My husband has seen me play CO and wants to try it out... is there some sort of buddy key system or free trial besides what comes with the purchase of the game?

I know from waiting for my box version to show up that you can't just download the client... you can't connect to the update server without a key. So I know there's no built-in trial. LoTRO, WoW, and several other MMOs have a download and try system in place, I'm just wondering if I'm missing something obvious.

In other words, I'm not paying $50 to see if he likes it. :/ And I'm definitely not letting him use a free character slot... I'm too busy playing! :P

Nope, no free trial whatsamadoozit thing in place yet.

Free trials generally (not always, but the majority of the time) don't show up until a while after launch, so that companies can accurately count the number of accounts/players for the first couple post-launch reports to see how popular the game is. Also, it ensures that anyone playing the game has paid for it, to maximize post-launch profit.

Disappointing, but that does make sense. Thanks!