A few months ago, Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick said investing $500 million to a billion still wouldn’t be enough to compete with an MMORPG like World of Warcraft. The MMORPG space is a costly investment and you’d need to really burn a lot of money to start competing against the mega-giant, but Mythic VP and Warhammer Online lead designer Mark Jacobs disagrees with that quote.
Jacobs says $100-million dollars would be needed to start competing against the giant subscription generator that is World of Warcraft. Although few developers are sitting on $100-million USD, it’s a bit more realistic an investment for a studio to scrape up compared to a billion bucks! A billion dollars is a scary number when you consider that’s the start of an investment that may, or may not, pay off in the end.
Kotick may not be using complete scare tactics, he may be working off experience when dealing with MMORPG’s. A startup MMO isn’t a cookie cutter system, there is a lot of development efforts, $100-million dollars worth, but MMO developers slip dates many times. When you start slipping your dates you’ll start burning more money and, before you know it, you’re a billion in the hole. Jacobs thinks $100-million will cover development costs and messing up, so a billion is still way over budget.
Perhaps this is a bit of a scare tactic, assuming a developer will fail and slip their dates isn’t really a great way to start quoting prices. However, shooting too low isn’t always the best method of building your development assessments. The end result, scream ONE BILLION and you may scare off any potential startup MMO developers.
Warhammer Online lead designer did mention one big barrier to entry: the need for “at least half a million subscribers to be successful.”
(Thanks, 1up)
@World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria announced
Well, they keep doing expansions, but something tells me people got tired of it.
As for raising the level cap, it is the only way you can keep the players that don’t want to grind up again.
@Deep Silver: “There is a clear technology gap“
Wow … they discovered that a 4GB system RAM, 1GB video RAM PC is better than a 256 MB system 256 MB video PS3 …
As Jordan said, the main issue is that developing 3 code bases is expensive. The advantage of the XBox is using PC-like components, and using a PC-like software platform.
@Starcraft II DOTA mod will remain free but monetized
What are the terms in the EULA? Does Starcraft II allows this?
If so, then it is the second game that I know of that does this (TF2 being the first), and I like the trend it sets.
@Minecraft dev wins interim injunction over Scrolls name
Good for them. If they kept a record of the offer to give up the trade mark, then this will weigh in quite a lot in the court: it’ll point out that Bethesda is not up to protecting the name.
@QOTW: none, unfortunately.
No Paul again. =(
Anyway,
@Minecraft dev wins interim injunction over Scrolls name:
Finally, I was sick and tired of hearing about this nonsense, and I am grateful that Bethesda hasn’t gained anything from his.
@QOTW: Just to show how much out of my time that is, my parents had an Atari 2600 back when they were still children.
ahhhh i really miss derrick and jennifer i wish they could host ,btw any news on their son???
@ minecraft dev wins interium injunction over scrolls name ,Hooray good for mojang im so sick of bethesda being so freaking sensitive
@qotw dude im 13 years old the atari is a dinosaur
Paul is gone again a mixture of sadness and happiness but mostly happines ,jk