Ah, damage control. It can be a beautiful thing to behold. Take Bill Roper, for example. CEO of Flagship Studios, they are responsible for a title that, a few delays aside, has enjoyed nothing but good press over the past few years. Then they went and said that their online play was going to be subscription-based. All hell, as they say, broke loose.

So now Roper's on the PR trail, trying to simultaneously calm, entice and reassure potential Hellgate customers. On why you should pay subscription fees to play online:

...we will be providing everything from a secure client/server infrastructure to 24/7 customer support to maintaining a complete live team to provide not only balance and bug fixes, but more importantly, continuing, ongoing content updates to the game

On why you...don't need to pay subscription fees to play online:

And while we are still finalizing the commercial and game aspects of our online plans, we can tell players that there will definitely be significant free online play.

And why you don't need to play online at all:

Just as with the Diablo series, we've created a complete single player experience whose longevity of game play benefits from all of the randomization, rarity and customization you'd expect from us.

What. A. Mess. Luke Plunkett

Flagship's Roper On Hellgate: London's Online Plans [Gamasutra]