MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
Sony Online Entertainment’s PS3 and PC MMO DC Universe Online will become a free-to-play title on November 1st. The studio announced that it was going to switch its title to the F2P model last month, but has only now finalised a date. New players joining under the F2P model will …
Read More »Valve: Piracy is not a pricing issue
The common consensus is that pirated games are popular because they’re free. But not so, according to Valve co-founder Gabe Newell. One thing that we have learned is that piracy is not a pricing issue. It’s a service issue,” Newell told a conference audience in Seattle, as reported by GeekWire. …
Read More »F2P games green-lit for PlayStation Vita
The thriving free-to-play monetisation model is coming to PlayStation Vita, a Sony executive has said. Chris Norden, a senior developer at SCEA, yesterday met attendees at an industry event in Texas to explain Sony’s policy. "You are free to explore whatever business model you want,” he said during his speaker …
Read More »Free FPS on the way for PlayStation Home
Discussing its upcoming shift of focus for PlayStation Home, the platform holder has demoed a couple of the new titles heading to the service. And Shack News reports that one of them – Bootleggers – is a free-to-play fist person shooter that lets gamers take direct control of their Home …
Read More »Star Wars Old Republic "will be the last large-scale subscription MMO"
EA’s Star Wars: The Old Republic will, whenever it eventually arrives, be the last large scale” MMO to monetise itself via monthly subscriptions. That’s the opinion of Sony Online Entertainment president John Smedley. We see some very interesting trends in subscription gaming,” he told GamesIndustry. In our cancellation surveys for …
Read More »DC Online Universe going F2P on PC and PS3
Sony Online Entertainment has announced its attention to transition PS3 and PC MMO outing DC Universe Online to a free-to-play model next month. Currently players must pay a monthly subscription fee, on top of the game purchase itself. IGN reports that new players joining under the F2P model will have …
Read More »Star Trek Online to adopt F2P
Yet another big-hitting MMO is to drop its current subscription model in favour of free-to-play. Cryptic Studios owner Perfect World has stated that the transition will happen before the end of the year, Gamasutra reports. "When Perfect World acquired Cryptic, one of our contributions was to share our free-to-play experience …
Read More »Warhammer Online: Wrath of Heroes announced
GAMESCOM: EA is to give another major IP the social network treatment with the announcement of Warhammer Online: Wrath of Heroes. The game will be free-to-play and available to all online, with Google+ Games in particular mentioned by BioWare’s Ray Muzyka as he took to the Gamescom stage for EA’s …
Read More »Codemasters announces F1 Online: The Game
UK studio to release Facebook title to support its F1 brand
Read More »Ubisoft UK details free-to-play hopes
Ubisoft’s free-to-play aspirations were unveiled to the UK press at a summer showcase last week. With F2P titles Ghost Recon Online, Imagine Town and The Settlers Online, Ubisoft is adapting its own brands with the ultimate goal of ‘upgrading’ users to richer online games. Using the free-to-play model, we want …
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