Loading... Show Me the Money

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Posted Fri, Oct 02, 2009 by B. de la Durantaye

Welcome to the 1,178th edition of Loading...

Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news, coverage, and commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.

The costs of developing a triple A MMOG is on the rise, while maintaining subscription numbers is getting harder and harder. On a risk versus reward scale, one has to ask how much longer will investors continue to pour money into a market, that, for the most part, has seen relatively little profit, aside from a handful of hit titles? Benjamin J. de la Durantaye takes a look at gamer expectations versus what we're offered in Loading... Show Me the Money.

The Pulse You vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Pulse (What is The Pulse?). Here's today's top 5 Pulse results: World of Warcraft Dungeons & Dragons Online Aion EverQuest 2 Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures Biggest movers this past week: Champions Online (down 4 to #8) Runes of Magic (up 4 to #16) Dragon Age: Origins (up 3 to #12)	Recent MMO Releases 8/25 - CrimeCraft (release date) 9/1 - Champions Online (release date) 9/9 - Dungeons & Dragons Online Unlimited (release date) 9/15 - Runes of Magic "The Elven Prophecy" (expansion) 9/22 - Fallen Earth (release date) 9/22 - Aion (release date)
	Upcoming Releases 10/9 - Cities XL (release date) 12/2 - DOFUS 2.0 (release date) Early 2010 - APB
	Important Dates 10/1 - 10/3 - EVE Online FanFest 10/23 - 10/24 - Hero-Con
Click here to explore the best free-to-play MMORPG - Runes of Magic The Elven Prophecy. Join now and create the ultimate fantasy hero.

Loading... Daily

I spent a little time in San Francisco this week for a Press Tour of CrimeCraft (look out for some CrimeCraft goodness coming next week). One of the cool things about these events is that it's a chance to talk with other professionals from the media and developing studios about what's going on in the MMOG industry. After the day's events, some of us stuck around to enjoy the hospitality of Vogster, and sat in the lounge sipping martinis and talking shop.

One of the topics brought up was the viability of MMOGs from strictly a financial viewpoint. Now, bear in mind that at this point it was just chatter and speculation between myself and a few colleagues from various websites and news outlets. Publishers, in particular, are usually quite stand-offish when it comes to revealing actual numbers, so the conversation that ensued was purely speculation on our part.

That being said, consider the cost of making a triple A MMOG. This isn't chump change. We're talking about anywhere between 10 and 100 million dollars, not too far off from a budget for a feature Hollywood film. Add to that technical and service and support costs to keep the game running, and the bill gets pretty big. As we've seen many times in the past too, some of these games don't even launch in a complete state, often due to lack of resources (meaning they went through their multi-million dollar budget and STILL didn't have enough to finish the game). That's a lot of moolah.

So how is the return on the investment? If recent launches have taught us anything, new games have exactly thirty days to impress fans enough to keep them subscribed. During this time, the game also has to be enjoyable enough that players will try to convince their friends and family to join them. If the game is launched in an incomplete state, and players are dissatisfied with either the early game play, or even the end game (make no mistake, there WILL be players that blow through the content in less than 30 days in most situations), there will be no referrals, and no renewing of subscriptions.

Now I'm not a marketer. Hell, I couldn't sell eye liner at an emo rave. But to me (and to several of my colleagues) that seems like some pretty hefty expectations that need to be met before a game can break even. I'm not sure what percentage of the revenue box sales alone represent, but if a game is incomplete, it's going to be the main source of income, and you had better sell a LOT fast.

So where does this leave us, as the consumer? From my vantage point, what I think we're seeing are two schools of thought from the publishing companies. The first, and probably the most common, are the guys who may not have a completely polished game, but they have built up enough hype that they hope to get their investment back in the first month or two from box sales. The second type of publisher, and my personal favorite, are the ones who look far into the future and build their game to last past the initial rush, and launch a product that has more focus on quality and referral value than marketing hype. The sad reality though, is that we see a lot more of type A than type B. The good news? Judging from the tone of a lot of boards, blogs and twitters, consumers are reaching an end of their tolerance levels for shabby games that are marketed well. All gamers really want is a fun, polished game that they can enjoy for months or years to come.

So, what do you think? Are we going to see a change in the marketing of games? Are publishers going to start focusing more on subsciber loyalty, or are we going to continue to see a mass amount of new games pushed to release far too quickly to make some fast cash, and "lifers" be damned?

Your thoughts welcome in the Loading... forum.

One studio that is all about player satisfaction are the folks at CCP. Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle is at the EVE Fanfest, and tomorrow he'll be blogging live the majore keynote address, discussing all the new EVE and DUST 514 content coming our way. Be sure to check it out at our blog page at 11am EDT, 8am PDT.

Shayalyn's Epic Thread of the Day

From our WAR General Discussion forum

A positive voice for WAR

It may have been a while since you've thought about Warhammer Online, but if this thread is any indication, people not only still do think of it, but some have come to think highly of it. "Everyone talks about the potential of WAR and yet they bash it constantly on these forums," says the thread's original poster, Halek. "How about some positive talk to actually promote the game and maybe we’ll actually see some of that potential come to light? I admit I cannot speak for the end game, but T1-T3 have been alive and well every night I’ve been on. Stop by and see for yourself."

How do you think WAR's holding up against newer releases like Champions Online, Aion and Fallen Earth? Are you still playing, or thinking of going back? Let's talk about it!

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Awesome Quotes from the Epic Thread

"I am about tempted to come back and try it yet again but I play Destro all the way. The only class I liked in Order was the hammerer which is equivalent to the choppa. From everything I keep reading though my BO is useless now as a tank which is really sad. I was damn good at blocking and pushing the line forward..."

- OneEyeRed
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Have you spotted an Epic Thread on our forums? Tell us!

4 new Ten Ton Hammer MMOG features today! 6 in October! 1,054 in 2009!

Today's New MMO Coverage and Features

Aion Newsletter - The Daeva Weekly #3
MMOGs are all about community, and part of being a community is helping our fellow players. Are you one that takes the time to lend a helping hand, or do you believe it's every newbie for themselves? Delve into the topic of helping others and catch up with the latest and great Aion news in the 3rd Ten Ton Hammer Daeva Weekly Newsletter.
Editorial - The Challenges of Porting MMOGs to Consoles
The walls that have prevented the console market from taking advantage of the MMOG market are slowly coming down, and pretty soon consoles will be supporting a number of MMOG titles. This week we take a look at what's holding back the development of console MMOGs and some of the benefits and drawbacks to porting them to console systems like the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.
Editorial - WoW's Grind Versus Gates, Attunements and You
Did attunements work as intended and keep lesser players from infiltrating raids, or where they just an arbitrary border causing more issues than they solved? Is it better or worse, or just different?
Champions Online - Supergroup Showcase: The WildCards
The strongest heroes in Champions Online often need a hand, and that's why there are Supergroups. We here at Ten Ton Hammer understand the importance of player communities in online games, and that's why we've chosen to showcase a different Supergroup every couple of weeks. This week we delve into what makes The WildCards tick.