MechWarrior Online sales pass $5 million before launch

Though MechWarrior Online will be free-to-play when it launches, players have already coughed up more than $5 million to play the beta version through its Founder's Program. Things are looking good for the stompy robot sim, then, and publisher Infinite Game Publishing is pretty excited about its slate of "premium" free-to-play games.

The MechWarrior Online Founder's Program launched in July then closed earlier this month, offering early access to the game along with in-game currency, premium membership, and exclusive mechs. Players could buy into $30, $60 or $120 tiers, each bringing fancier perks. $5 million represents an awful lot of people keen to stomp around exploding robo-faces.

"The success of the Founder's Program reinforces IGP's vision to help independent developers build exceptional games with the right economic model for the global marketplace," IGP CEO Nick Fostersaid in today's announcement. "We are in a unique position to be able to deliver a pipeline of high quality, innovative content for online game players."

For many years, free-to-play games were seen as a bit shoddy and exploitative, but F2P titles like World of Tanks, League of Legends, PlanetSide 2, Dota 2, and, of course, MechWarrior Online are really changing that. Developers and publishers are now realising they can put out top-quality free-to-play games without nasty 'pay to win' microtransactions, which is lovely.

Infinite is hoping for similar success with its next two F2P games, MechWarrior Tactics, which Jordan Weisman has described to us as "the most true version of the original boardgame I designed 30 years ago I've ever seen," and Sins of a Dark Age.