With all these "free" games on the horizon, is there a reason to pay to play anymore?

[SunnyD]

I'm curious about the general opinion out there with the latest crop of "free to play" games (micropayment or game shop style, or truly free). I'm betting most are going to say "you get what you pay for", however you really have to look at the traditional industry as well. The quality of some of these F2P games may be a little lackluster, but look at the likes of Age of Conan, or even WoW when it first released - hardly complete, and certainly with their own problems. Could this be a reason to actually condone taking a long look at some of the free games out there (like Runes of Magic)?

 

[BlueAcolyte]

Is this just for MMOs?

 

[SunnyD]

Originally posted by: BlueAcolyte
Is this just for MMOs?

No, though the biggest trend currently seems to be F2P MMOs.

 

[Auryg]

Honestly, I think what we now think of as flash games are going to evolve in to the main PC game. We're seeing things like Quake Live and Battlefield Heroes (although I'm pretty sure that's standalone, right) popping up, and flash games evolve every year and some are made ridiculously well with teams of people. It seems they're following the same trends the game industry as a whole did except quicker.

Now all we need is a better technology - flash is slow, doesn't really have 3D. Silverlight is better but microsoft isn't making it a required update meaning that basically nobody has it.

 

[Oakenfold]

Are there really any statistics on how profitable these models are?
These may just be a fad. I'm on the fence until I see some hard data.

 

[Red Storm]

Until I see one of these free games rake in $700,000,000 in one week, I see no reason why (certain) developers will not continue to spend large sums of money developing games that have the potential to be of higher quality.

 

[novasatori]

hate micro games, so easy to get caught up in the transactions

I try to avoid them

 

[Nik]

Originally posted by: SunnyD

Originally posted by: BlueAcolyte
Is this just for MMOs?

No, though the biggest trend currently seems to be F2P MMOs.

Free To Play MMOs? The only free MMO I know of is Guild Wars and that game blows hard.

 

[pontifex]

all of the free to play mmos i have ever played sucked ass.

 

[ConstipatedVigilante]

Originally posted by: Nik

Originally posted by: SunnyD

Originally posted by: BlueAcolyte
Is this just for MMOs?

No, though the biggest trend currently seems to be F2P MMOs.

Free To Play MMOs? The only free MMO I know of is Guild Wars and that game blows hard.

I think he means stuff like Perfect World, Runescape, etc. But yeah, generally the F2P games do suck ass.

 

[ultra laser]

I've never played a free game that was any good. Care to list a few?

 

[nerp]

A recent flash game in which you throw shoes at Bush was pretty fun. And free.

 

[ZzZGuy]

Yes.

No adds (at least I won't "buy" a game with blatant in game adds) and higher quality.

 

[AlgaeEater]

It's going to be a long, long time before the gaming industry picks up on this, since it's basically in its infancy. There's no real major data to support the fact that it is indeed a profitable way of handling video games, and advertising is ALWAYS a hard thing to measure, no matter what the medium is used.

But, as innovation goes, it's definitely not something to throw away or scoff at. The same people who scoffed at bottled water, MP3's and Online RPG's are pretty much in the same boat now with F2P games and advertising + exclusive bought only items.

Sure, us more hardcore PC gamers here on Anandtech can stick our noses up in the air about the idea, but the fact that the majority of casual gamers find fun in "Bejeweled" and its "ilk" means we're out numbered 1 to 10000 on what's considered "gaming" nowadays. Yeah give me a soapbox and a cane about gaming, but that's a whole another topic altogether.

tl;dr F2P games are way too early to be a viable model in the next 10 years, but there's definitely a market for them.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: ultra laser
I've never played a free game that was any good. Care to list a few?

There aren't any free decent MMOs.

There are free non-MMO games that are decent though.

 

[I4AT]

Combat Arms is one of the better multiplayer FPS I've played.

 

[TheVrolok]

Originally posted by: Bateluer

Originally posted by: ultra laser
I've never played a free game that was any good. Care to list a few?

There aren't any free decent MMOs.

There are free non-MMO games that are decent though.

Such as ... ? The only one I could think of was America's Army. I thought that was very good for being free.