First, how good does the Skyrim Creation Kit look/sound? The Steam integration part might be the biggest leap in gaming since Rift introduced us to MMO 3.0! Too bad for our genetically inferior slaves (console players) since won’t get this, but hey, if god wanted you to have nice things, he would have given them to you. Take the hint.
Next, file this under example #246234 that ELO in LoL works. As soon as Aria learned to play more than one champion, her ELO went up about 200 points. Weird how that works huh?
Also in a sign that she is becoming a true gamer, a few days ago she glanced at the old 21” monitor she use to play on and wondered how she ever used something so small. It’s not long before she demands a gaming-grade mousepad I tell you (for the record those work).
Finally if your MMO dev tells you they will never do something, start planning for exactly that to happen. First Turbine backtracks on selling you The One Ring, and now Trion is positioning Rift for the F2P minor leagues. What’s next? SW:TOR releasing content that’s not fully voiced? Is nothing sacred in the genre!?
Hardcore Casual 
Two things popped into my mind when I read the Rift 1-20 F2P announcement.
1. I will now definitely not resubscribe when my sub runs out.
2. This could bring back some of what was so great about Beta. I only played 1-20 in beta, even when further levels were opened up. The 1-20 zones were heaving all the time and rifts and invasions popped almost continuously. That could happen again.
I totally agree that this effectively moves Rift into the F2P market. They will eventually have to eat humble pie and go the whole way.
Good point – there’s definitely a good chance that this will replicate the “tier 1 jumping, tiers 2-4 deserted” effect of WAR’s Endless Trial.
Interesting thing – today’s patch added a “Lock XP” mechanism, with the specific note that trial accounts may NOT use it. So clearly they don’t want locked level 19 free accounts becoming the sole occupants of the lowest warfront bracket.
Are you referring to WAR here with the locked XP?
Its funny that you mention how 1-20 is so much better with masses of people playing. I totally remember that – just this momentum of players fighting against tides of Rifts and invasions. Why is the early part of the game so much more fun then current endgame is in most MMOs (including Rift)? LOTRO especially, and WAR’s early level PvP come to mind.
It would really sadden me to see Rift go ftp since Trion works so hard to make the Rift themepark at least as good as one can be, but don’t see it happening for long time. I was actually thinking of re-subbing both as a hat tip to Trion for all the positive steps they took with the latest patch and to check out the new content.
If you are refering to beta 1-20, that was a different game. Invasions/rifts were more aggressive, and could control/disrupt the zone more. The system was great, and it was one of the reasons I was so high on Rift in beta. The questing and all that felt like a ‘nice to have’ compared to the main event: Invasions.
At release or shortly after, Trion nerfed the whole thing into the token farming that it became.
Is there an echo in here?
of course something is sacred: $$$