Global Agenda Going 100% Guild Wars Model

Before I go into the news story, I’d just like to make one of my opinions public: I have a very big hunch that the era of B-list MMOs keeping the $15 a month fee is moving towards its end. Obviously I can’t predict where the market will wind up, but I earnestly believe that we are in the beginning of a shift where we will see a number of MMOs lower their subscription price, go freemium, or entirely free to play. Developers are seeing how many more players they can grab at a lower price, with the influx of new people paying far outweighing the group who was willing to pay the full price. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and despite complaints by a very vocal minority, the benefits can far overshadow the negatives if done correctly.

Global Agenda, being a part-MMO title that launched this February, became so successful that Hi-Rez had to add a new server to accommodate overseas players. I do get the hunch that, much like a certain Cities XL game that came out in 2009 and shut down in March, Global Agenda’s paid MMO side is not doing as well as the company had hoped. Oddly enough, this seems to be a trend with games that release with one half free, one half paid content, unless the game’s name is Guild Wars of course.

Hi-Rez Studios announced today that Global Agenda is going free to play (well, the subscription portion was), and speaking of Guild Wars, Global Agenda will be channeling Arenanet’s policy of having the game itself be free to play, with option paid expansion packs. Expansion packs are expected to release only once or twice per year, at rates similar to non-subscription game expansions (I haven’t purchased a non-subscription expansion since the Battlefield 1942: Secret Weapons. Twenty to thirty dollars sounds about right). Token awards for pre-subscribers will end on the 25th of June, and Hi-Rez has assured us that if the level cap expands, players will not need to buy an expansion pack to access the higher level cap.

Global Agenda is one of the few MMOs I don’t follow too closely, and I’m quite certain that the community will fill in the blanks behind this change, but look at it this way: At least Hi-Rez didn’t take the path of Cities XL and simply close up shop because not enough people were subscribing.

By the way: Global Agenda is 33% off on Steam until July 5th. What great timing.