Lord of the Rings Online Likely to go Free To Play
Lord of The Rings Online, LOTRO for short, is yet another pay to play MMORPG that’s going to join the free to play revolution. Of course none of this is official yet, but we here at MMOHut suspect that The Lord of the Rings Online will go free to play sometime next year. Let’s consider the success Turbine has had with Dungeons & Dragons Online since relaunching it has a free to play MMORPG:
Dungeons and Dragons Online (DDO) went ‘free to play’ on September 15th and has since enjoyed enormous success. Turbine, the game’s publisher, needed to do something quick to revitalize DDO’s miserable subscription numbers and decided to take a gamble – and it paid off. Since re-launching as a free to play, micro transaction supported game, DDO’s ‘subscription numbers’, the total number of users paying monthly, has increased 40%. Although the game is free to play, users can pay a $9.99 monthly fee to access special ‘VIP’ privileges. In a recent interview with Ars Technica Fernando Paitz, the game’s executive producer, said “We’re hitting and exceeding our internal targets, so far we’ve very happy.” “All aspects of our business are growing.” “Hundreds of thousands of new players in the world are playing for free, with a very high percentage using the store.” The fact is, since Dungeons and Dragons Online went free to play the game has exploded in popularity which resulted in increased revenue for the publisher.
We have already confirmed that Turbine has held serious discussions internally about converting Lord of the Rings Online to a micro transaction based game, but until an official announcement is made there’s no way to be sure whether anything will happen. The folks at Turbine are smart enough to realize that the free to play market is huge – huge enough to attract big players like Electronic Arts (Battlefield Heroes) and Sony (Free Realms), so it wouldn’t be too surprising if LOTRO actually did go free to play. With the enormous success that Turbine has had with Dungeons and Dragons Online, it would make a lot of financial sense for Turbine to embrace the free to play model for Lord of the Rings Online.
UPDATE JUNE 3, 2010: It’s Official. Lord of the Rings Online from Turbine is going free to play in Fall, 2010. This rumor was posted on MMOHut on October 17, 2009. We called it. See the official news in our news section HERE
By, Michael K.
February 9, 2010
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hi, i want to play lotr online and i just want to know when is it going to be free to play?, also i live in canada so idk where to get the game card since apparently it was withdrawn ty
March 20, 2010
#1
I hope it does go to free to play. It is a very gret great game, one for all lord of the rings and fantasy fans. I would even compare it to World of Warcraft. It will open up the game more, and more people will join, which will work perfectly with their new skirmish gameplay
May 9, 2010
#2
i love lotro and would only love it more if it went f2p, that would make my day :3
May 11, 2010
#3
I love LOTRO but I can’t play it coz they don’t support my country´s credit card, so if it become free I’m sure that will be the best thing ever in MMO’s
May 24, 2010
#4
let me clarify this, lotro is actually the sole money maker for Turbine and they still have paying customers the reason DDO went f2p is because they were gonna have to shut it down because it was dying in terms of players so they arent just gonna make it f2p all though its arguable that it may make them more money if it was f2p with the VIP features and the buying packs and all that but they wont be going to f2p any time soon because why would they if they still have a decent paying plaer base but yes I would love it to go free because I like lotr and havent played a good lotr game since the 3rd age which was a turn based one but was the closest to the lotr originality as it paralleled the path the heroes take in the books/movies but I want to play this as I want to be a bard really bad in this looks sweet but just dont get your hopes up for it happening soon unless something happens money or playerbase wise
August 9, 2010
#5
Well, it has it on their site that it’s going f2p this fall. So it’s going to happen. I play WoW, but will probably play lotro in addition to WoW.
June 4, 2010
#6
It just announced f2p today. All existing subscribers will automatically be VIP like in DDO. and Nick, yes LOTRO was the sole money maker for turbine, but not for Warner Bros who recently bought Turbine.
June 4, 2010
#7
MMOHut called this on October 19, 2009 =]. Go Us!
July 3, 2010
#8
It’s a good but I didn’t want to pay to keep playing. But for free, I’ll be playing every day…just waiting to re-install. = )
thx for the news, MMOHut!