EA – Page 3 – MMO Fallout

EA Shuttering BattleForge

BattleForge is a real time strategy game developed by Electronic Arts and centers around the idea of your units being represented by trading cards in an odd merger of Pokemon and Rise of Nations. Originally launched as a subscription title, BattleForge joined EA’s Play4Free library alongside Battlefield and several other titles, offering the base deck for free with the option to pay for booster packs. Unfortunately, EA has announced that the game will be retired this coming October.

The decision to retire older games is never easy. We hope you’ve enjoyed playing BattleForge as much as we enjoyed making it and we wish to extend our sincerest thanks to all of our passionate and dedicated players for supporting BattleForge over the past 4 years. Those of you who still have a balance of in-game currency are encouraged to spend it before the game is shut down on October 31^st and is no longer available for play.

The reason for the shuttering is not explicitly stated, but dollars to donuts, the answer probably has something to do with donuts. I mean dollars. If you played, or still play, BattleForge, or just have an opinion on the announcement, drop us a comment below.

(Source: BattleForge)

EA Introduces Origin Guarantee

Who ever heard of being able to return a digital download? The rare case on Steam, maybe, but otherwise you’re pretty much out of luck when it comes to digital purchases. Electronic Arts has unveiled the Great Game Guarantee, a new system that allows customers to return products that they don’t like, for a full refund.

The new Origin Great Game Guarantee works like this: You may return EA full game downloads (PC or Mac) purchased on Origin for a full refund–within 24 hours after you first launch the game, within seven days from when you purchased it, or within the first seven days after the game’s release date if you pre-ordered it (whichever of these conditions happens first).

Your reason for returning the game doesn’t even have to be technical. EA will accept returns even if you just didn’t like the game.

(Source: Origin)

The Old Republic: Everyone Is A Bounty Hunter

Bounty Hunters have the life, don’t they? All that they do is hunt bounties and collect paychecks. In an upcoming update to The Old Republic, Bioware wants to make everyone a bounty hunter, at least for a short period of time. Starting in August, once per galactic month the Bounty Brokers Association will begin posting lists of contracts across the many planets for any and all players to fulfill.

Bounty contracts will take you far and wide in the search for your target, but the BBA Mission Terminal allows you to select the specific planet on which you wish to hunt. Each day, you may sign up for one standard contract and one Kingpin Contract, and each may take you to a separate planet. Completion of a contract requires the death or capture of your target, but you will also be rated on your investigative technique and your aptitude for handling BBA underworld resources.

Look for the contracts coming in August. If you need a Bounty before then, check your nearest department store for ongoing sales.

(Source: The Old Republic)

Revenue Doubled Under Free To Play

As much as I know there is a subsection of gamers who want nothing more than for The Old Republic to be down and out so they can justify kicking it over and over, I have bad news for you: According to an earnings call by Electronic Arts, The Old Republic has not only grown exponentially in size, it is making lods of emone. 1.7 million new players have joined since the game went free to play, bringing up subscriptions to just under half a million.

“The really interesting thing that’s happening inside the service right now is monthly average revenue for the game has more than doubled since we introduced the free-to-play option. And as we look forward, we’re going to continually invest in new content for the service and for players every six weeks or so.”

Granted that news shouldn’t exactly be surprising. We would have been more surprised if The Old Republic had somehow managed to have less players and be making less money after the transition.

(Source: Polygon)

EA Sends Origin Coupons In Response To Playstation Store Downtime

Update: EA has retracted its free game offer, noting that the original notice was created in mistake. EA CFO Blake Jorgensen reached out to MMO Fallout to explain what was simply a case of mistaken identity:

Electronic Arts stands at the head of a large number of subsidiaries, and it’s become so hard to keep track of how many we’ve had to apologize for that we decided to set up an automated system we call the Apology Bot 3000. Unfortunately the system still has some kinks to work out and sent out the coupons under the false pretense that EA owns Sony. We apologize for the mistaken apology and to compensate our users, we will be sending each of our members an unlock code for a free copy of Peggle on the Playstation Vita.

Original Story: In an unexpected and unexplainable move, Electronic Arts has reached out in apology to Playstation 3 owners affected by today’s Playstation Store downtime, and has offered the console users a free Origin game as compensation for their frustration and time. Gamers are admittedly confused by the sudden move, since EA is neither responsible for the Playstation Store, or are they at fault for the store’s extended downtime. Still, it’s rude to look a gift horse in the mouth, and EA is offering players a free copy of Battleforge, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Need For Speed World, and Warhammer Online: Wrath of Heroes.

We will hopefully have a comment from Sony on the matter once they stop screening our calls.

[Community] The Move That Saved The Old Republic

Massively has a great article covering James Ohlen’s comments at GDC about how free to play saved The Old Republic.

When free-to-play launched in November, it “blew all expectations out of the water,” said Ohlen. Subscriptions started going up again. Concurrent players on the servers went way up. Both of those statistics continue to rise. As Ohlen put it, TOR is the second biggest subscription MMORPG in the western world, it has had two million new accounts since the F2P launch, thousands of new players try out the game everyday, and TOR is one of the largest microtransaction money-makers for publisher EA.

I’m interested in finding out what EA’s largest microtransaction money-maker is, assuming The Old Republic being “just one of the largest” doesn’t put it at #1.

(Source: Massively)

The Old Republic Introduces Pay-By-Phone In Select Countries

My credit card is like a third kidney to me, or a second ab, or a third stomach. Always attached, never without function. That being said, some people still prefer to pay for their game purchases via phone, and a good number of MMOs have systems in place to accommodate this. Bioware is the latest to join the club by offering Cartel Coin packs via SMS to players in select countries. Currently, players are only able to buy 450 Cartel Coins ($5 USD), plus any carrier fees that may apply, and the service is consolidated to a select few countries. Over time, Bioware hopes to increase the service to other countries, as well as expand the limits of purchases.

Currently purchasing via SMS is limited to the following countries:

Australia
Belgium
Brazil
Czech Republic
France
Germany
Hungary
Norway
Poland
Russia
Spain
South Korea
Sweden
Taiwan
Turkey
Ukraine
and The Netherlands.

(Source: The Old Republic)

The Old Republic First Expansion: Rise of the Hutt Cartel

Players are able to take on the first fifty levels of The Old Republic’s story line completely free, but what happens when that is all of the story line? The answer: Expansions. The Old Republic’s first expansion, Rise of the Hutt Cartel, is coming in Spring 2013 and brings with it several changes to the Old Republic game we all know and some of us might even love. The maximum level has been expanded by five to 55, and players are sent to the planet of Makeb, where they must put an end to the plot of the Hutt Cartel to become the new galactic superpower.

Free players will have to shell out $20 for the expansion, although subscribers can get it at 50% off for a mere $9.99. Preordering the expansion as a free player does upgrade an account to “preferred” status, and if either group orders the game before January 7th, they will have five days of early access to the new content. Otherwise, not a whole lot of information revealed at this stage. We can assume that the new planet will bring higher tier gear, raids, dungeons, and more space missions, and possibly more crafting options.

(Source: The Old Republic)

Warhammer Online Adds Items Doubling/Nullifying Exp

Believe it or not, Warhammer Online is still running and still has one or two people manning the ship, even if the steering wheel is rotting from neglect, the hatches have not been battened in a long time, and the poop deck could use a good swabbing, and there’s the little matter of that ice berg that the ship hit in 2008, and the crew going AWOL to work on the S.S. Wrath of Legends. Still, you can rest assured that somewhere, someone at Mythic occasionally looks into Warhammer Online long enough to ask the question “how can we continue improving the experience?” Put your hands down, a Vanguard-style revamp is still not the answer.

Warhammer Online’s upcoming 1.4.8 patch aims to unify the various Realm Vs Realm currencies under one roof: War Crests. But the new feature that sets itself apart from the rest of the update is the new vendor that will be available in the capital city. The vendor sells items in exchange for War Crests that alter the way in which players gain experience and renown. There are books that, when equipped, double either experience gained, double renown gained, or double influence gained. A fourth book completely stops any experience gain from monsters or players.

So if you want to stay in Tier 1 forever, and who wouldn’t, now you have the option to. Patch 1.4.8 goes live on December 3rd.

(Source: Warhammer Online)

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