Bethesda and id Software are reviving Quake, complete with fast-paced arenas, pickups, and plenty of gibs. Not everything will be how you remember it, however.
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We already knew Quake Champions would have, well, Champions, with each hero coming with its own special abilities and passives. Now we know you’ll get access to one of those Champions for free, though you’ll have to put a payment down for the rest.
Quake Champions’ creative director Tim Willits told Polygon the game will give access to a single character – a Champion named Ranger – for free. Players can then choose to buy a Champion Pack to get access to the rest of the roster.
“At its core, it’s a free-to-play game,” Willits said, “with the option to buy the Champion Pack and just get in and play with all the Champions. There are a number of Quake players that just want to play their Quake, right? And they are familiar with the business model of our previous games, and they are totally fine. ‘I want to buy the game. I want to start playing. I want to have access to all the Champions.’
“But then we also understand that we want to get as many people into the game as possible, especially outside of North America and Western Europe, where we have a massive fan base. So we want to have the flexibility to have a free-to-play option for those people.”
Accessing the other Champions will be a different process for free-to-play players, with an in-game currency called Favor unlocking Champions for a set time, but both paid and free players will share the same games.