Cryptic caused a stir earlier this week when they announced that the tempting subscription deals offered to early adopters for Champions Online were sold out. The playerbase was consternated and confused. On the one hand they’d been told that the subscriptions would be available until August 31st, and on the other that they were limited. And since the open beta only started a couple of days ago, that left very little time for people who hadn’t been in the closed beta to get a feel for the game and decide whether they wanted to spring for the special deals.
All over the internet, and especially on the CO boards, a thousand voices cried out. And Cryptic listened — the lifetime and 6 month subscription offers are back until August 31st, and they’re unlimited this time. Good luck to anyone who wasn’t able to pick one up before but still wants to buy, and Syp has some tips for new players to CO to get you started.
I wonder if they’ll sell more of the subscriptions by introducing an arbitrary scarcity, inciting a panic, and then opening the offer again … for 3 days only.
Welcome to Spinksville! 
As I told you already on Twitter, I think it was a nasty marketing ploy to sway the undecided into buying lifetime subs or the 6 month package.
More and more companies do such things nowadays… Guild Wars also had a one-time-only promotion for downloading/buying Eye of the North from the NCsoft store. The “bonus mission pack” then became available from the same store for money some time later, due to overhelming popular demand. 😛
Yeah, the cynic in me agrees that this smells like a way to get cheap marketing. Not too hard to expect people to get into an outrage about them canceling the offer early, then everyone who got into an outrage will happily post an advert, I mean blog post, about how the offer was “reinstated”, making the cutoff before official launch seem not that bad now that they’re honoring their original offer.
So, were they stupid for cancel the offer early, or crafty for reinstating it later?
I’m trying to squelch the cynic in me. But at the end of the day, I have the opportunity to take advantage of the offer (which I immediately did, before they changed their mind again). Though I also have a few more gray hairs from ranting about it.
Almost does sounds like a marketing scam. Shut down the subscriptions because they’re all “sold out” then reopen them again due to “popular demand”. Good press and helps build the hype.