Sony Online Entertainment announced that more than 20 million users have registered for Free Realms since its launch in 2009.

“This benchmark is an honor and a true testament of SOE’s success with Free-to-Play games,” said John Smedley, President, Sony Online Entertainment. “Free Realms delivers a truly captivating, quality gameplay experience that keeps our community engaged and continues to attract new players every day.”

SOE is also hosting a Free Realms Spooktacular in-game event where fun tricks and treats will be available for players to claim when they log in. From October 24 through November 7, 2011.

“Reaching 10 million registered players on the eve of Free Realms’ first birthday is an incredibly exciting event for SOE and our passionate online community, millions of gamers have confirmed that the genre we pioneered over 11 years ago with the original EverQuest continues to evolve and expand to include new styles of gameplay that reach a wider audience than ever before.”  – SOE president John Smedley.

And to celebrate the 10 million, there will be new decorations, live community events, two new combat mini-games, party hats, commemorative in-game t-shirts, new mounts like the rainbow mane Unicorn, Beetle, and Balloon Animal Pets, as well as Chick and Rabbit Pet Pals and more!

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“With Free Realms, we’ve been able to reflect the needs and wants of our players by keenly listening to their suggestions and feedback,” said John Smedley, president of SOE. “We believe the persistent exercise of capturing in-game research inside Free Realms has been a huge contributing factor as to why we’ve attracted over nine million players in less than a year. It truly helps us give our players a game where they can do and be whatever they want.”

Continuous development of new features and themed in-game events, as well as persistent marketing support, has drawn a constant influx of new players into the free-to-play virtual world. An example of a customer-requested feature recently introduced in Free Realms is Rides.

Introduced last month, Rides not only look cool and come in multiple color choices, but they allow players who have purchased a Membership to hop on the back of a T-Rex or Dragon and travel anywhere in the overland world at 150% of their normal speed. Building on this player-driven feature request, Horses are the next Rides scheduled to be released, with more types of transportation in the works. The development team is also set to introduce new Owl and Groundhog pets, as well as an exciting new 3-D minigame in the near future.

According to John Smedly of Sony Online Entertainment, the success is due to heavily customizeable gameplay features, such as pets, houses and more.

“Free Realms is more than just a virtual world for our players; it is a portal for imagination,” said Smedly, emphasizing  “the tools that inspire and compel (players) to share their experiences with eight million others.”

Has the fact that the game is completely free had much to do with it’s success? Maybe.

Sony Online Entertainment’s Free Realms has reached a new landmark. Over one million people have signed up for the game just about two weeks after launch. Satisfied by its success SOE announced that it will be giving a life time membership to the one millionth subscriber to the game.

A Playstation 3 version is also expected to launch sometime this year.