The second official statement from Nikita Buyanov, head of Battlestate Games, about the devastating situation of Escape From Tarkov after all the recent backlash over the game’s new $250 version finally confirms that all EOD owners will eventually receive free access to the PvE mode, but not instantly.
Buyanov reveals that the new PvE game mode is being hosted on a separate group of servers, without enough capacity to welcome all the EOD owners all of a sudden. Hence, the game mode will still remain behind a paywall until Escape From Tarkov 1.0 releases, which is when the developers will upgrade the infrastructure for PvE to host a bigger amount of players.
Until then, Buyanov suggests, you can either buy access to the PvE mode separately or upgrade your current version to The Unheard Edition to get early access to the new mode. The EOD owners will get a %50 discount for upgrading to The Unheard Edition, and a 70% discount for only purchasing the early access to the PvE mode.
While Battlestate’s new solution to the current situation has gotten a bit better, there are still some big plot holes and contrasts in this new offer.
The biggest question that comes to mind is that if the current infrastructure of the PvE mode is not capable of hosting all EOD owners, then what happens if all or most of the EOD owners decide to upgrade their game to The Unheard Edition?
Other than that, Battlestate Games and Nikita Buyanov himself revealed in their first statement that all EOD players were given 6 months of free access to the PvE mode.
It is worth noting that the previously mentioned 6-month trial is no longer offered and was simply removed from the board, but that offer does reveal a lie here. So, either Battlestate Games is lying about the infrastructure shortage, or the PvE mode will turn unplayable if more than a certain players buy the early access to it.
After all, Battlestate Games would be quite happy if all EOD owners decide to upgrade to The Unheard Edition and play the PvE. But, based on what Nikita Buyanov said, that should result in servers overflowing.
Either way, it just gets from bad to worse for Battlestate Games and Escape From Tarkov, as the developer still insists that the PvE mode is not a DLC, and tries to pretend the new offers like added value to the EOD version of the game, while everyone knows that the PvE mode should be available free of charge for the supporters.
It is yet to be seen what else will happen in the future, but Battlestate Games still doesn’t want to be honest with their player base. There are surely many more ways to monetize Escape From Tarkov, but Battlestate Games insists on the worst of those methods.