Until February 16.
Tag: Extended
Everquest II: Now With A Decent Free Trial
Technically Everquest II has the mother of all free trials, however if you’re looking to bud into the subscription-only sector to play with friends, this promotion doesn’t exactly help you. Announced on the Station website, the new free trial offers 14 days of worry-free gaming, with a few perks on the side. Players receive a superior experience potion offering twice the advancement for two hours, and a special cloak that increases run speed by 25%.
If you don’t play the subscription version, you can still obtain the cloak and potion in Everquest II Extended, along with a few other items according to players. For casual players who don’t have anyone playing the subscription version, Extended is still the best deal.
Final Fantasy XIV: Holy Free Third Month, Batman!
Back in October, Square Enix announced that early adopters of Final Fantasy XIV would receive an additional month of time to try out the game, play through it, and hopefully weather out the storm of issues with the game. This month, Square Enix announced a tentative update coming on the 25th of November, just a few days after most of the free extensions will expire. In response, Square has issued a news article detailing yet another extension to the free time:
Today, we have decided to extend the free trial period an additional 30 days. Please refer to the following for more details.
Players who purchase FFXIV before November 19th can also partake in this free month (giving them 60 days of free game time), while those who adopted early are enjoying their third free month. In addition, Square put out a comprehensive list of updates they have planned for the coming months, which you can find here: http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=cb4dc09784bc24b4fde2e45de9f018ec5fb504d2
And since the discussion on other forums is already erupting on this subject, yes this is to appease early adopters and get them to stick around until Square can do some much needed maintenance on the game. In case you hadn’t noticed with All Points Bulletin, when a company doesn’t fix glaring issues fast enough, the game dies: fast. Hopefully Square can get the necessary issues fixed before the early adopters disappear.
Any account created before the 19th will be able to take part in the free 30 days. More on Final Fantasy XIV as it appears.
Everquest II Heading Free To Play…Partially.
A big thank you to Valerie, who tipped me off on this before the official announcement.
I know what you’re saying, “Omali! You lying sack of crap! Dave Georgeson just said last month that Everquest 2 was not going free to play!” You would be correct, partially. Today’s news brings the announcement that Sony Online Entertainment will be launching “Everquest II Extended” or EQ2X for short. The 14 day trial is, of course, being thrown out the window, however the 14-day recruit-a-friend will still be in effect.
There are, of course, restrictions, but you knew that was coming. Players will find themselves barred from accessing the latest expansion pack, as well as having various classes, races, a smaller coin purse, etc, not to mention the more in-your-face cash shop. Of course, you can always subscribe to the “gold member” service which, oddly enough, is $15 a month. If you’d rather not take the leap and go full-fledged subscription, you can always use the Turbine-style cash shop to buy the locked races, classes, and areas separately.
Levels of membership will be free (self explanatory), silver (from a one time purchase), gold ($15/month), and platinum ($200/year), and each level will grant varying bonuses.
Now for the bad side: If you want customer service as a free player, you’re out of luck as such a service is reserved for those who have made purchases. Free players will also not be able to send (although they can receive) mail, not to mention free and silver members will be locked out of the broker system. If you have items in the broker and downgrade, the broker will not release the coins/items. I should also point out that although members will be able to bleed their characters to Extended servers, the same will not be possible the other way around.
And now for those who hate cash shops: The cash shop being implemented on to the extended servers will sell, as the FAQ put it:
“Healing potions, powerful weapons and armor, attack wands, buff runes, self-rez items, basic mounts, and a lot more. None of these items are required for a great gaming experience.”
P.S: Those of you playing with the subscription (gold member) will find only four races available to you. The rest must be purchased on the cash shop, according to the FAQ and tier-list. Gold members will also have access to only seven character slots.
I have a feeling the opponents of cash shops are going to have a field day with this, especially with the announcement that subscribers will receive perks in the form of bonus weapons/armor/mounts/etc, and the fact that subscribers will still have to pay for addition races. The highest tiers of weapons/armor will not be available on the cash shop, SOE has promised. Also, according to the FAQ, free/platinum members will also be inundated with “frequent reminders to upgrade.”
Hopefully (and I do mean a big “hopefully”) Sony will implement this in a way more similar to Turbine’s free to play approach with Dungeons and Dragons Online, rather than say bringing people in with the promise of a free breakfast, and then locking the doors and refusing to let them leave (or have breakfast) until they buy into your time share.
Read the full announcement here: http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=483443. The beta is coming mid-August.
I’m not saying someone at Sony is a pathological liar but…
“As I said in that interview, we will not be changing your subscription model. We’ve heard you folks loud and clear that you do not want items with stats introduced, you don’t want players buying their way to power, etc. Your world will stay the way it has been and we will continue to support it with new content, items, etc.”
-Smokejumper, Sony Online Entertainment Senior Producer, 6/25/10
Isn’t double-talk neat? It’s not a change in service, it’s a completely new service!
So where do we end this? Technically speaking, Everquest II will be competing against itself as the 100% separated Live and Extended servers fight for new players. John Smedley has stated that the reason behind making this a completely new service was due to player feedback against having the two services combined. So, as we saw in Trammel on Ultima Online, we’ll see just how many current Everquest II players hold out on the live servers, and how many merge in with the Extended service. As a free/silver member, upgrading to gold on the Extended servers holds much more incentive than switching over to the Live servers, as your characters will be stuck on Extended.
Either way, I wish luck to Sony Online Entertainment and Everquest II. Hopefully Sony can enjoy the same success Turbine does with DDO and (perhaps) Lord of the Rings Online when the latter goes free to play this year. MMO Fallout will continue to bring you news on Everquest 2 Extended as it appears, and if you follow the full announcement, Sony staff are sticking their head into the forums every now and then to answer questions.
MMO Fallout 