Paradox Interactive have announced that the upcoming wizard battle arena simulation Magicka: Wizard Wars is entering open beta on May 27 after having spent a good while in Steam's Early Access programme. The game will presumably be free-to-play upon full launch with customisation items and perks given to those who buy into the Early Access offer. The game also recently added an in-game store where real money can be used to purchase items.
This is how Paradox hope to keep the game fair for all players (paying and non-paying):
"As we have said since day one, we are very much against the possibility of players being to fight using the power of their Visa/Mastercard, rather than their own skills or teamplay, i.e no "pay-to-win" here. The same philosophy we have so far will carry forward, any item you buy will have as strong negative effects to one elemental affinity as it does positive to another.
As far as how you actually buy items, and what the format of the store will be, read on! We will have different tiers of items, beginning at the basic "entry level" robes which you can earn through play (gold crowns). Above this we have our "Premium" tiers for the really fancy stuff, i.e extra cool art/models etc, for now this is where the real-money part of the store comes in.
Now, fear not, we aren't reserving all the shiny things just for those with a hefty wallet! There will be both a "free to play" premium tier and a real-money premium tier, each tier will have items with the same stat-combinations, it's only the models/skins that look different. There is no quality difference between the skins/models between the free or pay tiers, they will look different, but they will both be of the extra quality that we feel suits the premium tiers. For the free to play tier it will require some time investment to get the robes, but end of round rewards will be tweaked so we feel that we get a good balance. for the real-money robes, you simply buy them as with any other Steam purchase."
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