Star Wars: The Old Republic Profitable With 500,000 Subs

[Mcface]

It's going to be a linear instanced based game. Weather you want to believe it or not.

Oh, so what you're doing here is looking at the short sequences shown from the Class Stories and Flashpoints and assuming that that's all there is to the game.

I'll be happy to burst your bubble here, because BioWare have said and shown plenty of material that indicates a non-linear world (EDIT: or rather a galaxy with many worlds) with multiple storylines and option sidequests, as well as raid content and crafting/gathering.

How the hell can you have a story be unique to every player, and not be instanced?
They said multiple times, if I kill this NPC during a quest, he wont be in my game. But he will be in the city still for everyone else.

Selectively displayed content (through cutscenes or otherwise) does not make the game instanced.

So theres going to be 50 people crowned around staring at a wall to me, even though they are really looking at an NPC? Sounds just as bad.

And it sounds like its a lot of work. Meaning theres probably not going to be a lot of content, meaning, like DCUO, everyone will quit after the first month anyway.

 

[Neosage]

As a Bioware and Star-Wars fan this looks interesting, but like the majority of people I won't buy it purely because it takes a monthly fee. This may be the way that WoW works, and it's obvious that this works for them.

However, I don't think it will necessarily work for Bioware in this case because it won't convert much of the non-MMO playerbase to MMOs. I see this as a crucial point to make because the majority of MMO players will already be playing WoW.

Now, if I was a WoW player (which I'm not) and was interested in this, then I'd probably be willing to give it a go. Although, I don't think that it's a matter of how good quality a game WoW is any more (I'm not saying that WoW is a bad game, but after all this time if Bioware comes out with something inferior as a game then TOR has no hope in hell).

A lot of WoW player's will have been playing WoW for a long time, and I don't think they would be willing to give it up so easily. If I'd spent hundreds of pounds/dollars and (solid) weeks (in total) playing a game, then I would probably return, no matter how amazing TOR is.

I hope this works out because it will raise the bar of MMOs everywhere. Although if it fails, it will just be another Warhammer Online.

Returning to my first paragraph though, I think charging an equal amount to WoW would be a very bad move. People (like me) don't want to have to shell out a monthly for something I will have already bought. I can understand paying for expansion packs, but I refuse to pay for something that I have already paid for (over and over again...) unless I'm actually paying for something (like extra content).

 

[Neosage]

As a Bioware and Star-Wars fan this looks interesting, but like the majority of people I won't buy it purely because it takes a monthly fee. This may be the way that WoW works, and it's obvious that this works for them.

However, I don't think it will necessarily work for Bioware in this case because it won't convert much of the non-MMO playerbase to MMOs. I see this as a crucial point to make because the majority of MMO players will already be playing WoW.

Now, if I was a WoW player (which I'm not) and was interested in this, then I'd probably be willing to give it a go. Although, I don't think that it's a matter of how good quality a game WoW is any more (I'm not saying that WoW is a bad game, but after all this time if Bioware comes out with something inferior as a game then TOR has no hope in hell).

A lot of WoW player's will have been playing WoW for a long time, and I don't think they would be willing to give it up so easily. If I'd spent hundreds of pounds/dollars and (solid) weeks (in total) playing a game, then I would probably return, no matter how amazing TOR is.

I hope this works out because it will raise the bar of MMOs everywhere. Although if it fails, it will just be another Warhammer Online.

Returning to my first paragraph though, I think charging an equal amount to WoW would be a very bad move. People (like me) don't want to have to shell out a monthly for something I will have already bought. I can understand paying for expansion packs, but I refuse to pay for something that I have already paid for (over and over again...) unless I'm actually paying for something (like extra content).

Think of it this way, it is a service cost. The initial cost that you pay for is for the software. The 15 dollars a month is for the necessary costs needed to run an MMO. Such as maintenance, electricity bills, ISP bills and server costs themselves. It's not cheap.

Running MMOs takes a LOT of money to run. And by contributing 15 dollars a month, you help keep the service and the community going strong. Besides, most Star Wars and Bioware fans have a good paying job at this point. So I don't think many people will give two thoughts to paying a measily 15 dollars a month for this.

I know I won't.

Fair enough, if I was earning money then I'd be more inclined to pay for it. In fact if I had a job, I'd probably get it, my other points still stands though.

 

[Sixcess]

EVE Online has around 400k subscribers, has been going for 7 years, was started by a tiny development team, and didn't have Star Wars attached to it - not bad for a title that's got a rather niche crowd.

Yet you think the biggest nerd IP on the planet, with one of the most popular game developers, is doomed to fail? There is currently no real reason to expect this to crash apart from because you want it to.

I don't want it to fail, if for no other reason than I think if it does it will have a bad effect on future MMO development, but...

EVE has slowly built up to 300K over those 7 years, and it is unique - renowned as the most ruthless sandbox PVP MMO out there bar none.

Star Wars being a big IP won't cut it - if it did then we'd all be playing Star Wars Galaxies at the moment, which has been crumbling for years. As for Bioware - their fan base is entirely in single player gaming - TOR is going to be a big game, but it's not going to be the size of a dozen or so Mass Effects and their fanbase isn't accustomed to paying month after month for the same game.

If there is one golden rule of MMO development it is this - once players start reaching the level cap it is impossible for developers to generate new story content fast enough to keep pace with them. A game that's heavily reliant on fully voiced cutscenes is going to have even more trouble with that. This isn't doom mongering this is a simple fact of MMOs, and anyone who plays MMOs will tell you that once you've hit the level cap a few times, unless there's a grindtastic endgame ala WoW, there are long periods of sitting around waiting for the next new batch of content to be released, during which players drift away.

Like I and others have said - getting 500K subscribers for the first month or two? Easy, I wouldn't be surprised if they hit a million. Keeping those subscribers for a year or five? That's another challenge altogether and nothing that I've seen in TOR suggests they can do that.

 

[Woodsey]

EVE Online has around 400k subscribers, has been going for 7 years, was started by a tiny development team, and didn't have Star Wars attached to it - not bad for a title that's got a rather niche crowd.

Yet you think the biggest nerd IP on the planet, with one of the most popular game developers, is doomed to fail? There is currently no real reason to expect this to crash apart from because you want it to.

I don't want it to fail, if for no other reason than I think if it does it will have a bad effect on future MMO development, but...

EVE has slowly built up to 300K over those 7 years, and it is unique - renowned as the most ruthless sandbox PVP MMO out there bar none.

Star Wars being a big IP won't cut it - if it did then we'd all be playing Star Wars Galaxies at the moment, which has been crumbling for years. As for Bioware - their fan base is entirely in single player gaming - TOR is going to be a big game, but it's not going to be the size of a dozen or so Mass Effects and their fanbase isn't accustomed to paying month after month for the same game.

If there is one golden rule of MMO development it is this - once players start reaching the level cap it is impossible for developers to generate new story content fast enough to keep pace with them. A game that's heavily reliant on fully voiced cutscenes is going to have even more trouble with that. This isn't doom mongering this is a simple fact of MMOs, and anyone who plays MMOs will tell you that once you've hit the level cap a few times, unless there's a grindtastic endgame ala WoW, there are long periods of sitting around waiting for the next new batch of content to be released, during which players drift away.

Like I and others have said - getting 500K subscribers for the first month or two? Easy, I wouldn't be surprised if they hit a million. Keeping those subscribers for a year or five? That's another challenge altogether and nothing that I've seen in TOR suggests they can do that.

Galaxies was actually rather popular for quite a time before they did a large overhaul to the combat system.

As for BioWare's fanbase, they don't exclusively play BioWare games. You can assume that they all like RPGs (obviously) and that there are a lot of them, and that the crossover between them and people who like mermorpergers will also be large. I see no issue in that respect, and certainly no reason to simply disregard it as not a noticeable thing to work in their favour.

 

[Kingsnake661]

EVE Online has around 400k subscribers, has been going for 7 years, was started by a tiny development team, and didn't have Star Wars attached to it - not bad for a title that's got a rather niche crowd.

Yet you think the biggest nerd IP on the planet, with one of the most popular game developers, is doomed to fail? There is currently no real reason to expect this to crash apart from because you want it to.

I don't want it to fail, if for no other reason than I think if it does it will have a bad effect on future MMO development, but...

EVE has slowly built up to 300K over those 7 years, and it is unique - renowned as the most ruthless sandbox PVP MMO out there bar none.

Star Wars being a big IP won't cut it - if it did then we'd all be playing Star Wars Galaxies at the moment, which has been crumbling for years. As for Bioware - their fan base is entirely in single player gaming - TOR is going to be a big game, but it's not going to be the size of a dozen or so Mass Effects and their fanbase isn't accustomed to paying month after month for the same game.

If there is one golden rule of MMO development it is this - once players start reaching the level cap it is impossible for developers to generate new story content fast enough to keep pace with them. A game that's heavily reliant on fully voiced cutscenes is going to have even more trouble with that. This isn't doom mongering this is a simple fact of MMOs, and anyone who plays MMOs will tell you that once you've hit the level cap a few times, unless there's a grindtastic endgame ala WoW, there are long periods of sitting around waiting for the next new batch of content to be released, during which players drift away.

Like I and others have said - getting 500K subscribers for the first month or two? Easy, I wouldn't be surprised if they hit a million. Keeping those subscribers for a year or five? That's another challenge altogether and nothing that I've seen in TOR suggests they can do that.

SWG, hasn't just been crumbling for years, it's been crumbling for a DECADE, and, i might add, still has players INSPITE of itself. You can't get rid of them. What they've done in SWG redifines nerfing, effective rebuilding from the ground up a whole new combat system, dumbing down the crafting system, junking an entier skills system, and merging servers, and it's still apperently turning a profit cause it's still up and running. THAT'S brand loyality.

If bioware can tap into that with a GOOD game? Think about it.

Right now, bioware has 2 major factors against it SWG didn't at it's launch. WoW, and a crapy econemy. WoW, is a juggernaut true, but one doesn't have to BEAT it to stay competive. Other MMO's thrive. This one can too, assuming it has long term appeal. As for the econemy, well, *shrug* If it keeps getting worse, the fate of TOR will be the least of our worries honestly. So, lets stay optimisitc and hope it gets better... which would work into TOR favor, and everyones really.

 

[fanklok]

If they somehow manage to not break even from people buying the game, just the game no subscrictions or anything just some cardboard and plastic, I will be amazed.

 

[Midnight Crossroads]

I don't see this succeeding. Especially with the numbers they're putting out.

Voice acting? Who cares? I read my quest while running. Lots of players don't even do that. All that voice talent will go to waste as players spam the ESC key. It's a waste of money, time, and effort. The best voice acting on the planet is going to get on any person's nerves when they roll their fifth character and have commander whatshisface tell you to go shoot five space wolves.

BioWare puts way too much effort into the story. WoW isn't still going because people are waiting with bated breath for the next exciting chapter in WoW's unfolding story. They have to release stories on a schedule. It's a lose-lose situation. Either they make it long enough to kill their own lore, or they don't come up with enough that they can salvage it after the servers shut down. You'll know they're done for when you have Revan on farm status.

Star Wars is a terrible universe for an MMO. Everyone is going to be a Jedi or Sith. The release day is going to have servers leaking Jedi with names like Joda and Luke Skypacer or the classly Darth XxvaderxX. That's nothing when you count in balancing Jedi. This is what happened when they messed with Galaxies, and BioWare has decided to just them in from the start. That would be like Blizzard allowing anyone to roll a Deathknight from day 1. Actually, Blizzard did do something like this with Paladins and the Forsaken.

It was a disaster.

 

[MaVeN1337]

Oh look another Star Wars game!

I hope this shit fails, not only because it's being put out by Bioware but because this is the millionth Star Wars game. ever.

 

[Cyrax987]

I'm actually really looking forward to this game a lot. World of Warcraft has been king for a long time and would be nice to have better alternatives. Not posting "Lol wow killer" or anything but something that actually can stand on its own and do good would be great.

Not to mention lightsabers.

 

[Midnight Crossroads]

I don't see this succeeding. Especially with the numbers they're putting out.

Voice acting? Who cares? I read my quest while running. Lots of players don't even do that. All that voice talent will go to waste as players spam the ESC key. It's a waste of money, time, and effort. The best voice acting on the planet is going to get on any person's nerves when they roll their fifth character and have commander whatshisface tell you to go shoot five space wolves.

BioWare puts way too much effort into the story. WoW isn't still going because people are waiting with bated breath for the next exciting chapter in WoW's unfolding story. They have to release stories on a schedule. It's a lose-lose situation. Either they make it long enough to kill their own lore, or they don't come up with enough that they can salvage it. You'll know they're done for when you have Revan on farm status.

Star Wars is a terrible universe for an MMO. Everyone is going to be a Jedi or Sith. The release day is going to have servers leaking Jedi with names like Joda and Luke Skypacer or the classly Darth XxvaderxX. That's nothing when you count in balancing Jedi. This is what happened when they messed with Galaxies, and BioWare has decided to just them in from the start. That would be like Blizzard allowing anyone to roll a Deathknight from day 1. Actually, Blizzard did do something like this with Paladins and the Forsaken.

It was a disaster.

What disaster?

The problem with allowing Jedi from the start was that it betrayed the principles of what made Star Wars: Galaxies a hit. The original SWG was about you being a normal part of the universe. With realistic rules and laws. Becoming a Jedi is a huge challenge just like in lore. SOE wanted to make the game more like WoW, so they made it "Combat lololol!" and took out a lot of what made SWG unique.

I still don't understand what makes paladins and death knights selectable from the start such a "disaster."

From what I can tell, you just don't like the way Bioware makes games. That means it won't succeed? That's pretty narcissistic of you. Just looking at the gaming community it is easy to say that people really like Bioware's style of creating games. With a passable combat system but good stories and believable characters behind them to push it forward. With that in mind, unless the game itself is a complete bomb then it should be really successful.

Hah. You think I just want the game to fail because its BioWare? No, I'm basing my thoughts on experience with many MMOs. And I see BioWare making the same mistakes lots of others have made in the past. Good stories and characters mean nothing for an MMO. And narcissistic? If you're not sure what a word means, don't use it. Their exist dictionaries on the Internet which are free.

The disaster was that when Blizz made paladins and Forsake in the beginning, the Forsaken were undead and immune to fear. This gave them a massive advantage over the Alliance which could only be countered by paladins with abilities specifically designed to hurt the undead. The Horde became almost exclusively undead while the Alliance had to match with just as many paladins to keep up. Eventually, Blizzard stepped in and changed the Forsaken to humanoid and turned their passive fear immunity into an activated ability which has been nerfed ever since. For a long time afterwards, paladins had a long list of abilities originally intended to fight the Forsaken which were now useless as demons and undead enemies are rare compared to, say, spiders.

If BioWare wanted to succeed. They should have took a hint from Sony and left Jedi out from the start, but that would piss senseless idiots off. They ruin the game because everyone wants to be one. Blizzard was smart enough to leave heroes out. LoTR had enough sense as well. BioWare is just steaming ahead thinking its a good idea. They're letting their ideas get in the way of making a game.

 

[theultimateend]

I hope it will succeed. I don't want EA to suffer any more losses and wither and die beneath Activision's milking tendencies.

I honestly do not like seeing Activision exist...but at the same time I'm so disinterested in this.

Star Wars has been beaten into such a pathetic position I just have so little faith in anything related to it :/.

 

[JediMB]

It's going to be a linear instanced based game. Weather you want to believe it or not.

Oh, so what you're doing here is looking at the short sequences shown from the Class Stories and Flashpoints and assuming that that's all there is to the game.

I'll be happy to burst your bubble here, because BioWare have said and shown plenty of material that indicates a non-linear world (EDIT: or rather a galaxy with many worlds) with multiple storylines and option sidequests, as well as raid content and crafting/gathering.

How the hell can you have a story be unique to every player, and not be instanced?
They said multiple times, if I kill this NPC during a quest, he wont be in my game. But he will be in the city still for everyone else.

Selectively displayed content (through cutscenes or otherwise) does not make the game instanced.

So theres going to be 50 people crowned around staring at a wall to me, even though they are really looking at an NPC? Sounds just as bad.

And it sounds like its a lot of work. Meaning theres probably not going to be a lot of content, meaning, like DCUO, everyone will quit after the first month anyway.

As if it's any better than that you have 50 players crowded around a farmer who asks you to retrieve his stolen wallet? There are ways to get around these things, such as simply fading the player characters out of regular existence while they're in a cutscene, or letting them walk into another room for the duration of the cutscene. They're not perfect solutions, but neither is WoW's system.

And you could try to not make assumptions based on assumptions based on speculations based on a lack of information. BioWare and Electronic Arts' employees aren't incompetent fools, but they obviously can't put all their cards on the table before the game is released either, as that would ruin the players' sense of exploration and discovery. I'd advise you to maybe try to be a little less prejudiced.

 

[shintakie10]

(speculation ahead) 500k is quite an aim they have there. I could see them easily gettin that at launch, prolly quite a bit more than that honestly. The problem is goin to be keepin that and I've made the argument time and time again, Biowares decision to have the game fully voice acted and story based will bite them in the butt in that regard. Blizzard can get away with months upon months of lack of content patches because of how invested most people are in the game, Bioware wont have that luxury for a couple years. The increased costs and time investment needed to craft all the ever increasin stories will prolong content patches far more than they'll be able to get away with before somethin folds. It wont be pretty.

I hope it doesnt fail. I really really dont. The amount of time, money, manpower and money spent on this game doesnt allow it to fail. If it does, I doubt Bioware will be able to survive.

 

[Sonic Doctor]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzAo7fWBn1Y&feature=channel

Im sorry but this game is just a generic MMO that copied Oblivion or mass effect in the story telling, it has a UI just like WoW even the targeting system is WoW.

I assumed it would be a FPS or TPS but no its just a target and click 12121212121212 win

This game is not a big lose if it fails, it will teach people to stop copying WoW because im really sick of people that try to say the game is new when i see 500 of the exact same game over and over.

Not a big lose, better if company's learn from this rather then to see it succeed

They even have mana.....really new huh....

Also why do MMOs always put skills on 1234567890?? cant the defult be E Q CTRL SHIFT R T F C V just saying its way more ergonomic then to have it be 123456789 when i move with wsad

Your video proof that it is "bad" or "samey" backfired, at least with me. It actually convinced me that I will play it at launch. I've played WoW, and this looks different. Come on, cover based combat, jumping across the map and majorly damaging an opponent before they can't see you.

So what if it is target and click.

Considering the first KoTOR, I can't believe anybody would have seriously thought that this was going to be an FPS or TPS.

I'm sorry, but Mass Effect is a different product compared to what KoTOR was styled for when it came out. It was obvious that the they were going to style TOR after KoTOR.

If they ever think about making a Mass Effect MMO, then you can gripe when it isn't an FPS or TPS.

On the 123 thing, there is no problem with it. Besides, it wouldn't matter to me, I've never been comfortable with using the keyboard for anything other than movement. I've played Lord of the Rings Online for a year and I used my mouse to click every square that held an attack or ability, or potion in the hotkey rectangle.

TOR will easily make the 500,000 mark. Lord of the Rings has a way smaller fan base and appeal than Star Wars, and Lord of the Rings Online had way over 500,000 for at least to years, before it went to F2P.

I easily feel safe in saying that I think TOR will have at least 1,500,000 for the first year. That gives it a 1 million player drop off gap for the next year.

If WoW can boast 11 million subscribers, than something that is more versatile with more than just a fan base like TOR will do just fine.