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Games Entertainment

MMORPG: Money, Money, Money 288

Posted by Hemos from the hand-over-fist dept.
JTacomis writes "There's an interesting article up at Business 2.0 magazine about Sony Online and EverQuest. It says that EverQuest makes Sony over $5 million a month. Star Wars Galaxies is expected to make even more than that. It's a long and in-depth articles that takes us through the whole back-story to EverQuest. One interesting fact: EverQuest almost didn't get made. According to the article, the idea was originally turned down inside of Sony."
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MMORPG: Money, Money, Money More

MMORPG: Money, Money, Money

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  • Since everyone hates him, I can see a long queue forming just to kill him off in the game...
    • Or, more likely, you will be able to play as a Gungan (or whatever he is) Imagine it - hordes of little kids with their parents credit cards, swarming you with their characters, blocking the only way out with their dead bodies. I'd pay a lot of money to see loads of dead Jar-Jars.
      • This is what pissed me off about UO. It used to be 18 or older requirements. Now it's just listed as Teen.

        I swear to god it drives me nuts! You get assholes at all ages but damn if I have to see another player named "AzZRapEr" I'm going to yarf!
      • No. At least in the launch product, Gungans are not a playable race (although they will be present in the game as NPCs; whether you can encounter Jar-Jar is unknown -- heck, whether he's still ALIVE during the time period SWG exists in, is unknown).
      • Have you tried the Phantom Menace video game? The second level is great.. it's the Gungan city, and using Obi Wan you can cut down every single last Gungan citizen if you like, women and children too. Great stress relief.

        One catch: The only Gungan you CAN'T kill is Jar-Jar... the purpose of the mission is to resuce him. Well.. you CAN kill him, but then you fail the mission. Over and over and over again. ;)

  • Is 5 million a lot ? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by tmark ( 230091 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:45AM (#4060466)
    I'm just not sure whether 5 million a month is a lot ... it doesn't seem like it would be a lot for a company the size of Sony. And if the Star Wars game gets popular, you have to expect that a lot of it will come at the expense of cannibalizing the Everquest ranks. MMORPGs, like MUDs, after all, require a very particular type of person to pay to play.
    • The dream is to have a multitude of online games to choose from, each generating similar revenue.

      A cash cow of 30 or 40 million a month with large profit margins is very attractive.

    • 5 million dollars a month may not be much, but 40 per cent gross profit margins are rather attractive.

      Seriously though, the market will only expand if it offers differing types of online game. If they are all D&D/Star Wars type universes, they'll be competing for the same market. The Sims looks like a promising idea for tapping a different section of the online population.

    • You don't think the players of everquest will stay faithful to the world they've invested alot of time in? I can understand people trying out a new world, but it'd have to be significantly more entertaining to overcome the homesickness!

      - Lnr
    • Once the game is developed 5 million is a lot per month.

      Development costs are covered by the sale of the game+manual+first month subscription package, day to day running costs (coders doing bug fixes, server system admins) are pretty negligable, considering companies like Blizzard and the EA can afford to do it for their customers for free, and newbie helpers/game testers/Wizards/Gods whatever, tend to be players prepared to do the work for free.

      So all those Evercrack subs are sheer monthly profit, a nice little earner, even for a megacorp like Sony.

      As for Starwars or whatever the MMORPG of the month is stealing custom, well that will happen, but a lot of their customers will be ex Evercrack addicts, looking for a new fix. There's plenty of burnt out players who while never wanting to touch Everquest again, won't be adverse to trying a new game out.

      Remember kids, Choose life, or rather than MMORPGS choose Heroin, or crack cocaine, at least those drugs get you out of the house, meeting people now and again.

    • Re:Is 5 million a lot ? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Ryvar ( 122400 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @07:09AM (#4060536) Homepage
      This is all gleaned from developer quotes, interviews, and gamasutra articles:

      $5 million is quite a bit as it comes out to $60 million a year. Keep in mind that most games are LUCKY to break 100,000 copies sold (x$50 = $5 million), and thus Everquest makes Verant as much in a month as most games do in a year.

      However, a solid chunk of this goes to upkeep of the servers, bandwidth, and salaries for the shoddy-at-best support staff. IIRC, slightly less than 50%. So that leaves $30-35 million a year to play with a year. But wait, let's assume I'm way off base and those fees rack up 80% - that's still $10 million a year net.

      Guess how much it takes to develop a good MMORPG? Between 8 and 11 million dollars. EQ has been running a few years now, which is why Sony/Verant can afford to develop four new games simultaneously (EQ2, SW:G, some MMOFPS I believe called Planetside, and some MMORTS).

      Frankly, the whole business makes me sick. Everquest is terribly unfun to anybody not hooked on it, yet it's like crack to the poor souls addicted to it (many dropping out of college, ignoring their marriages, and in one case neglecting their newborn to the point of death). In exchange for making a shitty game Verant reaps ungodly amounts of money as far as their industry is concerned. Perhaps worst of all, though, is the way Verant hits new heights in censorship of its playerbase - going so far as to remove the accounts of players who post 'objectionable material' in message boards, or those trying to write their own software to act as third-party servers for the game client (DMCA, anyone?). While they're certainly entitled to write any crazed demands into their EULA that they wish, they'll never see another cent from me again.

      For a story about a relatively sane MMORPG company that built its game cheaply and (for an MMORPG) fairly bugfree using a mix of licensed proprietary client software and open source software on the backend (smart combination, that), check out Postmortem on Mythic Entertainment's Dark Ages of Camelot [gamasutra.com] (free login required).

      --Ryv

      • [...] yet it's like crack to the poor souls addicted to it (many dropping out of college, ignoring their marriages, and in one case neglecting their newborn to the point of death).

        They baby (almost?) dying smells like an urban legend. Do you have a published news story reference on that?
      • Your figures are wrong. Sony, EA and every other MMORPG vendor have had terrible trouble turning interest into profits.

        About six months ago, Sony On-line Entertainment *laid-off* almost half its staff. Hardly the act of a company making too much money from on-line gaming. At EA, Ultima Online 2 has been canned.

        Video game vendors have no experience in running server centers with guaranteed up-times. They need to constantly patch offerings to prevent cheating (Sega's PSO has reputedly been spoilt by hacks which allow players to crash other players' boxes.)

      • EQ Free for almost 1 year now (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Reductionist ( 523541 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @10:42AM (#4061830)
        You're right about EQ being terribly unfun to anybody not hooked to it and how it's like crack to most of the regular players.

        My personal addiction to EQ lasted 2.5 years - from launch in March of '99 to 9/11 of last year. Yes 9/11 was the event that made me realize what EQ really is: a banal, empty escape from reality.

        I played on Mithaniel Marr, which is home to 'Afterlife', one of the most powerful guilds in the game. I wasn't in AL, but I used to visit Afterlife's website just to check out their accomplishments.

        Afterlife is for hardcore addicts only, the degree of their addiction must be mind boggling considering most of them play every single day 6 to 8 hours a day(or more). They literally have thousands of hours 'invested' in addiction, and it wouldn't surprise me if some of their characters had a 'played' time of 300 real world days or more.

        True to form they held a raid on the evening of 9/11, as nothing was going to keep them from their addiction, not evening the most horrifying attack on this country since Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on 12/7/41.

        Something about that really disgusted me, as it made it painfully clear for once and for all that EQ is an addiction that's just as harmful as an addiction to alcohol or drugs.

        I never mentioned this to anyone on the discussion boards. I just quietly came to the conclusion that for the sake of my own health and welfare I needed to leave the game.

        Initially I considered just taking a break for a couple of weeks, but I never played EQ again after 9/11. In early October I logged on for the last time and gave all of my items and wealth to a couple of my closest in game friends. Once my characters were stripped I said my goodbyes and bid the world of Norrath farewell. I immediately camped out and deleted my characters(56 War, 56 Shm, 46 Mnk) to make sure I wouldn't be tempted to come back.

        It wasn't easy, but it turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made.

        Its been nearly a year since I left behind the world of Norrath. I don't have too many regrets since I always had a love/hate relationship with the game. In the end I decided the negative aspects outweighed the positive and that it just wasn't worth wasting my time.

        Since then I still occasionally play computer games, like Civ III, Medal of Honor, or RTCW, but they don't take over my life like the way EQ did. I started riding my bike again in March for fun/exercise, which helped my lose about 30 lbs of mush that I put on while playing EQ. I'm generally much more social with my friends in the real world, and I've even started dating again. I read a lot more and find it much easier to think clearly now that my mind isn't in a constant EQ induced haze.

        Being away from EQ has made me realize that reality is infinitely much more interesting and bizarre than anything I ever did in Norrath. Addictive MMORPGS such as EQ are ultiamtely a poor substitute for 'reality', 'community' or 'relationships'.

        This more than anything is the reason why I think MMORPGS will always be a niche category. Americans are already overworked and suffering from a society fraying at the seams. The last thing we need is a mass escape from reality that encourages people to once and for all drop out from society.

        Will most people will realize that it just isn't worth it?

        I'm not so sure..


        • This is perhaps the most insightful comment I've read on slashdot in a week or more. Don't get me wrong. I love video games. But I think Reductionist's experience should be considered by anyone who is heavily wrapped up in online gaming. The big question is, "How much is 'heavily' wrapped up?" Each person needs to figure that out for themselves. I guess the mature solution would be to ask oneself, "Do I have other things I need to really do instead of play this game?"


          Damn. 30 pounds in six months? That's impressive!
          • I agree with you - this comment represents the type of information that should be gleened from forums such as /.

            I too was addicted - but never to EQ, to UO. It almost caused my divorce (which happened later - but for other reasons).

            The interesting thing is that sometimes you may think "God, wouldnt it be great to not have to work and be able to play this all the time" WRONG. I was out of work for a year and a half and just went back to work at the beginning of June. While I was not working I started to play Anarchy Online - thinking that it would be fun as I had no job and I could spend time - lots of time - playing the game. mistake. I liked the game, but man did I feel like a loser wasting the beautiful california summer days on that game. playing for 12 hours at times....

            this didnt last very long, luckily I knew that it was not good for me - so I only played for about a month.

            I play a lot of video games - I absolutely love them. and I know I will be playing till the day I die (hopefully far far in the future) - but I now see the importance of balancing my cyberspace thrills with meatspace reality. Now I have sert aside Tuesday nights for gameplay. My girlfriend knows this and agrees to it. It is much easier to have one night set aside for it - it causes less stress on relationships and you know what to expect. Some tuesdays a bunch of us get together and do paper D&D (which we recently started playing again - while drinking and playing and its actually more fun that I remember it as a kid) - and on alternating Tuesdays we play neverwinter nights online - same characters as the paper game for the most part....

            Since I love FPS games as well (sniping games really) I also recently started doing Paintball... thats a lot of fun as well.
        • I'm an EQ'r, and I've read AL's site. Under requirements for membership they have line along the lines of "Must be able to raid from 6PM-3AM PST". That's ridiculous. I play EQ, and I've never considered myself and addict. I get home from work about 6ish, eat dinner, play with my daughter and chill with the wife until about 10pm, when the little one usually goes to sleep, then I play from 10pm-Midnight.

          These people that have 300 hours logged in are really, REALLY bad examples. Most people that have that kind of time played are farmers, which to non-players means they go somewhere where an uber mob drops and uber item, waits possibly hours to kill it, gets the item, and then goes into a commons/bazaar area and tells everyone they have it for sell until someone buys it. Or they're multiquesters, which means they'll go get one piece of a quest, and then sell it to someone actually doing the quest for a ridiculous amount of money just because the person doing the quest may have ample money, but little time and/or patience.

          The numbers are wildly inaccurate for people that actually PLAY the game. If you concentrate on nothing but actual leveling up your character, it will not take this long, under any circumstances. I have a lvl 60 character, maximum level possible, with a total playing time of about 700 hours, over a span of playing him for roughly two years, off and on.

        • I think a large part of the "problem" with MMORPGs is that they're just too slowly paced--it takes too long to get anywhere useful. In an ordinary RPG, a month or so will usually be more than sufficient to beat the game, max out your characters' levels, etc., but in MMORPGs that will barely get you started.

          I signed up for the Final Fantasy XI beta on a lark earlier this year (more because I wanted to exercise my bug-hunting skills than anything else), and to my surprise the pacing was faster than I had expected, and in about a month and a half of play I had raised my character's level pretty close to the level cap (35). The final version, however, slowed things down considerably; I haven't been able to make as much progress in three months as I did in half that time in the beta, and it's become more of a chore than anything else. (I've already resolved to quit later this month once I pass my items and such on.)

          While I obviously don't know what Square is really thinking, I've heard rumors that they need to keep players paying for a year to recoup their costs, and it seems to me that they're doing their best to make sure players can't progress quickly and have to pour tons of time into the game in order to "enjoy" it. Since RPG players in particular have a tendency toward trying to maximize their stats, it's inevitable that this leads to the sort of addiction we hear stories about.

          Ironically, when you click "Play" on the FFXI title screen, a message pops up saying "don't let FFXI affect your real life" (or words to that effect), yet Square publicly congratulated the first players to hit the level cap. Perhaps the right hand doesn't know what the left hand's doing?

    • I agree that most of the MMORPGs are going to start competing for the same small group of people. Though new worlds and themes will bring in some people who don't currently play, I can't see this ever being more than a niche market. In the article it states that "one third of players 18 and over spend more time in the game world than at their paying job". I don't see that this type of commitment is possible for the majority of game players. One possibility for them to attract new people is to have a tiered pricing structure like ISPs do with dial-up access. If I'm paying $14.99 a month for playing Star Wars Galaxies then I would want to play as much as I could to get my money's worth, but if I pay only $5.99 for 20 hours or so then it might be more palatable.
      • I get the feeling I'll get a -1, Flamebait for this, but I'm not trying to be a pain in the ass.

        Money shouldn't control you like that. Never think that because you paid for something, especially in a case like that, that you have to make it worth your money. Play for the most fun, and then stop playing again, until you want to play some more.

        At that point, if it's not worth your money, just stop paying, and playing. ;p

    • The article notes that the consumer electronics market profit margin is around 1% and the online game profit margin is around 40%. That means to match the profit from 5 million in profit from online games, you have to sell 200 million in personal electronics, a month. 200 million in electronics sales in a month is a lot.

    • According to the Fortune 500, Sony has revenues in excess of $60.6 billion per year. So Everquest's annual $60 million accounts for 1/1000th of Sony's revenue. It is probably a notably high margin portion of Sony's revenue, however.
    • Who cares if its a lot or not? Its PROFIT. Certainly Everquest might only be a small percentage of Sony's business, but Sony has a lot of fingers in a lot of different pies. As long as each one of their ventures is making money, who cares if one single investment isn't making a LOT. Any tech company making a profit these days is in good shape.

      -Restil
    • require a very particular type of person to pay to play

      I'm not sure about that...the addictiveness of the online RPG translates well across all boundaries. When I watched my friend play Ultima Online (I bowed out after the beta test ended...I was like, they want me to pay to play this unfinished game?) I found that UO appeals to the same impulse in people as slot machines do. An online RPG is really nothing more than a slot machine with a positive expectation of gain. You put your quarter in (time), spin the wheels (mob spawns), and you get your reward (item). Because the rewards gained are virtual, the house (Origin) can guarantee gain, whereas a slot machine must take in more than it pays off.

      I realize RPG'ers probably like to think of themselves as more sophisticated than slot players, but hey, there are a lot of parallels there.

  • More MMORPGs == less bucks for EQ (Score:4, Insightful)

    by codexus ( 538087 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:48AM (#4060472)
    With all the MMORPGs in development, I think people are going to play more diverse games. And since, playing a MMORPG takes a lot of time, people aren't going to play more than 1 or 2 at a time. So either all those new MMORPGs aren't going to be popular or the current big ones are going to lose a lot of customers.
    • This becomes much more of an issue as the market becomes riddled with next-generation MMO-Games (I believe we're at the 3rd or 4th gen. right now).

      The big three used to be Asheron's Call, Everquest, and Ultima Online. More recently there are challengers such as Anarchy Online, Dark Ages of Camelot and that one space-age MMORTS game. While all have acheived a significant user base due to its hype, they don't seem to have the stability that the "big 3" still manage to maintain.

      I've played all three of the big 3, and it is truly difficult to balance between even two of them, playing 8-10 hours daily.

      Getting back to the original point - the upcoming MMOers will need to rely on more than hype, as can be seen by the current offerings. Hopefully they've learned the lesson by the launch of Anarchy Online.

      As for the current big ones - it's slowly getting to the point where the only players are the dedicated ones, so there shouldn't be much of an "mass exodus" when new ones appear - probably more of a gradual one.

      No, I have no idea why I wrote this much at 5am.

      • Re:More MMORPGs == less bucks for EQ (Score:4, Interesting)

        by mshiltonj ( 220311 ) <mshiltonj&gmail,com> on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @08:26AM (#4060879) Homepage Journal
        I've played all three of the big 3, and it is truly difficult to balance between even two of them, playing 8-10 hours daily.

        What?! You play a game for 10 hours a day? As a habit?! Good god, man.

        I can't believe you ponder the difficulty of "balancing between two games" like pondering the difficulty between balancing work and family.

        I remember years ago when the very first Sim City came out. I thought it was great game. I wasted too much time on it. I realized once that had spent 7 hours in one sitting playing that game. I deleted the game from my system and haven't been a game player since.

        But, holy shit, to repeatedly play any game, or any number of games for 8-10 hours a day, strikes me as dysfunctional. Is this typical for gamers? How do you get anything else done?

        This post sounds like a flame or a troll, but it's not. That post just threw me for a loop.
    • So either all those new MMORPGs aren't going to be popular or the current big ones are going to lose a lot of customers.


      That assumes a static consumer base. By all accounts the number of game players are increasing and 'public acceptability' (whatever that may be) of gamers is also on the increase.

      With consoles sporting internet connections and network ports, MMORPGs I'm sure will become inceasingly popular.

      I'll agree that people aren't going to be playing more than 1 or 2 at a time, but with more people playing, more MMORPGs doesn't neccesarily mean less popularity per game.

  • Money, money, money indeed (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jukal ( 523582 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:54AM (#4060489) Journal
    In Ultima Online [uo.com], you can now change your character name, which was previously fixed. But, quess what, it costs $29.99 [uo.com]. Can you believe it!! A simple DB query, I believe. Sheesh.
    • But it does keep people from constantly changing their names with the rise and fall of current pop stars.
    • When you started to name yourself like 'K1lj00Nl00UrAsS' and became real good after killing 1000+ people or so, you want to get a better name so as to gain acceptance among noble knighthood. :)
    • Same with EverQuest. Honestly I'm glad they charge for it because otherwise people would be changing their name daily, which really makes it hard to keep track of who is who. $30 is enough that it would discourage people from doing it casually, but not so much that it would keep people who have a dumb name and are truly unhappy with it from availing themselves of the service.
      • > $30 is enough that it would discourage people from doing it casually

        I agree with this point, but still the cost is rather greedy. If they wanted to just discourage people from changing their character's name, there's other ways to do it.

        Then again, a $30 dollars extra is not much, if you buyed an 3l33t account from ebay, and paid $400 for it. And also, I quess the MMMMMMMORPGS are here to make money, I just simply envy them for being able to pull such fortunes out of twiddling with 32 bytes for 1 microsecond. :)))

    • Actually with UO there's more to it than a database query.

      There are some issues with guildstones and other things that require a GM to be available in-game when you do the change. I personally think people needing to change thier name are stupid. What is so hard about thinking up a really good name when you start? I spent 30 minutes thinking about what I wanted to name my character.

  • Turned down! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by standards ( 461431 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:54AM (#4060492)
    Yeah, a lot of projects are initially turned down for business investment ONLY because they suck.

    You see, a business project needs to be shown to be profitable (in the short or long term), and if the original business plan didn't drive that point home, well, it'd be rejected by management. Plus the original business plan would have had to fit into Sony's core business model. If not (and this plan did not!), the plan would have to be much more detailed and robust.

    It isn't that management is always stupid - most executives get dozens of business plans thrown in front of them every week. They have to pick and choose the most likely to succeed.

    After all, it doesn't make anyone look good if $10 million was "lost" in a business plan that most senior executives would laugh at.

    It's kind of like FedEx. We all know that business plan only got a "C" at Harvard Business School. But the fact is, it should have gotten an "F". As a business plan, it sucked. Sure, in the end it turned out to be a wildly successful and profitable business... but the initial business plan could be summed up as "likely to be a failure".

  • MMORPG's are great, but... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mrgrey ( 319015 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:56AM (#4060496) Homepage Journal
    Would you rather pay $150-$200 for a game and not have monthly charges, or pay $40 for a game and $12.95 a month to play it? I think MMORPG's would be more successful, in the terms of user numbers, if they would stop charging by the month. Maybe that's why some people are still playing MUD's and MUCKing around....

    • Re:MMORPG's are great, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by jukal ( 523582 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @07:43AM (#4060667) Journal
      > Would you rather pay $150-$200 for a game and not have monthly charges, or pay $40 for a game and $12.95 a month to play it?

      No. if I start to play some MMORPG, I tend to do it for a long time until there is not much to see, do or try. I will eagerly pay the monthly cost if that makes sure that the server exists also tomorrow. If there is no monthly cost, it usually means that the server gets hosted by a third party, whose main business is somewhere else - and as that third party does not have much incentive to keep the service running, it is easy to shut it down.

      What would be best, I think, would be that the game was freely downloadable without any cost, and if you want to develop your characters (play for longer than a few fays test-period), then you would have to start paying a subscription fee.

      • I know of at least one game like that, Lineage [lineage-us.com]. I got the client off a PC Gamer CD.

        (Didn't keep playing after the free period though - this isn't meant as an endorsement)

        There's probably more out there, too.
        • Anarchy Online has a free evaluation as well, I believe 30 days, along with a free download of the client. If you want to keep playing, I _think_ you have to pay them the 10 bucks they would have gotten if you'd bought the box.
    • I'd like to pay $5 per month plus N-cents per hour. Why should I pay $15 per month when I only use the game for 10-20 hours a month, while a friend plays 180 hours a month, using up 10-20 times as much server time as I do, still for $15 per month?

      Why when I take a 3 month break (big vacation, changing interests, etc) do I still have to pay $15 per month just to maintain the character on disk on the server?
    • Would you rather pay $150-$200 for a game and not have monthly charges, or pay $40 for a game and $12.95 a month to play it?

      Go ahead and do the former. You'll go out of business because too few people will be willing to pony up that much money upfront.

      People (and companies) are funny like that -- they'll pay ongoing fees instead of a large upfront fee. Partially because ongoing fees are easier to budget for, partially because there's not such a sense of commitment with a smaller upfront fee.

      On the flip side, there's no way in hell that I'd want you to pay a large upfront fee instead of monthly. Monthly gives me an ongoing revenue base, which is great since I probably have ongoing expenses (like staffing, rent, etc). The large upfront fee gives me spikes in revenue - which is hard for me to budget for and isn't viewed kindly by investors.

      I played EQ for nearly 3 years, had 2 accounts for a year, and bought the expansions up to and including Luclin. So I guess I spent something in the neighborhood of $700 on the game alone in that time. So yeah, it would've been cheaper for an upfront version. But if I had to pay $200 to just start then I never would've played, and that's a huge stream of revenue gone. (And while I will never again play anything like EQ again, I can't really be too pissed -- without it I never would've met my wife, who also played).

      On the flip side, I bought lifetime memberships for both my TiVo's, at $200 each. One has already paid for itself, the other will do so within a few months.

    • Would you rather pay $150-$200 for a game and not have monthly charges, or pay $40 for a game and $12.95 a month to play it? I think MMORPG's would be more successful, in the terms of user numbers, if they would stop charging by the month. Maybe that's why some people are still playing MUD's and MUCKing around....

      I think this method runs into the same problems as unlimited calling plans or all-you-can-eat bandwidth. There are real costs to the running the service which vary with usage. A pricing model which ignores this invites difficulties and "abuse".

  • Sony and ideas... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by MosesJones ( 55544 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @06:56AM (#4060500) Homepage
    Ideas that have "almost" been turned down by Sony are legend, the point about Sony has always been that they tend to take a punt on this "possible" cases rather than doing the standard corporate drone concept of "doesn't look like something we've done before".

    As the recently departed (as in dead) chairman said of the Walkman "if we'd asked focus groups we'd never have made it". They've also almost not invented CDs almost didn't get into the console market etc etc etc.

    Sony are the company that doesn't kick itself years later saying "damn we though of that why didn't we try it".

    • FYI (Score:2, Informative)

      by Goon Number 1 ( 168487 )
      Sony didn't invent the CD, Phillips did.

      • Re:FYI 2 (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        CD standard was developed by Sony and Philips together.
        Specs are in the Red Book. Read it and be wiser.
        • You Idiot, this proves nothing. Philips invented the CD, almost everybody know this, and if you care to do some real research, you will see this. Philips approached Sony, therefore, "they almost didn't invent the CD" is incorrect.

  • Wired Magazine's Article (Score:3, Interesting)

    by The-Bus ( 138060 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @07:03AM (#4060520)
    50,000,000 Star Warriors Can't Be Wrong [wired.com] This article on Wired is pretty neat --- it mostly talks about the cultural effects of SWG on both the world culture and the Star Wars canon. The amount of work and detail that they've put up is amazing.

    I think what is interesting is that the flat-fee model rewards playing a lot -- I guess these companies have balanced out server loads with making sure the game is popular. More people playing for long periods of time = better word of mouth, happier players, more $10-15/m in the future.

    For the record, I only ever played Ultima Online and I think I got to be a Noble Master Warrior, all on a friend's account and PC. I played so much I made him fail freshman comp sci and drop out of school. So beware! Don't let me play Star Wars, say, at your work, or you'll be fired!

  • Then there's Blizzard.. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by CBNobi ( 141146 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @07:17AM (#4060564)
    Blizzard is on the other side of the spectrum in terms of how they make profit. They initially charged $60 for Warcraft III.

    It reportedly sold one million copies, which means roughly $60 million - about as much as Verant makes in a year with Everquest.

    If Blizzard plans to sell Worlds of Warcraft, their massively multiplayer version of Warcraft for about the same retail price, they've got a huge cash cow waiting for them, especially with the current trends of higher monthly pricing for MMORPGS - from $10 to $12.95.

    (Assuming they can get it out before the market becomes stuffed with major contenders such as Star Wars, Everquest 2, and Asheron's Call 2)
    • Blizzard will sell on name alone. Personally, I hate the whole massively online genre, but will purchase this and play it for at least a month or two, just because its Blizzard, and they have a proven track record. I am sure that other people will, too. I see its only real competition being SWG, as people longed to be padawans long before they were at home in Azeroth.
    • Blizzard won't make $60 million out of it - remember that if it costs $60 retail, it probably costs something like $40 wholesale. Once you've taken off shipping, production costs etc you're probably talking about $20/box - $20 million. subtract from that the cost of development, advertising etc and suddely that $60 million is looking a lot more like $6 million.

      If Sony is raing in about $5 million/month and as the article says, only spends about 40% of that on maintainance, upkeep, development etc..., then they're putting away $36 million/year.

      I'm looking forward to seeing what World of Warcraft is like though...!
      • Obviously there's a difference between gross and profit, but it just shows that Blizzard will up their prices, and this is important when their MMORPG starts up.

        Granted, they must have huge development/production costs, but so does Star Wars Galaxies.
        • Obviously there's a difference between gross and profit, but it just shows that Blizzard will up their prices, and this is important when their MMORPG starts up.

          They can't up their prices on their games. Most People just won't pay much more than $60 to purchase a computer game. With MMORPGs customers are paying monthly fees for updates, and maintence on a persistent world.

          Blizzard can likely charge people to play their games online. It would lose them a lot of loyal fans because they are used to geting that service for free. What people are really paying for with the monthly fees is a persistent, evolving world in which their characters can interact with others.

          Traditional games don't give developers an ongoing cashflow to continue to develop and evolve the game. After the game is released, they provide patches to fix bugs so that they can keep selling more coppies to more players. But after a while, the game goes on the bargain shelf, revenues drop, and it no longer makes much sense to keep developing that game. They may still do some bug fixes to maintain customer brand loyalty, but the money just isn't there to maintain the game. With a MMORPG, the money is there as long as the customers are there. As long as they can keep customers happy, the game will continue, and continue to be profitable.
        • My original point was going to be that Blizzard would only see about 15%-20% of the retail price anyway, but then I noticed that they published WCIII themselves. The developer doesn't normally get the lion's share of the retail price - that normally gets shared out between the retail outlets and the publisher.
    • Don't forget to subtract the costs of battle.net from those figures. That's a huge cash drain that doesn't directly bring in any income, it's supported solely by box sales.

      I think that's why Blizzard is making World of Warcraft. It'll keep battle.net funded.
    • You are forgetting that Every EQ subscriber, currently 400,000+ ACTIVE subs, bought the game. Then they bought expansion 1. Then they bought expansion 2. Then they bought expansion 3.

      And all through this they paid the monthly fee.
    • Wow, what amazingly bad math.

      Ok, by the same measure then, Sony/Verant has had an income of roughly $130 (EQ + Kunark + Velious + Luclin, all bought new at release) * 400,000 = $52M.

      Of course, that's wrong too. Far more than 400k people have bought the game, because Sony/Verant has about a 30% cancellation rate. And they didn't reap all of that money in one year, nor did people pay full price for everything.

      More importantly, they see nearly none of that money at all -- maybe a third of it. The rest goes to the end store and the middle men. Ditto for Blizzard.

      What Sony does see, however, is $9.89 (now $13ish) per month from every active account. Until they cancel. And when Planes of Power is released (end of the year? Hell if I care anymore) they'll sell another expansion to 80% of their customer base at $30 a pop. Sure, half the price and a third of the user base. So what. It's icing on the cake at this point -- the development is already paid for, the servers and maintainence are already paid for, every penny that comes in is pure profit at this point.
  • 989 Studios actually started in 1995, working on a project called 'Turret Syndrome' - a tank-combat RPG. In 1996 they shifted to work on a MMORPG concept - Everquest.

    They completed Everyquest in just 3 years time, at double the initial budget. $7 million dollars.

    About a year after releasing Everquest, 989 was asked to provide copies of marketing research they did before deciding to go ahead with the project. They admitted that they didn't do any research, because if they had, they would not have been able to justify even making the game.
  • I played Anarchy Online, and I did and said stuff I could have done in a Christian chat room for free, but without the graphics.

    Where is the 3DMMORPG for Leisure Suit Larry? I want something to tide me over until I get my holodeck (Thanks Scott Adams)

    • Well actually there was a little MMORPG for Leisure Suit Larry a couple of years ago called Leisure Suit Larry's Casino. You could make money in the casino and buy items, buy nice rooms and hang out in the bubble bath with some babes, all of this online. It was fun as I recall it, but people found ways too cheat with it and it became a little stupid after that, because everybody had maxed out their money by then. But the game didn't have a monthly subscribtion fee so that was good.

  • When the whole concept of MMORPGs was explained to me, I thought "Wow, this is pretty cool!" But when I was told that I would have to pony up $10 a month after paying $50 for the game, as long as CS and Battlenet are still out there, I think I'll pass.

    Don't get me wrong, more power to these guys, but really, we're talking about the same mentality behind selling heroin, except that the first hit isn't free. Now if the game was a free downloadable, I might consider it. Hats off to these guys for the scam of the century, but my money is going towards something without ongoing expenses.

    • It's not called "Evercrack" because it's cute, man.

      I myself am a relatively new EQ player. At first I balked at paying $12/month for a game I had already purchased, but after I looked at it and put it all in perspective, $12 for a month's worth of entertainment isn't that bad, considering you're going to pay more than that for 2 trips to the movie theatre.

      And I know you gotta buy the game (got the whole kit-n-b kaboodle, game and 3 expansions, for $60) but that's just a little overhead.

    • Everything has ongoing expenses. Battle.net pays for itself with ads, and Blizzard's agreements with the ISPs that provide the battle.net servers. People need to maintain Counter Strike servers, and the large internet connections needed to support them (and with badwidth costs on the rise...). If you think those things have no ongoing expenses associated with them, you're deluding yourself. The difference is, with the pay for play games your favorite server is likely to stay around alot longer than Battle.net (dont' forget, Blizzard is working on a Warcraft pay-for-play MMORPG) or your favorite Counter Strike/Tribes 2 server.
    • ". . . we're just giving people something to do while they're waiting to die."

      The above was the response of the designers of Magic: The Gathering when I jokingly called them pushers.

      They said it in unison; obviously a well-rehearsed line.

      Stefan Jones

  • The article gave a false impression of what the future holds for MMORPGs, by focusing on the success of Everquest. Yes, this genre is coming out of it's infancy and there is potential there, however you have to keep in mind that these are still games. And if it's a poor game, it will not sell well and it will not succeed. i.e. Anarchy Online from Funcom, one of the newest MMORPGs, has failed. The company had to close down their other divisions in order to keep the game running longer.

    I think EQ's success has to do more with timing than anything else. They came into the scene right at it's sweet point. Nobody else had a 3D MMORPG out there and Ultima Online, The Realm, and Meridian59 had already paved the road of making the public aware for this type of game. Had EQ not snatched most of the players 6 month before Asheron's Call was released, we could be very well to this day be reading articles on how Asheron's Call is the #1 MMORPG.

    SageMadHatter
    • Except AC dosen't have the same type of drive that EQ does. It's more of a d2 style leveling than EQ. EQ you set a goal (60 with DC for instance) and work to achieve it, the moment you get it, there are other goals. It's absolutly impossible to quit playing EQ unless you have no goals left, which is a very hard thing to have happen if your the type of person that plays EQ.

      Also AC dosen't cater to uber players nearly as well as EQ, and part of what makes a good MUD in lots of peoples opinions (and EQ is just a prety mud, don't kid yourselfs) is the fact that there are some amazingly l33t people killing sleeper while everyone else is out enjoying thier "mundane" groups. Without the uber players EQ wouldn't be what it is today. The tales of waking sleeper etc are what keep level 30's in "Awe" of the game, and what keep the ubers interested in the new content.
  • if Sony Online could replicate EverQuest's success in game after game, creating alternate compelling virtual worlds for every fantasy -- the Wild West, World War II, ancient Rome, George Orwell's 1984, or New York's 1930s mob wars -- it suddenly could be looking at revenue streams easily approaching several billion dollars a year.

    Why would I want to play 1984, when I can live it for free? Just rename it to 'George Bush's 1984', it's a little more accurate.

    I won't play EQ, SWG, UOL, or any other MMPORG. Don't encourage the giant corporations! The pay-to-play, listen, watch, and do mentality is going to come back to bite you in the ass.

    The RIAA and MPAA are hard at work getting this subscription model to work for them. You are a dollar sign. Here is another quote from the article.

    "Would you believe we've generated over $1 million in revenue simply from moving characters?" Smedley marvels.

    Sure, this kind of stuff will fade as more MMPORGS appear. The $$$ required to play will become less and less thanks to competition between the companies. For now, you're going to see this:

    Last April, when Sony raised the monthly subscription price 31 percent to $12.95, it hardly lost a player. In fact, Smedley says the game continues to add 12,000 players a month.

    Anything I have to pay to use/see/hear AFTER I buy it, is not going to get a fscking cent from me.

    A cheap bastard for over 30 years and counting. :P

    • Hmmmm, but you are posting to slashdot. This implies that you have a computer (yes, you could be posting from a public machine, but if you read /. enough to post, you probably do own one). Computers require electricity. *GASP* You're paying to use something after you bought it!

      And, while I'm at it... how did you get your computer? Did you happen to drive somewhere in a car? Did you have to put gasoline in it? OMG! You had to pay for something after you bought it!!!!

      Sorry, you probably also have an internet connection of some sort... which you need to make use of your modem, which is yet again, paying to use something you already own.

      Yeah, it's called a "service". If you don't want services that interact with other humans (and thus usually cost money for their time), you need to be Self-Sufficient (TM). For examples of this, you could check out http://www.amish.net/ -- although that is itself a rather amusing contradiction and example of yet more interdependant services.

      Hmmm, perhaps being a lone trapper in the Canadian wilderness would get you away from those pesky "services"? Let's look at http://www.ranger1.ca/CNTA/issues.html AHHHH! They have a comitte, which means human interaction.. and... NOOOOO! $5/year membership fees.

      There is, at least ONE thing you can buy which will not entail any ongoing service contracts or other fees. A cemetary plot. Or is it????

      • I knew I'd get it from this angle, so here goes:

        If I buy a CD, will I pay the RIAA everytime I listen to it?
        If I buy a painting, will I pay the artist everytime I look at it?
        If I buy a book, will I pay Simon & Shuster everytime I read it?

        The answer? A resounding, echoing NO.

        As for as gasoline, electricity, and internet access, yes, they cost money, and yes, I can't use my car, computer, browser effectively without them. Of course, this is a circular argument.

        I was referring to the subscription model of entertainment/content that is "hot" right now, and will become a pain in the ass when/if enough people migrate to it. But thanks for the www.amish.net tip BTW - I may have to buy a new hat.

  • Annoying (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Luminous ( 192747 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @09:28AM (#4061290) Journal
    I find MMPORPG's really annoying. I find the people annoying, I find the experience annoying, and I find paying for the annoyance annoying.

    I loved EQ for the first 3 months of play, but realized I just don't have the time to focus on 'levelling' and after accomplishing my first big quest and getting a nift item, I realized everyone will do that quest, kill that monster, get that item. My actions don't change the world one iota.

    So I gave up and waited for DAoC. It at least allowed the world to be affected through the PvP/realm vs realm option, which was a cool concept. I played, found a group of people to play with who played in character and didn't metagame -- but of course they all played 4-6 hours a day while I could only play 4-6 hours a week. Thus they quickly increased in level and I didn't, which means I couldn't join them on group adventures because I wouldn't get any xp.

    Now we come to Neverwinter Nights which so far is exactly what I've always wanted. I can create the world, I can play in the world with other people, and our actions can change the world. And I don't have to be annoyed by yet another meaningless online wedding/funeral/whatever.

    • Re:Annoying (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Maul ( 83993 )
      Exactly one of the reasons EQ is not "fun," is what you mentioned. Everyone around you is an adventurer. There are very few "commoners" in the game. What makes it worse is that no matter if you kill the evil orc king (or whoever), he'll just respawn for the next guy. Nothing you do affects the world. Infact, to build your character, you might have to sit around and wait for that evil orc king to respawn. Lame.

      Another problem is that to have a group of friends to play with in the game, you HAVE to play as much as they do... because of the persistant nature of the game, you can play it 24/7.

      I also tried DAoC for similar reasons you did. The PvP system in it sounded compelling, in that the PvP you did would have an affect on the world in some way. Of course, to get to the point where you can participate in the PvP in any meaningful way it turned out you needed to be high level. Until that point it is just another EQ with a bit better of a story.

      Strangely, DAoC is not as "addictive" (so to speak) as EQ. Dunno why. EverQuest has some weird quality about it that makes you feel the need to play, even if you don't want to.

      Anyway, Neverwinter Nights is great. The ability for DMs to make their own worlds and change them based on the actions of the players makes it much more fun than EQ. Real roleplaying can occur (rather than loot collecting and camping). Plus it is hard to play 24/7, since the world is not constantly respawning (there are people who have made modules with respawns, etc... but the game is more geared towards single shot encounters).

  • MMPs, Money & Free Software. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Lejade ( 31993 ) <olivierNO@SPAMmekensleep.com> on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @09:37AM (#4061371) Homepage Journal
    Finally a subject where I feel I can safely contribute. :)

    I've spent a few years in the MMP (Massively Multi Player) arena so I think I know my way around. As founder and CEO of Nevrax [nevrax.com], where I initiated the Ryzom [ryzom.com] RPG [ign.com] and the NeL [nevrax.org] technological platform, I've had plenty of time to reflect on the state of this industry.

    First let me say that MMPs are an entirely different class of video games. The technology, the gameplay dynamics, almost everything is different. It just happened that the game industry got its hands on them first because it had the closest ties, but it could have been otherwise.

    The most important thing to remember is that MMPs have a radically different business model.

    In the traditional game industry you create a game, put it a box, then try to move as many boxes you can in the few month the public stays interested. It's a product oriented business.
    The typical business plan for a studio is:

    1- Convince publisher to finance the production of a game
    2- Try to make a small profit in the process
    3- Make some royalties (maybe) if the game is hugely successful
    4- Start all over again

    This is not very different from what goes on in the music business or in the movie business. Basically to make it simple, the author/studio gets a lousy deal from the publisher/distributor who gets to reap all the benefits.

    The MMP industry could - it's not there yet, but it will eventually - be very different.
    An MMP producer creates a virtual environment, then sells access to this environment. It's a service oriented business.
    A simplified business plan for an MMP producer could be:

    1- Create a Massively Multi Player Game
    2- Make the client software as easily accessible as possible
    3- Sell access to the MMP on a recurrent basis
    4- Profits! ;)
    5- Keep improving your MMP over time > expand user base > more profits!

    This would be the equivalent of a musician cutting the middle man and selling his music straight on the Internet. With one enormous advantage: An MMP producer has no fear of having the client software copied since all that does is expand his potential user base. Whatever you do, you *have* to pay if you want to get the experience.
    Which is, IMHO, the reason why so many people are whining about the subscription fees. It's not that it's too expensive (12$/month for 20H of entertainment time in average is cheap compared to say, movies), it's just that they can't freeload anymore. :)

    My guess is, in the coming years, there will be a real distinction appearing between traditional studios (doing regular PC and console games) and companies building MMPs.

    Now back to the current game industry.
    The hardest part with the model I just described is making "step 1" happen while still retaining the control of your creation. That, from my painful experience, means avoiding to be financed by either game publishers or vulture capitalists, as they will find a way to wrest control from you. The problem, as it has been said before, is that making a professional MMPs is expensive.

    Sure, they are ways to get the numbers down if you know the trade secrets, but it's still going to be expensive.

    That's where Free Software can help.

    My initial idea for Nevrax was that Free Software and MMPs were a perfect match.
    You get all the benefits of Free Software, but keep a strong business model where you can avoid having a competitor piggyback on your work as you stay in control of all the "data" (art assets mostly).
    One of the big cost associated to running an MMP is due to maintenance. Also, having a robust tech on launch helps a lot. Those are things that Free Software can help alleviate tremendously. This is why we created NeL [nevrax.org]. A Free Software engine for MMPs.

    As an added benefit, now that I am starting a new company out of the hands of the VCs, I can freely reuse all the tech we did at Nevrax. My software development costs just got divided by a factor of 10. Imagine that...
    And the best thing is: you can do it to! :)

    One last thing I would like to say to people who think that Everquest & co are boring and ugly: you are right. But real communities formed around these games, and that's what is truly fascinating about MMPs. As time goes, you will see MMPs that are more and more geared towards fostering these online communities, and less and less "games" in the sense that we understand it today. Just because you don't see the point of playing today, doesn't mean that you won't see the point of playing tomorrow...

    And I know I'll be working hard to make that happen ! ;)

    • one comment on your last part (Score:5, Informative)

      by Stalcair ( 116043 ) <stalcair.charter@net> on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @10:38AM (#4061806)
      I agree that as they evolve, MMG's are fostering more of a community aspect of gaming than what we are familiar with currently in interactive games.

      What I would add is this: first, there are different mixtures if community and game that should be recognized, IMHO. This is an aspect of not just the game but the type of gamer. Many really do play for the community. There are many online chat communities that have an almost occult following, yet there is no interactive gaming. Look at the old BBS's. They added some games as afterthoughts, and when they did good it was usually because of a well designed (or just luck) integration and use of said community into the game itself.

      Which leads to my second comment. I feel that many of these games are a horribly made collage instead of a well engineered system of parts. While it is not new for this (movies and single player games) method of plugging in something as an afterthought in the hopes of attracting more people, the aspect of community is just now beginning to dawn on many designers' minds. Again... my opinion. (I feel I have to say that because of lurking trolls and other over sensitive folk :)

      To date, I have felt like these games are basically a graphical click fest game, overlaid with a chat room. That is great for many, but what about a true immersive world? Instead of a lame situation of "Hey, lets go raid Dungeon X" to which thousands of raids have already happened, along with current raids yet the environment never seems to acknowledge this, how about raiding a group of orcs that are players (most of them maybe)? They will definitely react to continual raids by dying, leaving or changing tactics like fortifying and having patrols.

      Basically, the problem I see is that the MMG's created to date are entirely too inflexible, limited and predictable so as to not work with the community aspect. It seems all the focus has been placed on things like shield symbols, colors of clothes and little cute floaty name things that tell what 'Guild' you are in. However, what about making a real community? I think that making it more natural and cutting back on the 'safety net' of unrealistic protections for players and their property is the main problem. Imagine if you will a mountain that is found to have rich veins of gold and high quality iron. Soon, many miners will settle there. However, where will they keep their stuff when selling unless a trade and logistics system is setup. Those trade carts sure are easy picking for evil characters/npc's! So they will need guards, or even better clear the surrounding areas. Soon, depending on choices and the environment an entire town will emerge that could become a kingdom based on its control of arms and trade in the region.

      Now compare this situation to what has been presented mostly to date. You have a very fake system of housing to where once you plop that house down, it invulnerable to harm, intrusion, etc. You just eliminated some naturally occurring quests and fun because of that. Sure you might have some static NPC that besides never leaving the same spot EVER and repeating their dialog/mantra endlessly without change will give a fake quest to find the 'orcish burgler' and return his magic gem of village shielding. Yet when you perform this mission, you are given a coin or two and NOTHING CHANGES. You will come across that orc later, as will someone else.

      Making a truly dynamic questing system is hard, but they make it harder because they hard code it all. Instead of just feeling for the game environment, the quests should integrate with it and be a part of the change. Quests should be based perhaps on economy, or security, or such, not hard coded to one particular 'named critter.'

      Well that is my rant and raving on this, forgive me if it is too odd or too long.

      • My particular MMG addiction is WWII Online. Many of the issues you note re: not mattering, things not changing and intelligent organized opponents are taken care of by creating an Us Vs. Them situation from the get-go. This setup creates meaning and teamwork.

        There is nothing that alters a town quite like a battle ripping through it. Shell furrows in the ground, bullet holes in the wall, buildings ruined, oh yes the environment will tell you a battle took place.

        And there are no magic powerups or twinkie bazookas- the closest thing to magic is a Char, an 88 or a Stuka and they can be taken down. Life is terrifyingly cheap in WWII, a typical day sees 5000+ deaths per side. You gain in rank due to successful missions but no one is going to have a Ring of Panzer Defense to sell.

        And since it is a realistic battle you cannot win on your own. So teamwork is literally built into the game. Many are very passionate about their squad, and work on them like softball teams. And because the company is open to suggestions, the forums are crammed full of history nuts clamoring to get ideas in about how to make a realistic game fun.

        So yes I'm sure there are nuts out there, but at it's best MMGs shouldn't be any more disruptive or 'wrong' then your bowling team.

  • Losing money? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by NPE ( 595798 )
    I'd just like to point out that, for a smart few, MMORPG's aren't a money sink or a waste of time. Those of you who have actually played a game or two surely know that there are people in every game who sell in-game stuff (gold, items, etc.) for cold hard cash. Not only can you pay for your monthly subscription fee, you can also make back what you initially paid for the game and still put a tidy sum in your pocket. For example, I played Anarchy Online like a true addict (6-8 hours / day) for about 6 months. For this I paid $60 total for the monthly fees and $20 for the game itself, so a total of $80. At the end of my 6 month subscription, I sold my account for $150, almost double my "initial investment". The only bad things that came from all this was I lost about 10 pounds and my GPA went from 3.14 to 3.12. I know that my example is something of a special case on the whole, but I think it stands as proof that MMORPG's can be better than the hype surrounding them if approached correctly. And now, to completely sound like a hypocrite, I should add that I have completely sworn off MMORPG's, as the addiction factor coupled with the GPA drop scared the hell out of me.

    • Re:Losing money? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Maul ( 83993 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @10:48AM (#4061872) Journal
      While yo did make money, you only made $70 off of six months of work. Even working at Starbucks for minimum wage, you'd at least make a few thousand with the same time investment.
    • You fared better than most people I know, myself included.

      Everquest == 40 lbs gained, lost job and girlfriend, GPA went from 3.25 to 2.27 (stopped going to class, too lazy to withdraw by deadline) I'll never play an MMORPG again...I like my new school, job, and girlfriend.

  • One MMORPG that is in beta right now, Neocron (www.neocron.com [neocron.com]) is considering using in-game advertisements in order to generate revenue. The setting for the game is futuristic (though based on a 21st century environment), so the idea would be to have billboards in-game advertising to the target audience of the users (e.g., hardware / software manufacturers). While I'm not too keen on having my online gaming experience intruded upon by ads from AMD or NVIDIA, I might be willing to overlook the real-world intrusion if the monthly fee is lowered (or non-existent).

  • Star Wars MMORPG - ugh (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Tuesday August 13, 2002 @05:11PM (#4065122) Homepage
    Would you want to live in a world populated entirely by rabid Star Wars fans? Ones with no life? That's what it's going to be like in there.

    I suspect this thing will have a huge churn rate. 90% of the users will drop out within a month. Remember the last time Lucas overestimated the fanaticism of his fans? 80 Billion Tons of Jar Jar Merchandise now 70% Off. [theonion.com]

    With a movie-inspired game, everybody wants to go to the places from the movie. That's going to be a problem for an MMORPG. Sure, you can have a huge number of instances of the universe (shards), but then, what's the point of having a big shared online universe? Either the world is mostly empty, the world doesn't let you go where you want to, or there are lines like Disneyland on a bad day.

  • Since sony had nothing to do with the publishing of EQ until the very end of production. EQ was produced by 989studios, and is continually "patched" by verant. The inital server infrastructure came from Sony, but I have no doubt that Brad et all could have found another buisness to get them off the ground.

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