What, you mean it’s free, what’s the catch? I hear you cry. Well, there ain’t one as far as I can see; it’s a gorgeous looking browser shooter and it won’t cost you a penny to play. Free online gaming has been around for years and one need only look to the success of sites like Popcap and Pogo to realise its potential.

Cheap as free chips

But, those guys at EA have taken it one step further with Battlefield Heroes – a free to play game that pits you against multiple players around the world for some gruesome WW2, first person shooter fun. With almost endless opportunities for character personalisation EA is hoping to drive revenue by selling clothing and other attributes for your avatar through its payment system of Battlefunds. Again this is nothing new, players have been paying for kit for years in World of Warcraft. EA are making waves by pushing this pricing model into the hectic world of online first person shooters; will it pay off for EA? The signs are looking good as gamers keen to express their personalities get creative.

However, you can bet that a team as savvy as EA isn’t putting all its eggs in one basket, in fact PC and console gamers can look forward to Battlefield 1943 in a couple of days. Traditional pricing models still apply.

Wonder if it would be cheeky to download on my work laptop, research purposes only. Please don’t tell IT.