Mojang: Scrolls Won't Be Free, But Will Contain Free-To-Play Aspects

Minecraft creator Markus Persson has revealed that Scrolls, the upcoming game from his Mojang studio, will feature a monetization service that is "along the lines" of the free-to-play business model. However, Persson was keen to stress that he is looking to avoid using the term to describe the game, as he doesn't want players to be coaxed into believing they are getting an experience different from that which is advertised. In a tweet earlier today, the Mojang dev explained, "Scrolls will contain aspects of 'free-to-play'. We won't call it free-to-play though, as it's not a 'free' game." Expanding on the topic to Gamasutra, he explained, "Scrolls won't be free at all, so we're avoiding the term 'free-to-play'." "It will have an initial cost that gets you started with the game. The game will be designed so you can in theory play the game with just this initial cost, but if you want to you can buy more scrolls to play with." He continued, "The idea is that you can play for free after the initial payment, which includes a lifetime subscription of new scrolls at regular intervals, and [you can receive more free scrolls] by participating in ranked tournaments and a few other things." "My personal opinion, however, is that Scrolls is definitely along the lines of a 'free-to-play' game," he admitted, "except we try to avoid the 'free' part of it. We don't want to trick people into thinking it's a free game." As part of a blog post, Persson noted, "While I am skeptical of the free to play trend, what I hate is the wording 'free-to-play.'" He reasoned that free-to-play has because so popular due to the fact that there is no limit to how much a player can spend, and that the sign of whether a game is a success or not now rests on whether a game is profitable. "You get your players hooked on your game, and then you try to monetize them," he explained. "Various psychological traps like abusing the sense of sunk costs get exploited, and eventually you end up with a game that’s designed more like a slot machine than Half Life 2."