News – Page 455 – MMO Fallout

Naoki Yoshida Not Against Free To Play

One of the memes floating around the internet in regards to Final Fantasy XIV is that the company would rather shut the game down before ever considering a switch to free to play. As Naoki Yoshida confirmed in a recent interview with Dengeki Online, this isn’t so much the case:

As far as the monthly billing goes, people are becoming more pragmatic and they’re only willing to pay for the things that they want to use. What that means to monthly billing is that there are players who would rather pay based on the amount of time they play in a particular month, after they’ve played. There used to be no debate about this, since monthly billing was the only standard for MMORPGs, but now F2P is a consideration. We see this desire for players who would rather buy items especially in North America.

Yoshida goes on to say that free to play isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and can be a beneficial move when done so based on the needs of the users rather than trying to turn around an unprofitable game. Check out the entire interview below, it dives into free to play, upcoming updates, expansion into new regions, and more. Is Final Fantasy XIV going free to play? Not with six figures of active players it isn’t.

(Source: Translated Interview)

Xsyon Expands With Launch of PvE Server

The post-apocalyptic world of Xsyon has become a lot more friendly recently as Notorious Games has announced that the game will be split between War and Peace, a PvP and PvE server respectively. Players will be able to maintain characters on both servers, and data will be copied on to both worlds from the original main world.

As of today, the apocalyptic fantasy sandbox MMORPG, Xsyon is available on two servers: War and Peace! (PvP and PvE) With this highly requested and anticipated move, Xsyon reaches out to wider audience catering to players who enjoy fantasy sandbox games both with and without player conflict.

Xsyon launched in 2011 under Notorious Games.

(Source: Notorious Games Press Release)

Ghost Recon Online Renamed Phantoms

Ghost Recon Online is still making its way toward launch, and Ubisoft announced today that the shooter isn’t just getting a new face, but a new name. Going forward, Ghost Recon Online is being renamed Ghost Recon Phantoms, bringing with it a new art direction, new characters, and reworking of lighting and level design.

Ghost Recon Phantoms brings a narrative layer to the game based around The Phantoms, ex- Ghosts and current adversaries who left The Ghosts to pursue personal agendas. We’ve also added new gameplay elements to expand the depth of the game. Of course, no accounts will be wiped, and our current players will not have to start over.

The new look and name are coming on April 10th.

(Source: Ghost Recon Phantoms)

Perpetuum Dropping Subscription Fee

Perpetuum Online has announced that it will be dropping its subscription fee on April 2nd. Rather than asking for a subscription, Perpetuum will adopt a buy to play model with an in-game cash shop for cosmetics and services.

The subscription model will be dropped in favor of a single purchase when players join the world of Perpetuum, and augmented with optional in-game purchases of previously unavailable services and cosmetic upgrades. The price of the single and final purchase of the game will be comparable to 3 months of subscription time in the past: 28.99 USD/EUR (VAT included).

Players with at least three months of subscription accumulated will receive a copy of the new game for free, while those with less time accumulated will be deactivated and will be required to purchase the $30 client. There is a lot more information at the official news post below.

(Source: Perpetuum Online)

ArcheAge Launching 2014, Trion Confirms

The question of the year for 2014 has finally been answered: When is ArcheAge coming to the west? Trion’s own Evan “Scapes” Berman appeared on ArcheAge Source to confirm that ArcheAge will be heading into beta and launch later this year.

While the tech work continues, the team is also finalizing plans for “early supporter” pre-launch packages slated to be introduced during this timeframe and available for the duration of closed beta, leading into launch later this year.

Scapes went on to confirm that ArcheAge will be free to play while avoiding some of the pitfalls in other territories.

Allow me to say this here and now: both Trion Worlds and XLGames want ArcheAge to be a free-to-play sandbox that fits our “No Tricks, No Traps” vision and will make development decisions for to achieve that goal in Trion’s territories. There are a couple of important recent examples we’d love to share: XLGames has agreed to our request that racial quests grant experience (which had been removed) and that mounts/gliders purchased from the cash shop provide solid value and fun, while earned and crafted items are objectively superior.

A new website for the western ArcheAge release is on its way, with more news coming in the future.

(Source: ArcheAge)

Everquest 15 Year Anniversary Graphic

Sony Online Entertainment has released an infographic detailing just how technology and the internet has progressed since Everquest launched in 1999, not to mention detailing a decade and a half of the franchise’s achievements. Do you remember when hard drives cost $25 per gigabyte? I do.

Final Fantasy XIV Launches 2.2 Teaser Site

Final Fantasy XIV’s 2.2 patch launches in just under two weeks, and it includes a ton of new content. Titled Through the Maelstrom, update 2.2 introduces new quests, new scenarios, dungeons, glamours, gardening, heavy fishing, and the second coil of Bahamut, and more. Update 2.2 launches on March 27th, but you can check out the full list of content at the promotional website, or by watching the trailer below.

Square Enix will also be hosting a live Letter from the Producer on March 21st at 2:30am Pacific, which might be early for many of our American viewers.

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ArcheAge Says Dosvidanya To Non-Russian Players

ArcheAge is a long time coming to the west, so long in fact that dedicated players decided to forego the wait and jump on board the Russian servers hosted by Mail.ru. Hopefully none of them have spent a lot of money on the game, as Mail.ru has announced that access to the servers will be restricted to gamers in Russia and former Soviet states. The IP block was requested by XL Games and provides no details on whether or not players who have already invested money only to be blocked will be able to receive any sort of refund or compensation.

If only Mikhail Gorbachev were here to tear down this wall.

(Source: Announcement)

"MMO For Girls" Teeters On Offensive

Today I received one of the most awkward press releases to grace my inbox, and if the title of this article left you a bit worried than we are both on the same page. AggroStudios, who apparently played a major role in support services for City of Steam, has announced that they are working on an MMO developed specifically with girls in mind. For the sake of argument, we assume that they do not mean the pre-teen My Little Pony demographic, but the older, teenage to adult, female audience.

Let’s look at the description sent to us, shall we?

AggroStudios’s innovative MMO for girls is being designed to encourage the type of game play girls enjoy. It features characters with strong personalities, girl-geared graphics, rich visual customization, cooperative play, and an addictive and dynamic storyline.

For the sake of clarity, I reached into MMO Fallout’s pool of girl gamers to gauge a reaction to this headline. With the exception of one, the response was almost unanimously negative. Our test pool found the ad offensive, condescending, and desired clarity on what constituted “girl-geared graphics” and “strong personalities.” Most responded that they would still be willing to give the game a try, but that the company’s description did not leave a positive first impression.

MMO Fallout will follow up when more details about the game are released.

(Source: AggroStudios press release)

FFXIV Enjoys 500,000 Daily Players

Naoki Yoshida has revealed in an interview to 4Gamer that Final Fantasy XIV currently carries 1.8 million player accounts, 6.75 million characters created, and 500,000 active daily users.

Well, the number for daily active user count can be misleading…. The peak time for Japan and oversea countries are different, for example. But if we simply look at the number of people logging in every day, I’d say we have about 500,000 people worldwide.

Yoshida also talks about Final Fantasy XI, Dragon Quest X, and an obsession with Everquest while Final Fantasy XI was in development. You can read the entire translated interview at the link below.

(Source: Square Enix interview)

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