Renewal – MMO Fallout

APB: Reloaded Implements New Premium Payments, With Auto-Renew!

Gamersfirst this week announced that players will finally be able to subscribe to the game’s premium service and have their subscription automatically renew every month. Through its payment provider Stripe, players can automatically subscribe to one month ($7.99), three month ($18.39) and six month ($26.36) plans that will automatically renew without needing you to manually re-purchase the premium package. You will still be able to cancel at any time.

It will also continue to be possible to buy premium with G1 Credits, however the announcement notes that an automatic renewal system that deducts credits from your account every month is not currently available. The team hopes to have it in at some point.

(Source: Gamersfirst)

Turbine’s Renewal of the Asheron’s Call Domain Is Probably Nothing

The internet is buzzing, or at least a small section is, over the news that Turbine has renewed the Asheron’s Call domain through 2022. While the revelation has naturally caused speculation on whether or not Turbine has plans for the property, the real answer is fairly likely to not exactly be what the community wants to hear. In practice, domain renewals are cheap and easy and done simply to protect a company’s IP. After all, while Turbine may have no interest in further work on the series, they don’t want the domains dropping into less scrupulous hands.

Domains generally only get pushed over to the public when the company goes fully bankrupt. Games like Hellgate: London for instance have had their hosting servers taken over by fan sites and revival projects, while games like the 2D Half Life 2 fan title Codename: Gordon link to a domain that has since been taken over by a porn website distributing malware, forcing Valve to remove the game from Steam. In either case, Turbine probably doesn’t want its domain linking to private servers or porn.

So don’t read too far into this domain renewal.

Lord of the Rings Safe Until 2017

When it comes to licensed MMOs, there is always the risk that the game will shut down not because of a lack of population, but due to issues over renewing the license. For Lord of the Rings Online, players are understandably concerned over Turbine’s license expiring at the end of the year. Luckily for all of us, Turbine has announced that the license has been renewed through 2017.

We have said as far back as July of 2013, we plan to support LOTRO for many years to come. I really want to be as clear as possible on this subject to avoid any further confusion or misunderstanding. The license was renewed. I think it’s rather clear and direct. I can’t think of a more direct way to say the license was renewed than to say the license was renewed. We have an agreement that runs through 2017.

Barring some sudden drop in population, players have little to be concerned over.

(Source: Contains Moderate Peril)