Trion Worlds Takes Up Free-To-Play Gaming Model

Quote: Trion Worlds jumped into the gaming industry with its online massively multiplayer role playing game Rift, which launched in March. That game was designed to look as good and play as well as traditional video games from Electronic Arts or Activision Blizzard, but be distributed and played online in real-time. The game is connected to and essentially played off of Trion Worlds’ servers and can be updated at any time. Rift now has more than 1 million paid users. Trion Worlds is announcing that its strategy game End of Nations will be free to play, as many social games like Zynga are. But unlike casual social games, End of Nations is a video game-quality free-to-play game, says Lars Buttler, CEO of Trion Worlds. But free-to-play, virtual goods-based games have been associated with casual, relatively simple social games, so will hard core gamers play them? Buttler says yes. He cites other recent successful titles such as Riot Games’ League of Legends and Wargaming.net’s World of Tanks. “End of Nations is simply fulfilling this trend,” Buttler says. “It’s really taking it to video game quality. Itis a gamer’s dream to be able play live large-scale real time strategy with  all your friends.” Buttler says free-to-play is the right model for this real-time strategy tame. But that doesn’t mean that model will necessarily work for other games. End of Nations is also the first third-party title launching on Trion Worlds’ platform. The game was created by Petroglyph Games, who previously created Command & Conquer. Buttler says more third party titles will be launching on Trion Worlds. Trion Worlds recently hired Dave Luehmann, who previously was general manager of Microsoft Game Studios working on the Xbox, as its vice president for 3rd party development.Related Posts: ...
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