Crytek: Premium pricing and DLC is "milking customers to death"

Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli is steering the company towards the development of free-to-play online games over concerns that the industry's current retail model is "milking" consumers.

Speaking to Videogamer at E3, Yerli explained that Crytek will be an exclusively free-to-play studio as soon as it has honoured its existing contracts.

"If you look at what kind of games are done in the packaged goods market, with DLCs and premium services and whatnot, it's literally milking the customers to death," he said.

"As we were developing console games we knew, very clearly, that the future is online and free-to-play. Right now we are in the transitional phase of our company, transitioning from packaged goods games into an entirely free-to-play experience."

In future, all of Crytek's games, projects and technologies will be built around free-to-play and supported by its social platform GFACE. However, Yerli stressed that the new business model would not alter Crytek's games in any way.

"As is evident in Warface, our approach is to ensure the best quality, console game quality. That implies budgets of between $10m to $30m - so no compromise there - but at the price-point of $0 entry. I think this is a new breed of games that has to happen to change the landscape, and be the most user-friendly business model."

Crytek's first free-to-play game, Warface, is in development at its Kiev studio. It will be released in Western markets some time this year.