In an interview with Eurogamer, RIFT executive producer Scott Hartsman mentioned that Trion has no plans for turning RIFT into a free-to-play title stating, “Right now, absolutely no plans whatsoever“.

Not a big surprise to hear given that the overall consensus is that RIFT is doing pretty well, however when asked for subscription numbers, Hartsman declined to provide any. Although he did mention that the game is “absolutely profitable“.

Not only is Trion making money from RIFT, but Hartsman stated they are licensing the technical platform of all three games (RIFT, End of Nations and Defiance) in which they were built on. So it doesn’t seem like money is an issue for Trion currently.

That being said, it’s almost never a good thing when a publisher doesn’t release any numbers, especially after being release for as long as RIFT has. The only number we’ve seen so far is the 1 million registered accounts that were created during the pre-launch. Had RIFT actually hit 1 million subscribers, I’m sure they would have gladly released that number by now.

There must be something to the sandbox design as it was recently announced that Skyrim has sold over 3.4 million copies in just 48hrs, not including digital sales. This outpaces every game this year with the only exception being Modern Warfare 3.

While Skyrim is obviously a single-player game, the Elder Scroll series has always utilized a sandbox design allowing players to truly have the freedom to do whatever they want and go anywhere. This includes, but is not limited to, murdering, stealing and looting, something that most MMORPGs are too afraid to do these days.

The Elder Scroll series takes a realistic approach to crime, where if the player gets caught they must face the consequences of it, either by going to jail or being killed. In the case where the player can escape, they become essentially bared from that town or city, which in itself is pretty cool.

Skyrim also doesn’t pigeon hole players into a specific class, allowing them to user any gear and weapons they find. Players also have the option of completely reworking their perks or skills if they decide they don’t enjoy the character they’ve created without having to start over.

These sort of features have always been used against sandbox MMORPGs, with the argument being they’re just too “hardcore” for mainstream players. I call BS on that. I think the reason the Elder Scroll series has grown into the RPG juggernaut it is, is because players love the freedom to do anything they want. Stealing from or killing friendly NPCs are one of the great hallmarks in Elder Scrolls. How fun it is to go back later on it the game, kill your NPC trainer and loot their awesome gear.

One thing to keep in mind is that Skyrim is a single-player game, so all of these sandbox features are one sided. Meaning no one is going to steal or attempt to kill you unless you attacked first, so there’s really no sense of constant danger for the player as there would be in a MMORPG.

Even so, I think MMO players are getting tired of the same old theme-park system nearly all MMO games today follow, at least I know I am.

The Escapist is reporting that the developers behind the Japanese MMO game M2 are shutting the game down because they accidentally deleted everyones account during server maintenance and they didn’t back it up.

On Oct 21st, the servers were taken offline due to a “critical issue” with one of the games’s main servers and while trying to fix it, someone accidentally hit the big red button that said delete.

Neither Hangame nor Sankando, the original developer, could restore the game data so the game was shut down. While I’m sure nearly all players are upset they lost their accounts and time, the most upset are the ones that spent money to buy in-games items. Hangame however did say they will provide conditional refunds to certain players.

Pretty insane to think a MMO developer wouldn’t have multiple backups of players game accounts. I’d say maybe this was an excuse for them to shut the game down if they were losing money, but this also completely ruins their name. If I was a player, I’d never even think about playing another MMO from either of those two development studios.

In what seems to have become a weekly ritual, this week we have Earthrise announcing they are now going Free-to-play staring December 1st when they will no longer be charging a subscription fee. However, new players will only be added via invitations as Masthead prepares the game for a full F2P launch.  Current players will be able to invite a few friends during this transition period.

Masthead, the developers behind Earthrise, have stated the new in-game store will not be pay-to-win so players need not worry. CEO Atanas Atanasov also  stated that during the transition to F2P, they will concentrate on adding polish to the game and as well as tweaking some of the features that “spoil the fun in the game“.

No word yet on when the game will official launch into F2P, however it is expected in early 2012.

The fifteenth expansion to Eve Online now has a official release date, Eve Online: Crucible will be launching on Nov 29th. The Crucible expansion will introduce new ships, bring enhancements to the graphics, user interface and will include over three dozen updates to game-play mechanics.

Below we have a list of some of the new features that will be included in the expansion, however a full list has not yet been released.

• Improved chat windows
• New Station-themed Captain’s Quarters
• Time Dialation: Improved server performance for massive fleet battles
• Ship spinning and graphics tweeks
• Hybrid weapons balancing
• Assault ships
• Capital ship balancing
• New T2 modules
• Starbase logistics management
• T2 Rigs manufacturing

The first thing I should mention is that I am not a Star Wars fan. I’ve seen the movies of course – over 2 decades ago when I was a kid. I never had any of the action figures, I’ve never played a Star Wars game, and unless I hit Google I couldn’t tell you which movie features the Ewoks or which one has Luke losing his hand. You can call me an ignorant savage if you like (my fiance does), but I prefer old classic movies like The Lion in Winter or The Maltese Falcon, and as a kid I preferred Schmendrick to Luke. When it comes to MMOs, I don’t like story-driven games, I want to just go out into the wilderness and kill and kill and kill my way up the leveling ladder. Companions? If I want company, I’ll group or play a single player game like Dragon Age. Space combat? I’d rather go crawling through a deep mazelike dungeon. Jedis? Lasers are cool, but I’d prefer a nice dagger to stick into my enemy’s back after I’ve robbed him blind (I just love MMOs with pickpocketing, I get to loot my enemies TWICE!).

I thought the game was being overhyped simply because it has lightsabers, Jedis, spaceships, and Sith. So when I had the opportunity to sit down and play Star Wars: The Old Republic this weekend, I expected to have a few hours of ok fun, uninstall the game and walk away.

I was wrong. Not only did I not walk away, I preordered two copies.

Continued…

That damn instance finder is so hot right now (I don’t know, Zoolander just gOt into my head so I had to) that Turbine has decided to add one for Lord of the Rings Online in their upcoming Update 5 content update.

Along with the instance finder, update 5 will continue the Epic Book story-line focusing on Theodren and will introduce 5 new dungeons which will take place in near or within the Tower of Orthanc leading up to Saruman.

Three of the new dungeons will be 3-man, one 6-man and one 12-man raid where players will confront Saruman himself. Along with the new dungeons there will also be new instance gear sets and raid sets.

Good news for players who weren’t all to pleased with the content from the recently released expansion Rise of Isengard, which only included one new dungeon raid.

It seems the Dungeon/Instance finder is catching on as RIFT also recently added one and WoW recently expanded theirs to include raids. Good news for solo players, not so much for role-players.

The third closed beta weekend for BioWare’s Wrath of Heroes has been announced for Thanksgiving weekend. So if football isn’t your thing and you need a reason to get away from your relatives, you can tell them it’s an exclusive beta weekend that you can miss.

The closed beta weekend will begin on Nov 24th and will end on the 27th. No info about if any new features or characters will be added for the third beta weekend, however it should be released sometime this week, so we’ll keep you posted.

Today we have a new video from En Masse showcasing their latest TERA Big Ass Monster or BAM, the Ovolith, which is a spider-like giant that morphs into an egg-shaped cocoon.

The Ovolith is capable of spraying poison on its enemies, is especially fast-moving and capable of dealing massive damage with its monstrous pincers. As it can shiftshape between spider and cocoon, the development team had to take both shapes into account as they affect both the ovolith’s hit detection and damage.

“The monster’s outer shape matters a lot in combat because TERA lets players aim their attacks naturally. Auto-targeting games only need a normal attack with different attack motions, but we have more aspects to consider because the player’s character actually gets hit in TERA. But this extra challenge is one of the joys of creating monsters for TERA,” says the game’s Monster Concept Lead Artist, Junghyun Kim.

“After we make some sketches, we discuss our ideas and make decisions on how to create the monster so it’ll work in the game. Then we complete the animation in perspective view to deliver the feel of the monster, make three-view drawings (useful in creating 3D), figure out how the monster moves, and so forth,” says the game’s Monster Concept Lead Artist, Junghyun Kim.

Check out the TERA Ovolith video below.

Continued…

Just over a week ago did DC Universe Online went free to play with Sony Online Entertainment bragging about how its player population increased by 1000% in the first few days. Today we learned that over one million new players have registered since the switch, which means the game only had 100,000 players before. So it’s very clear now as to why the switch was made, 100k is pretty horrible.

Today we also learned that Age of Conan: Unchained has gained 600,000 new players since the switch to F2P in July. Not quite as big as DCUO, but AoC is an older game and I’m sure most of the people who were interested in AoC had already tried it at some point.

Lord of the Rings Online, Dungeons & Dragons Online, Global Agenda, Champions Online are just some of the other MMORPGs that made the switch over the last year or two, all with great success.

While the free-to-play business model can be a savior for some games, it’s not the cure all with games like as Lego Universe, Faxion, Mythos and others closing down even after making the switch.

It’s clearer then ever the pay-to-play model is dead as just about every MMORPG announced, with the exception of Star Wars: The Old Republic and maybe The Secret World, going F2P. You can also view our MMORPG list and see that we only have 25 subscription games left of more than 350 games listed and only 5 of those 25 being released in the last 2 years.

With the amount of AAA MMO games now free, STO, EQ2 and Lineage 2 on their way, I don’t see TSW making it as a subscription title and I’m betting it’ll make the switch before the end if it’s first year if they do.