TotalGaming.net Launches

TotalGaming.net, a new gaming network from Stardock Entertainment, launched yesterday. The web site lets users purchase games via a download either singly or as part of a subscription. “We’ve been testing this concept on a smaller scale with our own games via Drengin.net which TotalGaming.net is succeeding,” said Brad Wardell, president and CEO of Stardock. “We’ve found that people who buy software on-line don’t want to have to mess with copy protection or Digital Rights Management or ‘wrappers’ or renting schemes or what have you. They want to be able to buy the games and not have to deal with any hassles.” TotalGaming.net differs from Drengin.net in that it offers titles developed by companies other than Stardock. For $89, a subscription consists of “a host” of games (the company doesn’t specify how many), plus all new additions that reach the site that year. Individually downloadable games will cost between about $10 and $50.