In our columns section we ask various local gamers for their opinions on certain topics. These articles are meant to create lively debate, and the opinions expressed therein do not necessarily reflect those of MyGaming. Are you a decent writer with a cool idea for a column? Let us know in the comments section.

There’s been a lot in the news lately regarding games taking up the “free-to-play” model. Not too long ago it was announced that Team Fortress 2 would now be free-to-play, no doubt encouraging those who hadn’t tried it before to give it a whirl.

We then saw a rumour that Valve’s DOTA 2 may very likely be free to play, a rumour which came right after the dipping of their toe into the F2P pool with Team Fortress 2. DOTA 2, however, seems to be a secret so closely guarded I wouldn’t be surprised if the first screenshots came from Wikileaks. So as with everything DOTA 2 related, we’ll just have to “wait and see”.

On top of all this, it was recently revealed that when LittleBigPlanet was originally pitched to Sony, Sony wanted to turn it into a free-to-play title. An argument can now be made that that may have been a poor decision, considering the phenomenal retail success of the IP.

All this talk of free-to-play has me pondering it not only as a viable business model, which I think it has proved itself to be, but also the possibility of it being a superior business model. Could free-to-play one day become the new standard for video game retail?

I don’t care how much you want to hate it. Noone can resist a free Valve game.

As ironic as it may seem, free-to-play games can often make a lot more money than their pay-in-full counterparts.

Games do this by tapping into one of human society’s most basic instincts: why work hard for something I can just buy?

As it turns out, there are plenty of gamers out there with money to spare, and they are happy to spend five dollars to get an item that would otherwise take 40 hours of grinding.

We’ve seen these kinds of “micro-transactions”, as publisher CEOs so lovingly refer to them, pop up more and more in game releases. They’ve been appearing even in games that sell for regular full retail prices, just as a nifty little added income boost.

We’ve also seen the extremely popular advent of DLC, or downloadable content, where game developers attempt to extract more of our hard-earned cash through shiny new maps and other goodies. These sometimes feel a little unfair – for example, we’re promised unlimited online playtime upon buying an FPS, but then cannot play on any of the servers running the new DLC maps without buying it ourselves. This causes a split in the community, and has often forced gamers who don’t particularly care about the new maps to but them anyway, just want to be able to keep playing.

Games like League of Legends have also lent a lot of credibility to this form of payment model. Gamers are allowed to play for free and earn experience points, which can be used in the League of Legends store to purchase more characters and special items called runes.  Of course, you can also just punch in some credit card details and save yourself hundreds of hours of playing.  While there are plenty of players (like me) who have never actually used real money in the store, there are plenty more who have done it enough to pay for themselves and for people like me.

 
Riot Games didn’t make this game for people like me.

There are clearly a lot of advantages to this model:

Initial surge. The obvious advantage is that, all things equal, you’re going to get a lot more people playing your game than you would have had otherwise. For a person to commit a chunk of money to a game, they usually have to be pretty damn sure it’s actually something they want to play. Make that game free, and a ton of people are going to give it a try just out of curiosity. This opens you up to a lot more interest through word of mouth and online user reviews. 

This also allows for more…

Addiction. Developers and publishers have caught on fast to the fact that if you attach a shiny icon and a point total to some kind of goal, it keeps people playing – offering achievements is like offering free cake at fat camp. Another method of addicting gamers is by tapping into our most noble of traits – greed, ambition and megalomania. Gamers will pour countless hours (and money) into a game in order to get better items, higher levels, and more power. Being able to actually see and feel progress – to be better than our peers – is a strong motivator for many to keep playing. After all, it’s the introduction of high scores that filled arcades decades ago – everyone wants to be the best.

 
“Hi everyone. My name is Chris, and I’m an Achievement Whore-der.”

No Piracy. There may be some exceptions to this, but for the most part, making your game free means pirating it is about the dumbest thing a person can do. It is much easier to control the purchase of items, levels, perks, whatever it is you are selling, than to stop people from pirating a typical retail game.  This is certainly an attractive feature for PC developers, where piracy is rampant. It’s nice to know you’ll be losing very little piracy-related income.

More Income. The advantage of these kinds of business models is their sustainability over time. Adding things like achievements, perks, DLC etc. allows developers to greatly extend the longevity of a game, by not only giving players more reason to play for longer, but through incremental expansion of the game itself. It is clear that this model is most easily adapted to MMO and RPG type games, but there is no reason we couldn’t see this model in an FPS. We already have things like achievements, DLC and exclusive weapon models; it should be viable to turn that into a micro-transaction market.

There are of course some obvious downsides. One of them is simply that your game has to be really good. If you can hype up a mediocre game enough (I’m looking at you, Black Ops), you’re going to sell a ton of copies just because it’s “the next big title”.  If your game is free-to-play, it relies on actually capturing and maintaining people’s interest – no matter how hyped your game is, if people don’t like it they’ll stop playing before you can make a reasonable profit.

Another problem for publishers is that often they don’t particularly WANT to extend the life of a game by all that much. Game series like Guitar Hero or Call of Duty make their money by releasing a fresh new version every year, rather than a game like League of Legends which consistently updates and upgrades one existing game.

Sell by: 08/11/2011

For gamers, fairness may also be an issue. A lot of gamers may feel cheated if the person with more money gains a massive advantage over those that don’t choose to spend a lot. This would obviously be problematic, and it’s up to the game developers to balance this appropriately.  Anyone who has played League of Legends will know that money mostly offers more variety and fun, rather than an unfair advantage.

The real question is – what do you prefer? While this model seems promising for the future, there is the issue that it may have us spending even more than we are already. The concept of full access for free does seem appealing, but it feels ominously like there’s some fine print being overlooked. I feel like a man sporting an Italian accent and an expensive suit is asking if I’d like to borrow his Maserati for the weekend. Something doesn’t feel right about this.

Do you think free-to-play may be the future of video game retail? Do you love it or hate it? Let us know in the forums, or comment below!