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.
One of the most common tips sent to the MMO Fallout email address (mmofallout at gmail) relates to Terms of Service and End User License Agreements, and people (understandably) have a tendency to take the wording of said documents as an open door for the company to abuse its customers down the road, rather than its real intention: Covering the company’s collective asses.
The reason I’m writing this article today is because of a recent discovery in EA’s Origin download manager that states your account may be deleted for inactivity after two years of no action by the user. After many contacts to EA’s customer service, by myself and others, I can conclude that EA has no intent of following through and deactivating accounts for anyone with games. Doing so would cause irreparable harm to the company’s reputation among gamers.
Steam, EA, and virtually every company have clauses where your license can be terminated for any reason whatsoever, and in some agreements for no reason whatsoever. This doesn’t mean Valve or John Smedley are going to one day say “hey let’s ban ten thousand people and see how many buy their games back,” rather I can say from someone who has worked customer service in the gaming industry, that it’s an end-all beat-all for people who try to circumvent the wording of the Terms of Service to evade a ban. It’s similar to when you would try to get around your parents by saying “well you didn’t specifically say I couldn’t do this,” and they would respond with “well I’m the adult and what I say goes in this house.”
For the record, such a clause is indeed legal. It’s similar to how EA can shut down online services for various games each year but retailers can keep the games on shelf with their original box art, or how an MMO can shut down without legal repercussion (they do have to take the boxes down in that case, however). The biggest drawback to terms of service and EULA’s is that they always favor the company, no exceptions, and will always grant full control over the game to the company. In the case of MMOs, this translates to you own nothing regarding your account, your characters, your items, etc. What you, as a consumer, must take into consideration is how much trust you put in that company.
But as I have always maintained here at MMO Fallout: Vote with your wallet. If you still don’t trust Origin and want to buy The Old Republic or a similar game, buy the boxed copy. Or don’t buy it at all. It might also be productive to email EA to express your discontent for the service.
I don’t make myself out to be an expert in the business side of MMOs, although I do try my best when writing articles here at MMO Fallout, even I recognize that the prospect of Warhammer Online going free to play is a tough one. On one side you have monetization, the need to populated the cash shop with items people would want to buy without feeling they need to buy. On the other side, Warhammer is primarily a player vs player title, so placing armor, weapons, or buff potions on the cash shop is a minefield Mythic would have to tiptoe quite carefully over. With a cash shop, Warhammer takes the risk of bringing in new (albeit less loyal) players at the risk of alienating their current base.
But this article doesn’t have much to do with free to play, at least not presumably. Earlier this week, Mythic took in a few WAR bloggers to see some interesting material regarding some upcoming patches. Thanks to the j0y of a magical document we call a non-disclosure agreement, we won’t hear about what that information is until some point in the near future.
From what we do know so far, it appears there will be a focus on fortresses, incentives to defend, and new zones. Other than that, as blogger Werit posted:
It is substantial news. However, it is probably not what you’re thinking it is. I was quite surprised when they told us about it. Is that cryptic enough? Don’t worry about it too much though, as we may see an official announcement in a few weeks.
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 March, I mentioned a Warhammer Online campaign on Facebook with simple terms: Once the WAR Facebook profile hit five thousand likes, the price of the RvR Booster Double Pack would be dropped (permanently) to $9.99. At the time, if my memory servers correctly, Warhammer carried around fourteen hundred (1,400) likes. I also compared the move to Jagex having a poll to bring back the wilderness, but then starting work on development before the poll had even finished, because they knew what the outcome would be, and simply wanted some free press.
Well, as of Monday, the Warhammer Facebook page has hit five thousand likes, and the price for the RvR Booster pack has dropped to $9.99. All in all, slightly over a month.
On another Warhammer Online note, I have a big stick to raise with the team at Mythic. Perhaps you should consider making the Herald the home page for Warhammeronline.com. When I go to your website, the first thing I see is a news section, with the latest news being “Return to War” and “Patch 1.3.1,” from September 1st and August 31st of last year, respectively.
That’s just my morning two cents on the matter. It’s a small aesthetic change, but in a world where Warhammer’s active status is constantly in question, every little bit helps.
Less than a week ago, I told players to expect more Warhammer servers to be merged and shut down this year, and although I was right on the mark, I honestly expected Mythic to spend more time “discussing” what to do about the server population issue than this. In the latest Herald news article, Mythic’s own James Nichols announced that next week will begin the free transfer off of select servers.
On the North American side, Iron Rock and Volkmar will allow players to transfer to Gorfang for free. On the European side, players on Carroburg will have the opportunity to transfer to Drakenwald. These transfers will begin on the 9th, when the affected servers (Iron Rock, Volkmar, and Drakenwald) will become “legacy” servers, disabling new characters from being created on them. After a period of three weeks, the servers will be retired, forcing characters to transfer to the chosen destination server for free, or to a server of their choice for a fee.
Each server will feature a multi-realm ability, meaning players will be able to have both factions on one server. This will leave Warhammer with two North American servers (Gorfang and Badlands) and three European servers.
Warhammer Online is a game that thrives on PvP, and therefore requires decent server population in order to keep those that are in the game, still with the game. There has been numerous signs of impending server mergers in the past, with player testimony to MMO Fallout such as Xianthe who posted on last year’s article about the Auction House:
To put it frankly, WAR’s AH is so unused at this point having too many features actually hinders use and makes selling things a pain. I know it seems unintuitive to take away features, but let’s face it — WAR is trucking along but with an unhealthy population in many respects. Making search work well, and a simple buy sell feature is really all that is needed here.
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.
In case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve been out in North Carolina for the past week or so (hence the lack of updates) in a period of what I can only refer to as not having the internet, at all. But, now that I’m back, it’s time for a quick wrapup of what I should have written about at the time, but didn’t, so now the news is coming a few days too late. Just like getting a newspaper, right?
1. Enjoying the Rift Beta
I tweeted two RIFT VIP keys before I left, and hopefully those two people are enjoying the current beta event, which was extended to Saturday morning. I hope to have more of these giveaways in the future, so subscribe to my twitter in the right hand side, or follow @mmofallout so you can take part, and so that my internet ego my grow to epic proportions.
2. That Superhero MMO Is A Bestseller
DC Universe became Sony Online Entertainment’s best selling MMO to date, also topping Steam’s sales charts over the past week. In fact, DCU is selling so well that the title is having a hard time staying in stock in many retailers, I imagine partially due to people like myself who put down a few bucks to reserve the game, but went ahead and bought it somewhere else instead.
3. All Points Bulletin says “Two Strikes, and You’re Out”
At least according to Jagex, not having a no tolerance policy on cheating works to keep paying customers who may have gone out of line once, but are indeed salvageable by the great legitimate-promoting gods. So K2 Networks announced on their blog that they will be instituting a two-strike policy when APB goes live. Cheat once and you are temporarily banned, cheat twice and you are permanently banned. Of course, one could glance at Valve, whose previous policy of banning for five years was rescinded because the accounts went right back to cheating, but I wouldn’t want to distill the hope well.
4. That Other Superhero MMO Is Now Free
Champions Online may not be Cryptic’s first MMO, but it is their first AAA title to go partially free to play. Launching on the 25th, Cryptic is reporting large increases in population (most of them free players). Free players will find themselves with access to all of the game’s content, with restricted arche-types, with access to purchase the premium packs from the Cryptic Store. The premium packs are made up of the expansions that were released over the past year or so.
5. No Loving For EA’s MMOs, Say Investors
At least according to Gamasutra. With Star Wars: The Old Republic on its way, investors are a bit scared to support the giant corporation, looking back at the poor performance of Warhammer Online and especially after the two month lifespan that was All Points Bulletin. Bioware may have had successes in the past, but this is the company’s first dive into the MMO genre, and if Richard Garriot has taught us anything, even having a successful past in the field does not guarantee that your current project won’t go directly into the trash bin.
The Old Republic is being backed by a powerful company and developed by one with a name in the gaming business, both of which mean absolutely nothing in terms of whether or not the game will succeed, especially against the odds of its budget.
6. Codemasters Reveals Anti-Hacking Service
Codemasters hates account thieves, and for players of Lord of the Rings Online (in Europe), they are now offering a service for those of you who have had your accounts stolen. Players must be eligible to raise a support ticket, report the incident within seven days of it occurring, and the service also requires GM verification. Meeting these three requirements will reimburse the player and allow them to get back to where they were pre-account cleaning. A word of warning, however, abuse of the system may lead to a permanent ban.
I feel like I’ve been gone for a good month. Oh well, back to the old grind stone!
A good man once said “there is no such thing as a free lunch.” A greater man then followed him with “luckily it’s past 3pm, so to me this is dinner,” right before tucking into his now-complimentary meal. Those of you who play Anarchy Online’s free to play offering, or really anyone who played an EA Games…game several years ago will be aware, if slightly, about the use of in-game advertising. Mostly you might see this in Madden games, street racing titles, and other names. With the way EA was utilizing in-game advertising, one might think it a lucrative business.
Turns out, it isn’t. Electronic Arts Ben Cousins said in an interview to Edge:
“We actually aren’t getting much from ad revenue at all”, the in-game advertising business hasn’t grown as fast as people expected it to.”
Cousins reminded us that the advertising system isn’t completely dead, but does need to go deeper than simple in-game billboards. Cousins suggested soda deals as part of the system.
“We did a deal with Dr Pepper for Battlefield Heroes, where if you buy a bottle and scan in the code you get an exclusive outfit. That kind of deep integration will work, I think, but I’m not convinced that we’ll have billboards in games and things like that. Maybe those days are over.”
So if in-game billboards are dead, does that mean I’ll be able to walk around in Anarchy Online without seeing the latest Lil Wayne CD? Does Lil Wayne still make CDs? Guess there’s only one way to find out.
Last month Mythic Entertainment’s own Carrie Gouskos made it quite clear that Warhammer Online is not going free to play…for now. In the interview with Ten Ton Hammer, she talked about the danger of monetizing power in a title that focuses so heavily on player vs player. There was that part at the end of the interview, now what was it…
We do have some vanity stuff that we’ve looked at and said if players want to buy it, that might be something we’ll make available. But power is really, really scary. And that’s the only thing that would be worth anything.
That’s it! Vanity items. When in doubt, don’t give it stats. Mythic announced today via the Herald that a few new items have hit the EA Store. They are as follows:
Server Transfer – $19.99 USD, this will grant you a code that can be redeemed for one server transfer for a single character.
Starter Mount Pack – $8.99 USD, all characters on an account will receive a deed to obtain a mount usable at level 2 giving players a 25% speed boost and have a 100% chance to dismount upon damage.
Trusty Mount Pack – $9.99 USD, all characters on an account will receive a deed to obtain your choice of a new mount usable at level 20 giving players mounts of up to 60% speed boost and have a 55% chance to dismount upon damage
Trinkets of the World Pack – $4.99 USD, all characters on an account will receive two tokens to spend at the new Trophy Vendor in the capital cities. Each token can be used to purchase one of 14 different trophies.
Specialized Training Pack – $9.99 USD, all characters on an account will recieve one War Tract that will allow them to immediately advance one full level when used
Herald Pet Pack – $9.99 USD, all characters on an account will be granted adoption papers to the Snotling Herald vanity pet. This pet will follow you around and give you a boost!
Initially I was posting that the Training Pack would allow someone with enough cash to fully level all of their characters, but the Herald was later updated to note that the items are one time deals (you can’t buy two training packs and get two levels).
If Mythic is considering moving toward a free to play model, this is certainly the way to do it. Remove the subscription and sell vanity items/mounts. A well-trained eye will note that Champions Online was setting itself up for just a similar model through the carefully named Adventure Packs that Cryptic released, and the RvR packs that Mythic are currently releasing may be gearing up for a similar switch, where the company doesn’t go full Turbine, but rather a halfway approach where classes/races/features are locked off and for sale either on a VIP basis or through individual cash shop purchases.
MMO Fallout 