Originally posted by timtrack

This thread, and all alike it, just encouraged me to go activate my subscription. Tonight i'm playing SWTOR.

 

Cheers!

Sned me a postcard from Tattoine and call me when you get bored tomorrow!

Originally posted by Karteli

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by Caldrin

Well they sold millions of copies.. and i guess the polulation is pretty stable now..

What would make it a sccess or failure in your eyes ?

 

 

To knock WoW of it's throne....? Or dent their massive subscriber base...?

That was the intention of this game or at least what the devs/moneymen was hoping for.

Server mergers, free to play .... you tell me.

Could you show us where Bioware said or showed intention of knocking down WOW from number one spot? if that is how you judge success then every MMO is a failure.

Only two companies have openly said this. First Rift with its 'We are not in Azeroth anymore' video and Mike O brian of Anet who openly stated that he wants GW2 to beat WOW in sales and popularity.

Bioware never made sucha  claim.

 

Well I guess they never made any claims like that, if you close your eyes and pretend they didn't.  It's littered all over the web .. heres one:

ref:

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/306437/bioware-old-republic-will-more-than-compete-with-world-of-warcraft/

E3 2011: BioWare: Old Republic 'will more than compete' with World of Warcraft

June 9, 2011

[BioWare Co-founder Ray Muzyka being interviewed]

"We've been testing the game aggressively for quite a long time... and the focus for us as we head towards launch is on security, stability, saleability and retention," he said.

Muzyka continued: "There are ten of millions, tens of tens of millions of potential consumers for this game because Star Wars is the biggest IP in the world and that's a factor that can't be underestimated."

"I have tremendous respect for the folks at Blizzard, but I think we're building a product that will more than compete."

 

I hope this doesn't break your bubble.

No my bublle is stil intact. You can twist the meaning of what they are saying to show they want to beat WOW but unless a MMO company makes a clear indication like Anet did with GW2 i am not buying it.

Do be honest guys u are the failure here giving much attention to other people' ssuccess instead of looking to have a success on your own.

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by Karteli

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by Caldrin

Well they sold millions of copies.. and i guess the polulation is pretty stable now..

What would make it a sccess or failure in your eyes ?

 

 

To knock WoW of it's throne....? Or dent their massive subscriber base...?

That was the intention of this game or at least what the devs/moneymen was hoping for.

Server mergers, free to play .... you tell me.

Could you show us where Bioware said or showed intention of knocking down WOW from number one spot? if that is how you judge success then every MMO is a failure.

Only two companies have openly said this. First Rift with its 'We are not in Azeroth anymore' video and Mike O brian of Anet who openly stated that he wants GW2 to beat WOW in sales and popularity.

Bioware never made sucha  claim.

 

Well I guess they never made any claims like that, if you close your eyes and pretend they didn't.  It's littered all over the web .. heres one:

ref:

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/306437/bioware-old-republic-will-more-than-compete-with-world-of-warcraft/

E3 2011: BioWare: Old Republic 'will more than compete' with World of Warcraft

June 9, 2011

[BioWare Co-founder Ray Muzyka being interviewed]

"We've been testing the game aggressively for quite a long time... and the focus for us as we head towards launch is on security, stability, saleability and retention," he said.

Muzyka continued: "There are ten of millions, tens of tens of millions of potential consumers for this game because Star Wars is the biggest IP in the world and that's a factor that can't be underestimated."

"I have tremendous respect for the folks at Blizzard, but I think we're building a product that will more than compete."

 

I hope this doesn't break your bubble.

No my bublle is stil intact. You can twist the meaning of what they are saying to show they want to beat WOW but unless a MMO company makes a clear indication like Anet did with GW2 i am not buying it.

I'm a TOR fan and even I have to admit, that sounds pretty clear they had intentions of knocking WoW down.

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by Karteli

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by Caldrin

Well they sold millions of copies.. and i guess the polulation is pretty stable now..

What would make it a sccess or failure in your eyes ?

 

 

To knock WoW of it's throne....? Or dent their massive subscriber base...?

That was the intention of this game or at least what the devs/moneymen was hoping for.

Server mergers, free to play .... you tell me.

Could you show us where Bioware said or showed intention of knocking down WOW from number one spot? if that is how you judge success then every MMO is a failure.

Only two companies have openly said this. First Rift with its 'We are not in Azeroth anymore' video and Mike O brian of Anet who openly stated that he wants GW2 to beat WOW in sales and popularity.

Bioware never made sucha  claim.

 

Well I guess they never made any claims like that, if you close your eyes and pretend they didn't.  It's littered all over the web .. heres one:

ref:

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/306437/bioware-old-republic-will-more-than-compete-with-world-of-warcraft/

E3 2011: BioWare: Old Republic 'will more than compete' with World of Warcraft

June 9, 2011

[BioWare Co-founder Ray Muzyka being interviewed]

"We've been testing the game aggressively for quite a long time... and the focus for us as we head towards launch is on security, stability, saleability and retention," he said.

Muzyka continued: "There are ten of millions, tens of tens of millions of potential consumers for this game because Star Wars is the biggest IP in the world and that's a factor that can't be underestimated."

"I have tremendous respect for the folks at Blizzard, but I think we're building a product that will more than compete."

 

I hope this doesn't break your bubble.

No my bublle is stil intact. You can twist the meaning of what they are saying to show they want to beat WOW but unless a MMO company makes a clear indication like Anet did with GW2 i am not buying it.

OK, I'll bite - How is this twisting the meaning?

Ray says that this game has 100 million+ consumers (10's of 10's of millions) for this game and it will more than compete with WoW.  Where I come from, when I open a business and tell the #1 on the block that I'm going to more than compete with them because I have 10 times the people interested in my business, this means I'm going to blow them away, to the point where they won't even matter.

Keep your eyes closed if you wish, but, according to you, what was their true intentions for these statements? lol :-)

Here is another one: http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/02/10/bioware-wow-is-the-touchstone-for-the-old-republic/

"It [World of Warcraft] is a touchstone. It has established standards, it's established how you play an MMO. Every MMO that comes out, I play and look at it. And if they break any of the WoW rules, in my book that's pretty dumb," Zeschuk said.

They were thinking:

~ we have STAR WARS

~ we have 300mln from EA

~ EA will invest in advertisment another 200mln

~ This game is almost WoW clone and we have Voice Acting

~ WE ARE BIOWARE

~ WE CANNOT FAIL

Reality shows that whatever the money, whatever IP you will fail if you can't make good game. I would love to see what ArenaNet would do with 300 milions, 5 years, advertisment like that and Star Wars IP. They could kick WoW ass so hard that no one would ever look at pandas. 

Originally posted by dariuszp

They were thinking:

~ we have STAR WARS

~ we have 300mln from EA

~ EA will invest in advertisment another 200mln

~ This game is almost WoW clone and we have Voice Acting

~ WE ARE BIOWARE

~ WE CANNOT FAIL

Reality shows that whatever the money, whatever IP you will fail if you can't make good game. I would love to see what ArenaNet would do with 300 milions, 5 years, advertisment like that and Star Wars IP. They could kick WoW ass so hard that no one would ever look at pandas. 

So you think....TOR was a critical darling just like GW2 is, so don't go getting yourself all excited there.

Sooo Ea and Bioware's goal was to make the most expensive mmorpg in history only to keep enough subs to make a profit?

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by Caldrin

Well they sold millions of copies.. and i guess the polulation is pretty stable now..

What would make it a sccess or failure in your eyes ?

 

 

To knock WoW of it's throne....? Or dent their massive subscriber base...?

That was the intention of this game or at least what the devs/moneymen was hoping for.

Server mergers, free to play .... you tell me.

Could you show us where Bioware said or showed intention of knocking down WOW from number one spot? if that is how you judge success then every MMO is a failure.

Only two companies have openly said this. First Rift with its 'We are not in Azeroth anymore' video and Mike O brian of Anet who openly stated that he wants GW2 to beat WOW in sales and popularity.

Bioware never made sucha  claim.

If you're in a competition, you don't aim for the #2 spot. You go for gold. The MMO business is a competition. Make no mistake about that.

So why single out only SWTOR then? because every other MMO is at second spot. That would mean there has been not a single successful MMO since WOW.

I love your logic man!

They were in DIRECT competition with WoW. I'm not going to link you directly to the interview where they constantly spouted this nonsense as that means i'd be allowing you to continue to be lazy.

In short, they claimed SWTOR was going to be the best MMORPG ever created by the best talent ever assembled. Trying to refute this simply because they didn't outright say "We will beat WoW!" is ignorant and childish.

How about using some logic and watching all their pre-launch interviews again as it is horribly obvious they were after WoW from the start.

All depends what measures you want to use to define success.

By some, yes, the game did succeed, but if you narrow it down to a few specific ones like most sub retention or something, probably not so much.

But I think it would be fair to say EA really did have hopes of providing a strong challenge to WOW and being able to retain several million ongoing subs at least, because they were so sure the SWTOR IP was a guaranteed path to glory.

I'm positive the results of SWTOR have disappointed many who helped bring it about.

I dont give a crap if it tried to beat wow, made millions, ppl quit management, or whatever. SWTOR is a success because Im still playing it and enjoying the game. Thats all that matters to me. 

The bottom line is that SWTOR might have made a profit, but the profit is not enough for it to be warranted as a "success".

Thats why its been downscaled, and thats why the doctors are out. Plain and simple.

That's business.

Originally posted by RavingRabbid

I dont give a crap if it tried to beat wow, made millions, ppl quit management, or whatever. SWTOR is a success because Im still playing it and enjoying the game. Thats all that matters to me. 

 

 

I'm callin a big stinky fliy infested pile oh crap on this one mate. Why you ask? Well you are lying about one thing or another. You CAN'T be playing SWTOR as it says right under your picture Rabbids CAN'T play MMOs. That or you've been lying to us all along and Rabbids CAN indeed play MMOs and now our games have become secretly infested with the floppy eared, plungergun toting bastards. You know now that I think about it I've yet to ever see you dance a single step. Your whole life has been a tissue of lies  HASN'T IT!!!!!????

I rest my case.

Originally posted by Fadedbomb

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by lifeordinary

Originally posted by LoverNoFighter

Originally posted by Caldrin

Well they sold millions of copies.. and i guess the polulation is pretty stable now..

What would make it a sccess or failure in your eyes ?

 

 

To knock WoW of it's throne....? Or dent their massive subscriber base...?

That was the intention of this game or at least what the devs/moneymen was hoping for.

Server mergers, free to play .... you tell me.

Could you show us where Bioware said or showed intention of knocking down WOW from number one spot? if that is how you judge success then every MMO is a failure.

Only two companies have openly said this. First Rift with its 'We are not in Azeroth anymore' video and Mike O brian of Anet who openly stated that he wants GW2 to beat WOW in sales and popularity.

Bioware never made sucha  claim.

If you're in a competition, you don't aim for the #2 spot. You go for gold. The MMO business is a competition. Make no mistake about that.

So why single out only SWTOR then? because every other MMO is at second spot. That would mean there has been not a single successful MMO since WOW.

I love your logic man!

They were in DIRECT competition with WoW. I'm not going to link you directly to the interview where they constantly spouted this nonsense as that means i'd be allowing you to continue to be lazy.

In short, they claimed SWTOR was going to be the best MMORPG ever created by the best talent ever assembled. Trying to refute this simply because they didn't outright say "We will beat WoW!" is ignorant and childish.

How about using some logic and watching all their pre-launch interviews again as it is horribly obvious they were after WoW from the start.

You didn't even read my post properly did you? because when you quote two or three posts together i assume you read everything before hitting reply button.

It was more of rehotorical question because according to OP any MMO which fails to beat WOW and is holding a second spot is a failure. That is why the question 'why single out SWTOR'. It had nothing to do with what Bioware claimed but a general statement on how people twist meaning of success on these forums.

So before you call me childish and ignorant atleast be agrown up yourelf and read properly please? thank you.

Originally posted by Tardcore

Originally posted by RavingRabbid

I dont give a crap if it tried to beat wow, made millions, ppl quit management, or whatever. SWTOR is a success because Im still playing it and enjoying the game. Thats all that matters to me. 

 

 

I'm callin a big stinky fliy infested pile oh crap on this one mate. Why you ask? Well you are lying about one thing or another. You CAN'T be playing SWTOR as it says right under your picture Rabbids CAN'T play MMOs. That or you've been lying to us all along and Rabbids CAN indeed play MMOs and now our games have become secretly infested with the floppy eared, plungergun toting bastards. You know now that I think about it I've yet to ever see you dance a single step. Your whole life has been a tissue of lies  HASN'T IT!!!!!????

I rest my case.

+1   you caught me...now I cant let you live! meet your doom by the soiled plunger!!!! DDDDDDDDDDAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!

Many people ask what is the definition of a MMO'e success, for SWTOR it's actually pretty easy to frame. Bioware is a division of EA. EA is a publically traded company. The definition of success for a project of a publically traded company who's shares are owned by investors is the projects Return on Investment.

Whether you rosy up SWTOR's sales and retention numbers, or paint them in a grim light, the game is either close to breaking even, or millions in the red. (Exact figures are unkonwn.)  One thing is certain, the retention rate of the subscribers (the game's primary revenue stream) is low, thus the switch to the Freemium business model.

So any way you look at the numbers, the ROI is either negative or very low.  From an investors point of view, this is not good, not good at all. What's worse, is that this project was huge in both moneis and time invested. This was a six to seven year project which cost anywhere between $200-$500 million in development and marketing. (Yeah I know, the exact number is unpinnable, that doesn't really ease investors' doubts.)

With a project that long and expensive in scope, the game isn't just sunject to review of ROI, but on oppurtunity costs as well (To be honest, a project taking so long is subject to correction of true cost factoring in inflation).

Although EA is a multi-billion dollar company, even its resources are limited. Those 800+ employees could have been working on other smaller, more profitable projects. (Not to mention SWTOR's very exsistence pretty much precludes any KOTOR3). The money invested in SWTOR for a negative or paltry ROI could have been invested elsewhere. Investors have put money into EA to convert money invested in video game developer talent to create games which in turn create a good ROI. If the games produce a small to negative ROI, the investors think that they would be better off investing their money in other industries and commodities, several of which offer less risky and better expected returns.

This game received even more attention then most MMOs because its success or failure represented a huge gamble and risk for EA. EA's stock and overall fiscal performance has been underperforming as of late. Investors were keenly aware of this game because it represented a huge amount of money invested. From an investor's perspective, SWTOR's performance represented even more then just money spent on SWTOR, but also the money EA invested in acquiring Bioware in the first place. (SWTOR was deemed to be one of the major lures for EA buying BW.)

From the investor's prespective, SWTOR's performance was the metric to measure the wisdom in investing $800 million to acquire Bioware, the $200-$500 million to develope and market SWTOR. After SWTOR's initial mediocre to dismal performance, EA's stock price dropped significantly. To combat the stock price drop (and prevent risk of a coporate take over) EA announced a $500 million stock buy back to prop up EA's share price.

From an investor's point of view, adding up funds invested due to SWTOR were $800 million BW buyout, lets say $500 million for SWTOR's development and marketing (I'm painting a nervous investor's mindset), and $500 million in a stock buyout due to SWTOR's poor performance. That's a total of $1.8 billion dollars sunk into a game that has either lost money or barely made any over the course of 7 years. A game which was so unsustainable financially it had to switch to FTP.

From an investor's point of view, which is what matters most since SWTOR is a property owned by Bioware a division of publically traded EA, is an unmitigated disaster. In an attempt to appease these dissappointed investor's, EA has decimated Bioware Austin's staff and project leaders. Furthermore, EA has begun to gut Bioware overall in general.

Anyway, that's my take on it. If people want to keep talking about, "well if you factor in collector's editions", "digital downloads from Origin make more money then boxes", "FTP is the future, look at LOTRO, Facebook, and Zynga", "by my math SWTOR has already made $10 million", "It was never intended to compete with WoW", "the game may make back its initial investment.", well that's their prerogative; I just think they are missing the bigger picture.

They haven't made up for the budget they spent on the game yet. It was something crazy like 3-4million box sales and something around 6 months of subscribers to break even. 

There was an article on it somewhere, but it was so long ago I can't remember where. Maybe Kotaku.