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Tag: Henrik Nystrom
Star Vault Announces Mortal Online 2 As Mortal Royale Dies On Steam
Star Vault this week announced Mortal Online 2, the sequel/reboot of the sandbox PvP MMORPG. According to CEO Henrik Nystrom,
“We are proud of what we have achieved with Mortal, a game with little in the way of close competition. But technology has moved on and the time has come to upgrade to UE4.with much improved graphics, inclusive vr compatibility and many other advanced features. Doing this will create what is in part a new game. And this makes this a good time to restate our vision for what we want Mortal to be.”
Star Vault’s plans for Mortal Online 2 include absolutely no free to play, naming and shaming cheaters, and no more multiple characters per account which the company views as a form of pay to win. According to the announcement, player achievement in Mortal Online will transfer over to Mortal Online 2, however the details were not specified.
This announcement comes off of the recent outright failure of Mortal Royale, Star Vault’s entry into the Battle Royale game mode. Mortal Royale hit Steam in December of last year and managed a peak of 93 players, most of whom have left in the intervening two months. Despite the game boasting 1,000 player servers it couldn’t achieve a tenth of that via Steam traffic. Mortal Online as of this writing has 74 players online on Steam, however unlike its sequel Mortal Online is free to play.
Star Vault’s Q2 Report: Sales Down, Profit Up
Star Vault has released their financial results for the second quarter of 2015 and the news isn’t all bad.
Net sales for the quarter dropped ten thousand dollars over last quarter, from sixty eight thousand down to fifty eight thousand. While net profit is still in the red, it has been steadily climbing for the past five quarters straight. In the second quarter, net profit increased from a loss of sixty one thousand to a loss of forty one thousand.
While profits increased and sales decreased, the report notes that the number of subscribers remains unchanged for the second quarter. In his note, CEO Henrik Nystrom expects Mortal Online to launch on Steam this month.
In order to be as ready as possible for the Steam launch, we built another starting position players – a queuing system. This and the start position is now completed. Moreover, we want to use Steam Achievements, which is different gaming sites where players can receive an award by doing different things in the game. In this way, players can show what they managed to achieve, which is also visible to other players on Steam. It’s a great way for others to see what you can do in Mortal Online, as well as the players can see that you play Mortal Online on Steam. We estimate that we will have these elements in place and to launch Mortal Online on Steam in August 2015. We have now compiled Steam Achievements, and the final polish on the level of detail.
(Source: Aktie Torget)
Mortal Online Releasing Sarducca Continent Sunday
Star Vault has announced the release of Sarducca, Mortal Online’s next continent, for this Sunday May 17th. The update goes live during maintenance in the morning (Swedish time) and will be monitored throughout the day for any unexpected bugs.
CEO Henrik Nystrom revealed that more content for Sarducca is already on the way.
I want to express once again that the development of further polished areas, improvement in AI, new content, etc, will NOT stop with the release of Sarducaa. The geography of the continent is finished, and as you can read in the patch notes there have been tons of polish and new content put into to game with Sarducaa, but we will continue working on even more content and polish after the release.
(Source: Mortal Online)
Star Vault Profits Continue To Drop In Q2
Star Vault has posted their second quarter finances for 2014 and the results are not pretty. Net sales amounted to approximately seventy thousand dollars, down over 30% under the one hundred five thousand in the first quarter. Net profit, meanwhile, took a nearly 80% dive down to one hundred fifty two thousand in the red compared to eighty six thousand in the red for the first quarter.
The report notes that the number of subscriptions dropped in the second quarter. Player activity has dropped over the summer which Star Vault believes may be related to waiting for the territory control patch to be released. During the same quarter, Star Vault has also been at work to make Mortal Online compatible with the Oculus Rift.
Henrik Nystrom’s quarterly statement:
In April, we announced an updated development plan to allow time for testing and bug fixing prior to the launch on Steam, as the content and quality are prioritized over making a quick launch. During the first half of 2014 has been fully focused on getting the TC patch (Territory Control) with brand new unique features, completed and we went into the testing phase at the end of June.
As expected, the number of players has decreased over the summer, which may be partly due to the players wait for the TC patch will soon be released. At the end of the period, the reduction of the number of players stalled.
In parallel with the TC construction, we have worked with the new continent as planned, where most is via outsourcing. With the new continent will face in Mortal Online will be doubled and the new Territory control, we will be able to offer unique features.
During the quarter, we have also developed a full support for virtual reality headset Oculus Rift that lets you see the game world in a completely different way; when you turn your head the same thing happens in the game and you look around. It also sees the depth and 3D by Oculus, which may provide some benefits in Mortal Online because you always play the game in first person view.
We plan to further develop support for Oculus Rift hardware (now owned by Facebook) so that this is clear until the release date of Oculus Rift published. There is a huge interest in this among the players and we believe that the combination of Mortal Online and Rift Oculus will provide a gaming experience beyond the ordinary.
Henrik Nystrom
CEO, Star Vault AB
In the long term, Star Vault plans to develop new titles however no other information has been given.
Editor’s note: Quarterly reports are provided by Star Vault and publicly available via the Aktietorget stock exchange. All monetary values are presented in Swedish Kroner and are converted to US Dollars for your convenience using rates provided by Citibank NA and reflect trading values on the day of reporting. Henrik Nystrom’s statements are automatically translated by Google and some context/grammar may be lost in the translation.
Star Vault Sees Q1 Bump In 2014
Star Vault has released their Q1 2014 finances and the results are actually looking good. Net sales broke one hundred thousand for the quarter, up heavily from the previous quarter’s report of eighty one thousand. Net profit remains in the red but increased severely over the previous two quarters, from one hundred fifty thousand in the red down to eighty three thousand. If Star Vault can keep this momentum going, the company will be in the black by the end of the third quarter.
As usual, Henrik Nystrom made his quarterly address.
During the first quarter of 2014 marked by a continued positive trend in increased player activity in Mortal Online. Meanwhile, we have the beginning of 2014, working with a major focus for the planned release on STEAM, the world’s largest online distributor of PC games. Mortal Online will then be posted on a global playlist daily visited by between 4-6 million players worldwide. In February, the game engine Unreal Engine updated, resulting in a large number of improvements in place. Briefly, the above, including both graphical quality and performance improved, which facilitates the creation of a new continent in the game, so we can handle a larger number of players.
With the new continent will face in Mortal Online will be doubled and the new Territory Control will enable us to offer unique features. These features will be released in stages before release. In our industry it is known that all releases are unpredictable and I think it’s important to be clear that although we will encounter problems in the same way as the major players, but we’re doing what we can to be prepared. One of the major challenges in the industry is of course to bring in new players, but also to maintain the existing players by offering a consistently high quality. The competition is tough and you have to deliver. We will just as before to continue to be very honest with our player and also allow them to participate and judge when we have what it takes for a successful release on STEAM.
As previously announced, of course, both the content and quality priority, which means that we update the plan we had from the beginning, to gain more time for testing and bug fixing before release. In this overall development plan to release the work has been divided into six blocks; Engine update (completed and is live), development of the Territory control, test and release of Territory Control continent’s development, test and release of the continents, and the testing and release of Steam API (Application Programming Interface). Each block has a lead time of about one month, while parts of the work of the various blocks is done in parallel.
We have since the beginning of the year even able to announce a new functionality in the form of that Mortal Online has built-in support for Oculus Rift. Oculus Rift can be described as the next generation of virtual reality headsets and developed by the company Oculus VR. In March 2014 it was announced that Facebook, Inc. decided to buy the project for about two billion dollars. By playing Mortal Online with Oculus Rift given increased playing experience then, so to speak “comes into play.” Turn the head of the unit really does play the character in the game too. One sees also the depth and 3D by Oculus, which can provide some benefits in Mortal Online because you always play the game in first person view. When Oculus Rift released, we think players will be interested to try the dedicated first-person games such as Mortal Online, which is the first mmo game that is exclusively dedicated first person only, and therefore lends itself very well to play with Oculus rift.
Henrik Nystrom
CEO, Star Vault AB
Editor’s note: Figures are provided by the Aktietorget stock exchange. All figures are presented in US Dollars using conversions provided by Citibank NA and reflect trading values on the day of reporting. Henrik Nystrom’s statements are automatically translated by Google and may contain various spelling or grammatical errors.
Star Vault Lays Down Road to Steam
With its big show on Steam just over the horizon, Star Vault has laid out how the hardcore sandbox MMO will make its way to gamers worldwide. Before Mortal Online is allowed to release, however, Star Vault is implementing a number of updates and fixes. In the latest press release, Star Vault has laid down just how the Steam rollout will happen.
Each block, according to the release, has a lead time of about one month, noting that multiple blocks may run in parallel.
? Block 0 – Unreal Engine update
? Block 1 – Territory Control
? Block 2 – Territory Control Testing and release
? Block 3 – Continent Support
? Block 4 – Continent support testing and release
? Block 5 – STEAM API release on STEAM
Henrik Nystrom, Star Vault’s CEO, made the following comment (translated):
We continue our focus on working towards STEAM, it looks we all look forward to the team, but I also believe that our current players see the value in this. We will increase communication about the development work currently involves about 40 resources in our global development team. For transparency to our shareholders, we have teamed up with Axier, specialists in communication to the stock market. They have produced an analysis of Star Vault. I hope you find it interesting
(Source: Star Vault Press Release)
Star Vault Q3 2013 Finances
Star Vault has released their third quarter finances, and odds are if you are taking the time to read this, you already have an idea of what is coming next. The good news is that, according to Henrik Nyström, third quarter subscription numbers saw a rise compared to the previous quarter, although net sales dropped slightly and net profit dropped approximately thirty percent. The number of registered users on the forum has also increased over last quarter, the financial report shows.
The other good news is that Mortal Online may be set for an infusion of new players. In September, Mortal Online was officially greenlit for release on the Steam platform. In response to this news, the board conducted a private placement of 2.6 million shares to several private investors to increase development toward a Steam release.
Our hearts also go out to the family and friends of Ulf Nyström, father of Henrik Nyström, who recently passed away due to illness. The board has decided not to fill his position immediately, but to wait until the 2014 Annual General Meeting.
Star Vault Q2 Finances: Sales Down, Profits Down
Star Vault has released their second quarter finances for 2013. Following a rise in the first quarter, net sales dropped approximately 15% to $811,263 USD while net profit fell further into the red at $-937,168 USD. According to the quarterly report, the number of active subscriptions in Q2 2013 is in line with Q1 2013. Earlier in the second quarter, Star Vault sold approximately one million shares to two investors from the UK and USA, allowing for “accelerated development” as the report describes.
Star Vault CEO Henrik Nystrom’s statement:
Just like in the beginning of 2013, we have in the second quarter could see a slightly positive trend as the number of registered members of the Forum of Mortal Online has increased slightly compared to the first quarter, which is obviously pleasing.
Through the private placement we completed in May 2013 was Star Vault capital to advance the development moving forward and deliver new features to the game. At present, we use external services to mass produce content for Dominion (territory control) and the new continent. Before that we delivered in April a ‘mount package, which could be completed with the help of playing donations. Mount package has been received with great joy by our players and brings to my mind a new dimension in Mortal Online.
Henrik Nystrom
CEO, Star Vault AB
The information above was pulled directly from the AktieTorget stock exchange and all monetary values converted from SEK into USD based on international conversion rates provided by Citibank NA. The graph uses the original SEK figures presented in the document, and the statement from CEO Henrik Nystrom was translated into English from its original Swedish via Google’s translation service.
Mortal Online Q2 2012: Sales Down, Profit Up Slightly
It is the end of August, and that means financial records aplenty. Star Vault has released their second quarter finances for 2012, and the results are mixed. The number of monthly payments during the second quarter decreased compared to the previous report, as well as the sale of licenses. In the release, Star Vault notes that the launch of the expansion Awakening aims to make Mortal Online appeal to a wider audience, and there is something for players to do constantly, even if they are not interested in conflict.
The launch of Awakening has also lead to the reactivation of accounts and an increase in sale of new licenses, according to Henrik. Star Vault now expects to break even at some point in September/October.
MMO Fallout 