Hellgate Guru

Been a little while since we’ve seen Gamasutra generating Hellgate: London content. This time it’s in the form of an interview with Flagship Studios CEO Bill Roper on the topic of the company’s formation, as all as that of its first concept title.

Gamasutra: Has the reaction to the Hellgate: London revenue generation model been a surprise?

Bill Roper: Somewhat, but that is mainly because – like the game itself – the model doesn’t fit neatly into a prescribed paradigm. We’re offering an amazing amount of value with Hellgate: London. Much more, in fact, than we did with the Diablo games. For the price of a single-player game, you also get a free secure online experience with many more features than we offered with Battle.net. Not only do you get to play the game with your friends for free, but we have guilds, auction houses, and a host of community and game play features we’ve never offered in the past.

Unfortunately, I think some people believed they were somehow getting a lesser experience than subscribers out of the box, and that simply isn’t true. The subscription model is there for players who want more and are interested in enjoying a steady stream of continuing content. Our intention is always to over-deliver to our players, and with a subscription model we can constantly keep developers on the game and provide the long-term experience that they’ve shown us they want.