Dev Blog #5 - Let's Talk About Money

Hey everyone,

Most games talk about pricing as late as possible, in the smallest font possible. We'd rather do the opposite. Money is the thing that kills trust in this genre faster than anything else, so here's exactly how we're thinking about it — including the parts that aren't decided yet.

Where This Game Actually Comes From

Some context first, because it matters for everything below.

Eternal Realms Online is funded by one person: the lead developer. No publisher, no investors, no crowdfunding. He's been playing MMORPGs since he was ten years old — all the way back to The Realm Online, one of the first MMORPGs ever made — and has spent his life in these worlds. Today he works as a software developer for a living, and this game gets built around that job, funded out of that paycheck, for one reason: it's the MMO he's been waiting his whole life for someone else to make.

That's the honest origin story. Nobody's salary depends on squeezing you. Which is exactly why we can afford to be this blunt about the rest.

The Part Nobody Can Wish Away

An MMO is not like other games. When you buy a single-player game, the developer's costs basically end at the sale. An MMO runs — persistent worlds, online 24/7, for every player at once — and that costs real money every single month, forever.

We've engineered our server setup to be seriously efficient (it's a big part of how a three-person team can even attempt this), but there is no clever architecture that makes a living world free to operate. And there's a second reality: if the alpha lands and people genuinely love this game, the lead dev would need to shift most of his focus from his career to building it further — and likely bring on additional people to help. That's the actual dream scenario, and it's also the expensive one.

So the game has to sustain itself. The only question is how — and we think some ways are honest and some aren't.

Why a Subscription

Members will be $9.99/month, and here's the reasoning:

A subscription is the only MMO business model where the developer's incentives point the same direction as yours. A cash-shop game makes money by designing problems and selling you the solutions — inconvenience you can pay to skip, power you can pay to buy, whales to catch. A subscription game makes money one way only: by being worth playing next month. Every design decision flows from that.

That's why the no-pay-to-win pledge isn't marketing for us — it's structural. There is no cash shop to protect, so there's nothing to corrupt.

Why We're Weighing a One-Time Price Too

Here's the undecided part, shared openly: we're weighing whether the game should also have a one-time purchase of $19.99.

The reasoning is simple math, not greed. There will be a free tier, and free players still cost real server money every hour they play — money that, right now, comes out of one person's pocket. A one-time price means everyone who joins the world has at least covered their own seat in it, while everything else about the free tier stays intact: no time limit, no trial, real gameplay.

We haven't committed to it. But we'd rather tell you we're thinking about it now than surprise you with it later. When we decide, you'll read the reasoning here first.

When Would We Actually Charge Anything?

Not for a long time — and this part is decided:

• The first closed alpha — around 100 players from the waitlist, planned for January 2027 — is completely free. No purchase, no sub, nothing.
• There will likely be several closed alphas after that as the game grows, and we don't plan on charging anything while the game is still in alpha.
• Real pricing only enters the picture once the game is genuinely past that stage and worth your money.

No Kickstarter, No Founder Packs, No Pre-Orders

One more thing, because it's the standard indie-MMO move and we're deliberately not making it: we are not seeking funding. No Kickstarter, no early-access packages, no $500 founder tiers with exclusive mounts.

This genre is littered with games that collected the money first and delivered later — or never. We're doing it in the other order. Deliver first. Then ask. If we ever take a dollar from you, it'll be for a game you can already log into and judge with your own eyes.

That's the whole plan. Realistic about the costs, boring about the business model, and allergic to taking money we haven't earned yet. As the numbers firm up, we'll keep posting them here.

More soon.

- The ERO Team