When Free Isn't Enough - Games That Went Free-to-Play and Died Anyway

Table of Contents

• When Free Isn't Enough - Games That Went Free-to-Play and Died Anyway
• Battlerite
• Bless Online
• Zombies: Aion, Rift, Tera

Bless Online

Bless Online is an example of a great promise and disappointing results. The title took a long time to reach Europe. It first entertained players in South Korea and Japan, and then in Russia. It didn't do too well in all those MMORPG havens, so they eventually tried the Western market. As it turned out – with meager results.

In theory, it was guaranteed that this version of Bless Online would be different from those that didn't work out in the aforementioned countries. The creators promised atonement and the abolition of the "gender-lock," a non-invasive item shop, and a revised combat system that was supposed to be more dynamic. Was it enough? Nope – because nothing could hide the fact that Bless Online was just an average game that had nothing more to offer. Poor optimization and vulnerabilities didn't help either, encouraging fraudsters to indulge in their regular misdeeds.

Switching to a free-to-play model didn't really solve anything. The developers failed to improve their work, and the "freeness" turned out to be only superfluous, which led to the shut down of the servers. However, there's light at the end of the tunnel, as under a completely different authority, Bless Unleashed, or "a new, better Bless" is being created. Later this year, we'll see what comes of it.

Life is Feudal

We are used to the fact that MMORPGs are full of magic, so the announcement of a production of this type, devoid of magic and set in medieval realities, caused a lot of excitement. Life is Feudal: MMO looked like a perfect game for people tired of the typical fantasy, who just want to build a village, plant a forest, and conquer their neighbors.

It quickly became apparent, however, that Life is Feudal: MMO does offer the aforementioned elements, but you have to grind hard to reach them. Playing the game was akin to a full-time job with the possibility of losing everything by the whim of fate. This excessively hardcore nature meant that this title was unable to attract a wider range of players. Micropayments didn't help either, making gameplay much easier, which obviously gave an advantage to those with fatter wallets.

The switch to a free-to-play model brought Life is Feudal: MMO only a temporary boost. Players who didn't pay still encountered painful restrictions, which didn't earn the game any good publicity. Changing the rules of the game 180 degrees didn't help either. At one point, the difficult, hardcore title became downright casual. In time, they decided to go fully "free," but the decision came too late and soon after, Life is Feudal: MMO was shut down.