SOE head John Smedley is convinced that MMOs can be successful on consoles and he’s got the evidence to prove it, as DC Universe Online is vastly more popular on the PlayStation 3 than the PC.
According the Smedley, a whopping 70% of DCUO players play the game on the their PlayStation console. Not only does this point to the potential for future MMOs on the platform, but also the power of the free-to-play model, a concept CCP is pushing with the upcoming release of Dust 514.
Smedley told GamesIndustry:
It’s 70% of the audience. Free-to-play on PlayStation 3 is huge. In fact, right now, it’s us with DCUO and Free Realms and our friends at CCP with Dust 514 that are going to prove that this market really works.
There’s a lot of people that go through that store and it’s so easy to find and download these games that it’s a great business model. A lot of people have already stored their credit card information so it’s very frictionless if they do want to buy something.
There’s no doubt that Sony is much more receptive to these types of business models when compared to Microsoft and Nintendo, and it appears that their less stringent policies will work out for them in the long run as the market continues to shift in the free-to-play direction.
