WildStar Heads Free-to-Play This August

We should have seen this coming. And we have. WildStar, once called the WoW killer (like so many other MMOs) by many, has struggled with its subscription numbers, so it was only a matter of time before Carbine Studios pulled the plug on the subscription model.

Today, the WildStar Team has announced that the sci-fi MMO will be going free-to-play in August, admitting that it is a better business model. Quoting Mike Donatelli's statement on the matter:

"Free-to-play... it's the better business model. Fact. There are no barriers to entry. Pick a forum, any forum, go there and there'll be people saying 'I like the game, I'm just not paying you money for it. And that's every post... we absolutely acknowledge that the MMO community has evolved past the (subscription) business model."

WildStar, the Disney/Ratchet and Clank sci-fi alternative to World of Warcraft, launched with high popularity, but the numbers soon dwindled and reaching out to new players proved to be difficult. According to NC Soft's quarterly reports, WildStar earned far less in comparison to the other games in the publisher's arsenal. Thus, WildStar went from hero to zero rapidly, partially due to the tough difficulty serving as the barrier to entry.

To elaborate on the new business model, the game will boast more currencies than the introduced Cred, Gold, and convenience tokens. Cosmetic and "convenience" items will be added - how convenient has not been announced, but hopefully these items will refrain from being labeled pay-to-win. Fortunately, the items that cost real money will also be obtained via grinding as well. On top of these offers in the free-to-play transition, a loyalty program will be active, granting subscribers loyalty currency to purchase various items. Subscribed players will also receive reward packages when WildStar goes free-to-play.

So far, most games seem to have dropped the pay-to-play business model, even WoW, in favor for free-to-play or "hybrid" models. To this date, the only popular MMOs (that I know of) that remain 100% subscription-based are Final Fantasy XIV and Final Fantasy XI, and frankly, the subscription numbers of Final Fantasy XI have dropped immensely. We can say, however, that Final Fantasy XIV is still going strong, and with Heavensward just over the horizon, the subscription model will more-than-likely remain for a good while longer.

Sadly, WildStar just didn't have the chops to maintain the subscription model. You can find the details on the changes on the official site.