Cliffy B: Couldn't Do F2P LawBreakers "Without Feeling Dirty"

By Jason Winter, News Editor Posted: April 21, 2016

Speaking to Destructoid, Boss Key Productions' leader Cliff Bleszinski said that the reason for LawBreakers' shift from free-to-play to pay-to-play was because, as he put it, F2P felt "dirty" to him.

"It was hurting my brain, thinking of ways to do it. Do we do a hero rotation? Do we do energy [pay to play]? We kept coming back to the idea of paying a lump sum, and at that point we decided to get rid of free-to play."

Cliffy B keeps going back to an energy system, which even the slightest research into F2P should tell him is pretty much universally reviled, while hero rotations are much less controversial. And his comments regarding CS:GO ("I didn't feel bad spending money on cosmetic shit") might lead one to surmise he didn't think LawBreakers could be successful selling "cosmetic shit." Or that the F2P version would have been rife with pay-to-open lockboxes.

Boss Key co-founder Arjan Brussee acknowledges that it could be difficult to compete in a world largely dominated by F2P shooters but insists that his game will be more in the $20 to $40 range -- "Closer to $20, hopefully" -- to help compete with games like Overwatch, whose cheapest package is $40.

In any case, Boss Key released a new teaser video for LawBreakers today, titled "Between Our Guns," which you can check out above. There is some NSFW language contained therein, so you might need to keep the volume down.

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About the Author

Jason Winter, News Editor

Jason Winter is a veteran gaming journalist, he brings a wide range of experience to MMOBomb, including two years with Beckett Media where he served as the editor of the leading gaming magazine Massive Online Gamer. He has also written professionally for several gaming websites.

More Stories by Jason Winter

DemondOridth 9 years ago

don't worry they will probably be making a loot system that requires you to buy keys.. and they will also sell skins along side that $30 price tag to buy and play that game. Its not that they didn't think of ways to make it free to play... they just want to milk more money out of it in anyway possible and when they see the game going in decline they will push it out as free to play and give a big middle finger to all their buying population.

Bombo 9 years ago

Do Gamer or Normal Player know what right and wrong anymore in Multiplayer online games Nowadays? The Free to play has declined a lot over the years with new Games or Old Games on the Market.

rickshaw 9 years ago

The game itself looks like a quake rip-off! nothing really new just a revamp of an old game.

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Curst 9 years ago

They are either ignorant and unprofessional, or they know all to well that their game won't be good enough and popular enough to make money without doing unthinkable stuff like energy/stamina. Either way this makes me uninterested in their game.
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P.S. By the way, there's a new FPS that has been announced recently. It's being developed by Allods team and I believe they are going to name it F.R.A.G. (yeah, terribly original >_>). There are still no details about what it's going to be like. Maybe MMOBomb will be able to get something out of them. Or maybe not, because there is no official English web page for now :D

Thhher 9 years ago

If the game has good gameplay and good options ( like FOV of 90+ etc. ) then i would love to buy the game and spend money on skins.

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Zoran Revaic 9 years ago

Wow power to him. I kind of agree with him. Free to play seems to sound like the most greedy option. At least with P2p you don't exploit almost every profitable slice of content and you don't have to worry about falling within a certain ethical monetary guideline that F2p seems to still have to regulate itself with. I wasn't interested before but I believe I am now loyal to Cliffy B and his kind of thinking.

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