It’s not easy being the guy! ?Actually Ole Schreiner is one of the longest standing employees at Funcom, but .. he is the new CEO. Anyways, Ole is already having to tackl tough questions about the future of?The Secret World, saying that the studio is prepared to take the title free-to-play. ?In an interview with GamesIndustry,?Ole Schreiner?said that?TSW?was developed to be subscription-based with the options to change the model down the road.
“We tried leaving our options open during development so that we could launch with a different model should we have decided during development that’s what we wanted, but eventually we did settle on the subscription model and that’s what informed much of the game’s design,” Schreiner said. “That said we definitely have the tools to turn?The Secret World?into a free-to-play game — or even hybrid — should we decide to do that somewhere down the line.”
Schreiner admitted that it’s become difficult for subscription titles to thrive in a F2P-dominated field. He added that?The Secret World?is now a “profitable operation” following the studio’s restructuring: “Despite the obvious challenges, I definitely think we’re heading into a promising future for Funcom.”