Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Streaming WAR

Recently, I did some intensive investigating (twitter) and found an interesting tidbit about WAR.  You may recall that WAR is revamping their free trial.  That is not the only change coming to it though.

In addition to the unlimited time free trial, they are also making a streaming version of the client.  Instead of having to download 8gb for the trial, you will download a much smaller package and the rest will happen in the background as you play.

WAR is not the first to take this approach.  EverQuest 2 recently launched a similar client.  For me, free trials are often an impulse decision.  One day the mood may strike me to try out a new game.  Nothing kills that mood like a 8gb download.

With a streaming client, players will be able to get into the game much quicker.  This is something every MMO should be trying to adopt.  Just imagine if you could try a game by clicking a link and a couple minutes later you are in and playing.  If other games embraced this, I'd certainly do more free trials.

NOTE: Guild Wars also uses a streaming client