How many of you would have ever tried RO at all if you had to pay a fee just to sign up? Personally I think many would just go over to some other Free Game instead of paying money on a "may be a cool game".
There was once another MMO called Ryzom (Its open source now I believe). It had a similar Premium system as to what RO has. However, non-premium accounts were not allowed to leave the training grounds. They required a small payment via credit card or phone to be able to leave the training grounds.
However, the training grounds in themselves were not like RO's. You could get a firm grasp of the game, crafting, leveling, skills, weapons, fighting bosses in large team fights, different classes, even a full auction house for the training area only. The training grounds themselves took a good 5-7 days to complete.
You could see that the developers put a LOT and I mean a LOT of time and effort into making these training grounds and engaging the user into them, and I watched from a developers point of view, to see this business genius as player after player enjoyed the training grounds, and paid their little fee to get into the real world.
In this particular game, the real world was utter crap. But, they got their money from you, so their job was done.
The training grounds had invaluable items for the players. But, they were all non-tradeable, excluding some crafting items. All these items were exclusive to the training area, and once in the real world were utterly useless.
But, its a great idea. You would get no Chinese Zeny farming bots any more, and also be able to control the first experience players have of your game.
I told you this suggestion years ago Heim.
It was even coded up on eAthena. Renewal tried to copy it with their skill books and quests in the training grounds, but utterly failed and just tried to tack on features as usual.
Edited by Wiggles, 16 September 2011 - 07:22 PM.