In an interview with Turbine CEO Jim Crowley, Kotaku.com points out
Not only have more than a million new players signed up for the massively multiplayer online role-playing game since September, players signing up for the optional paid subscription have more than doubled.Things are looking up in the game’s new DDO store, where players have been buying items and new content at a rate three times higher than industry average, increasing the franchise’s revenue more than 500%.
I am, of course, smug in my lack of surprise. It is gratifying to know that a model like this can succeed, if not unseat the Blizzard juggernaut. The game is indeed a worthwhile experience, my only complaint is the lack of community that can be found in the likes of WoW. The free servers just weren’t as populated as I would have liked. More recently Mythic introduced their “Endless Trial” with the hope that this would generate new interest in the game. The restrictions are more binding than DDO, though, and in the long run I think this will amount to the WoW 10 day trial. All in all it might be time to take another plunge back in.
