Wildstar might be coming to Steam as a free-to-play game

In digging through the SteamDB, some PC Gamer staff found something interesting: sci-fi MMO Wildstar has a new entry, and it's flagged as "Free on Demand," which is the Steam term for free-to-play.

Currently, Wildstar has an up-front cost plus a monthly subscription, which puts it at two strikes as far as the contemporary MMO scene is concerned. Most MMOs either have a monthly subscription (like World of Warcraft) or a one-time up-front cost (like Guild Wars 2) but not both. This may explain why Wildstar is doing so poorly - in fact, in a recent conference call, the company admitted that the game is its worst-performing title by far.

With games like Elder Scrolls Online going free-to-play, is Wildstar next? I hope so, because I really wanted to try the game, but I didn't want to drop $60 up front plus $15/month to play it.

Image courtesy Flickr/Rebecca Hathaway