As you may have read today, NHN (the publisher for TERA in Korea) has decided to change TERA’s business model to be free. The industry has shifted in this direction and the Korean gaming market has always been on the forefront of this shift. NHN’s decisions are their own as is every territory that services TERA. TERA currently remains a subscription-based game in North America and Europe.

Regardless of the news from Korea, the good news is that TERA will continue to grow and improve with new game contents in North America, and all contents will be available for us should we decide to evaluate their use. As mentioned in A New Year for TERA, we will be following up in January with more information on the upcoming content including Crucible of Flame, an instance with scalable rewards and the new 3v3 battleground, Champion’s Skyring.

We know you are full of questions but that is all we have for now. Enjoy the holidays and look to January for more information – 2013 is going to be huge for us and we can’t wait to get started.

"all contents will be available for us should we decide to evaluate their use"

Does that mean you will decide/have control over which content we will get?

---Also agrees with below post, Minea go home lol ;)

Just to preempt all the inevitable negative Nancy's, free is a good thing IMO. Free always brings in more money first of all, and more money coming into any region is good for the game as a whole so this benefits all of us. Along those lines it brings in more players which creates a healthier and more fun, lively community. Secondly, since this game was created as a P2P game it already is a high quality game so any comments along those lines are irrelevant as well. Oh and the obvious third, this is for Korea and does not mean any changes are coming for us.

Also, I vote that EME let's Minea go home. O.o

I clicked here hoping for a big content trailer, sigh...

Alright, I'll come back to this thread later with my customary world-weary cynicism, and criticisms about the state of TERA US. *

Tonight, though, I'll just say merry Christmas, to Minea, and everyone else at EME.





*Okay, just one thing. Experience shows that 2013 will only be huge for you, and us, if it's huge for other TERA markets first. Get them to work on that, please.*





*sorry

I think k-tera change to f2p cements that this version is going to f2p in the future, it's just a matter of when rather than if.

Quote: Leiloni on 12/25/2012, 07:51 PM - view


I have to totally disagree. Free is good? maybe if the cash shop is fair and not overboard. If there is anything in the cash shop that = p2w/pay for power then it is a wrap. That is not good.

To me, this is really bad news.

I want TERA to keep being pay to play, and it no longer being that way in KTera really worries me.

Quote: Leiloni on 12/25/2012, 07:51 PM - view
Free is not a good thing from any other perspective other than "Hey, it's free!"

It may bring in "more" money (debatable, though - compare the subscription profits of WoW to a successful f2p game), but that is because they microtransaction their customers at every single opportunity. It is horrible from an ethics standpoint and horrible in terms of "bang for your buck" from the perspective of a potential consumer.

Free is NOT good for the game as a whole. It generally means fewer if any content updates and bug fixes, lower quality customer service (or none), and a lower quality product overall. TERA already doesn't meet up to a lot of the expectations of a pay-to-play MMO (primarily in the content spectrum), so your own little comment about irrelevancy is, funnily enough, irrelevant - especially so as though it won't change TERA's past, it will most certainly change its future.

Free-to-play communities may be... "lively", but I would hardly call them healthy or fun. They are a haven for the worst the internet has to offer, because there is no barrier to entry. I would take the community of a subscription MMO over a free-to-play one any day.

I think it is foolish to claim that things that happen in Korea do not in any way affect what happens in North America. No, we are not at the moment going free-to-play, but there are a lot of signals coming over to us that do not look good.

From my experience with F2P's I entirely agree with Arwydd. Ask people in those F2P games what type of customer service they get. Gosh look at SWTOR, it's turned into a Ferengi swamp.

Unfortunately, based on Minea's words it is very clear that NA and EU TERA will be following those tracks in one way or another.

"The industry has shifted and the Korean gaming market has always been at the forefront of this shift." Merely means that they are ahead in the direction everyone (namely TERA) is heading towards. This is very unfortunate, because if people in general did not warm up to lucky Bags in an F2P model you can expect EVERYTHING to be based not only around Lucky Bags but also Master Keys and other such gambling tactics. And that's what will generate the money, and that's where development will focus. It's always like that.

Perhaps if they did go the B2P direction it could be less brutal but honestly, I feel despite their claims to independence about these decisions both EME and Gameforge remain under BHS's final authority as to which model they'll take. But to be B2P and not Cash Shop dependent they'll need content. Or tangible rewards given by Chornoscrolls / Subscriptions (not the garbage TSW and even SWTOR have awarded their subbers.)