Following the free to play craze, WoW has decided to “Wow!” us with its new offering in the free department as well, by way of its latest patch dubbed: “Rage of the Firelands.” On the currently yet to be released Episode 3 of Turn Based, Gary A. Swaby, Mr. AKQ and I actually predicted and discussed this very situation.
World of Warcraft, the household name of computer and MMO gaming, has significantly expanded its free trial period. It is not exactly what we predicted and discussed, but this is definitely interesting timing. Previously it was a limited trial as far as content, features and time, giving players only about 10 or 14 days to play the game. Now, it has expanded to allow players to get their character all the way up to level 20, without having to pay a penny, which is now known as the World of Warcraft Starter Edition. Players can even continue playing with the characters they created in their original trial, but whether other restrictions remain is still unclear.
In addition to this, they have revamped some of the core game features as well. There will be some UI upgrades, a new raid area, some new PvP stuff as well as a new quest line for mage characters. Finally, this patch allows complete and free access to the first expansion: The Burning Crusade, to anyone that has bought the original vanilla copy of the game.
So, how about this information? Are you surprised at all with these changes? I’m just surprised it happened only a couple days after we discussed it on Turn Based, which should be up very soon. Leave your comments below, and go give the game a try! You get to play a big chunk of it, at your own pace, for no cost…so why not?
Source: Game Informer and OnPause
