The era of free online games
The era of free online games is here. It is remarkable how much progress has been made in the free online gaming market in the last five years or so. Earlier this decade, when people heard “free games,” horrible images of free-to-play games created by college kids in their spare time came to mind, games that looked like beta versions of PC RPGs from the early 1900s. 1980. No more. Today, there are literally dozens of free games in almost every genre. Maple Story alone, a free-to-play 2D MMORPG released in 2003, now has over 56 million accounts worldwide 1. In case you were wondering, World of Warcraft with its 10 million users is out of the water. While MMORPGs are the most common genre of free-to-play games, free-to-play games exist in every field. Shot Online and Albatross18 are free golf games with a level of depth rarely found in the retail golf market. Games like GunZ: The Duel, Wolf Team, War Rock, and Soldier Front offer FPS experiences that range from frag-fests to team-coordinated tactical matches. It’s hard to think of a genre that isn’t covered. There are several excellent free racing games, such as Project Torque, a simple but realistic racing game. If you want something more immersive, look no further than the Racing/RPG hybrid game Drift City, which has several fully explorable cities full of side quests and locations to explore with similar graphics to retail Grand Theft Auto games. If you like to mix rocket launchers with your racers, the free market offers; Upshift Strikeracer is all about rockets, mines, and other nasty weapons to knock the other players out of the race. Even traditional sports are covered. Freestyle Street Basketball is a simple yet addictive game where each game lasts five minutes, perfect for the casual gamer. If you are a soccer fan, try Kicks Online.
I’ve mentioned only a fraction of the free games available and it almost feels like a crime to have left out such great games as Fly For Fun, Exteel, Gunbound and the dozens of other games now accessible to anyone with internet access. Connection. Now, dear reader, you must be convinced that we are now entering the era of free games, but I have one more surprise for you. This is just the beginning. As I write this, there are dozens of high-quality games in beta testing, either here in the US or in Japan and Korea. Beautiful games like Neosteam and Gundam MMO are in the works. The list of free online games available and under construction is in the hundreds. Many old paid games have been released from their monthly fees. Archlord, RF Online, Savage, Anarchy Online, and Shadow Bane are now available to the masses for free. Surely this is a trend that will continue.
The next time you consider pulling out your credit card to activate a subscription or purchase an online game, think twice and give a free game a try. You may be surprised by what you find. If you’re looking for a resource site to do some reading on the best free games, I highly recommend checking out MMOHub.