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1-Drakantos is a free-to-play game, and the studio has described the business model it is aiming for in some detail without committing to prices, dates, or a final shop list. Everything below comes from developer statements made before launch, so it describes intent rather than a shipped store. No monetized build has been offered to the public: both closed beta tests were free and carried no store.
1+Drakantos is a free-to-play game, and the studio has described the business model it is aiming for in some detail without committing to prices, dates, or a final shop list. Everything below comes from developer statements made before launch, so it describes intent rather than a shipped store. Both closed beta tests were free to take part in and nothing about them was sold, though the developers have not stated outright that no store was present in either build.
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33 Model at a Glance
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55 ElementStatusDetailBase gameConfirmedFree to play. No purchase is needed to download or play.Optional subscriptionStated planA paid subscription that is optional rather than required, described as giving the complete experience while the free version stays fully playable.Cosmetic shopStated planA cash shop with a deliberately narrow selection, weighted toward hero skins rather than everything at once.Hero unlocksStated planSome heroes unlocked by default and others purchasable, explicitly not a gacha or lottery.Subscription bought with in-game currencyStated planA route for free players to pay for the subscription with currency earned in game, funded by players who buy it with money.Battle passRuled outThe game director has said there will not be one.Founder's packUndecidedAn idea, but blocked from being a storefront pre-order; see below.NFTsRuled outExplicitly not the studio's intention.
66 Optional Subscription
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88 The centrepiece of the plan is an optional subscription layered on a free game. The game director has described this as the fairest of the models available to an MMORPG: once the fee is paid a player has the whole game, and unlike a mandatory subscription the free version is not locked out. The studio has cited long-running free-to-play MMORPGs that use the same structure as its reference point.
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1010 Tied to that is a plan to let the subscription be bought with in-game currency, so a player who has the time but not the money can fund it by playing while a player with less time can buy currency and sell it on. The developers see this as balancing the two audiences rather than favouring either.
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1212 Cosmetics and Progression
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1414 The studio is cautious about selling cosmetics, and the reasoning is about progression rather than revenue. Most pets and mounts are meant to be earned in the open world or dropped by bosses, because a rare mount only carries status if other players know it had to be chased down. Selling a spectacular mount on day one, in the director's framing, removes the reason to go looking for one.
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1616 Some cosmetics will still be sold, released gradually rather than all at launch, and hero skins are the category most likely to appear there so that players who want to look different from the start can. Dyes and hero styles obtained through play are tradable between players, which gives them value even to people who are not interested in customization themselves.
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1818 Heroes
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2020 Heroes are not sold through a gacha. The stated approach is that some are unlocked and others can be bought outright, in the way a competitive game sells an individual character, with new heroes arriving as ongoing releases. Because the roster is account-wide, buying a hero adds options rather than replacing a character.
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2222 Founder's Pack and Pre-Orders
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2424 The studio looked at selling a founder's pack before launch and ran into a storefront restriction: pre-orders are not offered to small developers without a large publisher behind them, since the platform carries the risk if the game never ships. Selling one outside the store was considered and not pursued. The fallback idea is an in-game, time-limited founder bundle available once the game is live, with exclusive items. None of this is settled, and the developers have said they cannot give details because the details do not exist yet.
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2626 Real-Money Trading
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2828 The team has said it dislikes real-money trading and does not want the game treated as a job, while acknowledging that no developer can fully police it. That caution is why the rules around direct player-to-player trading are still open: the player market is planned to handle most exchanges, and direct trade may end up limited or restricted. Selling in-game currency for real money is not something the studio intends to endorse, and NFTs have been ruled out outright.
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3030 What Is Not Known
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3232 No prices, no subscription tier names, no currency names, and no shop inventory have been published. There is no date for any of it, since the game itself has no release date. Anything stated here can change before launch, and several parts of the plan were described by the developers as still being worked out.