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PAX East 2011: Will World of Warcraft ever go free-to-play?
It seems that every new MMORPG wants to bill itself as a "WoW killer." From Lord of the Rings Online to Age of Conan to (most recently) RIFT, everyone wants a piece of the most popular subscription-based MMORPG of all time. To date, World of Warcraft has weathered the competition. Its subscriber numbers have reached an all-time high (now over 12 million), with its latest Cataclysm expansion selling nearly 5 million copies in the first month alone. The game should remain popular and successful for years to come. Still, even Blizzard admits: It can't stay on top forever. So what happens when the game starts losing a significant amount of its subscriber base? If what happened to Turbine's Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online is any clue, World of Warcraft might move to a free-to-play model. Since switching to free-to-play, both of Turbine's games added subscribers and increased revenues. This past weekend, I sat in on the free-to-play MMO panel held at the PAX East 2011 conference in Boston. Afterward, I caught up with Robert Ferrari, VP of Publishing and Business Development for Sanrio Digital (Hello Kitty Online), to discuss WoW. We discussed the free-to-play industry and whether or not World of Warcraft could eventually find a place in it. "WoW has to be looking at a free-to-play model currently," Ferrari theorized.
Ex-Turbine exec to joins forces with Hello Kitty Online
Sanrio Digital has recently announced a new vice president of Publishing and Business Development for their Hello Kitty Online MMO project. Robert Ferrari is joining the HKO team from Turbine, where he previously worked towards the success of such games as Lord of the Rings Online, Dungeons and Dragons Online and Asheron's Call."I am pleased to welcome Robert to Sanrio Digital," said Yat Siu, chief executive officer of Sanrio Digital. "We are excited to secure such a well-respected and experienced industry professional on our team. Robert's established background and reputation in MMOs and social gaming make him the ideal driver for our publishing and business development efforts across the Americas, Europe and other markets. I am certain he will contribute greatly to our global strategy and success."
