Because this is a very importent time for gaming. With indie developers showing up like crazy, we finally have a chance to have a world without companies like EA. But for every blind fanboy who gives them money, were one more person away from seeing them purged
So you're getting angry at someone not giving them money?
I'm not angry at you though....
It seemd you were :P. But cool, it's all good then .
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
If they continue to lose about 23.5% of their subs per quarter, the game is going to drop under 500k sometime during Q1 2013. That's assuming it doesn't drop significant amounts when the 3 month and 6 month subscriptions finally expire.
I suppose it's possible that sub numbers stabilize and even go up. Of course, it's also possible that Earth will experience world peace in the near future... "possible" doesn't mean either are likely.
Not too long ago people claimed Swtor will go f2p by this time.
EA is buying up MMo indie dev companies.. when did this start?
Eventually those companies will get published, just like Bioware did. Everything will be great until a company like EA comes along, buy them, fired half the staff, and milks their franchises.
So just the numerical layout for a bit of controvercy..... Bioware/EA claims 1.3 million subs across 215 servers worldwide.... That is roughly 6050 accounts per server.... Where are all these people. Seems kinda odd that most independant studies place server populations between 400 - 800 on low pop servers, 800 - 1300 people on average servers, and 1500 - 2000 on high population servers like The Fatman.
Well only a certain percentage are going to be on at any given time. Hmm Fatman still healthy? Wonder how many bloodfiners are still there.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
This game is nowhere near profitable atm,maybe years end,but not now.To think it is show's who's uninformed amirite?They may have about 120 mill back right now.People seem to think a $60 box sale = $60 to EA/Bio and it's lucky to be half that.Or should I say 1/10 to you Axe?
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
EA is buying up MMo indie dev companies.. when did this start?
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not. But here is some info on EA aquisitions. You can decide for yourself whether some of these companies are indie.
Eventually those companies will get published, just like Bioware did. Everything will be great until a company like EA comes along, buy them, fired half the staff, and milks their franchises.
Who needs a publisher when you can just sell the mmo on steam,
EA is buying up MMo indie dev companies.. when did this start?
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not. But here is some info on EA aquisitions. You can decide for yourself whether some of these companies are indie.
EA is buying up MMo indie dev companies.. when did this start?
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not. But here is some info on EA aquisitions. You can decide for yourself whether some of these companies are indie.
If they continue to lose about 23.5% of their subs per quarter, the game is going to drop under 500k sometime during Q1 2013. That's assuming it doesn't drop significant amounts when the 3 month and 6 month subscriptions finally expire.
I suppose it's possible that sub numbers stabilize and even go up. Of course, it's also possible that Earth will experience world peace in the near future... "possible" doesn't mean either are likely.
Not too long ago people claimed Swtor will go f2p by this time.
Yeah, that's nice and all, but I'm using the numbers EA provided. Personally, I doubt their validity and believe there was some clever reporting used to define "active accounts". My doubt of the validity of their numbers doesn't change that using their numbers and holding the current rate of decline (as a percentage) constant, the game will drop under 500k subs sometime at the beginning of next year. What conclusion you want to draw from that is completely up to you.
So just the numerical layout for a bit of controvercy..... Bioware/EA claims 1.3 million subs across 215 servers worldwide.... That is roughly 6050 accounts per server.... Where are all these people. Seems kinda odd that most independant studies place server populations between 400 - 800 on low pop servers, 800 - 1300 people on average servers, and 1500 - 2000 on high population servers like The Fatman.
Well only a certain percentage are going to be on at any given time. Hmm Fatman still healthy? Wonder how many bloodfiners are still there.
I understand what your saying but you have to remember more then 50% of these server have less then 200 people on at any given time... There is just no way they are hitting 1.3 million subs unless they are counting accounts like mine that have been unsubbed for almost 2 months but still say active.
This game is nowhere near profitable atm,maybe years end,but not now.To think it is show's who's uninformed amirite?They may have about 120 mill back right now.People seem to think a $60 box sale = $60 to EA/Bio and it's lucky to be half that.Or should I say 1/10 to you Axe?
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
then my question to you would be is it worth the $200million? If you were the boss of EA and you knew then what is known now would you sign off on this game? It occurs to me that noone invests 200m just to peak at 1.7million subs and then watch it slowly drop. The risk/reward doesnt seem to be there. Other companies have cloned WoW for a lot less money.
This game is nowhere near profitable atm,maybe years end,but not now.To think it is show's who's uninformed amirite?They may have about 120 mill back right now.People seem to think a $60 box sale = $60 to EA/Bio and it's lucky to be half that.Or should I say 1/10 to you Axe?
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
then my question to you would be is it worth the $200million? If you were the boss of EA and you knew then what is known now would you sign off on this game? It occurs to me that noone invests 200m just to peak at 1.7million subs and then watch it slowly drop. The risk/reward doesnt seem to be there. Other companies have cloned WoW for a lot less money.
Opportunity cost. Could have used that $200 million to make many single player games, which would likely have resulted in far more total profit in a short period. That original capital can then be reinvested in more single player games. I am sure there are many other ways the original investment could have been used to yield far more profit in a shorter time frame. This is what investors are concerned with and how they would rate an investment a good one, a bad one or a failure.
1.3 million may not sound bad, but I think the primary issue that most forget is that we are talking about EA here and that logic may not apply. 1.3 million subs may sound fantastic for players, but for EA it may be an utter disapointment, especially if they invested heavily into this game with the expectations that it would become a heavy hitter in the MMO industry. I know someone stated that it could survive off of 500k subs, but if EA expected this game to be a WoW killer then I doubt they are happy right now.
No matter how well TOR fairs, if it does not meet EA's expectations then there is trouble for TOR.
Again, 1.3 million subs is not bad, but we are talking about EA here, not actual MMO players.
This game is nowhere near profitable atm,maybe years end,but not now.To think it is show's who's uninformed amirite?They may have about 120 mill back right now.People seem to think a $60 box sale = $60 to EA/Bio and it's lucky to be half that.Or should I say 1/10 to you Axe?
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
This is a breakdown of where the money goes for a $60 game:
Developer - $15
Publisher - $20
Licensing - $10
Retailer - $12
Manufacturing and Distribution - $3
Digital sales will differ somewhat.
Somehow, I think your number crunching and 'experience' of game production might be... lacking foundation.
'Post-launch run rate' for this game, which was released before it was ready and missing major features, is going to be high. They must still be paying a large team of developers just to get the game stable and out of pseudo beta status.
I'd be suprised if they make a profit by this time next year!
Didn't EA said that they needed 1m subs for a year to break even?
"Esport with tournaments is for hardcore pvp'rs that want to be competitive. Openworld PVP with ganking and griefing is for casuals that just wants their pvp mixed with pve from time to time." otacu
This game is nowhere near profitable atm,maybe years end,but not now.To think it is show's who's uninformed amirite?They may have about 120 mill back right now.People seem to think a $60 box sale = $60 to EA/Bio and it's lucky to be half that.Or should I say 1/10 to you Axe?
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
This is a breakdown of where the money goes for a $60 game:
Developer - $15
Publisher - $20
Licensing - $10
Retailer - $12
Manufacturing and Distribution - $3
Digital sales will differ somewhat.
Somehow, I think your number crunching and 'experience' of game production might be... lacking foundation.
'Post-launch run rate' for this game, which was released before it was ready and missing major features, is going to be high. They must still be paying a large team of developers just to get the game stable and out of pseudo beta status.
I'd be suprised if they make a profit by this time next year!
Doesn't Lucas Arts get some of that money too? Or is that covered in the licensing expense?
I think it's safe to say that the game is experiencing negative growth (more people leaving than joining).
This is not really surprising given that this is what happens in most subscription-based MMOs after their launch. WoW Classic (and TBC I guess) was the only MMO different in this regard - they continued to grow after release.
From this point on, I doubt SWTOR's population will grow. It's very unlikely that it will, given how population works out in MMOs.
"Never argue with a fool; onlookers may not be able to tell the difference."
1.3 million paying customers, making it easily the second largest western MMO, is... Dying?
It's a question of return on investment. If you cut through the cheering/jeering from the stands, there is a real serious question here about the entire future of our hobby.
If the game is sufficiently profitable, it will become the template for the entire next generation of clones (from the tiny collection of companies able to afford to pay the cost). If the game fails to turn a profit, it will be unlikely we see another fully voice-acted story-driven MMO attempted any time soon.
Given the astronomical sums whispered about how much was spent to construct the game, it is entirely possible for it to have one of the highest subscription rates ever and still be the death of its infant subgenre. That said, there are so many contradictory numbers and so much spin flying around that I'm finding it difficult to get a feel on exactly what's going on. I guess only time will tell how investors and publishers are reading these reports.
EA spent around 100 million to developed SWTOR and they got all that money back from their box sales.
Got a source that says they spent only 25% more than it took to make vanilla WoW, especially considering Blizzard didn't have to pay a third party for their IP, and were able to do a substantial amount of their marketing through battle.net?
Comments
It seemd you were :P. But cool, it's all good then
.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
EA is buying up MMo indie dev companies.. when did this start?
Not too long ago people claimed Swtor will go f2p by this time.
Actually it is worse than that considering all the accounts they reactivated for their free month.
Eventually those companies will get published, just like Bioware did. Everything will be great until a company like EA comes along, buy them, fired half the staff, and milks their franchises.
Well only a certain percentage are going to be on at any given time. Hmm Fatman still healthy? Wonder how many bloodfiners are still there.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I think you needed an active account to get the free month.
They had an opt in reactivation for like 7 days as well, question is how many actually did that... No one here knows.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Simple math regarding box sales and modeling a harsh decline (losing 30% subs per month) showed $200mm revenue in like 4 months after launch. Literally the only unknowns were retail store profit margins (which are said to be quite small, and certainly aren't 50% MSR) and ongoing post-launch run rate.
The link posted in this very thread is EA itself pointing out how profitable the game is with 1.3mm players.
Feel free to keep your arbitrary, hastily-drawn opinion with no basis in facts. Meanwhile I'll crunch numbers with experience having actually produced games and worked closely with the product managers running them -- and discover the game is profitable independantly even before the EA link confirmed it ("profitable at 500k subscribers" is just about where my uber-conservative numbers crunch put the game 4-5 months out...at which point it became profitable.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not. But here is some info on EA aquisitions. You can decide for yourself whether some of these companies are indie.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Electronic_Arts
Who needs a publisher when you can just sell the mmo on steam,
Were talking about MMos.
Oh, right. You were. The other guy wasn't. He was talking about them buying up indie game developers.
Yeah, that's nice and all, but I'm using the numbers EA provided. Personally, I doubt their validity and believe there was some clever reporting used to define "active accounts". My doubt of the validity of their numbers doesn't change that using their numbers and holding the current rate of decline (as a percentage) constant, the game will drop under 500k subs sometime at the beginning of next year. What conclusion you want to draw from that is completely up to you.
I understand what your saying but you have to remember more then 50% of these server have less then 200 people on at any given time... There is just no way they are hitting 1.3 million subs unless they are counting accounts like mine that have been unsubbed for almost 2 months but still say active.
then my question to you would be is it worth the $200million? If you were the boss of EA and you knew then what is known now would you sign off on this game? It occurs to me that noone invests 200m just to peak at 1.7million subs and then watch it slowly drop. The risk/reward doesnt seem to be there. Other companies have cloned WoW for a lot less money.
Opportunity cost. Could have used that $200 million to make many single player games, which would likely have resulted in far more total profit in a short period. That original capital can then be reinvested in more single player games. I am sure there are many other ways the original investment could have been used to yield far more profit in a shorter time frame. This is what investors are concerned with and how they would rate an investment a good one, a bad one or a failure.
1.3 million may not sound bad, but I think the primary issue that most forget is that we are talking about EA here and that logic may not apply. 1.3 million subs may sound fantastic for players, but for EA it may be an utter disapointment, especially if they invested heavily into this game with the expectations that it would become a heavy hitter in the MMO industry. I know someone stated that it could survive off of 500k subs, but if EA expected this game to be a WoW killer then I doubt they are happy right now.
No matter how well TOR fairs, if it does not meet EA's expectations then there is trouble for TOR.
Again, 1.3 million subs is not bad, but we are talking about EA here, not actual MMO players.
This is a breakdown of where the money goes for a $60 game:
Developer - $15
Publisher - $20
Licensing - $10
Retailer - $12
Manufacturing and Distribution - $3
Digital sales will differ somewhat.
Somehow, I think your number crunching and 'experience' of game production might be... lacking foundation.
'Post-launch run rate' for this game, which was released before it was ready and missing major features, is going to be high. They must still be paying a large team of developers just to get the game stable and out of pseudo beta status.
I'd be suprised if they make a profit by this time next year!
Didn't EA said that they needed 1m subs for a year to break even?
"Esport with tournaments is for hardcore pvp'rs that want to be competitive. Openworld PVP with ganking and griefing is for casuals that just wants their pvp mixed with pve from time to time."
otacu
Doesn't Lucas Arts get some of that money too? Or is that covered in the licensing expense?
I think it's safe to say that the game is experiencing negative growth (more people leaving than joining).
This is not really surprising given that this is what happens in most subscription-based MMOs after their launch. WoW Classic (and TBC I guess) was the only MMO different in this regard - they continued to grow after release.
From this point on, I doubt SWTOR's population will grow. It's very unlikely that it will, given how population works out in MMOs.
"Never argue with a fool; onlookers may not be able to tell the difference."
I need to take this advice more.
Got a source that says they spent only 25% more than it took to make vanilla WoW, especially considering Blizzard didn't have to pay a third party for their IP, and were able to do a substantial amount of their marketing through battle.net?
It was actually 500k subs over 12 months to break even.
They also said 1 million over 12 months would be a good profit but nothing to write home about, the investors would not be happy!
at least 1/2-1/3 came back to play the free month and left so u are looking at about 600k-800k or less.