Does the world need another virtual world? Sony seems to think so: after a closed beta period, Sony has launched Free Realms, a browser-based virtual world (but still Windows-only) tied to its Free Realms trading card game. Free Realms tries to blend the open-ended nature of many existing virtual works (like Second Life) with quests, items, leaderboards, and other goal-oriented activities more common in MMORPGS like World of Warcraft. In Free Realms, users can have pets, work at jobs, race around, play games, explore the world, and (of course) customize and deck out their avatars.
Players of the trading card game Free Realms will recognize a few elements: users can assemble a deck of cards that gives them capabilities to handle a variety of in-world situations.
Free Realms is available for free, although a $4.99 per month option enables players to have up to three avatars, get access to exclusive quests and jobs, as well has have their feats recorded on leaderboards. Paid members also get access to more than 400 extra items. The game uses an in-world currency (called Station Cash) to buy in-world rewards and items. Players can buy Station Cash (and even use it to pay their memberships), but they can’t give Station Cash to other players or pull it out of the game as real money.
When Sony initially announced the Free Realms virtual world back at CES, Sony said it planned a version for the PlayStation 3 as well as Windows-based Web browsers.
