Ugh_Lancelot
Title: Ooo...bouncy!
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2743804562
Very restricted, granted, but still...
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jojo263
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haha
oh ya there will be all kinds of subscription plans soon enough just like eq2 and there will probably be free to play from 1-80 soon enough. I remember saying this and everyone said you're crazy there will never be any kind of f2p.
don't worry soon enough you can pay to do 5 mans with your friends on any server too.
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Auenwing
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Ouch. WoW-lite.
Or as my guildmate says, "We're watching the death of a Titan." (e.g.subscribed MMO)
How many of you guys would still play if WoW was f2p? That's a serious question. Wasn't there a thread on this somewhere?
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jojo263
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Just thinking about the people who would sign up to play f2p wow scares me.
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Jyiiga
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Yeah I would expect a pretty huge influx. Will be tons of people that just use it to mess around in and never really level up.
It had to happen though, to many other fun MMO titles are moving F2P. If they don't at least start the process now they will be way behind by the end of the year.
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Jyiiga
Title: The MMO Snob
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Here are the restrictions. Same as they were before.
* A level cap of 20.
* A maximum of 10 gold.
* Trade skills are capped at 100 ranks.
* Inability to trade via the auction house, mailbox, or player-to-player.
* In-Game public chat channels will be unavailable. (Players will still be able to communicate using say, party, or whispers).
* Characters will be unable to create or join existing guilds.
* Accounts will no longer be able to whisper other players unless they have been added to those players’ friends lists or have received a whisper from them first.
* Characters will not be able to invite players into a party.
* Characters will not be able to join parties with other players above level 20.
* Voice Chat is disabled on trial accounts.
* Realms with login queues will give priority to customers with retail accounts.
* Will not be eligible for any Character Transfer service.
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Fedup23
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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I guess I don't see where the never ending trial account equates to WoW going to what we know as f2p. Its so restricted that any level restricted account is basically useful for getting a small idea of how the game mechanics work and what the game world looks like.
Maybe I am missing something..just seems like an aging game doing more to advertise/entice new clients. I suppose you could see it otherwise.
For the amount that I still play... / shrug.
You guys do realize that the game has been out for 7 years...pretty soon all of your predictions of where its headed will be coming true..I wouldn't hurt yourselves too much trying to pat yourselves on the back!! 
JK of course...hope the game lasts a while longer..I still like it with my weekend coffee! !
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Isoke
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Sometimes I think gamers have more fun posting "OMG THE GAME IS DYING" than they do actually playing 
A strong free trial game is pretty much what any company has to do these days in order to attract new players, and anyone who's been following gaming in general on more than a very casual basis has seen this trend settling firmly into place.
The MMO landscape is changing, but it's like turning a big ship around. The change is so incremental (at least in my opinion) that you almost can't see it. But it's happening. Smart companies will adjust to those changes. Blizzard is smart, even though I may not personally care for some of what they're doing.
I dunno. Maybe I'm crazy, but it just feels to me like MMOs are on the cusp of a change, and until that change can manifest through a creative breakthrough or by happy accident, those of us who still enjoy gaming are expecting less, finding other stuff to do, and gaming with a different mindset when we do game. Or we're posting "OMG THE GAME IS DYING" comments whenever a company does anything focused on promotion or on attracting new players =P
I suppose there's always the chance that the MMO industry will completely collapse into a black hole of mediocre products that all have basically the same grind, but games are just too expensive to produce to allow that trend to continue. The same old grind won't hold enough customers to make the huge investments reasonable. Something's got to give, and I don't see the industry giving up and turning its back entirely on the basic concept of MMOs. The genre still holds incredible potential. It just hasn't been tapped yet.
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Voqar
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Eh, no such thing as free to play, really, unless you want a stripped down game. Every game that's free to play does micro transactions or subs for more/full features. F2P doesn't pay for servers, bandwidth, or employees. The only reason companies go with this model is if they think they can make even more money off of the extra players that join and players that end up coughing up more money than sub money via perks, micro transactions, and so on.
I could see bliz doing this with WoW based on how many suckers will pay more than a full month sub fee for a single vanity pet, mount, race/name/faction change, server xfer. People pay big for simple data that takes/took almost no dev effort. If I was the designer/dev responsible for some of this stuff, I'd be LMFAO nonstop over it all (as a programmer I appreciate the beauty of it).
WoW has a lot of crappy players who are incapable of earning anything interesting in-game, no lack of cheating scumbags that pay cash for gold and/or toons/accounts, so...why not go for it. Why let 3rd parties make cash on WoW gold when you could sell it yourself for some extra cash? There's zero enforcement of rules hindering players from cheating/buying, so why not make the cash yourself, bliz?
Seeing as how Bliz have evolved into greedy corporate whores, I'm surprised they don't sell even more crap for cash. It's not like they have integrity anymore with GC running/ruining WoW, $15-25 for pets/mounts/data alterations.
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The_Korrigan
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I don't see a problem with that, but my question is, will those "free to play limited to level 20" people be able to join BGs?
This could very well bring a massive influx of "players" to the 10-20 bracket... expect notably a lot of multi boxing twinks then.
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Jyiiga
Title: The MMO Snob
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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The_Korrigan posted:
I don't see a problem with that, but my question is, will those "free to play limited to level 20" people be able to join BGs?
This could very well bring a massive influx of "players" to the 10-20 bracket... expect notably a lot of multi boxing twinks then.
In addition to that some people play the game to RP alone. You could have a ton of BG players as you mentioned above but, you could also have a ton of people that just use it to rp/socialize.
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The_Korrigan
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Jyiiga posted:
Jyiiga posted:
The_Korrigan posted:
I don't see a problem with that, but my question is, will those "free to play limited to level 20" people be able to join BGs?
This could very well bring a massive influx of "players" to the 10-20 bracket... expect notably a lot of multi boxing twinks then.
You could have a ton of BG players as you mentioned above but, you could also have a ton of people that just use it to rp/socialize.
Can I farm posts too? 
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Jyiiga
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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This is what happens when you post from work. You pay half ass attention to what you are doing.
Edit.. but, I can remove my posts. 
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Auenwing
Title: straightface
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Isoke posted:
Sometimes I think gamers have more fun posting "OMG THE GAME IS DYING" than they do actually playing
A strong free trial game is pretty much what any company has to do these days in order to attract new players, and anyone who's been following gaming in general on more than a very casual basis has seen this trend settling firmly into place.
The MMO landscape is changing, but it's like turning a big ship around. The change is so incremental (at least in my opinion) that you almost can't see it. But it's happening. Smart companies will adjust to those changes. Blizzard is smart, even though I may not personally care for some of what they're doing.
I dunno. Maybe I'm crazy, but it just feels to me like MMOs are on the cusp of a change, and until that change can manifest through a creative breakthrough or by happy accident, those of us who still enjoy gaming are expecting less, finding other stuff to do, and gaming with a different mindset when we do game. Or we're posting "OMG THE GAME IS DYING" comments whenever a company does anything focused on promotion or on attracting new players =P
I suppose there's always the chance that the MMO industry will completely collapse into a black hole of mediocre products that all have basically the same grind, but games are just too expensive to produce to allow that trend to continue. The same old grind won't hold enough customers to make the huge investments reasonable. Something's got to give, and I don't see the industry giving up and turning its back entirely on the basic concept of MMOs. The genre still holds incredible potential. It just hasn't been tapped yet.
That was the thought behind my guildmate's comment... concern for direction of the genre overall. NOT: the GAME is dying, but the SUBSCRIPTION Model is.... and WoW being the last of the big ones to head in the direction of f2p.
With the cost of production these days, and a lack of discretionary VC funds, it's going to be harder to bring new smaller and potentially ground-breaking games to market and sustain them. Watching what's happening with MMO's is similar to watching the changes in the car industry in the 70s. But that's a topic for another thread.
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Ugh_Lancelot
Title: Ooo...bouncy!
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Fedup23 posted:
I guess I don't see where the never ending trial account equates to WoW going to what we know as f2p. Its so restricted that any level restricted account is basically useful for getting a small idea of how the game mechanics work and what the game world looks like.
Maybe I am missing something..just seems like an aging game doing more to advertise/entice new clients. I suppose you could see it otherwise.
For the amount that I still play... / shrug.
You guys do realize that the game has been out for 7 years...pretty soon all of your predictions of where its headed will be coming true..I wouldn't hurt yourselves too much trying to pat yourselves on the back!!
JK of course...hope the game lasts a while longer..I still like it with my weekend coffee! !
lol...well, phase 1 is unlimited trial accounts. Phase 2 will probably end up being 1-60 and/or a few restrictions being lifted. Endless possibilities there.
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Fedup23
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WoW free-to-play phase 1 is live
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Ugh_Lancelot posted:
Fedup23 posted:
I guess I don't see where the never ending trial account equates to WoW going to what we know as f2p. Its so restricted that any level restricted account is basically useful for getting a small idea of how the game mechanics work and what the game world looks like.
Maybe I am missing something..just seems like an aging game doing more to advertise/entice new clients. I suppose you could see it otherwise.
For the amount that I still play... / shrug.
You guys do realize that the game has been out for 7 years...pretty soon all of your predictions of where its headed will be coming true..I wouldn't hurt yourselves too much trying to pat yourselves on the back!!
JK of course...hope the game lasts a while longer..I still like it with my weekend coffee! !
lol...well, phase 1 is unlimited trial accounts. Phase 2 will probably end up being 1-60 and/or a few restrictions being lifted. Endless possibilities there.
Yeah.....OR. they could be just trying to entice new players.  There are endless possibilities ..and what we THINK is "phase 1" ..could just be a boring endless free trial. 
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Zero_Washu
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Let me play to 60 :P
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_Taebo_
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Zero_Washu posted:
Let me play to 60 :P
I bet that's next.
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Spookysheep
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And so it begins...
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jojo263
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People just don't see how Cata was set up for subscription plans and a free to play model. I mentioned it awhile back.
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Sprawl-zero1eye-
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It's harder and harder to invest in a monthly subscription when your latest and greatest "online worlds" are nothing more than a single player game on rails with other people around.
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Fedup23
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jojo263 posted:
People just don't see how Cata was set up for subscription plans and a free to play model. I mentioned it awhile back.
OK ok.. you told everyone so.. ok, you mentioned it a while back!! There.. sheesh!! 
J/k 
.. but yeah.. we heard you were getting The Nostradamus Award.
just ribbin ya
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NilByMouthReborn
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Sprawl-zero1eye- posted:
It's harder and harder to invest in a monthly subscription when your latest and greatest "online worlds" are nothing more than a single player game on rails with other people around.
Omg omg the sky is falling - I'm agreeing with Sprawl. (Yes - I'm an old FFer!)
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jojo263
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Fedup23 posted:
jojo263 posted:
People just don't see how Cata was set up for subscription plans and a free to play model. I mentioned it awhile back.
OK ok.. you told everyone so.. ok, you mentioned it a while back!! There.. sheesh!!
J/k
.. but yeah.. we heard you were getting The Nostradamus Award.
just ribbin ya
lol
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Shenron_
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