Starbreeze Has No Free-to-Play Plans, Prepares P13

After the disastrous launch of the Syndicate remake earlier during the year, the development team at Starbreeze is exploring a number of new business models, but it has no plans to try and create a free-to-play title.

Mikael Nermark, the chief executive officer at Starbreeze, tells Edge that, “We’re never going to do free-to-play, because then you have to cater to everyone out there – that’s costly and it’s hard.”

“We’re probably going to go down the road of cheap to play. Would we go all out? No, I don’t think I’m going to bet on just one business model,” he also says.

The executive mentions that his company has some AAA projects in the works, but that it has a number of people who work exclusively on testing new ideas, as well.

Nermark adds, “We’re going to keep that and do the smaller, downloadable self-funded stuff like P13 and Payday 2 and we’re going to dabble in other areas too. Multiple different business models, multiple different games. To rely on one business model is very risky.”

He would not elaborate on the exact nature of P13, but the game will apparently have a number of unique mechanics and the team working on it is pretty sure that it will be a hit when launched.

The second Payday title will likely be developed by the Overkill team that Starbreeze has recently acquired.

It’s not clear which publisher will be involved with the sequel and with P13 as Electronic Arts, the company having launched Syndicate, has not been officially linked to them.

Starbreeze is best known for creating The Chronicles of Riddick titles, Escape from Butcher Bay and Assault on Dark Athena, and many players still have fond memories of the first-person shooter titles.

P13 might be a code name for another Chronicles of Riddick game.