On Wednesday, MMORPG.com Managing Editor Jon Wood spoke with EA Mythic VP and General Manager Mark Jacobs about four different announcements from the studio. Part One announces a name change for the company from EA mythic back to Mythic Entertainment. Tomorrow's part two will reveal three more announcements concerning Warhammer Online.

Mythic Entertainment. It’s a name that we haven’t really heard much of since June 20th, 2006 when the company known best for their Realm vs. Realm style MMORPG Dark Age of Comelot and their upcoming MMORPG Warhammer Online announced that it had been acquired by publishing giant Electronic Arts (EA). After the announcement the company went through a name change and a re-branding, including a new logo, that saw the studio re-named “EA Mythic”.

Today, MMORPG.com learned that EA Mythic will be going through another transition as the company reclaims the Mythic Entertainment name.

Read the whole interview here.

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

Originally posted by Jquik

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

You betcha... Mythic has embargoed the remainder of the interview because it is time sensitive I bet  and I imagine beta is the reason :)

Originally posted by Jquik

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

I don't want to ruin the surprise, but I also don't want you to get your hopes up. No, it has nothing to do with beta, or any other date for that matter.

Originally posted by Stradden

Originally posted by Jquik

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

 

I don't want to ruin the surprise, but I also don't want you to get your hopes up. No, it has nothing to do with beta, or any other date for that matter.

You hear that sound? That's the sound of hopes being dashed against the rocks...

Originally posted by Stradden

Originally posted by Jquik

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

 

I don't want to ruin the surprise, but I also don't want you to get your hopes up. No, it has nothing to do with beta, or any other date for that matter.

Boo :)

Thanks Jon.  Disappointing as it is, I am happy to have that clarification rather than 523452 posts about the Beta announcement coming tomorrow.  Heh.

Originally posted by Stradden

Originally posted by Jquik

Enormous Announcement = Beta date? :) :)

 

I don't want to ruin the surprise, but I also don't want you to get your hopes up. No, it has nothing to do with beta, or any other date for that matter.

ITS A CONSPIRACY, hes definately a mythic employee

let me guess...

announcement  1 :With a subcription for  warhammer online, you get to play Dark Age of Camelot for free.

announcement  2 : Sanya is coming back! woot (Ihope)

announcement  3 :no idea

Aww, no news on Dark Age of Camelot. At least they're going back to good old MYTHIC! No EA bs.

Announcement = WAR pushed back to Q1 2009?

2. CE sold out

3. open beta access to all pre-orders CE and not CE. 

just my guess

No matter what they do they can not take the EA away.

Same EA doing business as usual with hostile takeovers of other companies and ruining them.

Take 2 anyone?

If they can really leave Mythic alone then thats great, just dont see that happening down the road.

The announcement...

The reason that EAMythic was changed back to Mythic is that EA has decided Mythic and WAR = epic fail.  It was determined that it would be the best course of action to remove the EA from Mythic now.. rather than after the sale.

After the announcement Mark Jacobs will state that Mythic is being resold the rights to their properties for "a very good price".

Mark Jacobs will also announce that he is hiring Brad McQuaid to be the VP of operations at Mythic.  It has been said that Mark believes Brad is the only other person alive who can spin a turd as well as he can.

Within 3 months it will be announced that they have signed with SOE to co-publish WAR...   

Then pigs will fly.

At least 50% of this is true.. but even I am not sure which 50%.

(yes I was bored).

Originally posted by tikovoo

No matter what they do they can not take the EA away.

Same EA doing business as usual with hostile takeovers of other companies and ruining them.

Ok my one serious reply for this thread.

There was NO hostile take over of Mythic by EA.

Mark Jacobs claimed it was in Mythics best interest to sell to EA.

When you consider how much the population of DAoC had already dropped...

That they had canceled the development for the game they were making (the futuristic rome thing.. Emperator or whatever) and that they had obviously paid out money for the rights to WAR...

Most likely they needed a large cash injection... thus they sold.

As to EA ruining companies it aquires... totally agree.

No beta date that sucks!

As far as the other surprises that are coming they better be good or it will be disappointing. I have been playing Warhammer for many years and I can not wait to finnally play this as an MMO. Please let the news be good and not that the date has been pushed baack again.

Though I can't give a significant reason why, this announcement seems important to me.  Just the removal of EA as a precursor to Mythic feels like a burden has been lifted.  I honestly can't even explain myself.  I just remember reading it and feeling this imaginary elephant being lifted off my shoulders.  How weird is that.

Originally posted by tikovoo

No matter what they do they can not take the EA away.

Same EA doing business as usual with hostile takeovers of other companies and ruining them.

Take 2 anyone?

If they can really leave Mythic alone then thats great, just dont see that happening down the road.

EA used to acquire companies and mess them up by restructering and taking to much control away from them. Tack on the fact that they would pump out games requardless of how good they actually were.

Now they have a new CEO that is trying to change that image. He is placing more importance on the quality of games. Mythic is a big example of this. Not only are they allowed to make the game they want, they are allowed to take the time they need to make it, and now they are being allowed to keep the Mythic name seperate from EA.

As for Take 2. They have yet to be acquired let alone ruined. It is fairly obvious why EA would want them and that is just pure business there.

Now take a look at C&C 3 Red Alert. They are getting a bunch of the orginal C&C Red Alert devs on the project. I haven't heard anything bad coming from Bioware after they got acquired either.

I think they have learned their lesson about public opinion and game development teams. Honestly though I would trust EA and SOE, SWG was a tragedy but what they did with EQ2(after launch) and Vangaurd shows they can make forward progress, to make another MMO that I would try. As long as they show signs of trying to change in the right direction. Blizzard hasn't really shown me that and they still rely on old IP's to make games.

Originally posted by SagaBoy

Though I can't give a significant reason why, this announcement seems important to me.  Just the removal of EA as a precursor to Mythic feels like a burden has been lifted.  I honestly can't even explain myself.  I just remember reading it and feeling this imaginary elephant being lifted off my shoulders.  How weird is that.

 Did you even read the interview?

"Jacobs also points out that they are still the same company and are still a part of EA"

EA isn't going anywhere, this is just a namechange.

I doubt the upcoming will be very important. If it was, they wouldn't announce it exclusively on this site.

That's the smartest thing they did since they brought onboard EA (EA + MMORPG = Layoffs)

They'll still be with EA but at least they are getting rid of the name.