LawBreakers No Longer Free-to-Play?

Boss Key Productions, the studio behind the highly-anticipated MMOFPS LawBreakers, announced that their first major project will abandon its original plan for a free-to-play model. Instead, LawBreakers will instead have a set price, though one isn’t listed at the moment as Boss Key looks at its options.

At a GDC panel, headed by CEO and designer Cliff Belszinski (former design director for Epic Games, responsible for the Unreal series and Gears of War) and COO Arjan Brussee, the duo revealed the the free-to-play model was not in line with where they wanted their game to go. While cosmetic options such as skins could still possibly be implemented as microtransactions, Art Director Tramell Isaac stated that the free-to-play model became a “distraction”, forcing the development team to look at ways to make the game profitable rather than an enjoyable experience for those investing their time to play.

Come Get Some!…At Steam

Also at the panel, Boss Key took the time to announce that the game would become exclusive to Steam, abandoning another original plan for the game to have its own launcher. Boss Key cited reasons such as the simplicity of the Steam client and how its friends list can make the game more interactive as motivating factors for making LawBreakers a Steam exclusive.

Currently, the game looks to be a competitor to other team-based MMO shooters such as Counter Strike: Global Offensive and the upcoming Overwatch. The main focus of the development team right now is to try and differentiate their project from the competition. Studio Communications Manager Rohan Rivas confessed:

“We were moving so fast, there was no time to pinpoint the identity of this stuff.” 

This is evident in them redesigning their logo and making gameplay more action-packed and intense. LawBreakers is slated to be released sometime in the middle of this summer, shortly after the release of Overwatch. Only time will tell what the game will actually be like, but Boss Key is looking to make their first game a winner right out of the gate.

Are you guys excited for LawBreakers? Do you think it should be free-to-play? Do you think it will compete against Blizzard’s Overwatch and become and MMO giant? Let me know down below in the comments!