Is Brighter Shores Premium Pass worth it? Price & tiers explained

Brighter Shores, the new MMO from RuneScape creator Andrew Gower, is now available on Steam Early Access as a free-to-play title with an attached, paid-for Premium Pass.

Brighter Shores features a point-and-click movement system similar to RuneScape and multiple different skills (Professions) for players to engage with. Leveling these is key to increasing in-game wealth and progressing through the story of Hopeport and beyond.

Like most subscription games, buying into the Premium Pass unlocks a wealth of new content otherwise not available, but is the asking price worth it, and what exactly do you get for the price?

Should you buy the Brighter Shores Premium Pass?

Yes, Brighter Shores’ Premium Pass is worth buying, but not straight away. For further context, the initial starting areas are free to all players, requiring double-digit playtime to complete.

That being the case, the best time to buy the Premium Pass is only after completing Hopeport and Hopeforest, as you’ll need to do this anyway to unlock the Premium-exclusive Mine of Mantuban and Crenopolis.

Armor dyes are not immediately available, either, so if the only attraction here for you is additional customization options, it’s probably worth holding off until the feature unlocks in Crenopolis. Likewise, player-to-player trading, a key component of any MMO, is currently unavailable in Early Access.

Premium Pass Tiers explained

Three separate price tiers of the Premium Pass are available in Brighter Shores. All of these grant access to the same content, but differ in duration:

• Free – default tier that every new player starts as.
• Subscription – £4.99 (approx. $6): Repeats every 30 days. Cancel at any time.
• 90-day pass – £19.99 (approx. $26): One-off payment.
• 365-day pass – £62.99 (approx. $80): One-off payment.

The above prices are accurate as of November 6, meaning the cheapest option, if wanting to access Premium Pass features, is to choose the Subscription option. Buying the 90 or 365-day passes works out to be more expensive than paying the recurring subscription for the same amount of time.

That wraps up everything you need to know about the Brighter Shores Premium Pass but if you’re looking for more information on the MMO, see what the developer has planned for PvP, as well as a rundown of everything included in Early Access.