The Secret World: Pay Once Play Forever - Without Issues

If Joel Bylos is right, this doesn't matter at all but The Secret World is no longer a subscription based MMO starting today. There has been f2p transformation rumors around the game for a long time but Funcom had never hinted on such a drastic change. Continue reading for the details of the pay-once transformation.

The Secret World switches to pay-once-play-forever model

Guild Wars 2, The WarZ, are two MMOs I can think of that offers players a pay-once-play-forever model. Most players seem to appreciate the model. At the end of the day, players do understand that developers need money to make games and it simply can't be 100% free. Free to play model has had its good and bad times, good and bad examples too... 

In my opinion, The Secret World should have used this business model since the get-go. It's hard to believe it today, isn't it! Only a couple of months ago, Funcom developers have been saying that it would not be possible to offer the game without subscriptions. (*See correction below) Unfortunately Funcom perhaps had to go through the complications  with the subscription model and finally they have decided to give up before it's too late. Our guess is this will work better for the developer and gamers both.

The game's producer Joel Bylos, who has been more popular with his end-of-days videos lately, is very excited about the change. 

“With this recent change there is no reason not to join and take part in ‘The Secret World, most players end up having a ton of fun once they delve into the myths and legends of ‘The Secret World’, and we believe the game has the potential to be even more successful without the subscription entry barrier. It is an ambitious and very exciting move for us!”

Joel Bylos, The Secret World director

I have to admit too. The MMORPG was on top of my list since it was announced and I had pre-ordered The Secret World the very same day Funcom started accepting orders. However, after three months, I gave up on my subscription. Not that the game was too expensive or it wasn't worth the subscription fee... I just did.

Now that the game is free forever once you buy the game, it will definitely attract more MMO fans. We shall wait and see. If you don't know much about the MMORPG, visit our The Secret World section for screenshots and gameplay videos.

*Correction: Funcom has posted an in-detail FAQ. As The Secret World doesn't require subscriptions from now on, the Content pack, also known as Issues will become purchasable DLC's. First content pack in 2013 will sell for $5. In other words, we were wrong about our assumption and were surprised how developers went from saying one thing to another about premium content requiring subscriptions. Now the game doesn't require subscriptions but Issues will not be for free.

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