Steam drops controversial free RPG you can download now

Great news! There’s a brand new, lengthy RPG on Steam based on an extremely popular franchise, for the low, low price of absolutely free!

Terrible news! People seem to kinda hate it!

Jeez, where do I even begin with this one…

Game of Thrones: Kingsroad is an exploration-focused RPG, from developer and published by Netmarble, that released for free on 21 May.

Honestly, it looks pretty fun. It looks like it’s somewhere between the modern God of War games and a FromSoftware title, and it seems to be very visually impressive at a glance.

In fact, the reviewers on Steam agree. If you scroll through all the reviews on the platform, most of them seem to be praising the game for its combat and its story.

So… if that’s the case, why does it currently have a “Mixed” rating on Steam, with only 63% of the reviews being positive?

Well, no prizes for figuring this one out ahead of time: it’s got a mid rating because it’s full of a predatory, pushy microtransactions.

“As soon as I died and was asked to pay to be revived, I quietly exited the game and refunded,” wrote reviewer julbug.

“Perhaps the most aggressively unethically monetised game I have ever seen. It's like microtransactions layered upon microtransactions, buried behind endless false currencies to nickel and dime you for everything,” stated reviewer Hyde.

“There seems to be a subscription option, but even that is aggressively manipulative, with parts of it only delivered if you log in daily, all in order to artificially inflate the simultaneous user count.”

Ooooh yeah, that’s gonna be a no from me, chief.

Kind of a huge shame, honestly. The Game of Thrones universe seems like such a perfect setting for a video game and this legit looks fun as hell, but somehow this just sounds like another failed entry in the franchise.

I’d have definitely paid to just play this outright. Give me the option of a one-time purchase and I’d have given it a go, but I’m not entering my credit card details and spinning the gambling wheel every five minutes when there are a million other games out there begging for our attention.