Cliff Bleszinski Talks Lawbreakers and the Free-to-Play Model
Cliffy B's upcoming arena shooter, Lawbreakers, will follow a free-to-play model but Gears of War creator knows that "core gamers [see] free-to-play as a dirty, dirty thing."
Speaking to Destructoid at PAX Prime today, Bleszinski gave his own thoughts on the state of the F2P model. "It's the idea of perceived value ... The amount of money I've spent on free-to-play games is very little. I don't go full A Beautiful Mind on it, but I can kind of see where this is going. So, when it comes to Hearthstone, I'm just like 'Here's $60, just give me the fucking packs.'"
"We maybe have a program where if you want early access, give us $15 or $20," he continues, "then you can play the game before anybody else and then maybe get a super discount on the initial pack of stuff that other people pay a few bucks for. It's like open-world. How open-world are you? We want to be good free-to-play, not Vegas/mobile free-to-play."
With his business in mind, Bleszinski talked on metrics. The traditional model is dead, he cries, "That's pre-orders, that's 'how many do you get in the first two months' and then it's an exponential curve downward after that," Bleszinski said about the idea of his metrics for success suddenly shifting. "People who are still doing that: have fun. For me, that's old. For us, it's about a ramp."
"We may not make a lot of money in the first couple months. But, in the first year, we may start to ramp up. These games are like a locomotive where they get going and going. Once they get momentum, you look around and say 'How did this game get so damn big?'" he said, "the marking is a steady launch over the course of a bunch of different beats throughout the year as opposed to blowing the wad at Christmas while everyone else is blowing their wad. Or, the Super Bowl where you try to get Liam Neeson and Kate Upton to do goofy ads. We're in it for the long-run here."