I'ma be real with you its fun and you can somewhat survive going free to play but depending on how your server/merge cluster ends up working out you might be with mega whales which means you probably wont be placing very high in most events or things like illusion.Most things in this game also kinda leans in the direction of spending money for a more fun time as well when it comes to access to ninjas and gaining power again it's not impossible to be free to play just know it comes with lots of waiting ,saving and the top units are almost all permanently out of reach without significant spending or luck in rng events that are pretty notorious for being low on success in hitting jackpots.