Of the many great ideas, concepts, presentation and news coming out of this years’ GDC in San Francisco, nothing rises to the top more than ‘free-to-play’.

mmohub.org’s editor Brendon Lindsey’s recent article about the genre and how it’s the next big thing is an excellent read.  Lindsey even teases with info about at least three major studios well past the initial planning stages of brand new free-to-play MMOs.  He nails on the head what we’ve been thinking for quite a while now, it’s only a question of acceptance and are Western studios willing to take the risk?  Pre-GDC, I may have said that this day has yet to come.  Post-GDC, I think it’s fair to say that free-to-plays have arrived, and are now being taken seriously by everyone in (and outside) the industry.  My thanks go out to Nexon for keeping their eye on the ball and pioneering where all others said they would fail.

A primary deterrent to early free-to-play titles in the Western market was that they were developed in and for an Eastern market style of play.  That, and 9 times out of 10, well, to be honest, they just weren’t of very good quality, thereby leaving the end user with a ‘errr….this is crap, can I play WoW now please?’ experience.  Add to this experience the fact that Western developers and studios just couldn’t grasp the profitability margin in ‘optional payment’ games.  Fast forward, and may I introduce to you both ‘Runes of Magic’ as distributed by Frogster, and ‘Wizard 101’ as developed by Kingsisle.  Note that ‘Runes of Magic’ is in fact developed by Taiwanese studio Runewaker, but distributed and marketed by a Western firm, Frogster (based in Berlin, Germany).  Both of these free-to-plays have conquered a rather vociferous audience and successfully ported them to the world of free-to-play.  Sure, there have been some grumbles here and there, but at the end of the day, the numbers that both Runes and Wizard are putting up in such a short amount of time cannot be a coincidence.  There’s a movement afoot, and if you’re a studio or developer team not already thinking free-to-play/microtransactions, chances are, your competitors already are.  Petroglyph’s Mytheon anyone?

And here’s where East meets West philosophy starts to kick in.  In Eastern f2p’s the concept is simple; players can play the game entirely for free, but will be at a distinct disadvantage, thereby encouraging them to purchase better and better gear.  Conversely, the Western philosophy seeks to maintain in-game balance as best as possible (combating the pay-to-pwn theory) and I’d go so far as to say that devs are still experimenting with the best ways to approach this.  Kingsisle, for example, approaches the topic by providing a (more or less) glorified trial of Wizard 101, maintaining game balance.  There are a number of other free-to-play’s out there that broach the topic in very much the same manner, and offer microtransaction items as temporary bonus or assistance items (think health, mana, invisibility, etc. potions)

All things considered, I’d go so far as to say that 2009 (maybe 2010, as the holiday season is bound to be chock full o’ releases) is the year that free-to-play/microtransaction based titles shake the shackles that had been holding them back in Western markets, and really put their stamp on the gaming industry as a whole.

Now, as a free-to-play developer, why spend months upon months trying to develop, implement, test and re-test a microtransaction financial mechanism when there’s already an expert on the field that’s done all the work?  Wouldn’t you want to ride the wave of good tidings, and get your product in front of interested eyeballs as soon as possible?  fatfoogoo and you.  Let’s talk.