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Fine free-to-play tank 'em up World of Tanks is now substantially prettier, as update 8.0 and its graphical overhaul is now live on both North American and European servers. 8.0 also overhauls the physics system, meaning tanks can no longer casually hang over the edge of a cliff to take a pot-shot. Sorry, heavy tanks.
Free-to-play games were once seen as a bit low-budget and janky compared to 'proper' games, but the F2P revolution of recent years has shown they can be just as pleasant and polished as anything wot comes in a box. NCsoft's Blade & Soul certainly has prettiness down pat, and the publisher announced yesterday it's bringing the F2P MMORPG westward following a smash hit launch in South Korea.
Nadeo's TrackMania games traditionally ran under a free-to-play model of sorts but TrackMania 2 Canyon shook that up by simply charging a cover price, and it seemed ShootMania Storm would too. Not so. Nadeo's first FPS will in fact return to the old way, publisher Ubisoft announced today, and offer two of its many modes for free.
Gotham City Impostors seemed set up to be free-to-play from the start, selling XP boosters, costumes, instant unlocks, and the like, yet it still had a $15 price tag. No longer, at least on PC. While the console editions curiously are still paid, Monolith's Bat-tastic FPS is free-to-play on PC through Steam from today.
Tim Schafer's Double Fine studio is the latest to chase after mobile riches. Middle Manager of Justice is not only the team's first mobile game, but it's also their first free-to-play title.
Xbox 360 is finally jumping into the world of free-to-play. The "large-scale multiplayer" action game, Happy Wars, will be launching as a free download to all Xbox Live Gold members.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot says that only 5-7% of users pay for boxed retail PC games, the same percentage of people who pay into free-to-play titles.
We played through the beta of Dust 514 and found that the melding of an FPS with the MMO EVE Online presents some interesting possibilities.
How would you like to play Ghost Recon for free? Well, that depends on how it's monetised, doesn't it? Ubisoft launched the Ghost Recon Online open beta today at Gamescom, letting all and sundry try the free-to-play multiplayer FPS and judge whether the fun of shooting men outweighs the annoyance of microtransactions.
Though the announcement of Command & Conquer: Generals 2 was welcomed by many, EA really needed something a little more drastic to revive the flagging strategy series. Drastic it has indeed delivered, announcing at Gamescom that Generals 2 will be free-to-play as part of an online F2P service, with more free C&C games to come.
