Steam Adding Subscription Gaming

Valve has done a lot of good for the PC gaming world. They also strive to keep Steam the best PC gaming engine available. In order to do this, they are now offering subscription based gaming. This means that people who are into hardcore MMOs which require a payment every month to keep using can now play that game on the same platform as all their other PC games.

While it is great to see that Valve is diversifying their platform, it has always been my humble opinion that subscription based gaming should curl up in a hole and die. In a market that has proven games can turn a profit while being free to play (especially when hosted on Steam) it baffles me that some game designers still expect players to hand over retail price and then keep paying every moth to have the privilege of playing the game they paid for. Enough of my side rant.

The first title to be added to Steam’s list of subscription based games is Darkfall Unholy Wars. From the videos on Steam (some seeming to be narrated by a man trying far too hard to do a radio voice) this game is a generic, 3rd person fantasy MMORPG with large, empty environments, that is sure to be worth the $39.95 USD you pay for the game as well as the $14.95 USD you pay each subsequent month you use the game (that’s just $204.40 for the first year!)