City of Heroes to Go F2P Later This Year

Posted June 21, 2011  

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Added Under NEWS | MMORPG | International

City of Heroes Freedom
City of Heroes goes free-to-play under a new name – City of Heroes Freedom.

City of Heroes is going free-to-play later this year, NCsoft has announced. The free-to-play version of the superhero MMO, dubbed City of Heroes Freedom, will arrive alongside the Issue 21: Convergence update.

“Freedom is about getting more content into the hands of our players, whether they are subscribing or playing for free,” said Paragon Studios Executive Producer Brian Clayton. “To do this, we’ve looked at City of Heroes from the ground up and focused on three ways to enhance the experience by giving our players more choices, greater rewards and the best content we’ve ever produced. And for the first time ever, players can choose to enjoy more than seven years of content for free.”

The new City of Heroes will operate under a hybrid model, where players are able to access most of the game’s content for free, including full access to all Hero and Villain zones and play up to the level cap of 50.

Free players have the option of upgrading to Premium Player status by purchasing any amount of Paragon Points, or to VIP Player status by subscribing. There will also be a new in-game store called the The Paragon Market, where you can purchase costumes, powers, items and certain game services and features.

All 15 of City of Heroes’ global servers will be accessible to free players, with the exception of the new VIP-only server.

For more information on the F2P update, check out the official City of Heroes Freedom FAQ.

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  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Kåre-Kristensson/100002528300869 Kåre Kristensson

    Wow, a lot of MMOs are going free to play this year.
    But this game has anyway interested me for a long time, a friend of mine played this game and he had a lot of fun with it.
    Can't wait for the free to play fun to begin. :)

  • Kakuri

    I wonder if MMOs are going free because there is more money in F2P model or if they lack subscribers?
    Anyway, i hope this game is better then Champions Online.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Osama-Elshimy/100001531800940 Osama Elshimy

    it is

  • NathLines

    Both, obviously. They lack subscribers so they need more money. They wouldn't go F2P if they didn't expect to earn more money that way.

  • refaat

    no champion online is way better thin this the graphiq suck and the gameplay is realy boring you will see

  • Cody

    played both and champion online sucks

  • psudo

    i used to play this game and it was great. i'll admit that i lost a year or so of my life to it. its been a while but every once and a while i'll just on for a month and see how it is but its been pretty dead for a while. if going F2P doesnt draw in more people then it's going to shut down.

    but it is an awesome game and SO much better than champions online. i reccomend giving it a try.

  • Detreus

    i agree sice champions online had gone free to play it had lots of problems with the server i could just stay in the game for 5 minutes and havent playd it ever since

  • Vladimier4

    yea, sweet, ive been waiting this game to go free to play a long time ago, this game is kinda dead the last time i played the 7 day trial, so i agree with psudo, if it doesnt atract more players in next couple of months, its probably goin to shut down. i hope it doesnt since this game has great potential, they should just make more stuff when they go f2p, and then they spread it through the internet, then theyll see how much players they will get.

  • Nick

    Free-to-play is a misnomer these days, a phrase bandied about by game companies but seldom true. Most F2P games are stripped-down shells of their former P2P selves (at least the “free” parts are), not worth playing because they’re so restrictive. Lets face it, the devs want us to pay for all the “cool stuff” while making it sound as if its all fair and even. Well it isn’t . A level cap less than the max paying VIP customers get means you have to “pay to win”. Strategy these days is to con us players into thinking we’re getting a good deal out of the F2P aspects of the game, while hiding the lack of content from us.

    Champions Online is a classic example: the core of the character development system of the game is excluded from F2P players, and archetypes are instead offered (about half of them only, the rest one has to pay for). Adventures (quested story arcs) also need to be bought in order to experience the best the game has to offer.

    Free-to-play my ass. Stop LYING and playing with words, game devs!

  • refaat

    soooooooooooooooo ture i played global agenda and champions online and when you play with a free account you will never win pvp or get a good gear and you start felling like you want to bay the game