Sony Online Entertainment reveals Planetside 2 release date

It's official: Planetside 2 is only about a month away from release.

 After what seems like years of waiting, we finally have a release date for Sony Online Entertainment’s upcoming massively multiplayer online shooter Planetside 2: November 20, 2012.

“Planetside 2 is without a doubt the next great MMOFPS and I believe it heralds the next phase and future of the gaming industry,” said SOE president John Smedley in the official press release. “External beta participants have experienced first-hand the sweeping implications that Planetside 2’s unrelenting action gameplay and large-scale mixed infantry, air, and ground vehicle combat have had on the advancement of the FPS genre. By providing an enormous magnitude of multiplayer action gameplay and features, we are fostering a community of passionate, engaged players and delivering an experience they have never before encountered, but always envisioned, in an online shooter: massive, player-driven combat warfare on unparalleled thousand player battlefields.”

Obviously Smedley would be excited about this game as that’s part of his job. We however are a bit hesitant to get our hopes up. Planetside 2 has long been planned as a free to play massively multiplayer game, however as we outlined in October there are some seriously tempting benefits only available to those who shell out actual cash-money for the game. Among other things, those that drop real-world dollars on Planetside 2 will receive priority access to the game’s login queue, 25 to 50 percent increases in experience points gained during gameplay and a similar boost in the number of resources your character accrues for his or her side of the sprawling planetary conflict. Granted, these bonuses will set you back $15 per month, but it’s still pretty easy to see that players who opt to enjoy the game totally gratis are getting the short end of the stick.

That said, we still have hope that Planetside 2 will be a quality gaming experience. In September we published this preview of the game’s then-current beta iteration and things looked very intriguing. “After spending some time with the beta — where money hasn’t yet entered the equation — it is obvious there are things that work, and things that might work, but remain to be seen,” we wrote at the time, seemingly predicting that the inevitably release of the game’s subscription details would put a damper on the potential entertainment value found in the title.

However you feel about Planetside 2, at least now you have a release date to look forward to, right? Those of you who hold out anxious hope for the game will be happy to know that you’ll be able to get your hands on the final version of the MMOFPS on November 20, while those of you who abhor the game’s transparent money-grubbing can breathe a sigh of relief knowing that after November 20 you’ll never have to read another giddy preview for a game whose economic system you can’t bring yourself to accept.