The Free To Play Quake III Is Now Slightly More Free

I entirely forgot about Quake Live, which is a strange to do. There’s often lamention around these parts that id’s Quakes and Dooms haven’t been entirely well-treated in recent years, and yet there is browser-based Quake III re-release Quake Live alive and well and I believe relatively popular. And free to play. If you’ve held off exploring the not-free elements until now, you have a chance to nose at it without cracking open that much-abused wallet. From now until May 6 2012, which by my maths is 312 years, 4 months and five days away, you can sample all the ‘premium’ bits, bobs, modes and maps for no-pennies. If you’re already paying for premium or pro and God now I’m really confused subscriptions, you’ll get a code for one or two free weeks of free sub to apologise for the great unwashed hordes getting all up in your fancy-pants paid grill.
Premium’s usually 41893.799999999999999999 StroggBucks, or $1.99, per month, and includes the following things. I apologise for how often the word ‘premium’ is used, but I didn’t bally write it, right?

Access to over 50 QUAKE LIVE Premium only maps. Premium maps are a combination of brand new maps and frequently requested community favorites from previous QUAKE games such as Aerowalk, Overkill, Japanese Castles, and Spider Crossings.
Exclusive premium level awards.
Create your own clan and join up to five separate clans.
Access to Premium Scoreboards and Statistics in-game.
Match statistics stored for six months.
Premium Pak 12 updated content.

And Pro is $3.99 per month and… ah! I understand now. That’s like Premium-Premium. Specifically, means you can specify your own serve and manage clans, that sort of thing. That’s still ring-fenced off to the paying elite, though.

So, to summarise, five free days of Premium Quake Live from now, Pro is still paid, and foxes are a beautiful if admittedly troublesome animal that I wish humans didn’t try to kill. Ooh, political.

Full-er details here.