Originally posted by SnarlingWolf

They should fire everyone that had any part in designing WAR, and fire Paul Barnett so they can rehire him just to fire him again. Tired of that guy always saying it's the players who are dumb and WAR is great, all while the numbers drop nonstop.

As much as you may not like to hear that the players are broken, Paul is right.

The playerbase is the reason I quit WAR, not the game mechanics.

"THE INDRUSTRY IS DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED - THE EVIL COMPANIES CONTROL EVERYTHING GAMES WILL DIE"

Please...

MJ bascally promised us a sucess with WAR - it's become more than an below avg clone of WoW, the 'RVR' doesn't exsist it's more like PVE with players avoiding any form of active PVP and even in the EU servers it's basically one faction only servers and LotD hasn't given us any reason to beleave 'WAR is everywhere' it's more like 'war is now in one zone with new pve loot'. All MJ did was piss off both DAoC fans and many Warhammer fans. WAR is a mess but it could be saved if it had a new set of eyes on it, It's a $10million blunder.

MJ wasn't helping matters with LotD when it was clear he didn't see that the playerbase wasn't playing 'his way' and hasn't actally changed what was actally the issue forcing players not to just 'ZERG TO WIN' - Zone locking was just a bad idea and the domination system could and can be moded to support a more 'open world' style of gameplay

We've all talked about this and we the players knew what was wrong with the game, but after a year all MJ's 'vision' did was add to the problems and frustration of the game by allowing the playerbase to 'farm' the game. Like I said it's still NOT a 'RVR' game it's more like a very large WoW battleground where players are only interested in the item at the end not the actal fight.

Now take Bioware given their HUGE selection of sucessful games (even tho the gameplay content can be questioned at games) only Jade Empire and Sonic was a flop and they dropped from NWN's development when Atari went made with NWN2.

This is a very smart team here they know how to work with all this and this LISTEN to the community and FOLLOW AND WATCH what we gamers play and what we think currently (the change of style between NWN and ME proves that kinda). Bioware have deleaved exactaly what they've said so far (bar Jade Empire and Sonic).

All EA have done is changed the driving force behind Mythic to Bioware which just means changing team heads - thats all thats happened here - From the looks of things EA are trying to save WAR and DAoC by putting some new blood into the works.

To be blunt if this was 'evil EA' they would have just cut their losses and binned Mythic and the games altogether. Giving Bioware WAR is basically giving them the WHOLE IP - Yup Bioware (with the Mythic dev team) now does WARHAMMER.

Bioware, Mythic, Starwars and Warhammer - HOW CAN THIS BEEN SEEN AS BAD! eh? :) I'm kinda hopingthe new Bioware head of Mythic can walk into WAR at least 'reboot' the game to be just as good as their other products with the next big content update.

Edit: Added more behind the reasoning why many are pissed at MJ

Edit#2: Formatted so less 'wall of text'

Originally posted by Ramonski7

Originally posted by Goronian

Top quality? Seriously? Mass Effect had one of the most unfulfilling and bland RPG systems I've ever seen. The combat was hectic and uncontrollable and even the basic thing, like the assortment of weapons was off. The only things, that kept me going were the competent plot, interesting characters and dialogue, and even THIS was botched in the ending.

KOTOR wasn't much better, honestly. You know WHY people loved those games? Because there is nothing on the market like it, right now. The traditional western RPG genre is DEAD and semi-decent products are lauded like the second coming of the bloody Christ.

Like it, or not, Bioware lost their edge after BGII. SERIOUSLY lost their edge.

 

The little green part there you mentioned means you enjoyed SOMETHING as you finished it. I don't know too many people that play a clunky, crapfest of a game to the end just to read the story. I got a newflash for you Sherlock....next time pick up the book:  Mass Effect: Revelation and save your fingers the workout.

See, I live in Russia and I don't like piracy. We have no game rentals and there aren't enough people with 360's to exchange with. So when I pay for the game, I'm stuck with it and might as well beat it. The fact, that I liked the plot doesn't really save it.

Originally posted by Kremlik

"THE INDRUSTRY IS DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED - THE EVIL COMPANIES CONTROL EVERYTHING GAMES WILL DIE"

Please...

MJ bascally promised us a sucess with WAR - it's become more than an below avg clone of WoW, the 'RVR' doesn't exsist it's more like PVE with players avoiding any form of active PVP and even in the EU servers it's basically one faction only servers and LotD hasn't given us any reason to beleave 'WAR is everywhere' it's more like 'war is now in one zone with new pve loot'. All MJ did was piss off both DAoC fans and many Warhammer fans. WAR is a mess but it could be saved if it had a new set of eyes on it. It's a $10million blunder. MJ wasn't helping matters with LotD when it was clear he didn't see that the playerbase wasn't playing 'his way' and hasn't actally changed what was actally the issue forcing players not to just 'ZERG TO WIN' - Zone locking was just a bad idea and the domination system could and can be moded to support a more 'open world' style of gameplay - We've all talked about this and we the players knew what was wrong with the game, but after a year all MJ's 'vision' did was add to the problems and frustration of the game by allowing the playerbase to 'farm' the game. Like I said it's still NOT a 'RVR' game it's more like a very large WoW battleground where players are only interested in the item at the end not the actal fight.

Now take Bioware given their HUGE selection of sucessful games (even tho the gameplay content can be questioned at games) only Jade Empire and Sonic was a flop and they dropped from NWN's development when Atari went made with NWN2, this is a very smart team here they know how to work with all this and this LISTEN to the community and FOLLOW AND WATCH what we gamers play and what we think currently (the change of style between NWN and ME proves that kinda). Bioware have deleaved exactaly what they've said so far (bar Jade Empire and Sonic).

All EA have done is changed the driving force behind Mythic to Bioware which just means changing team heads - thats all thats happened here - From the looks of things EA are trying to save WAR and DAoC by putting some new blood into the works. To be blunt if this was 'evil EA' they would have just cut their losses and binned Mythic and the games altogether. Giving Bioware WAR is basically giving them the WHOLE IP - Yup Bioware (with the Mythic dev team) now does WARHAMMER.

Bioware, Mythic, Starwars and Warhammer - HOW CAN THIS BEEN SEEN AS BAD! eh? :)

 

Edit: Added more behind the reasoning why many are pissed at MJ

The part about WAR is very true and you explained exactly how I feel about WAR.

It can be a fun game at times, but in the end it feels like a big BG, too much handholding, lockouts, point systems ...as opposed to DAoC during the SI era, where the RvR was free and open ended.

Originally posted by CyberWiz

Originally posted by Kremlik

"THE INDRUSTRY IS DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED - THE EVIL COMPANIES CONTROL EVERYTHING GAMES WILL DIE"

Please...

MJ bascally promised us a sucess with WAR - it's become more than an below avg clone of WoW, the 'RVR' doesn't exsist it's more like PVE with players avoiding any form of active PVP and even in the EU servers it's basically one faction only servers and LotD hasn't given us any reason to beleave 'WAR is everywhere' it's more like 'war is now in one zone with new pve loot'. All MJ did was piss off both DAoC fans and many Warhammer fans. WAR is a mess but it could be saved if it had a new set of eyes on it. It's a $10million blunder. MJ wasn't helping matters with LotD when it was clear he didn't see that the playerbase wasn't playing 'his way' and hasn't actally changed what was actally the issue forcing players not to just 'ZERG TO WIN' - Zone locking was just a bad idea and the domination system could and can be moded to support a more 'open world' style of gameplay - We've all talked about this and we the players knew what was wrong with the game, but after a year all MJ's 'vision' did was add to the problems and frustration of the game by allowing the playerbase to 'farm' the game. Like I said it's still NOT a 'RVR' game it's more like a very large WoW battleground where players are only interested in the item at the end not the actal fight.

Now take Bioware given their HUGE selection of sucessful games (even tho the gameplay content can be questioned at games) only Jade Empire and Sonic was a flop and they dropped from NWN's development when Atari went made with NWN2, this is a very smart team here they know how to work with all this and this LISTEN to the community and FOLLOW AND WATCH what we gamers play and what we think currently (the change of style between NWN and ME proves that kinda). Bioware have deleaved exactaly what they've said so far (bar Jade Empire and Sonic).

All EA have done is changed the driving force behind Mythic to Bioware which just means changing team heads - thats all thats happened here - From the looks of things EA are trying to save WAR and DAoC by putting some new blood into the works. To be blunt if this was 'evil EA' they would have just cut their losses and binned Mythic and the games altogether. Giving Bioware WAR is basically giving them the WHOLE IP - Yup Bioware (with the Mythic dev team) now does WARHAMMER.

Bioware, Mythic, Starwars and Warhammer - HOW CAN THIS BEEN SEEN AS BAD! eh? :)

 

Edit: Added more behind the reasoning why many are pissed at MJ

 

The part about WAR is very true and you explained exactly how I feel about WAR.

It can be a fun game at times, but in the end it feels like a big BG, too much handholding, lockouts, point systems ...as opposed to DAoC during the SI era, where the RvR was free and open ended.

Also agree. Loved DAoC, one of the best MMORPGs ever, despite nerf bats, other problems, and it's death by TOA.

WAR was a big disappointment. I was hoping for even more epic RvR AND great PvE, and instead I got a solo quest game with instanced scenarios. WTF?1!!

they really want to beat Wow :)

Also agree. Loved DAoC, one of the best MMORPGs ever, despite nerf bats, other problems, and it's death by TOA.

WAR was a big disappointment. I was hoping for even more epic RvR AND great PvE, and instead I got a solo quest game with instanced scenarios. WTF?1!!

This.

www.massively.com/category/warhammer-online

Clarification for those that still think they are merging into a single game studio.

Although I am an avid fan of the Warhammer title and everything that goes with it, I will admit they are numerous shortcomings. I have no idea with they had 100 game servers in the first place but it may be a better idea to shut some more down to create a solid playerbase and make it easier to patch. But don't count it out completely. Mythic is still making improvements and as long as the profit doesn't hit the red, I imagine EA won't pull the plug yet.

I would like to see BioWare and Mythic(being under new management) tema up to release a new game. It may resemble a two-headed, three-eyed abomination but it'll at least mean they're not trying to undermine each other.

Originally posted by Dynamo112

Also agree. Loved DAoC, one of the best MMORPGs ever, despite nerf bats, other problems, and it's death by TOA.

WAR was a big disappointment. I was hoping for even more epic RvR AND great PvE, and instead I got a solo quest game with instanced scenarios. WTF?1!!

 

This.

Sums up 90% of the playerbase feelings.  Expecting a polished great RvR PvP game much as they did with DAoC... got instanced PQs and broken sieges and abilites galore.  I still play and loved this news it gives me some hope but I'm also in Aion beta and looking at other PvP oreinted games.  War had the potential for something great, it's slowly sinking it that it may never become that and this news may have come to late.

Only reason WAR fell flat on its head because there was no WAR there, they shouldn't of had so many instance battle zones also the world map should of been open no zone hopping to each tier shat, and for rvr lakes they whole map should of been rvr after tier1 at least.

The thing i hated worst about game is having to take a dam stupid dwarven chopper to everywere i wanted to go plus just get on fly few seconds zone and land woopie do i would of liked to see a few amazing scenes like disney world of they gonna strap me to kiddie ride.

Also having insane looking weapons and armor sells the game, hell i some times want to resub wow just watch my self kill stuff in my crazy lookin armor with a weapon that has a death glow lol.

EA has serious troubles in its MMORPG department so they regroup and put all of their eggs into one basket: the KOTOR project.

-----> For those thinking EA will re-invest money in War think twice/

All their efforts are now fixed to making KOTOR the real Wow contendor. Everything else will be put aside.

-----------

And ... as always : the trends shown by Xfire were very clear:

14K Xfire players at launch, 5.5K at Xmas, 3.5K players at the end of March, 2.2K today.

If 14K was equal to 800 K 'accounts' at launch, the present day 2.2K is ... 125 K 'accounts' playing.

Which of course is confirmed by the 15 US War servers of which only 5 are med/med filled. The rest is on low. That's Around 75K players for US.

Just like the head of FunCom rolled after seeing the Xfire stats of AoC after 4 months, now the head of Mark Jacobs rolled because the number of players went simply down.

And all the trends were shown MONTHS in advance by xfire, you know that "meaningless" sample of 300K PC players 24/24 hours on line.

At launch EA said WAR needed at least 250/350 K subs to give profit.

I guess 125K players today means ... it is no longer profitable in its working infrastructure.

RIP War.

Next.

Originally posted by Zorndorf

EA has serious troubles in its MMORPG department so they regroup and put all of their eggs into one basket: the KOTOR project.

-----> For those thinking EA will re-invest money in War think twice/

All their efforts are now fixed to making KOTOR the real Wow contendor. Everything else will be put aside.

-----------

I don't think there will be a WoW contender, and many agree. WoW released a solid game, and then polished it to perfection at just the right moment. They made a casual Massive Multi player game at a time when there was enough exposure to the MMORPG genre, and enough people had internet connections to make a huge hit. PLUS they were going with an alreadyh popular IP in the video game industry.

The consensus seems to be that the market will slowly deversify. People will continue to find new games they like to play, but everyone won't flock to the same game at the same tiime like they did with WoW. That was a unique situation that won't be repeated.

So there may never be a WoW contender. What you shoot for is not competing with WoW, but simply a profitable game, based on how much you invested versus how much you bring in with subscriptions.

I do think Kotor is a good possiblity for being very successful, even if it's NOT  a WoW contender.

Originally posted by Kyleran

Originally posted by Ikonic

I think its a great move by EA. Mark Jacobs has lost his vision that made DAoC a success. Hopefully with new management team, they can direct EA Mythic to make RvR fun again.

 

This.  About time they kicked him to the curb after the debacle that is WAR.

ok, I admit, i'm biased and hate the game, while 300K people disagree with me.  Where's my DAOC2?

 

This TBH

For those bashing EA on this one it's not their fault that Mythic screwed the pooch.  Mythic is a great company and I will join any bandwagonner on the planet and say that DAOC was/is one of the BEST MMO's of all time.  However, WAR was a complete letdown and Marc Jacobs was driving the ship on that, not EA.  By the time EA got involved with Mythic WAR was pretty much feature complete and just needed 'polishing' and 'marketting' according to the devs.  In fact there was no reason for Mythic to sell out to EA other than greed really.  So you can't blame EA for WAR's issues... it's all on Mythic.

I'm on the fence as to whether I like the idea of EA forcing a merger of Mythic and BioWare though... I'm almost afraid that the sub-par talent that seems to have infested Mythic on their development of WAR will harm the quality of BioWare's work.  Praying to god none of those guys get involved with SW:TOR because I am really hoping for a solid and fun Star Wars MMO out of BioWare.

 =======================

To those saying WAR isn't profitable... they needed 300-350,000 subscribers to BUY the game for it to cut a profit.  It has already surpassed 1 million box sales.  That's $50+ million USD.  (and frankly I would not be surprised if they've actually sold about 2million boxes at this point which would put them at or close to $100 million USD just from box sales.) The game only cost something around $60 million to develop IIRC.  Now tack on the approximately 400,000 that stayed subbed to the game for 6 months after it's release and you're talking 400,000x15x6= $36,000,000 USD in income from the game in it's first six months since release.  At this point the game has already paid for itself and cut a profit on top of it.  

Going forward they probably only need about 40-50,000 subscribers for the game to remain in the black.  That's the average for a game that's in 'maintenance' mode (what you call it once it's paid for it's initial development and is just cutting a slow steady profit).  As long as it has more subs than 50,000 or so you'll continue to see them able to put out content updates and expansions because it'll be making enough of a profit to justify it.  As of right now I'd guess they're probably around 150,000-200,000 subscribers which still lands them as a very profitable MMO... are they what they SHOULD be?  No, because Mythic screwed the pooch.  But EA won't pull the rug out from under the game as long as it's cutting a profit.

Remember:  UO i s STILL out there kicking around and only has right around 100,000 subscribers and EA just did a major re-investment in it not too long ago with the complete revamp of it's graphics engine.     As long as WAR has over about 50k subs I suspect EA will keep it around and have a team maintaining it, doing content updates, fixing bugs, etc.  Same goes for DAOC, which is also still running strong, if fading.

If you think a game the size of WAR can stay aflood with 50 K subs, you must underestimate the cost of maintaining the services.

50K subs hardly mean *$ 750.000 monthly income of which ALL costs must be deducted. Tech personal (HUGE !), maintenance, repairs, publicity, administration, huge investement in leasing of lines,...

So unless you want 5 men behind a desk (in a 24Hr maintenance room)  watching for the occasional red button to press and restart a server....

Forget it. as soon as a project the size of War hits the 100K subs range it is very much on life support.

Hardly ANY programmers will still intervene.

It is ALL about costs reduction in these times of economic crisis.

And an industry watcher said it in Sep 2008 at launch: War needed 250 K subs AFTER 6 months to stay profitable in the "current planning".

Well guess what: they changed the plans : so as of now War is on life support in a new organisation.

Of course EA will try to squeze every penny out of it as long as it is possible, but "updates" ? Forget it: they put it on life support with the minimal of services.

Any mmorpg which is on " the minimal of services" is just hanging in there until someone puts out the lights.

This IS EA you know. They have 98% other markets.

Taram - your math is laughably bad. Like ALL forum posters you think a game thats $50 and sells a million copies automatically means $50 million in profit to the publisher.
It doesnt.
A publisher will only see about 25% of the box sale. So, of the million copies Warhammer Online sold EA only got about $13 million back.
Its hard to determine the profit gained by subscriptions because of the free month after game purchase. But of course, they would comprise the bulk of the money EA has gained back from Warhammer Online.

Another thing you are forgetting are the ongoing development and upkeep costs. Mythic was given a very large development team by EA and didnt have to make any cuts for 6 months after launch. Paying for a bunch of empty servers wasnt cheap either.

So, considering ongoing overhead costs its doubtful Warhammer Online is "in the black". Combine that with the downward trend in subscribers and it is not surprising that EA is restructering Mythic after 9 months of release.

Originally posted by Taram

To those saying WAR isn't profitable... they needed 300-350,000 subscribers to BUY the game for it to cut a profit.  It has already surpassed 1 million box sales.  That's $50+ million USD.  (and frankly I would not be surprised if they've actually sold about 2million boxes at this point which would put them at or close to $100 million USD just from box sales.) The game only cost something around $60 million to develop IIRC.  Now tack on the approximately 400,000 that stayed subbed to the game for 6 months after it's release and you're talking 400,000x15x6= $36,000,000 USD in income from the game in it's first six months since release.  At this point the game has already paid for itself and cut a profit on top of it.  

Going forward they probably only need about 40-50,000 subscribers for the game to remain in the black.  That's the average for a game that's in 'maintenance' mode (what you call it once it's paid for it's initial development and is just cutting a slow steady profit).  As long as it has more subs than 50,000 or so you'll continue to see them able to put out content updates and expansions because it'll be making enough of a profit to justify it.  As of right now I'd guess they're probably around 150,000-200,000 subscribers which still lands them as a very profitable MMO... are they what they SHOULD be?  No, because Mythic screwed the pooch.  But EA won't pull the rug out from under the game as long as it's cutting a profit.

 

You didn't put up any figures for overhead, like advertising, bandwidth, customer service, billing, etc.

I know you're using rough numbers and that's fine, but without the overhead figures we dont know if it's in the black or in the red.

For example, they could have spent 50 bucks on Advertising, or 50 million.

Originally posted by Ahiles

Originally posted by cerebrix

Originally posted by GreenChaos

Originally posted by BioNut

Also EA is not the evil company it used to be. They are actually the good guys now. You should hate Activision and Ubisoft instead. Don't believe me? Maybe you should visit Neogaf and check it out. There are much better things than MMOs.

 

I do hate Ubisoft, but why should I hate Activision Blizzard?

 

 

because of how they treat their partners.

 

lets look at id software for example.  id's games BUILT activision.  i mean this is the company that invented the first person shooter for gods sakes.  their titles have always been great.  but because they were an external partner they were always treated like a second class citizen.

hence when the blizzard buyout happened, id took the opportunity to walk away.

 

on an interesting note, id merged with bethesda today.

 

Lol ID games built activision LOL.  It was a 2 way partnership without Activision ID would be nothing probably still trying to get their games out.   Activison were big players in the games and media industry long before anyone even thought of the game studio ID.

laugh all you want but you have no idea what you are talking about.

activision didnt get involved with id until quake 2.  id was with apogee and then gt interactive and midway after that.

and furthermore, from 86-91 there wasnt even an activision, they had been bought in a summary judgement after going out of business and didnt reemerge from restructuring until 92.  activision was completely starting from scratch at the time, essentially a new company with an old name.  kind of like the new circuit city has nothing to do with the old circuit city.

before guitar hero, id made them more than any other franchise they  ever had in their stable.  including pitfall (which doesnt really even count when you consider, that activision was a different company).

had those jokers handled things better, youd now see blizzard and id under the same roof.  i guess you also forgot not only did id invent the first person shooter, but they also invented the 3d engine as well as the hardware accelerated 3d engine.

but youre right, none of that shit is really THAT important is it? 

/facepalm

I still don't get why people think this is a merger.

All that happened was they cut out management they didn't think needed to be there, and promoted two individuals to manage a sector.

Group Manager
Group Design Leader

Then each team under the group, Bioware and Mythic, report to these two.

The group Manager still controls Bioware because they are currently working on SWTOR. Until the project is complete they will not find a General Manager for Bioware. It could generate bad press and leave people doubting the development of SWTOR, potentially hurting sales.

It's also the reason why Mark Jacobs was let go... making him lead could potentially generate bad press for SWTOR and hurt sales.

Ray and Greg will continue to manage Bioware until SWTOR is out and stable, then they will find someone to be general manager of Bioware.

It's not that Bioware now manages Mythic... but that Ray and Greg are in the process of leaving Bioware.

It's business.

Originally posted by Locklain

With Mark Jacobs getting the boot I am interested to see what will become of Warhammer.  Perhaps it could be the next MMO joining the F2P item mall payment plan.

Bite your tongue!  I don't even play WAR anymore and I still don't want to see it added to that shitty FAD of Asian-style payment schemes. GROSS.