{"id":1559123,"date":"2026-04-21T23:48:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T23:48:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xHncQCRXy5xZavEgPuiCJe"},"modified":"2026-04-21T23:48:01","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T23:48:01","slug":"back-in-2009-an-experimental-free-to-play-battlefield-predicted-our-grim-live-service-present-it-will-need-to-be-the-most-popular-battlefield-game-of-all-time-to-be-profitable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/back-in-2009-an-experimental-free-to-play-battlefield-predicted-our-grim-live-service-present-it-will-need-to-be-the-most-popular-battlefield-game-of-all-time-to-be-profitable\/","title":{"rendered":"Back in 2009, an experimental free-to-play Battlefield predicted our grim live service present: ‘It will need to be the most popular Battlefield game of all time to be profitable’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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It cannot be overstated how alien a concept “free-to-play” was just a few hardware generations ago. Long before we’d settled on a label for them, the only notable free-to-play games were browser-based MMOs, early MOBAs based on mods, and Korean games that had few players in the West. Free-to-play was niche in these parts, but by the late ’00s, major publishers began experiments in what free versions of their tentpole series would look like.<\/p>\n

One such experiment was Battlefield Heroes. The PC-exclusive spinoff was the first time a high-profile franchise dabbled with the model, though it was controversial for reasons other than its price\u2014its third-person camera and cartoony art were bigger hurdles for Battlefield fans at the time.<\/p>\n

But Heroes was fun. Back in the April 2009 issue of PC Gamer, 17 years ago<\/em> this month, then-editor Tom Francis wrote a Battlefield Heroes preview that included an interview with senior producer Ben Cousins. You can tell from Tom’s opening paragraph just how strange it was to make a big deal out of a free-to-play game:<\/p>\n

“This is the first time PC Gamer has ever put a free game on its cover. Thanks to the influence of piracy and the phenomenal success of some pioneering free games in Korea, we\u2019re at a point where one of the major PC game developers feels they can charge nothing for their next game.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

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From the archives<\/div>\n
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This interview was originally published in PC Gamer #199 (UK, April 2009)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

You can still subscribe to PC Gamer<\/a> to get new issues of the magazine (in print!) every month.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

That’s right: free-to-play was once sold as a solution for piracy. It’s fascinating to see EA open up about the challenges, advantages, and expectations of a free-to-play game. Francis again:<\/p>\n

“Heroes is a huge risk. Senior producer Ben Cousins told us that in terms of simultaneous players, it will need to be the most popular Battlefield game of all time to be profitable.”<\/p>\n

Cousins goes on to almost perfectly describe a development approach that we’d eventually call live service, and he does so with a transparency and bluntness that’s rare today.<\/p>\n

“The great thing is,” says Cousins, “because we can monitor people\u2019s reactions to different features on the fly, we learn whether a feature is worth putting in or not. If we actually hit our targets in terms of how sticky and addictive and fun the game is without adding a certain feature, then we now realise we don\u2019t need to invest time in adding it.”<\/p>\n

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This, too, might not make much sense if you can’t remember a time before games were constantly patched and post-launch updates weren’t guaranteed. It’s now expected that player feedback steers a game’s creative direction to a degree (modern Battlefield included<\/a>), but this “developing alongside players” mentality was abnormal for multiplayer shooters in 2009.<\/p>\n

Cousins also uses the word “sticky” multiple times to describe Battlefield Heroes’ progression\u2014a simple upgrade system for unlocking abilities and a currency for weapons earned by completing rotating challenges. Heroes had “dailies” before any other shooter I can think of, and while today there’s a growing exhaustion with currencies and grind, Cousins attributes these “sticky” systems to Heroe’s success.<\/p>\n

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“The first closed beta launched without [progression], and the result was sobering for the DICE team. ‘Because we had none of this persistence,’ Cousins explains, ‘and we only had two maps\u2026 people’s average playing time was only a few hours.'”<\/p>\n

Though we couldn’t know it at the time, Battlefield Heroes also offered a grim warning about live service uglification<\/a>: “The costume parts you buy for your heroes get more exotic as you level, so high-level characters often look nothing like World War 2 soldiers.”<\/p>\n

Indeed, Battlefield Heroes became a blueprint for both dos and don’ts of free-to-play. At the time of our preview, better guns could only be purchased with currency earned by playing, but in late 2009, EA would infamously tilt the game in a pay-to-win direction<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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