Free to pay vs free to play, with adds

perfectworld-dot-comRecently while playing Ghost Recon Online (now in open beta), it occurred to me I haven’t made enough blog posts.

The game also outlines what i hope could be some new trends in the PC free to play market.

Most of these games are often teased as being Free to Pay and not free to play due to often requiring players spend upwards of $40-60 inorder to actually get a desirable playing experience.

While still the case with some games like PlanetSide2, I find that GRO (Ghost Recon Online) could be the light at the end of the tunnel much like DLC prices, after they finished testing us to decide how much we where willing to pay during the days of old Xbox Live.

I noticed while playing GRO that end level gear is expensive but also some what unnecessary as you never have that call of duty feeling like your gun is the problem more so than you are. It’s partially a balancing issue but its worth talking about in comparison to games like PlanetSide2 where all variety and truly powerful weapons are on a mountain you must climb with either money or an exorbitant amount of game play.

Takes about 8 hours to make enough for a mid to end level gun.

Now the game is still in beta and could at any point get worse as the result of a triple A publisher’s greed, but on the bright side there is some behavior here I want to encourage.

In game advertisements are nothing new, we’ve seen talk of these as early as Battlefield 2, and recently we’ve seen some success with them in Android games and I like the idea of having them in regular video games, IF USED PROPERLY.

In Game AdsLord knows with the recent advertising events surrounding the Halo franchise (takes a sip of Mountain Dew) and similarly the purchasable currency in Dead Space 3 there is some cause for concern with video games slowly changing from being single purchase products to long-term service agreements for DLC. It’s easy to say that these advertisements may only go to feed a bottomless bit of greed.

I think advertisements in games could be a good thing. If prices stay reasonable and the game remains balanced then why not let Razer pay Ubisoft for my gaming experience (I already spend enough money on their mice). GRO is a good proving ground, given player lifespan can last for up to a full minute which is more than long enough to take a look at the add behind their target.

While these sorts of adds will really work best in games with modern settings it’s not an impossible trend (even if it comes down to a short add crammed onto loading screens or the like), Lets just hope we don’t start seeing game creators cramming these into Pay to play + micro transaction + dlc products.

Leave a Reply