14 DAY TRIAL // One of the overlooked elements in Sony's presentation at the E3 trade show was MAG, an upcoming massive multiplayer game which should debut exclusively on the PlayStation 3 sometime in 2009. Now Sony seems to be passing around a questionnaire about the game suggesting that, for the first time, it might be considering a subscription fee for multiplayer play.
The reason for the apparent lack of interest in the game is that Sony has not revealed much about it. What we know, though, seems mighty interesting. Massive Action Game, which could be the most uninspired video game name of the year, is supposed to simulate battles which involve 256 players at the same time, with a battlefield covering several square miles. The game is supposed to offer you both the option to be a foot soldier who takes part in the fighting and tries to complete specific objectives and the option to step into the shoes of a general who directs support fire all over the map and his troops.
A blog called The BitBag first received the e-mail with the questions and other sites have confirmed it as being genuine. All the 15 questions are related to the way the pricing system for the game will work. The central idea is that the game will cost you money and that there will be regular content updates on the same principle. But the basic multiplayer action, which is why you would get Massive Action Game, is not guaranteed to be free.
So far, one of the defining elements of the PlayStation Network, when compared to the Xbox Live service, is that multiplayer gaming is pretty much free. Charging for MAG would break this tradition and some players might be turned off by the prospect of paying every month, even if MAG promises to be a very interesting multiplayer, squad and army based shooter.