Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

by Cody “Micajah” Bye

When the Ten Ton Hammer team traveled to the Leipzig Games Convention a few weeks ago, we knew that the Warhammer Online team was going to be announcing the last two races for their game, the High Elves and Dark Elves. What we didn’t expect was the immense amount of people that would be swarming into the WAR booth on a daily basis, hoping to nab a fifteen minute play session with the game. Lines for the game were so long that they stretched out into neighboring booths and beyond.

Mark and Cody discussing the future of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning at AGDC.

While at the show, the editorial staff at Ten Ton Hammer concluded that our Best of Show award would be handed to Warhammer Online, not only for their fantastic presentations and gameplay but for the sheer amount of fan interest that was being displayed at their booth. Only a week after the German convention, Cody “Micajah” Bye was on his way to the Austin Game Developers Conference, and while attending the show he met up with EA Mythic’s general manager, Mark Jacobs, to discuss Warhammer Online and what was next for the upcoming MMOG.

As a first hand observer of the sort of craziness that was going on at the Warhammer Online booth, my first concern was to ask Mark what sort of response had he seen post-Leipzig. “It’s been overwhelming,” Mark said. “If you look at the number of people that were at the show and how many of them filled our booth on a daily basis, I think it’s fairly safe to say that we did pretty well. There was even one guild that drove forever to get to the show and then truly did nothing but circle around the line to play on our machines.

“People coming to see something? That’s hype,” he added. “People staying to play the game? That’s when you know you’re on the right track. Obviously we’ve done really well on the “buzz factor”, but to have people stand in line simply to play through the game over and over again… What more can you ask?”

Anymore it seems that most of the MMOG hype has been controlled by one giant gorilla that sits in the corner of the room and its name is “Blizzard.” However, Warhammer Online had a comparable booth presence to the Blizzard products at the show and was certainly no slouch in the hype department. For those who may not be as familiar with the Warhammer universe, I asked Mark why he thought the game had already generated so much fan responsiveness.

“Two reasons,” Mark answered. “We have the advantage of a very well known and very well loved IP. Warhammer isn’t as popular as, let’s say, Lord of the Rings. But what Warhammer does have is a really loyal and really committed fanbase that spends a lot of time and money playing their game. While we may not have the sheer numbers that the Lord of the Rings or Star Wars may have, we do have people who just LOVE this IP.”

“Combine that with a very good marketing plan and the cool stuff we have in the game, and people know that we’re not just trying to make WoW 1.5,” Mark added. “People also know from our previous product (Dark Age of Camelot) that we’re not going to be a vaporware company. They know that they can look at this game and believe a little – hopefully believe a lot.”

But at the same time, there have been times in the past where individuals (myself included) have been sorely disappointed with the eventual look, feel, and play of the game that they’d hyped for months, even years. Asking for Marks’ opinion, I wondered what his thoughts were on looking at a game before it even hits store shelves.

Warhammer has an extremely loyal fanbase who are more than willing to drive for hours to play as this priest.

“Never judge a game until at least thirty days after it has launched,” Mark said. “At points, back when we were releasing Dark Age of Camelot, I’d tell the community not to get terribly worked up over the game. Don’t expect that the game will do everything AND bring you coffee in the morning. Look at the game, and if you like what we’re doing and believe in us that’s great. Keep it simple and don’t go crazy.”

“Doling out messages like that, especially to the Warhammer fanbase, is a great start,” he continued. “Then you need to look at the history of online gaming. Generally when a game gets to be around three years old, you really begin to see the population of the game going down. It happened in Camelot, and it happened in Everquest. You now have a lot of people entering their third years with their respective game.”

I’ve heard that same sort of response, “numbers lie”, from multiple people in many different areas of my life. However, if a game’s numbers lie, which set of digits should we believe?

“The monthly subscriber numbers,” Mark answered. “In Warhammer or Camelot or WoW, it’s easy to see our numbers. But some free-to-play games claim that they have nine million people playing their game. No they don’t! They just have nine million people who have given them their information. I’m simply interested in the monthly subscriber.”