That image is getting old. This is an odd piece of news, Electronic Arts did its Quarter 1 financial call for the fiscal year ending in June. The Old Republic did not go on sale until a few days ago, likely leading many of you to ask: How is this being included in their last quarter’s report? Right in the title, man:
Star Wars: The Old Republic Breaks EA Record For Pre-Orders
Despite this being in the header, there is no other mention of sales, likely because of the sales being part of the current quarter. During the conference call, they did confirm that the team is ready for whatever sales the players throw at them:
2:29: Question on capacity management in SWTOR? EB: We’re in good shape to do that, we have the ability to scale for multiple millions of users. We’re looking at stuff coming in as far as marketing and pre-order promotion. We have a lot of capacity to do that.
Good news, fans of Star Wars, The Old Republic, and Bioware: Starting today, you may preorder EA’s upcoming MMO through selected retailers. While supplies last. Yes, if you want to preorder through Origin.com, you will have to go through the arduous “I’m not worthy” process of submitting a request to pre-order, waiting for your confirmation, and hopefully getting a spot. Oh and there’s a $5 “fee” to preorder, and a $20 fee to pre-order the collector’s edition (which is now out of stock).
Don’t worry, the limited supply is not because of something technically related, Bioware is artificially limiting supply:
BioWare has always had a history of delivering high quality experiences for our customers and we are dedicated to making sure that track record continues with Star Wars: The Old Republic. Our focus is on not only delivering a high quality game, but also in developing a thriving online environment. In order to ensure a great user experience we have decided to limit initial launch supply. Further supplies will be released post-launch.
It should also be noted that Origin is not accepting orders from Australian or South American users. But still, The Old Republic must be a great game if players are being billed a “fee” for the privilege of getting in line to possibly preorder a game, right? This is how EA plans to beat Steam in the digital distribution market? It is unknown how this is affecting stores outside of Origin, if at all.
You cannot say that you are in tune with player security and then only include one of the best security options available (authenticator) as an exclusive item with the collector’s edition. When Final Fantasy XIV was released, Square only allowed players to obtain the authenticator through the $79.99 collector’s edition. With the upcoming Star Wars: The Old Republic, the details of which were just confirmed today, the authenticator will only be released with the $150 collector’s edition.
Now, games like World of Warcraft allow you to buy the dongle separately, while games like Rift opt for digital versions (iOS and android devices). That isn’t to say Bioware won’t have the authenticator on sale at their store after the game launches, but given the standard edition already carries the premium-console price ($60), adding an authenticator could help justify that extra $10.
When Star Wars: The Old Republic launches, it will be one of the biggest launches since Aion, and that means every gold farmer and their brother is going to be phishing, hacking fan sites, and launching every attack they can to steal accounts. We see this in World of Warcraft, Aion, Lineage, and all of the big name MMOs: Where player activity is high, so is rampant account theft (the goal, for the unfamiliar, is to wipe the account clean and sell items for cash before the player can recover it). If Bioware wants to be known as the company that entered the MMO market swinging, they need to get serious about account security, as in starting yesterday. Otherwise they’ll be spending a lot of resources beefing up customer service to deal with all the incoming requests.
I say the same for Square Enix with Final Fantasy XIV, although the price of the game has dropped so dramatically, picking up the collector’s edition is a $25 investment at my local stores, so obtaining the authenticator is hardly out of one’s grasp like the $150 TOR edition.
Star Wars: The Old Republic is not a sandbox title. Let me say that again for emphasis: The Old Republic, developed by EA/Mythic/Bioware, is not. a. sandbox title. That is a very simple recipe of “this is not Star Wars Galaxies 2.” I don’t know why Bioware needs to reiterate this on a constant basis, but once again the usual troop of Galaxies vets have come in to make demands that the developers never promised and only they were expecting to begin with.
Although granted, we had this same conversation with Clone Wars Adventures, where I had to point out that the game is for children. Over on the Old Republic forums, Georg Zoeller posted in a thread asking for sandbox elements, to clarify once again that TOR is not a sandbox game.
There will certainly be out-of-combat player activities and activities that promote social interaction in the game, but you will not be able to take a job as a moisture farmer on Tatooine and simulate the life of such an individual in our game.
Zoeller states that concepts like player built housing are not completely off the table, just low priority. As far as MMO terms go, you can pick up your tickets at the booth, because TOR is about as theme-park as it gets.
In short: Uncle Owen and his life is not the kind of heroic journey we’re going for with this game. (The jawa’s with their rocket launchers wouldn’t make that a very fun activity anyway).
The amount of misinformation around The Old Republic is less surprising when you recognize that it’s looking to be one of 2011’s big players.
Back in the age of gaming magazines, getting an exclusive was really a privilege, as the other newspapers would have to wait until the next month’s (gaming magazines primarily printing monthly) print in order to keep up. In the age of the internet, however, exclusives simply mean an hour or two ahead of the competition. Developers have always had a pretty tight system of rules for offering information, and that system has (for the most part) been fair. Don’t unfairly trash the game, give ample screen time, and that is about it.
Operating a fan site (a decent fan site) is expensive work. Between managing databases and active users, the costs of bandwidth and storage space can get pretty high, and virtually any fan site not backed by some conglomerate (and many that are) offer some form of advertising to help pay down costs.
With regards to the upcoming The Old Republic, Bioware is having none of that. If you run a fan site and want any hope of Bioware talking to you, or promoting you through Twitter/Facebook, you may not accept any income whatsoever, either from advertising or from donations. None, nada, zilch. If your fan site pays its writers, you’re going to have to foot that bill yourself. If your fan site operates off of revenue from Google Ads or some other advertising, guess you’re not getting that promo or exclusive information.
Websites, especially the popular ones (which I would know nothing about), can reach bandwidth costs into the hundreds of dollars per month, and many go even higher. To demand that your fans not supplement their websites with some form of payment means that only a select few, those operated by wealthy groups of players, will have any hope at getting that sweet sweet Bioware nectar.
Of course, you could always list yourself as press and bypass that restriction. According to the website that broke the story, Toroz, Bioware is looking into the situation, and this policy may see some alterations in the coming months. That being said, when you’re about to launch your first MMO, you can’t do much worse than giving your potential customer base (given many of your fan sites wouldn’t have the funds to stay afloat without advertising revenue and donations) the middle finger and chastising them for being poor.
I’ll be following this story in case Bioware comments, and given MMO Fallout doesn’t offer advertising, perhaps I’ll have better odds at getting a statement.
Back in March 2010, I wrote about my concerns with Star Wars: The Old Republic, primarily built around the expectation by EA Games that the game would require one million subscribers in order to “break even.” In fact, in the very-pre-release hype, EA went as far as saying that they could not only see one million subscribers, but that the number could go as high as two million. Naturally, I expressed my concern that The Old Republic could wind up like Tabula Rasa (I would have made a comparison to All Points Bulletin, but the game had neither launched or crashed at that point), shutting down after about a year.
Perhaps in response to the news that investors are lacking faith in EA Games’ ability to maintain its MMOs (Warhammer and All Points Bulletin being two examples), EA responded this week by reeling back on their one million subscriber comment. In fact, they went as far as rolling down numbers to claim that The Old Republic could be profitable off of only five hundred thousand subscribers, although EA would prefer to see the insanely profitable number of one million and beyond.
So is EA CFO Scott Brown doing damage control? Very likely, as both comments came up during conference calls attended by Gamasutra. Claiming one million to “break even” is a recipe for disaster, and in a world where EA can’t risk losing any more investors to their MMOs, the fate of The Old Republic may sit on Scott Brown not exaggerating in conference calls from now on.
When Warhammer Online launched in 2008, the game peaked at about eight hundred thousand subscribers, before plummeting over the course of the next two months to little over three hundred thousand. Over the course of the first year, WAR lost over three quarters of its population, as well as a grand majority of its over-one-hundred servers. So given MMODATA.com’s latest graph showing WAR heading under one hundred thousand subscribers, questioning the game’s health is not exactly out of line.
Luckily, those of you playing WAR can rest easy, at least for the moment. In an interview with Eurogamer, Bioware Mythic announced that WAR is still profitable as it comes to its second birthday this September, and that the game is still chugging forward despite the naysayers. The endless trial has had its desired effect, and “tens of thousands of players” are experiencing the game each month for the first time, according to EA.
Even if you go by mmodata.net’s figures and give WAR a mean 90,000 subscribers, Mythic is still looking at $1.3 million in income a month.
Here’s hoping the Endless Trial goes even better than expected, and Mythic has plenty in the coffers to keep the game going. More on Warhammer Online as it appears.
Those of you who are acquainted with Sony Online Entertainment are likely aware of Live Gamer, the “legit” real money trading website where players can buy and sell characters, gold, and more between each other without fear of getting scammed by some guy sitting in China watching ten WoW bots do their work. Currently, the Live Gamer Exchange only covers Everquest II, Vanguard (Vanguard had 54 characters up for sale, with only one bid between them), and Free Realms.
No matter how you feel about Live Gamer, the company has announced a partnership with Electronic Arts to cooperate on their MMOs. There is no word as of yet as to which of EA’s MMOs this will include (The Old Republic, Warhammer Online, Dark Age of Camelot, and Ultima Online), or exactly what services Live Gamer will bring to these titles, but speculation is abound. Considering Live Gamer currently allows players to trade currency, characters, and items for cash (and vice versa) in the MMOs it does support, it isn’t too far of a reach to assume that whatever MMO EA decides to lend will offer similar features.
This is one of those times I must issue an apology: Saturday, May 8th, I issued an article (partly in sarcasm) that Alganon’s press releases may be clones of The Old Republic, owing to the following similarities in notation:
But, there is just slight similarity between the following press release on the Alganon website from April:
“Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,” Derek Smart continued. “In Alganon, in addition to these we’ve added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story. We delivered a fun, immersive adventure that gamers expect in a top quality massively multiplayer online game. To top it all off, we’re not done yet. A whole new adventure with new updates will follow soon, starting with a consignment house, new classes, PvP and much more.”
“Traditionally, massively multiplayer online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,” said Dr. Ray Muzyka, Co-Founder and General Manager/CEO of BioWare and General Manager/Vice President of Electronic Arts Inc., “In Star Wars: The Old Republic, we’re fusing BioWare’s heritage of critically-acclaimed storytelling with the amazing pedigree of Lucasfilm and LucasArts, and adding a brand-new fourth pillar to the equation – story. At the same time, we will still deliver all the fun features and activities that fans have come to expect in a AAA massively multiplayer online game. To top it all off, Star Wars: The Old Republic is set in a very exciting, dynamic period in the Star Wars universe.”
Due to unconfirmed reports, I was unable to fully verify that the message did indeed originate from Bioware, and for that I must issue a correction. As Derek Smart dutifully noted, the press release did not copy Bioware from 2008, but John Smedley from 2004.
“Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay elements – combat, exploration and character progression. In Everquest 2, we’ve added a fourth element to the equation; a story“
So again, please accept my apologies for noting that the speech was two years old, when I should have noted it as six years old.
On the next episode of Feeding the Alganon Trolls, we answer all of your ambiguous, inflammatory questions: I don my miners hat and hazard suit and descend into the furthest depths of hell to locate Derek Smart’s home town.
This is one of those times I must issue an apology: Saturday, May 8th, I issued an article (partly in sarcasm) that Alganon’s press releases may be clones of The Old Republic, owing to the following similarities in notation:
But, there is just slight similarity between the following press release on the Alganon website from April:
“Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,” Derek Smart continued. “In Alganon, in addition to these we’ve added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story. We delivered a fun, immersive adventure that gamers expect in a top quality massively multiplayer online game. To top it all off, we’re not done yet. A whole new adventure with new updates will follow soon, starting with a consignment house, new classes, PvP and much more.”
“Traditionally, massively multiplayer online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,” said Dr. Ray Muzyka, Co-Founder and General Manager/CEO of BioWare and General Manager/Vice President of Electronic Arts Inc., “In Star Wars: The Old Republic, we’re fusing BioWare’s heritage of critically-acclaimed storytelling with the amazing pedigree of Lucasfilm and LucasArts, and adding a brand-new fourth pillar to the equation – story. At the same time, we will still deliver all the fun features and activities that fans have come to expect in a AAA massively multiplayer online game. To top it all off, Star Wars: The Old Republic is set in a very exciting, dynamic period in the Star Wars universe.”
Due to unconfirmed reports, I was unable to fully verify that the message did indeed originate from Bioware, and for that I must issue a correction. As Derek Smart dutifully noted, the press release did not copy Bioware from 2008, but John Smedley from 2004.
“Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay elements – combat, exploration and character progression. In Everquest 2, we’ve added a fourth element to the equation; a story“
So again, please accept my apologies for noting that the speech was two years old, when I should have noted it as six years old.
On the next episode of Feeding the Alganon Trolls, we answer all of your ambiguous, inflammatory questions: I don my miners hat and hazard suit and descend into the furthest depths of hell to locate Derek Smart’s home town.
MMO Fallout 