Sony out to prove free-to-play “really works”

By: Moses Abaortae

  |   July 25th, 2012   |  

News, Uncategorized

John Smedley, the Sony Online Entertainment boss, claims that titles such as Dust 514 will prove that freemium is here to stay.

A term everyone will hear in the gaming industry these days is free-to-play; a number of publishers are working on establishing their presence in the freemium market with Ubisoft, Sony, EA and CryTek all working on multiple projects.

For those who are not familiar with the term ‘freemium’ it’s a fairly simple concept. The game itself is free to download and play but the publishers then rely on micro-transactions within the game to generate revenue.

For example, Ghost Recon Commander is a free-to-play title from Ubisoft on the popular social networking site, Facebook. Playing the game costs nothing whatsoever and can be played without paying a single penny.

However, if gamers wish to purchase additional content such as extra ammunition or certain abilities then they need to spend Facebook credits on the purchase. Incidentally Facebook credits are purchased for real world money.

Ubisoft is also working on Ghost Recon Online and CryTek has Battlefront while EA has a whole host of freemium titles on offer.

Sony is also keen on the emerging business model and has DC Universe Online on offer, however, the head of Sony Online Entertainment, John Smedley, believes that the release of DUST 514 will further prove freemium is the next big thing in the industry.

He said, “It’s 70 per cent of the audience. Free-to-play on PlayStation 3 is huge. In fact, right now, it’s us with DCUO (DC Universe Online) and Free Realms and our friends at CCP with Dust 514 that are going to prove that this market really works.”

Smith also believes that the fact that the main chunk of the game is free automatically attracts consumers to download and try it out.

He explained, “There’s a lot of people that go through that store and it’s so easy to find and download these games that it’s a great business model.” Before continuing, “A lot of people have already stored their credit card information so it’s very frictionless if they do want to buy something.”

The head of Sony Online Entertainment also believes that providing content that the end consumer will value is also crucial to making the model work and the focus needs to be on quality alongside the quantity as well and he emphasized on how Free Realms was the epitome of that approach.

However, all the attention is on CCP’s ambitious free-to-play first-person shooter, Dust 514, which looks to connect PC players in the EVE Online universe with those on the PlayStation 3. The future of Sony’s approach to the freemium model is sure to be influenced by the game and one can only wait and see how that will turn out.