR have nothing to do with the game mech but other reasons.

bsqminus4ac

SWTOR is an excellent game. The only beef I had was the monthly subscription. I’ve seen what can be done with an MMO without the requirement of laying out a monthly subscription (GW2) and there’s no going back for me.

The sad thing is that it’s doomed to fail even as free-to-play given that’s it’s public knowledge that they’ve sacked the majority of the team and therefore it seems unlikely that there will be any significant further content created for the game. Still, I’ll hope for the best as it really is a good game. Personally, however, I’ll be playing GW2.

JJGlyph

Am I the only one that hated the leveling process and loves the endgame HM FP & Ops? I really don’t see why the story is the selling point for this game. It was boring & watered down since you had like 5+ quests at all times during leveling.

http://www.facebook.com/stradus.woods Stradus Woods

I don’t know about other but when I say the story was the only good thing form game from me was exactly that. I hated the leveling you can pretty much point at any part of the game and there was things I didn’t like about it. Never did Ops tho never had the patents to grind for it.

DoctorOverlord

I’ve been pondering this and at first I thought this might induce me to try SWTOR again.. Then I remembered what I’ve experienced with SWTOR in the beta and current free trial. The same MMO class mechanics, the terribly designed zones, the boring travel sequences – these were all reasons why I left WoW years ago.

Then I remembered running down into a crypt, starting to attack some mobs when I realized someone else had already started to kill them. I backed off and began to apologize and I was struck by the idiocy of apologizing for helping someone trying to kill mutual enemies. And I knew that is what I could look forward to for 50 levels.

The cinematics are nice but the recurring complaint I’ve heard from players is that it feels like grinding just to get them. I’ve had enough of sloughing through timesinks to get to the good parts in an MMO. I’m afraid I probably won’t DL this game even when it does go F2P.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Willi-Enderle/1668850948 Willi Enderle

dun dun duuuun

http://www.facebook.com/hunter.doersam Hunter Doersam

Maybe they shouldn’t have built SW:TOR on a single player game engine…..and copy pasta wow’s classes….and suck

Cerein

So who won the over/under for the F2P date?

ArsenicSundae

Even F2P, it’s not worth the bandwidth to download. The flaws in this game are fundamental ones. The payment model won’t change that.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Shawna-Daniels/1135007726 Shawna Daniels

It was clear to most people many many months ago that this game simply wasn’t good enough to support a subscription model.
For those who still actually play the game, you should be happy, no more monthly fees!
Having to pay 15$ per month doesn’t make the game better by default.

So ya… three and a half weeks until GW2!!

http://www.facebook.com/people/Robert-Caliolo/100003765889295 Robert Caliolo

I could see me going back, but just to kill time. But if eventually new species are introduced, even to buy I would come back

This is typical Bioware. Buy the box, play the game put it on the shelf.
I have a fear we will not see any new content that has not already been designed for the game already.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Shawn-Hargrave/100003202374593 Shawn Hargrave

why dont they make a game worth playing instead of giving you rewards to play a pos game? the pricing was never an issue for me anyways it the games devs gabe ametegelo should have never touched this game seriously after he destroyed warhammers pvp. Hey james ohlen so much for the best pvp team eh?

Cant wait to see james ohlens f2p pr spiel lmao exciting new f2p content!! we found that no one thinks the game is worth 15 bucks a month except for me. I find it hilarious theyre trying to charge for end game content considering thats the reason most left in the first place.

Wish swg would relaunch pre nge god id pay 50 bucks month for that game just to play it again. Yes i knows theres an emu

http://twitter.com/dohcheezits Doh Jesus

I like how every video that Jason is in, he acknowledges his presence after the intro by breathing directly on his mic

http://twitter.com/SeedEve AppleSeed2148

This game was already old when it launched in 2011.Even F2P I don’t see it worthy of my time to download because it will still be the same shitty game.

My bet is EA Louse should be laughing right now and the Biodrones raging

http://www.facebook.com/nik666 Nikolai Tzolev

Bummer

pc11

“SWTOR will go F2P before the end of the year”

BAM totally nailed it!

Maybe now I will casually play some of the other storylines when I am bored…

http://www.facebook.com/people/Filip-Buhov/1379207683 Filip Buhov

now we just wait for the TR show , so they can blindly fanboy defend the most fail mmo in gaming history.

http://twitter.com/MrSunrock Sunrock

I thought that was Warhammer Online
- MMO_Doubter
  
  It USED TO be.
  
  ANOTHER EA MMO, BTW.
http://twitter.com/Rurik1547 John

I really don’t understand how this is as you put it so elegantly “the most fail mmo in gaming history”…didn’t they break records when they launched? Are they still not up and running with a little under 1 million subscribers? I’m no fan of the game by any means but I do enjoy playing it every now and then.

God forbid someone have an opinion and defend a company and a game they enjoy playing. Look in the mirror buddy, you’re no better than the so called “blind fan boys” defending their game by blindly hating them and the game they play.

http://twitter.com/MrSunrock Sunrock

This means I will stop playing all to gather… I will go back to play darkfall now I think. There I can avoid all the damn casual players. God forsaken gamers….

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000372530123 Scott Bamforth

Its a shame you guys can never right a good article about SWTOR and only point out the bad things about the good things they are trying to do…… Oh wait for forgot its because they arn’t paying you guys like arena net so you’re not going to put anything from swtor in a favorable light

Iwerks

Yeah, it has nothing to do with the games standing on their own. GBTV has no personal opinions, they just sell out to the highest bidder! Rawr!

Seriously, why watch these videos if you don’t want to hear their opinions? They’re legitimate opinions, and at least they don’t try to sugar-coat the very real problems facing so many MMOs coming out. Sub model will not survive unless aimed at a very specific audience, rehashing the quest/quest/raid model will not surpass the existing model in WoW, and so on. GW2 gets attention because it’s solving these problems, not because they’re paying GBTV (There’s enough corroborating sources out there, after all, and there’s no subscription fee to pay for all those bribes XD).
- MMO_Doubter
  
  GBTV saves all their sugar for GW2.
  
  The cash shop will be paying for the bribes.
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/3JO75BNS43WDETCNCO7F7XS6Q4 jo
    
    haha the news took a heavy toll on you even though you probably quit swtor long ago. that little emotional seed is still rooted in you, love and hope and belief in bioware, hatred of the evil GW2.
    
    rough life for you guys.
    - http://www.facebook.com/people/Alex-Mac/777995513 Alex Mac
      
      Maybe for him. I’m excited for this change. And I’m excited for GW2. I’m not going to speak for any of the above commenters, but people can enjoy two things or more at the same time.
    - http://www.facebook.com/people/Reed-Summers/1071061816 Reed Summers
      
      Hasn’t anyone ever heard of a threesome?!
- http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr
  
  You don’t think the GamebreakerTV staff is looking for jobs in the gaming industry.
  
  You have to wonder how many of them have apply for the ton of job opening at Riot Games. The Community Manager position for League of Legends looks pretty sweet.
  - Revanhavoc
    
    The Gannonator is not looking for another gig he is our fearless leader and you are a blasphemer.
    
    Don’t ever speak about the Gannonator in that way again, even as a joke. Do you understand me young man?
    
    The Gannonator is my belief system so technically you are infringing on my religious freedom.
    
    Don’t make me take off my belt! Get back here!
    
    (Aww Revan you’re scaring away all our friends…)
    
    Not friends, havoc…Blasphemers! Heretics!
  - MMO_Doubter
    
    Rubi left to work for ANet months ago.
Jant0n

”it is not pay to win so just throw that idea out right now”
“I think they can work them [Cartel Coins] in as easily as other games”
It sounds as though they believe that this could be a reasonable business model for TOR that could attract more players. I read most of their articles and they have, in my opinion, been very fair to SW:TOR showcasing both the positive ad negative attributes of the game. As for being paid by ArenaNet, that is absolutely rediculous. The reason they have so many positive things to say about GW2 is because they haven’t found a whole lot of negative points.
- MMO_Doubter
  
  It is funny how they have remained remarkably silent on the lack of mounts and the issue of P2W in WvWvW.
  - Jant0n
    
    ”It is funny how they have remained remarkably silent on the lack of mounts”
    I agree ArenaNet have not really said much in regards to mounts, at least not that I could find. They could be an interesting addition depending on how they implemented them, but I am in favor of the no mount system. The know mount system makes you slow down and actually explore the world more (IMO). Also the waypoint travel really eliminates most of the need for mounts.
    “the issue of P2W in WvWvW”
    I fail to see how this is going to be an issue but neither of us can say what will happen; only time will tell.
    - http://www.facebook.com/people/Bob-Dobalina/100002971552895 Bob Dobalina
      
      What part of there will be no mounts don’t you understand? Arenanet has said this enough not to talk about it anymore.
    - http://twitter.com/Rurik1547 John
      
      So because someone may disagree with the idea that there shouldn’t be any mounts and that ArenaNet has said there won’t be any AT LAUNCH (because they haven’t said there won’t be any mounts at any point in the game from what I’ve read) they can’t talk about it? Get over yourself.
      
      I would personally like to have some mounts in the game, I understand that a lot of people will disagree because of the waypoint system but I would like them only for the exploration aspect of the game.
  - http://www.facebook.com/jonathan.hornsby.7 Jonathan Hornsby
    
    No one has been silent on the issue of mounts because it is
    a non-issue. There are no mounts, there are not going to be any mounts, and
    there is no need for mounts. This was known and confirmed MONTHS ago. There is
    simply nothing to talk about on that subject.
    
    And as far as p2w in WvW….um…what? Have you even played WvW?
    How is there any kind of pay to win there?
http://profile.yahoo.com/T2CF4DYZNZBU3MGDQOADWCBWQE Big

Do you have hard evidence that they are being pay by AN or are you just making this shit up?

http://twitter.com/Dope_Danny Danny Smith

First two words this brought to mind: “Pools closed”.

There will be a troll firestorm on those servers when it hits.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jason-Mueller/100000004327864 Jason Mueller

its just a free to play OPTION, you can still have full access with paying a sub. Options are good, whatever gets more people to play I am ok with.

http://twitter.com/MrSunrock Sunrock

Yea what about the damned cash shop they are adding. Or what do you think the cartel coins are for?
http://www.facebook.com/davidallmighty David Cohen

The issue is not more people playing, the issue is quality content. Most good players left cause the contnent sucked. Buggy and laggy 4 mans and operations are not gonna attract anyone worth a damn, and making the game f2p doesnt change that

http://twitter.com/dularr Dularr

Sigh, haven’t played SWTOR in months, but it looks like I’m going to have a crap load of Cartel Coins. What to do. What to do.

http://twitter.com/Billy341 Shaun Brown

My only issue is as follows, with most of the game becoming free to play, how is Operation Access + a few different Warzones worth the $15 a month sub fee.

Revanhavoc

I totally understand Jason’s skepticism, but I really feel this coud be the first step in the right direction for Bioware, and hopefully the start of a long term F2P game.

I am looking forward to getting back with my Imperial Agent. She was sexy.

http://www.facebook.com/jonathan.hornsby.7 Jonathan Hornsby

I hope for you that character wasn’t already level 50 or higher. They said that you have to pay for content post level 50, so yeah….NO ENDGAME FOR YOU!

Timothy Noël

Despite how I loathe the gameplay and the ridiculously weighty programming, I’ll most definitely check out the f2p. The story line and cinematics are spectacular. Too bad it does not run as smoothly as certain OTHER AAA mmos. *whistles*

Luxin

True, it doesnt run as well as some 8 year old AAA MMOs designed to run on 10 year old HW.

H S

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.Well, maybe a few thousand biodrones.

TheHolgar

Its sad to say, but i wont go back to SWTOR even now when it hits f2p – couse it dont have what i desire today – i want to explore, you cant do that in SWTOR …..GW2 here i come

http://twitter.com/Nathiest Nathiest

Simple updates that’ll get people to play the game again. Maybe even some new players as well.

*They need to add at less 4 new playable races.

They need to remove the Race/Class restrictions.

They need to give each playable race their own running, walking and fighting style.

They need to add the ability to skip the the starting zone for players who have at less one character level 20 or higher.

http://profile.yahoo.com/FJR5OIFQII4WKUPYIHXMODD44Y Monolyth Tha Great

SWTOR sucks i’ll just wait on KOTOR 3 single player to come out…next

http://profile.yahoo.com/365EISMZLVECFUUDRSE7EDJ54M Jack

it will never comeout, that was established before this came out, it was this or kotor 3 and bioware chose swtor.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=761720316 Gregg Lopez

I’ll play F2P

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=761720316 Gregg Lopez

…where’s “The Republic” Ep. 101? Waiting on it, you’re a bit late…

MMO_Doubter

That will cost extra, now.

jayremy

If SWTOR played like a Mass effect online and been more of a shooter/action combat type gameplay, i’d been all over that from the start. But you know for a “WoW-clone” I doubt I will ever jump into a game like WoW again, F2P for people like me doesn’t mean a bit of difference.

MMO_Doubter

If it had the polish and features of WoW, it would be fit to play (and PAY FOR).

Being a WoW-clone wasn’t the killing blow. It was being an INFERIOR WoW-clone.
- jayremy
  
  It is extremely hard to out-due WoW from the start without breaking the company’s bank account. WoW has up to 7 years of content, meaning time and money spent over that duration to make it. They had 7 years to learn, polish and adapt.
  
  For any game just releasing matching that and then out producing is very hard, people are complaining about content issues and so on and the game was only out for a few months. “Waaahhh more raiding waaaahh” when the game was only 2-3 months old. There were plenty of legit no-brainer issues they could’ve fixed sure, but anybody making a WoW-clone is a near impossible handicap to bring more to the table.

http://profile.yahoo.com/Z36GPOU3Q2QIQYBIDVNQAVGNGE Raul

“It’s not sinking, now it’s a Submarine!”
there, spun.

would pay 20.00/month, if it had real space pvp,
-and didn’t use Hero engine.

http://www.facebook.com/jonathan.hornsby.7 Jonathan Hornsby

So Star Wars: The Old Republic goes to a free-to-play business model. How long until we start hearing that other dreaded term; pay-to-win? The two seem to be a package deal in the minds of many gamers, even when the claims are not justified. I’m just surprised that, so far, I’ve only seen one person even mention it.

Eaker82

HA! Knew it

Damir Miric

I still have a sub running but since I’m only interested in pvp I find Smite far more entertaining. And I dont have to grind gear and leveles to play

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002176551133 Ametz West

Cartel coins gona be the death of this game. I really dislike ALL microtransaction games.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=761720316 Gregg Lopez

It’s only an opinion. Most of the MMOs nowadays have microtransactions and that doesn’t mean that they’re dead.
- MMO_Doubter
  
  Right, it just means they deserve to die.

Luxin

People play MMOs in long term for social reasons. When you are the market leader with unparalleled brand recognition even among non-gamers… you are hard to beat. By the way, 1.1 million lost subs for Wow is 10%… it is going down as well

Cameron Hackett

I think that these cartel coins will just be for cosmetics. I am confident that swtor will be f2p not p2w.

MMO_Doubter

You are wrong. They have already stated that ‘advanced player features’ will be for sale. Not that SWTOR has any of those.

No cash shop ever stays with just cosmetic items.

MY prediction is that fanboys and shills will exclude whatever turns up in the shop from their working definition of ‘pay to win’.

OF course, GBTV and the other ‘gaming’ sites will continue to spew the party line that it is NOT P2W. Because they serve the industry, not the gamers.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002458642143 Jared Gordon

still kinda confused will i need a copy of the game to do this free to play option or can i just sell my copy on ebay

http://www.facebook.com/garimi.tamayoke Tamayoke Garimi

maybe? I was a Beta that was convinced all would be well. I also as promised sooo much for Legacy perks to come. Now I wil return to Lord Aldraas? wait nope! I wil have to move servers asn f my names asn legacy are on new server? bow out to someone that paid far less and gve my name to their leel 10. F2P is not going to easily bring me back. SWTOR taught me NEVER PRE_ORDER again .

BioWare To Take The Old Republic Free-To-Play This Fall

The War Z Is Out! Infestation: Survivor Stories Is In!

UPDATE! It is Official! Microsoft Planning A Full Reversal On Xbox One DRM!

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