Eric

RoM is actually the only cash shop game I spent any money in. I believe I paid 5 or 10 bucks for a permanent white horse mount. It's not a game I play often, but I like to jump on now and then when I can't sub to my favorite MMO, or I just need a little change. I keep an Elven Warden on hand.

Can't say it was a bad investment, 10 bucks for a pretty fun MMO to play every now and then.

If SW:TOR succeeds, SWG is gone.

If it fails, DAoC or WAR is going.

I tried this game FOREVER ago and found it, well, I hated it. Like you said, finding how to do anything was really difficult. When I played the game had very few players, I'm surprised it's still kicking.

Interesting video. I actually enjoy seeing a dev just mess around for once, saying something stupid. I hope he was just messing around anyways :P

In playing the NFS: World beta, I really do enjoy it. It does feel arcadey (I mean, you get powerups like Juggernaut, which lets you plow through a car without losing speed) but I really am enjoying it. And this is coming from someone who spent countless hours in TOCA Race Driver 3 and GRID.

Now, what separates from the failed games, like Motor City Online and TDU? Well MCO only had US cars, and the lag was pretty nasty. As for TDU, I'm not sure why it failed, it looks neat. The reason I think NFS: World won't fail... well, there's actually two, first off, the branding. The Need for Speed name is quite popular and it grabs press and people take second glances. I have been a life long NFS fan (Canyon and ProStreet don't exist, got it? :P) and this is a pretty neat game for me and others. Secondly and most importantly, have we mentioned NFS: World will be free? You will be able to play for free, forever, although you can only progress to a certain level (I heard 13 somewhere) for free, then you must buy the starter pack for 20 bucks. But, even at 13 (or whatever the lock out it) you can still race and do pursuits and I believe earn money, just not experience points.

It should be a neat foray and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

I use a small equation for Star Wars merchandising myself:

Star Wars = wallet - money

If it says Star Wars I'm in. I even went and saw the Clone Wars movie, piece of junk it was, and sat through the whole thing. At least there was Rex.I'm looking forward to this though. I'm hoping we'll actually get some battles, I would love to play a clone commander in some big PvP battle just for k/d and gear. I think it'd be awesome. Looking forward to PvP space battles. In the end, I just want PvP :P

Oh, thank you. I though VIP was something special, like a particular number of purchases or something.

Thank you for the clarification.

Not going to lie, just found this page http://www.lotro.com/betasignup/vipchart.html and I'm a little ticked now.

Obviously, since I own everything I get the level cap of 60 and all my quests (I hope), but my Rest XP is removed, I only get 2 slots per trait type, my crafting guilds are limited, my wardrobe is taken away, I can no longer use destiny points, monster play is no longer available, and I get no customer support?

Big thing here is NO MONSTER PLAY. That's a big thing. It's the game's only real PvP and now it will be more dead than it already is.

Essentially, the free mode is an expanded trial, and premium is a "Maybe" mode and then once you pay you get the actual game. They need to fix this I think. Give Premium members all the bags, gold cap removal (just stupid), rest XP (at least make it purchasable) let free and prem. have Monster Play access, open up traits with one purchase, and open up wardrobe. Then I'd be happy.

Although if the prices are cheap, I wouldn't mind spend 15 bucks once to get my bags, wardrobe, and gold cap off. Although Monster Play HAS to be available to premium players. Really, it will be dead if not.

I would also like to chime in and say, it's GREAT to see a company trying this on a successful game and not just to save one. Finally we can see this model applied to a game because the developers/publishers think it's the way to go, not just because it's the last option.

I subbed for 15 months, spent 20 on the game, 80 on MoM CE, and another 20 on siege of mirkwood. Little disappointed I get nothing for all of that, but at least I'll have a nice 55 or so Elven Guard to play on once it goes F2P.

Although if they think they're making me pay to get any of the features from Siege of Mirkwood or Mines of Moria that I already bought, they are very, very wrong.

Thought I should mention, this game is to run on the Unity Engine. This means it should be 3D, along the lines of Tiger Woods Pro Golf Online (EA's newest free online sports game offering) and it looks wonderful. So, I'll be on the look out for it. I mean, it's free, what to lose?