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Allegedly Free Game: Difference between revisions
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== MMORPG ==
* Many [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game|MMORPG]]s that started out as strictly pay-to-play have begun offering free trial accounts as a way to increase their playerbase, due to the difficulty of competing with established giants like ''[[World of Warcraft]]''. Most of these offer access only to low-level content and newbie areas. In order to advance beyond the newbie levels and regions; you have to upgrade to a fully paid membership. Many of these also offer additional restrictions on game content for free trial players. A lot of them refer to their free play content somewhat misleadingly as "endless" or "perpetual" free play; to distinguish it from the previously common time-limited free trials.
* ''World of Warcraft'' itself became free-to-play, but with a level cap of 20 among other restrictions. It's essentially the 14-day trial, only now it lasts forever.
** ''World of Warcraft'' does, however, restrict the player rather severely in "free-to-play" accounts. The biggest restriction is that "free-to-play" accounts are not allowed to create or join a party, which means locations like the Deadmines (accessible at level 18ish) are off-limits, as they're elite instances that all but ''require'' parties.
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** You can play free, buy areas piece by piece, or subscribe. But the "play free" section is one tiny corner of the world with about a dozen areas (only three of which have fightable opponents, if you don't count dungeons). And I've already managed to beat all the freebie quests before hitting level 10 (another player just informed me that no, getting to level 10 does not open up additional free quests). On the up side, the pay-as-you-go is in increments of $5, with each area being $1 to $3 (so each time you ante up, you can open two or three new areas).
*** Also, they give you a friend only to yank her away behind the payware wall. You do a couple quests for the NPC, start to get to like her, even see some hint of the mystery of her character and her family... and then she disappears, leaving a note to come look for her in Payville. Or, rather, the Dark Scary Cave that she has no business adventuring in when she can't even manage to walk fifteen feet to turn in her own registration paperwork.
* ''ZT Online''. [https://web.archive.org/web/20080511221059/http://www.danwei.org/electronic_games/gambling_your_life_away_in_zt.php This game is one of the biggest offender of this trope], and '''by far''' the most popular [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game|MMORPG]] in [[Red China]].{{when}} Think about that.
== Fighting ==
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* The later versions of ''[[Bloons Tower Defense]]'' are technically winnable without shelling out for all the various upgrades a player can buy, (more lives or in-game money, faster shooters, etc) but you have to get everything ''exactly'' right.
* The online Flash game ''Dinowaurs'' has stat-boosting equipment which can be purchased with DNA (the in-game currency) or with real money. As any [[Genre Savvy]] online game player can probably guess, DNA gains are next to nothing, to the point where it would be faster and much less work to mow your neighbors' lawn and use the money to buy equipment.
* ''[[
* ''[[Evony]]'' advertises itself as "Free Forever", but the only reliable way to get special items is to buy them for real money. This includes the Michelangelo's Script, a requirement to upgrade a building to its highest level, for $5 per upgrade. It also includes medals, which you'll have to buy if you want to have more than two cities at once. They also have three separate "[[Blatant Lies|free gifts]]", the best of which requires the player to spend $100. The worst part is that the game coins are called "cents" even though each cent costs $0.10, to make things seem cheaper. (All figures in US dollars.)
{{quote|"Pay now, my Lord!"}}
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