Emmanuel Lusinchi, the lead designer behind Star Wars: The Old Republic has revealed to GamesTM that BioWare is looking into the possibilities of making the subscription based title free-to-play.
"The MMO market is very dynamic and we need to be dynamic as well. Unless people are happy with what they have, they are constantly demanding updates, new modes, and situations. So we are looking at free-to-play, but I can't tell you in much detail. We have to be flexible and adapt to what is going on."
He continued, "If it was just free-to-play games and they weren't very good, it wouldn't even be a question, but there are definitely good games out there and good games coming out, so of course all of this competition impacts your plan with what you want to do.”
It’s not entirely surprising to see BioWare consider this route, as the game may have been critically praised, and certainly attracted plenty of interest at its launch last December, but it’s been reported that it has recently shed around 400,000 users, and there were even layoffs at BioWare itself.
Moving to a free-to-play model would certainly attract a great deal of new interest in the title, and may also persuade those that jumped ship to give the game another try. The move to a micro transaction system will of course, be implemented in order to generate revenue, and it’s a route that’s work for many other free-to-play MMOs, and it could certainly work here.
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