“We don’t need the kind of subscriber levels that people throw around, like a million subscribers, to make a lot of money on this title. If we get anywhere near that level, we’ll be making a lot of money.”
Why thank you, THQ CEO Brian Farrel. MMO success is, as I have said before, relative. Technically any MMO that can make a profit and sustain both its viability in the market and the love of its developers over a period of several years is a successful MMO. Back in March, EA’s announcement that The Old Republic would require one million subscribers to satiate the title’s massive budget, and that they were hoping for two million, I wasn’t the only one to become worried. As far as Western MMOs go (discounting free to play eastern titles), one million is a lot if your name is not World of Warcraft, and very few titles have hit that one million mark.
So, those looking forward to the upcoming Warhammer 40k MMO may be worried, as a number of forum threads have indicated: Will Warhammer 40k be placed on the same pedestal of Warhammer Online, where the developers expected the MMO community to jump on the title as if it were the second coming of Jesus, resulting in substandard results and the great majority of servers shutting down?
Nope! THQ wants you perfectly aware that they are not expecting one million subscribers, like some other studios. Warhammer 40k is aiming small. Not too small, mind you, but small enough that were the title to get even five hundred thousand subscribers, Farrel wants us to know that they’ll be making plenty of money. The aim is to develop the title with a small group of experienced programmers and developers, who will put out gold almost immediately, rather than beginning with flaky bronze and moving up from there.
Until then, get back into your formation soldier! What are you, some kind of free thinker? You will burn for that!
We will have more news on Warhammer 40k as E3 comes closer, so next month.
MMO Fallout 