The landscape of gaming is changing right under our feet. Different values are becoming important. At one time the adage went “Know who you are buying from”. These days it could be “Know who you are freebie-ing from”. Right now game publishers are trying to tap into the Free and are competing not to sell, but to give away. The reputation and experience of the publisher of the free content is going to be the deciding factor. You need to find games that you trust will not eat your machine, spy on you, or sell your credit card numbers.

Not too long ago gaming was limited to on a PC or on a console. Handhelds came along like the Gameboy and then DS. Now you have mobile games for smart phones, and tiny netbook PC’s that are on the cutting edge of today’s gaming. Gaming is no longer tied down to a desk, a living room or even indoors. With so many gadgets designed to be carried in the purse or pocket, every individual who is standing in a line or sitting in a waiting room is a gamer potentially.

There are three ingredients in this emerging trend. For the past two years game publishers have been attempting to capture the casual (women) game audience. Secondly, is the Free to Play Phenomenon, where more than just browser based puzzle games are free. The push to make games more accessible in your day and all around the clock is now coinciding with the arrival of the little netbook PC’s as well. A few years back a study was done that I remember distinctly. The statistic finally came out that the largest group of gamers wasn’t previously presumed males 18-35. It was actually women, kids and seniors who made up over 50% of the total of all games played. This group wasn’t plunking down on the couch to play Halo on Xbox. No, the largest group were playing free games on a web browser. Shortly after that game developers and publishers went off to meetings and conferences, and the term “Casual Gamer” became widely used. They attempted to attract these gamers that they were loosing, and get them to embrace their platforms and properties. Since February I have been playing every game I can get my hands on to test my new MSI Wind Netbook largely with great success. Free to play games come in all types. There are so many of them that you can search for websites that will list all the free games in the genre that you are looking for. You can find a free version of just about every type of game you are looking for. From turn based RPG’s to MMO’s to MMORPG’s. There are side scrollers, RTS, puzzles and everything in between. Some are downloadable and Free to the gamer, others only need a web browser.

They all use a slightly different ‘revenue model’ which just means that free is never free, and someone someplace is picking up the tab, even if it isn’t you. Games such as Maplestory use the sale of their virtual items to make their money. That is when gamers can purchase in-game items. Real world money can be converted to game gold and premium items can be purchased in – game from vendors. Or real money is used in a shop outside the game – play area to get these more desirable perks. This is what Dungeons and Dragons Online Ebbron Unlimited has planned. Guild Wars had you pay for the initial game and it was free to play forever. The successive expansions cost real money, but there were no monthly fees.

Others use ‘subscription tiers’ like Runescape. That money model has users playing the basic game free. Elite weapons or content are going to cost something in real dollars. Many games, even the console games which are the most expensive have advertising in them. There is product placement in just about every form of entertainment these days. Console games however,  which average $50-60 dollars US have not passed the savings down to the gamers.  Big corporations like EA, Activision, THQ and Microsoft have been using advertising firms like Massive for in-game advertising for several years now.

Some games use a combination of all of these. Neopets which is a browser game was so successful at selling plushies and other merchandise as well as subscriptions that it the original owners sold it for 160 million dollars. Mind you that all that money was for property that doesn’t actually exist, except as software.

In fact in the future everything will be free. When I sold the first Motorola flip phone in new england in the early 1990′s it cost $2500. Now phones are given away free with a plan. Time shares have been giving away those ‘free vacations’ for years. In fact Wired editor in chief Chris Anderson wrote a book called Free : The Future of a Radical Price. It may seem unfathomable that businesses can actually turn a profit from giving things away, but they are and they do. I’ve never understood why technology depreciates so fast. This book looks like it would explain it all.

My partner is fond of saying, “You get what you pay for.” As a penny pincher that might not always be what I want to hear. However it is still a truism. The reputation of the game company that you are going to deal with is more important than ever.

Free web browser games can have annoying pop ups galore. They can unwittingly spread trojans. Free downloadable might games include trojans, spyware, adware and cause damage to your system. When ever you are going for something free online you are taking a risk.

If you have a netbook, there isn’t a disk drive so all your games have to be downloaded or played on a browser. Sure disks could be accessed from an external drive. Who wants to carry around an extra brick in 2009 when tech is so fashionable? So download is really the way to go.

Today in a serch for content during this slow game week I attempted to download, or play several different games. I say attempted, because none of them fulfilled. Downloadable games, free or pay have been a consistent end user nightmare. When they work it is fabulous, but when they don’t it is a huge hassel. Weird things happen. Key codes don’t work, buttons don’t function in shopping carts, or strange glitches could occur with Paypal. The servers designated for free play may be full, with a long waiting que. Or when you are playing there could be a huge lag time making the game tedious.

I tried to get the Sherlock Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper Demo, Free Realms, Gaia Online, Parphenty the Cat: Adventures in the Country, and Kuso Party. Sherlock gave me an error message about a missing component. Free Realms was down earlier today, Gaia Online had a message up saying they were experiencing server problems and to try again later. Parphenty the Cat didn’t have a hyper link for download or a contact email. And Kuso Party turned out to be written all in Japanese. I haven’t been playing My Japanese Tutor on DS faithfully enough to be able to read Japanese as well as I would like to. Regardless, the two hours that I set aside to ‘play something to review’ were gone and without satisfaction.

I’ve played Dungeons and Dragons Online Ebberon Unlimited Beta and it is great and it runs perfectly, which almost never happens in a Beta. The upcoming free to play game should be wonderful. Dungeon Runners from NCSoft runs fine. It is  free to play with premium subscriptions available. Aion the new MMO that will be released in September, is expected to be the similar to Guild Wars. Perhaps there will be a single up front charge, and hopefully no monthly fee. That runs like a champ on the netbook as well.

Lord of the Rings Online has brought their monthly fee down to $9.99 and they give free expansions and content, as well as having larger expansions which have to be paid for. LOTRO is the only game I have had a problem with on the netbook. In Moria where the buildings are so amazingly huge, there is a known issue with the netbook’s chipset. Making it impossible to get through Moria and complete the game. It would suck if you bought the expansion pack and found that out later.

Before you enter the land of Freebies do your research. Be sure that the game you want will run on your specifications. If you don’t, your system can end up going haywire. Read, yes I said to read the user agreement carefully for check boxes that would enable tool bars and other annoyances to get on your machine. Most importantly go with a reputable game company that has been around for a while and save yourself a headache.