Let me set up a scenario for all of you.
You work with a company for years – you’ve done videos on various games they publish, have a great working relationship with them.
Said company goes on to announce a gorgeous new game – but the catch? It requires a premium purchase. $40, $60, $100. This is going to be an expensive title – but the fixed price guarantees a certain level of quality and a lack of pay-to-win.
So to support the company, you purchase the game. How else will you be able to play it? The game goes on to release, you have fun, but it’s poorly received, the playerbase goes into an instant state of decline, and the game hits a point where it begins to show signs of shutting down.
Which forces the company to do one of 2 things: Cut their losses, and shut the game down. Or convert the game to a free-to-play business model.

Unfortunately, there’s really no winning regardless of what Gameforge chose to do with Swords of Legends Online, but the latter option is definitely going to be a critical blow to those of us that spent $100 on those Collector’s Editions.

Swords of Legends Online was evidently not the breakout hit Gameforge wanted it to be.
As of writing this, there are 400 players logged in playing right now via Steam. Which, I’ll note right out of the gate – is indicative of a portion of the total players playing the game, as some players opted to purchase and play via Gameforge’s official website.
Even if we’re being generous, that still leaves this as one of the worst performing MMO releases of the entirety of 2021. It’s still outperforming Elyon though, so I guess that’s something to boast about.

SOLO ran into a lot of issues: A lack of content at endgame, a controversial performance – or, lack of performance. Running the game at 5FPS at times wasn’t fun. I think more than anything, this was one of the highest concerns players had with the game, one that was never addressed.
All of these issues – of which there were many, culminated in the ultimate and definitive failure of the game. In an attempt to change the trajectory of the game – or at the very least, in an attempt to delay the inevitable, Gameforge have confirmed a complete change of business model.
Gameforge announced this via a blog post on their website that also went on to confirm the addition of expansion into Russian and CIS territories, and a brand new update, titled “2.0 – The Firestone Legacy.”

SOLO 2.0 will be going live on February 24th – Yes, that’s just 2 weeks after Lost Ark launches and a couple days before Guild Wars 2‘s End of Dragons expansion hits.
Why Gameforge think now is the opportune time to transition to a free business model baffles me as the direct competition from BOTH of these titles is enough to absolutely destroy any potential this conversion would have had.
And that’s just its direct competition – disregarding other MMOs we have Dying Light 2, Horizon Forbidden West, Elden Ring. Seriously, who is this supposed to appeal to? Did the guy in charge of this look at the month of February and think “Oh yeah, this completely niche MMO will have no problem competing with any of those games.”

Now for those of you still reading – you might be thinking to yourself.. “But Stix… if it goes free-to-play, what does that mean for pay-to-win?” And “Do those of us that purchased the game get any type of compensation?” The answer to both of those questions is vague.
They state in their blog post “All items that you can buy in the game will remain purely cosmetic, as will Battle Pass content. Anyone who’s already purchased SOLO will receive gifts in the form of insanely pretty items and great bonuses as compensation.”
That just sounds like corporate crap to me – there is absolutely no way Gameforge will be able to maintain the game with purely cosmetic items now that players will no longer be financially supporting them with the premium purchase of the game.

I dug a little deeper at this juncture as I was curious if they said anything further pertaining to the transition to a free business model, and it turns out they have an FAQ on their forums – something that will go largely unseen. After scrolling down I noticed there’s an entire section dedicated to the free-to-play announcement.

Why the switch in business models? Should we expect more radical changes in the future?
Since release, there has been considerable interest in the game – but the purchase price is of course a limiting factor for a lot of people. By going free-to-play, we are opening the gates for everyone to enjoy SOLO and hope to tackle the concerns about declining player numbers that large parts of the community have voiced.

Going free-to-play isn’t going to change the trajectory of the game. It just isn’t. Elyon launched as a free MMO and its playerbase abandobed it almost as soon as it launched because it was just.. bad.
Bless Online converted to a free game and it died just as fast. Making your game more publicly accessible isn’t going to change what players already dislike about it. But it will open it up to more toxic players, abusers and pay-to-win.

What restrictions or limitations will apply to free players?
The full game experience will be available to everyone for free. This includes all old, new and future content, like the new classes and zones.

At least they’re not pulling an “ArcheAge Unchained” here and charging players for it.

Will the in-game store change? What about the Battle Passes?
We’ve stressed the importance of a cosmetic-only store since launch and have no plans to change that. Likewise, the Battle Pass will continue its current model of having a free and a premium version, featuring purely cosmetic extras on a seasonal basis.

As much as I’d love to believe that, I just can’t. I would love to be proven wrong, but if they don’t implement an additional means of return on their investment, this’ll be even more short-lived than their buy-to-play incarnation.

What about players who purchased the game while it was buy-to-play?
To show our appreciation to all the players who supported us early on, we’ve prepared a “bonus” package with items. This will be the same for holders of all 3 editions, as Collector’s and Deluxe Edition buyers keep the benefits of their respective editions.

Compensation is a couple items. Probably an outfit? Maybe a mount? Honestly I can’t really fault them here – there’s nothing they could realistically offer as compensation that would satisfy players outside of a refund choice. But given how long players have been playing, refunds would be entirely unfair to Gameforge.
Oh, speaking of.. actually, they go on to address this further in their FAQ.

I just purchased the game recently, and now it’s going F2P. Can I get a refund?
We will be offering a full refund of the main game to those who purchased the game between 17th January 2022 and the announcement (as well as all game access purchased up until the actual switch).

Good on you guys, Gameforge! You didn’t need to do that but you earned back some respect for offering it.

That’s all we know about their conversion to a free title. Whether this is going to drastically impact the game remains to be seen, but outside of going free-to-play there are going to be a substantial number of additions to the game in the 2.0 update: The highly-anticipated Fox Mage class, the Warrior class, a level cap increase, 5 entirely new areas, 5 new dungeons, 2 new raids, 2 new story chapters, new PvP content – not that anyone really engages in PvP anymore anyway, and additional PvE content that has yet to be elaborated on.

I’m kinda disappointed. I gave Neowiz crap for doing this when they released Bless Online as a premium title, then pulled a switch when the game began to decline and offered it completely free.
And Gameforge are doing the exact same thing. I’m glad they’re offering refunds for players that bought the game in January, but at the same time, if I buy a game – like Mrs Stix did with the $100 edition, I expect it to remain a game that requires that purchase.
Otherwise, why don’t we all just boycott premium MMOs, and wait for them to convert to a free business model? By doing so, we’ll save ourselves the money we would’ve wasted by purchasing it early and supporting the company.
I understand that companies want to milk as much money as they possibly can from us as consumers, but look at games like Lost Ark or the upcoming Blue Protocol MMO. Both are launching as free titles because they believe they provide a product of high enough quality that players will support them via their respective cash shops.
They’re not releasing as paid titles to try and trick us into spending more money, in an attempt to fund this repetitious cycle. It’s asinine, and I’m genuinely shocked that Gameforge specifically are doing it.

I’ve honestly never had an issue with Gameforge. I’ve worked on them repeatedly with games like SoulWorker, Guardians of Ember, Kingdom Under Fire 2, NosTale, Aion and even Swords of Legends Online itself.
But no company is infallible. I understand why they’re doing it – the alternative is shutting down. But at the same time, I gotta call out companies when they do things I don’t agree with. Even if I genuinely enjoy the relationship I have with them, and even if this means losing the opportunity to work with them ever again.
I’m excited to see where this update takes the game, and as Mrs Stix still actively plays, she’s even more excited. But I think this is a shady thing to do, and I don’t condone converting to a free business model after charging potentially hundreds of thousands of players initially.

Now if you’re interested in a game that isn’t SOLO but has the potential to be a pretty sick game later this year.. click this video over here. I guarantee you’ll like what you see.

“Go kill yourself.”

Those three words left Mrs Stix in tears. Broken. She wanted to quit the game – a game she had dedicated weeks to. She wanted to quit social media. She wanted to distance herself entirely from everyone online because of how hurt she was.
Sure, she knew there were some people out there that hated me. Me, not her. Because I made a claim they disagreed with about a game they like. Because they didn’t win a giveaway. Because they don’t like some of my titles.
Yet never had she felt a sting like that in all of her years in gaming. This forced her to change her name in-game and go incognito henceforth, to avoid these kinds of people. But we’ll talk about that in a little more detail in a minute.

So, I took part in every test phase for Swords of Legends Online.
I genuinely thought the game had a lot of potential. Gameforge promised that the game would be free of pay-to-win. That the cash shop would be fair. That players wouldn’t be capable of purchasing an advantage over one another. And you know what? They held true to that.
Swords of Legends Online ended up being exactly what they promised all of us, yet at the same time, population numbers for the game have been in a steady state of decline ever since it launched.
And let me stop you there. Yes, that is the ultimate fate of 99% of MMOs. There’s no denying that. But as of right now, there are 670 concurrent players via Steam, with a 24-hour peak of 1,450.
Granted, this is specifically pertaining to the Steam playerbase. Some players play through the Gameforge launcher as well. Yet even if we say there’s an equal split between platforms, this is proof that SOLO, in the span of 3-months, has lost 93% of its active daily players. Ninety. Three. Percent.

You might be wondering why that is, especially given that players should’ve been flocking to the game in droves, right?
Well, on the one hand, I noticed that unlike companies like Amazon with New World, or Square with Final Fantasy XIV, or, heck, even Nexon with Mabinogi and V4, Gameforge never really marketed their game to their influencers’ respective communities.
The number of high-profile MMO Youtuber’s and even streamers seemed to for the most part ignore SOLO. Sure, we did a couple videos on the game, but that was because Mrs Stix and I were genuinely impressed with certain aspects of it and were enjoying our time within it.
But after the first what, 48 hours? The game had all but been forgotten. A new decent-quality MMO release, forgotten faster than it released. And since then, Gameforge have done absolutely nothing to market the game, aiding in its.. well, rather rapid decline.

But even without regular marketing, without paying to advertise it, if the game was good, positive word of mouth would have spread, and that alone would’ve triggered a chain influx of new players joining.
Yet it didn’t. Nobody talked about it. Nobody encouraged other players to join. And the MMO has sunk into obscurity in 3 months.

One of the reasons I noticed people don’t seem to recommend the game is due to the community.
Yes, there are plenty of toxic communities out there. Communities like League. Like WoW. Online communities are some of the worst. They bring out these horrible sides of people that they wouldn’t dare show face-to-face. But anonymity all but encourages this type of behavior.
Let me give you 2 examples of this.

Mrs Stix regularly raids in SOLO. She does the most competitive type of content she can. Yet when new content is released – heck, even content that is multiple weeks old, has players joining, wiping, and then proceeding to instantly leave.
These ragequitters scold everyone else. They project the blame on to everyone else, fabricating drama out of their own inept abilities and then quit. This forces players to sit there waiting for new players to join. Or, worst case scenario, has players begin blaming one another and the group disbands.
This happens all too often. Instead of the community working through what they did wrong, instead of explaining a mechanic they’re failing to correctly do, they lash out. I cannot begin to express how much of a common occurrence this is, and it just makes the entire experience… something you end up wanting to avoid.
It’s either filled with drama, or it’s a waste of time. Granted this is much easier to avoid if you have an active guild or group of friends. But let’s be real… with a thousand, maybe two thousand players online, that’s unlikely.

The second example is what happened to Mrs Stix during the first month of the game’s life.
As I noted, we were avid fans of the game. We did, what? 3? 4 videos on SOLO within its first month. Each video went on to garner 50,000 to 100,000 views each. So the community knew who we were. They knew our names in-game.
Mrs Stix was looking to run a dungeon one day, when someone recognized her. They mentioned how they watch our videos and were ecstatic to get to meet and play with her in-game. Mrs Stix was happy to play with someone that enjoyed her SOLO videos, so she responded, confirming she was indeed who the player thought she was.
And that’s when someone interjected, and began to unabashedly attack her. Criticizing her. Her videos. The channel. Our streams. Me. Everything they possibly could to bring her down. Naturally, with SOLO’s community being the toxic cesspool it is, other players joined in and began to barrage her with personal attacks.
Not only in the public chat, but also through DMs. With, once again, people DMing her things like what I mentioned at the beginning of all of this.

Never had I experienced such a vile show of… Humanity, if you can even call it that, before in my life. Mrs Stix has done nothing on the channel but push out informative, well written content. She does maybe 2 or 3 videos per year, on topics that she feels passionately about.
And they had the audacity to attack her? Regardless, she went on to report the players that were sending those messages. So did other players in-game that were attempting to defend her. Some of these players ended up being mass-reported. And weeks later, Gameforge still had done absolutely nothing to them.
The players were allowed to send those types of messages in-game without repercussions. And that’s one of the main examples of toxicity in the game – toxicity within the community.

And that further leads me to another reason that this has been failing as severely as it has been: Gameforge, their handling of the game, support, and communication.
I’m not sure why, but they seem so “hands off” with this game. Sure, content has been flowing. Kudos to them for that. But… announcements for content are abrupt – are sudden. They don’t reply to support tickets. They don’t even enforce bans, which we saw first-hand.
I was shocked, and even slightly appalled at how poorly they’ve handled this game’s launch and continued development.

And with their recent announcement that Kingdom Under Fire 2 is shutting down, their recent loss of SoulWorker – which I might add has done significantly better without them. I daresay it’s only a matter of time until this game bites the dust in much the same way.
But this is why I gave up on Swords of Legends Online. I have plans of doing an “Is Swords of Legends Worth Playing in 2021?” video sometime soon, from Mrs Stix’s perspective, as she’s been obtaining some footage via our streams.
But I won’t ever go back to SOLO, and while she’s still actively playing.. she’s since changed her name once more after obtaining the footage we needed to avoid this type of situation from happening again in the future.

And honestly, we haven’t had this happen in any other MMO we play. Guild Wars 2. WoW. Final Fantasy XIV. Just Swords of Legends. And we’ve been playing the 3 aforementioned titles for years.

We have 101 Closed Beta keys for the upcoming hybrid action MMORPG Swords of Legends. We have several methods with which to obtain these keys.

1.) Be subscribed to our Youtube channel (MMOByte,) and navigate on to the video located below. Leave a comment simply stating WHY you want to play SOLO and we’ll pick 30 winners to send Closed Beta keys to.

2.) Follow us on Twitch as we will be raffling away Closed Beta keys every SOLO stream.

3.) Join our Discord as we will also be raffling away Closed Beta keys to our active community members.

Finally, take part in this Gleam giveaway below to win 50 CLOSED BETA KEYS! Yes, 50! Participating in it is easy.

SOLO CBT Key Giveaway!

In a reveal that was completely out of nowhere, Gameforge announced they were about ready to release a brand new MMORPG to the world: Swords of Legends Online, a beautiful Chinese wuxia-inspired Action MMORPG.

Swords of Legends Online is a beautiful PvP-themed action MMORPG set in a breathtaking open world inspired by Chinese mythology. With 6 individual classes, and each class possessing 2 unique paths they can pursue totaling 12 individual playstyles the game seems to provide players quite a bit of freedom over who, or rather how they play.

The action combat system allows for active dodging, various types of combos and according to the team behind the game, the ability to “switch between action and tab-targeted combat as you choose.” This is a little confusing for me as the last game that allowed for that was Revelation Online, which really didn’t provide players true action combat like Black Desert or TERA but I guess we’ll need to see exactly what we can expect from this in the coming months.

There seems to be a fairly strong narrative present in the game, with fully voice-acted cutscenes. The story weaves together gods, an ancient war and eponymous legendary swords wielded by legendary heroes of a time long-since forgotten.

Additionally, players can expect dungeons, raids, PvP systems and player housing in the form of – essentially – a floating temple. Yup.

Swords of Legends Online is a beautiful looking upcoming MMORPG with 6 different classes, each possessing 2 unique roles associated with the class. It has a fast-paced action combat system, a strong fully voiced narrative, a variety of different dungeons and raids of differing degrees of difficulty, lots of large-scale PvP battles, flight and an extensive housing system.

Swords of Legends Online will released in Summer 2021, with an expected Closed Beta taking place in April/May 2021. If we receive keys to enter the Closed Beta, you’ll find the information right here!