14 DAY TRIAL // Tribes: Ascend, the free-to-play first-person multiplayer shooter from Hi-Rez Studios, has managed to get more than 800,000 registered players since being officially launched and the team behind it is ready to deliver more language support soon in order to attract new sections of the public.
Todd Harris, the chief operating officer working at Hi-Rez Studios, has told Gamasutra that, “At this point we have over 800,000 registered accounts. Servers are very, very active. Reviews have been good. It’s really our belief that for an online multiplayer game, particularly, free-to-play is the best model for gamers and for studios.”
At the moment the development team is offering support for the multiplayer experience and is working on porting the game to more languages, but there are no current plans to develop a console version of the game.
He added, “The way it went is that we wanted to do the free-to-play model, and there wasn’t a clear path to that on consoles early on. Based on that, we optimized the game around the strengths of the PC, and specifically a keyboard and mouse control.”
The free-to-play model has not been very successful on consoles and the fast-paced action of Tribes and the quick movement that it emphasizes probably mean that it cannot be adapted to use the controllers of the two main home consoles.
Hi-Rez might create a stripped-down version of the Tribes experience, showing off the complex shooter mechanics, the skiing and the jetpack action that the game is known for, in order to make console gamers understand what they could get on the PC.
The new Tribes is one of the fastest and most complex multiplayer experiences on the market and allows any player to enjoy a number of classes and game modes for free.
Those who want more upgrades, some of them related to gameplay and some cosmetic, can use real world money or experience to unlock more content.