DDO to go free-to-play in Europe

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 20 July, 2010

EU players to get £40 to spend in Store.

Massively multiplayer online role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons Online will officially go free-to-play in Europe next month, Eurogamer can exclusively reveal.

Currently, the free-to-play version of Dungeons & Dragons Online, dubbed Unlimited, is exclusive to North America, although UK players have reported that they're able to access it directly from US servers.

Developer Turbine is also assuming full control of European operations from partner Codemasters Online.

"We are very excited to announce that Turbine will be expanding its operations and will assume full control of Dungeons & Dragons Online in Europe," Turbine told Eurogamer.

"Beginning 20th August, all European players can visit the official site to download and play the English version of DDO Unlimited with no monthly subscription required. Turbine's new German and French service will enter beta before the end of the year."

Turbine is working with Codemasters "to facilitate a smooth transition" to its new global service.

"We will be providing free character transfers to the new global service and players will be notified when the character transfer is available. Please note that all accounts will only be accessible through our English service until our new German and French services come online.

"As a thank you to our European players for their patience during this transition and to reward their loyalty, we are offering all current and former DDO Europe subscribers 5000 Turbine Points (nearly a €50/£42 value) when they transfer their characters. These points can be spent in the DDO Store on additional character slots, premium content, and much more.

"We thank Codemasters for the outstanding job they have done publishing and operating DDO in Europe and we look forward to continuing to deliver one of the world's best online entertainment experiences to the gamers of Europe."

The move comes as no surprise. In April, Warner Bros. Interactive bought Turbine, putting Codemasters Online's operation of DDO in doubt.

US DDO activity doubled at the beginning of the year following its re-launch in autumn 2009 as a free-to-play game.

Turbine said the re-launch attracted one million players and boosted revenues by 500 per cent. In May, the NPD Group said DDO was the third most-played MMO in North America.

Eurogamer re-reviewed DDO in September last year, giving it an impressive 8/10.

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (9) Latest comment 2 years ago

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  • Rubarack #1 2 years ago

    Awesome, will be great to get my old guys on the new system. DDO is amazing as a free to play.

  • Prehensile_Plant #2 2 years ago

    How odd. With LOTRO apparently staying with Codies in Europe. Mmm.

  • Machetazo #3 2 years ago

    I saw a video of this, by chance the other day, just a trailer but the game looked pretty interesting. I may well have to indulge my curiosity now. :)

  • Kremlik Verified Co-Founder, Crash To Desktop #4 2 years ago

    @Plant - thats easy to explain, codies have the hosting rights for LOTRO and DDO, however 'DDO f2p' was rebranded DDO:Unlimited back last year, the reason why it's taken this long is 'on paper' it's now a different game and probly Turbine and codies have been having legal issue behind closed doors as codies techically speaking still own the hosting rights in the EU with 'DDO' not 'DDO:U', but it's still techically the same game...*insert confusion here* so Turbine claim it's a 'new game' therfore the hosting rights to DDO:U are 'theirs' and codies claim it's the same game and attempt to keep control - now it seems like 'a setlement' has come about.

    LORTO is still the same game with the same name - so codies still own the hosting rights (or just got to keep them in exchange for DDO's rights, we dunno the details)

  • madgerald Verified Studio Head of PR & Marketing, Colossal Games LTD #5 2 years ago

    I've been playing the free version for months and I'm in the UK. I didn't realise it was NA exclusive (or at least meant to be)

  • Kremlik Verified Co-Founder, Crash To Desktop #6 2 years ago

    @mad - it's not kinda... iirc it was asked in the release FAQ if it was indeed locked to the US only, Turbine said it's open access worldwide (probly to tempt the codie accounts over for the reason I said above to twist the knife into codies p2p version to gain the rights back), what I'm fearing atm is that those US version players from the EU stay over there and leave 'our' version barren and/or Turbine lock it out and tell them to use 'our' version - it's going to be an interesting first few months now Turbine have both versions to play with
    Edited by 1 at 20/07/10 @ 13:56

  • Machetazo #7 2 years ago

    From what I read on the European announcement and FAQ, there will be one global game for all, operated by Turbine. Codies will transfer all info/accounts to Global DDO, "their" game will be taken offline, and Euro players will sign up at ddo.com like existing players.

  • YenRug #8 2 years ago

    Was planning to join LOTRO, when that goes free to play later this year, but DDO was definitely the one of more interest to me.

  • dredd97 #9 2 years ago

    Ok EG can we ban tossers like douremi ??