Following reports from Riot Games that League of Legends has over 15 million registered users with more than 1.7 million active players per day, Joystiq has reported that Heroes of Newerth will be transitioning to a free-to-play model as well. Heroes of Newerth, most commonly known by the acronym HoN, was previously only as a premium title. Currently, the game has around 460,000 active users, but developer S2 Games has stated it expects this number to increase following the transition to a free-to-play model. More information is available after the break.
Users who create a new account in Heroes of Newerth will find themselves having access to a pool of 15 playable characters, with new heroes being swapped in and out of this pool on a weekly basis. After players have surpassed a threshold based on the number of hours played, or if they have purchased the in-game currency to unlock premium content, their account will be upgraded to ‘Verified’ status. This will grant them access to a new matchmaking type, which exclusively pits experienced players against one-another.
Those who had previously purchased the game at full price will find their accounts upgraded to ‘Legacy’ status, giving them unrestricted access to all premium content in the game.
They should have done this a long time ago. Not sure if they’ll be able to do enough to prevent DotA 2 (when released) and LoL from pushing HoN aside.
Not to mention the Realm of the Titans was just went into beta, which is just more competition in the f2p moba scene.
As for DOTA 2, I’m curious to see if it will be similar to DotA or if Icefrog will make significant changes to the formula. I also enjoy the naming of the game. They couldn’t call it Defense of the Ancients 2, since if anyone had rights to a sequel, it would be Blizzard. So instead of coming up with a new name, Valve just named it DOTA 2, even though technically there is no DOTA 1.