Going Free-to-Play: The D&D Online Unlimited Q&A
Last week Turbine Entertainment announced an industry first: it revealed that it was retro-fitting a commercially launched, subscription-based massively multiplayer online role-playing game and relaunching it as a free to play game with micro-transactions via an in-game store. The game in question is Dungeons & Dragons Online, which, along with The Lord of the Rings Online, is Turbine Entertainment’s bread and butter.
But the privately held MMO company isn’t just grasping at straws here or committing an act of desperation with this move, because many in the industry believe free to play is the future. With games like Free Realms and Runes of Magic garnering millions of subscribers in a short amount of time after launch, there is no denying the viability of the free to play model. But how will a commercial game like D&D Online hold up in this brave new environment? We wanted some answers from Turbine, and answers we received.
For those answers, we turned to Dungeons & Dragons Online Executive Producer, Fernando Paiz and Turbine Entertainment Public Relations Manager Adam Mersky. They filled us in on the future of the Dungeons & Dragons Online MMO, henceforth known as Dungeons & Dragons Online Unlimited .
Crispy Gamer: The last time I talked to you, you had mentioned that you were working on a console game. You haven’t announced it yet - are you still working on it?
Adam Mersky: We haven’t made any announcements yet. We haven’t talked about it but it is definitely happening.
Crispy Gamer: You should talk to us about it.
Adam Mersky: My theory on that is that there are a lot of companies out there that just talk about what they are going to do. What I would rather do is show you what we’re doing. And that’s why I’m holding on it. Hopefully this fall we won’t just say what we’re doing, we will actually show you some of the work we’ve done.
Crispy Gamer: Fair enough. Let’s move on to DDO Unlimited. How long did Turbine think about doing free to play before it actually decided to do it? In other words, how much research went into this decision?
Adam Mersky: A lot. By no means was this a flip decision. DDO launched over three years ago and LOTRO launched over two years ago now, and since we rolled it out in North America and Europe, we’ve also been localizing and bringing them to other territories and especially in Asia where, as we go to market there we’re competing against these giant free to play games. So we knew several years ago that free to play was something that was going to grow and definitely come to the west and North America — and Europe in particular — and that we had to be in it.. and how were we going to go about that? Were we going to import games, were we going to create a new title after the Asian model? And after we researched it and learned more about how things worked, how they should work and what didn’t work that we’d like to improve, we looked at DDO at said “this is a pretty good fit for this model.”
It’s a game focused on small group experiences, instanced experiences that sort of lend themselves well from a technical standpoint of being able to gain content for this type of business model. And frankly, when you go back to the TSR days, this is how Dungeons and Dragons was marketed initially; where you picked up a book and you had a series of adventures you ran through with your buddies. And when the time was right, you went back to the hobby store and found ways to enhance your experience by buying more adventure books, dice, minis things like that.
It was very in tune with the IP, and so, with a bit more research, we said we don’t have to import a game or make a new one; we have a great game here that - if we take a thoughtful approach to it and reengineer it correctly, will make a great fit.
So we’ve been working on implementing it for well over a year.
Crispy Gamer: You kind of answered my next question but I’ll ask it anyway: why is the time right now to do free to play game for Turbine, and why did you choose DDO?
Fernando Paiz: I think we need to talk a little more about why DDO is the right fit, but as far as “why is the timing right now for free to play?,” I think that the industry is revolving. We are always watching what is going on in the industry - either with our competitors in Western markets or some of the Asian markets as well. We’ve had some experience with some of our games - including DDO - and what we saw there is that consumers were so much more attuned to this type of free to play model. And there was a feeling that “the Western market won’t accept it” and “we’re not sure how to bring it to the Western market, but something like this is the future.” Giving players a choice of how to pay for the games and not feel locked into $15 a month or “I have to play 10 hours a week or I’m not getting value’s worth” .. or whatever somebody’s internal equation is there. That is a barrier. That is the number one reason people will not an MMO: because of the subscription. So there is a need to be answered of how do you get a different kind of player who may be more casual in to these games and have them not be scared away by the subscription and we felt that time was right now.
with DDO Unlimited we’re really presenting an innovative, first-of-its-kind hybrid model here for the Western market, where it’s not just “you’re here for free and your forced into a subscription” or “you play for free and you have to actually have to transact with the store in order to get the good gear or the potions to survive in the dungeons.” That’s not what we’re doing; we’re offering this great hybrid model that lets you choose how to pay for the game at your own pace or - or if you’re a hardcore player and you really get into the game and you are spending a ton of time in there and creating five or six characters (which our players certainly do - and more) - then the VIP program, which is our new subscription program, will continue to be the best value for you.
