The Old Republic Will Be a Microtransaction-Based MMO

Following the announcement of Star Wars The Old Republic MMORPG, everybody was convinced that we’ll be receiving a “classic” subscription-based MMO, like World of Warcraft or Age of Conan. However, it appears that Electronic Arts might go for the microtransaction type of play, which means that the game, in a more or less complete way, would be free to play. Sounds strange, having in mind that it’s EA we’re talking about!

The man who created these rumors is John Riccitiello, EA’s CEO: “We are continuing to stick to the plan relative to building out our direct-to-consumer models which include microtransactions and subscriptions. The recent launch of Warhammer is a great example of that,” he said during a conference call. “Other initiatives we’ve announced, for example Star Wars online MMO, are mid-session games which are microtransaction-based. You’ll be hearing more about those in the February call.”

So this is pretty straightforward: The Old Republic will be a microtransaction-based MMO game. However, as it usually happens, Electronic Arts have decided against confirming the story, and said to Shacknews that Riccitiello’s statement was a misunderstanding. So… what do you say? Would The Old Republic be more interesting if it were a free-to-play, microtransaction-based MMORPG?