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Guild Wars 2 Goes Free-To-Play Effective Immediately
There are a few caveats for new free accounts, but overall, if you want to check out Guild Wars 2, you can now do so without paying.
You can now play #GW2 for free. Mike O'Brien explains everything about it right here http://t.co/MZEhzE2DYX ^DO pic.twitter.com/n5g4ltH3ix
— Guild Wars 2 (@GuildWars2) August 29, 2015
The game originally asked players to pay for the game once and did not demand a monthly fee, but did charge for large expansion. On its website, Guild Wars' Mike O'Brien insists it will not fall into the typical free-to-play monetization traps writing, "If anyone can play Guild Wars 2 for free now, does that mean we’re switching business models to free-to-play? Are we going to be one of those games that aggressively monetizes free players through microtransactions? Absolutely not. Guild Wars 2 remains the same game it always has been. We’re making the core game experience free because we’re confident that anyone who loves Guild Wars 2 will buy Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns."
Some of the differences between starting a free account, as opposed to the standard paid account, include fewer character slots and bag slots, chat and economy restrictions, and free accounts are also restricted in terms of skipping ahead to places if they aren't leveled high enough. Mostly these restrictions are in place to prevent players from cheating the game by creating lots of accounts, bots, or anything like that.
You can find a full FAQ about the change by heading here or reading the post about the change here. For more on the upcoming expansion, Heart of Thorns, head here.
[Source: Guild Wars 2]
Our Take
This will likely be good for Guild Wars 2's community in the long run by adding lots of new players, but it's oddly disappointing to see the game go free-to-play. I always appreciated that Guild Wars 2 did its own thing in terms of making money with its game, but it's hard to deny models that work.
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