It’s a new day for The Elder Scrolls Online.
The massively multiplayer online role-playing game has launched its new Tamriel Unlimited edition, which removes the original’s $15 a month subscription model. The Elder Scrolls Online isn’t technically free-to-play, since you still need to buy the game initially, but you no longer need to pay a monthly fee to keep playing. We don’t know exactly how many subscribers The Elder Scrolls Online has these days, since publisher Zenimax won’t release those numbers, but changing the payment model is a common tactic for troubled MMOs.
All existing PC and Mac accounts of The Elder Scrolls Online are automatically upgraded to the Tamriel Unlimited edition, so you can start playing again now if you ever bought the game before. Console versions of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited are coming to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on June 9.
The MMO market is dominated by Blizzard’s World of Warcraft, which has over 10 million subscribers. While few can hope to match Warcraft with a subscription plan, free-to-play and buy-to-play models have helped competitors like The Lord of the Rings Online and Guild Wars 2 find their own, smaller levels of success.