Following the success of Turbine’s free-to-play experiment with Dungeons & Dragons Online and Lord of The Rings Online, Cryptic Studios announced that it was switching Champions Online over to the freemium business model. Cryptic CEO Jack Emmert told Eurogamer that the company would be willing to switch Star Trek Online over to the model as well, depending on Champions’ success.
"I'm sure people are wondering whether we'll do it with Star Trek and the question is really how well it does for Champions," said Emmert. "We're not sold one way or the other with Star Trek yet. If people want Star Trek to go free-to-play then get in and play Champions and help make it a great success, because that would send a strong message. If we did Turbine's level of success that would certainly merit the discussion!"
"We hope for a success as big as DDO. That would be great - but I wouldn't say we're betting on it,” Emmert explained. "In other words, I'm not going to say we'll do or die if we don't get five times our revenue or whatever the stats were that Turbine did. We're just hoping to open it up and increase the fanbase, and we'll just wait and see - I'd love it if we got their results, but hey, if that doesn't happen it doesn't happen."
The free-to-play model has been around for a while, mostly in Asian-based MMOs and online titles, but Turbine’s success has helped to open the floodgates for the model in the West.
