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Gaf
Copy pasting whole gaf post
Cryteks CEO Cervat Yerlis been swung by free-to-play gaming, hes pushing to have every future Crytek title run on the model - the first of which will be Warface, which Jeremy was very taken with last week. Though, Yerlis not so keen on how Valve turned Team Fortress 2 into a free-to-play game: Team Fortress 2 is not a real free to play game, in a sense.
I kind of think it's a 70% free to play title. It's on the way to be there, it's a good model and it works for them, but there is still pay to win there and I don't like that.
Valves version of free-to-play sees the base game being entirely free but a charge being placed on custom content. Largely this is purely cosmetic gear; the infamous hats. However, not all of it is cosmetic. There are also whole new item sets such as new weapons and apparel that apply bonuses to qualities like damage and hit points. This is what Yerli objects to There's some great experiment there, with user-generated content, but you buy items. You have to buy items.
In his view, a free to play game doesn't allow you to sell items. This is the issue I have with that. We would allow communities to create items for virtual currency, but you can't really go with commercial items because that's pay to win. So that's why I'm saying I'm disapproving of the concept of Team Fortress 2, because that is effectively not quite free to play. The only thing that's free-to-play there is they I can just go into the game and play it. But there's a piece of game I can't access without spending money.
With free-to-play being bandied about as term so much now its easy to forget that its not one single homogenous business model and that, in fact, there are very different ways of implementing it. Valve have always suggested that theyre experimenting with how to create a working model of the system so it will be interesting to see how their future games change up the system.
At least Warface is a true free to play g...
Which brings me to whats likely to be Warfaces most divisive feature - resurrection coins. Acquirable only in bulk via the in-game store, coins allow players instant revival in co-op. In practice, I found that they could be used strategically, to jump back into existence at an opportune moment - for instance, as soon as my killers back was turned.
Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli described a situation in which his group failed to reach a checkpoint by such a thin margin that he wished hed cashed in a coin to save them. It is something for convenience, he said. Normally a game design like that, I've seen it in other games when you just [have to] wait til they get to the next checkpoint - they don't have the mechanic to respawn at all. Its [virtual] money for the greater good of the group.
Not sure if 2nd bit is true..but just in case.
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