Activision usually lets Electronic Arts do all the trash talking, but flame-haired demon lord Bobby Kotick has decided not to restrain his thoughts on Star Wars: The Old Republic. He has met EA's latest attempt to crack the MMO market with some derision, believing that licensing alone will ensure that only George Lucas makes any real cash.
"Lucas is going to be the principal beneficiary of the success of Star Wars," he said. "We've been in business with Lucas for a long time and the economics will always accrue to the benefit of Lucas, so I don't really understand how the economics work for Electronic Arts.
"If you look at the history of the people investing in an MMO and achieving success, it's a small number."
We don't really know the deal behind the game, but I am sure EA wouldn't enter into anything that it wouldn't stand to make bank on. That said, I also wouldn't put it past EA to sell its own corporate headquarters just for a chance to be better than Activision at something.
Activision CEO taunts EA, talks up "Skylanders" [Reuters]
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Contest:
9:00 AM on 11.29.2011 | 
Also, Bobby Kotick and Guitar Hero.
Thanks for making me feel even better for my upcoming purchase of SWTOR.
"NUH UH!"
"UH HUH!"
Replace the word mmos with.
TV, News, Politics, Video Games, Music, Religion, Humans, Anything else you can thing of.
Seriously, that's such a broad statement. Of COURSE MMOs are a waste of time because ALL video games are a waste of time.
Which is to say not because of any game itself, just the people playing it. I'm enjoying DCUO right now, but I don't know how eager I am to do the endgame stuff.
But the time put in to an mmo gives you less worth back compared to most other games, making it the worst possible way to waste your time(except crappy mobile games and social games like farmville).
Also, something tells me this game won't be verry good. I got this feeling when for the second year in a row at e3 the only major info about the game was another trailer.
Scifi fans, hardcore and casual alike, have proven time and again they will lay out copious amounts of cash on their favorite licenses. Yeah you'll be paying 14.95 a month, but if you want that shiny speeder bike or swoop racer mount instead of the crap land speeder, that'll be 10 bucks. Want that cute little whamp rat or mini rancor? 15 bucks please. How about a millennium falcon for your smuggler, just use your debit card for 25 bucks. Want some rare custom armor for that trooper? Caching!
EA will soak people laying this game with micro transactions. It may not be say one, but they will come. Activision already proved you can do it with sparkle ponies and pandaren monk pets.
I did the weekend beta, and while I was a bit disappointed graphically (I understand why). It wasn't a bad game at all. It played exactly like WoW.
Story telling was great obviously.
And considering how most new MMOs like Rift and Age of Conan, which do SO many things better then WoW, with WoW still remaining on top. Maybe a strong IP and a solid game everyone already plays will work.
It may be weird, but I think more of the same works in the MMOs world, as much as you and I disagree. MMO players like their routines, and what you and I would consider a waste of time, millions of people love it.
Change is obviously better from an industry evolution standpoint, but there must be a reason movies and games are so sequel copy-cap crazy so often.
I don't know why, and don't ask me to answer, cause I lost faith in humanity long ago. lol
The only thing I CAN say, is that from life experience, humans hate change, they HHHHHATE it. Anything that throws them off a routine and they will flip out, even if it's something unimportant like...MMOs.
Fucking stupid humans. lol
no words will save a 8 year old mmo from it's death.
If you like the genre, you'll like this game unless you are utterly devoted to another MMO and just can't stand the idea of losing it (I still have at least 3 friends who cannot POSSIBLY handle the idea of not playing WoW still) then this game won't be your thing. If you are like me and WoW was a game you played for almost 7 years, you've been waiting for a new place to raid and PvP for about a year and a half now. I think the leveling experience is just want needed the major change, and the Flashpoints I played were pretty fun though I didn't level far enough to play one that required a 'real' party structure yet.
All I can say to the article is that Kotick is worried about the 2 million WoW subscribers he's lost since the start of the year and that's been WITHOUT a major competitor releasing a new MMO. Seeing as I'm part of that 17% of the player base that just couldn't keep playing the game, I'm just waiting for the next reason for my time and as I'm still paying off college loans and have a car loan and a lot of other expenses (and that I can get my girlfriend to play MMOS :3 ) I'll be picking this up.
If this game is a failure, then a LOT of money will be lost. However, if it's a long-term success, then EA stands to gain a steady revenue flow.
As for MMOs being a "worse waste of time" than other videogames, that's a completely and totally relative. If you enjoy it, and you feel like you're making progress and achieving something, then it doesn't matter what kind of game you play.
This game likely wont profit EA not because of George Lucas, its because the pay-to-play structure of MMOs are quickly going the way of the dinosaur and free-to-play is becoming the future.
Would I need to get into the Star Wars universe before trying this game out? I'm one of the few nerds out there who never saw, read, or played anything Star Wars related. I'm still looking at what MMOs to sink my time into and I'm choosing between this and The Secret World.
Mirror's Edge, anyone?
I watched and enjoyed the first three Stars Wars movies, but I've only seen one of the last three, so I'm not a Star Wars fanboy by any means. I know next to nothing about the Sith, the Republic, or much of anything else that features prominently in this time-frame, but it's really a pretty basic plot.
Light versus Dark, Empire versus Republic. I don't think you need to have a ton of first hand knowledge, as long as you're average or above at learning from context. There are also the codex entries for people like us who don't know all the details.
I played the Bounty Hunter and Smuggler, and I never felt lost. There were often options to ask questions about things if you needed more information. I think what I liked most is that you start on the fringe, with the quests themselves leading you further into the Empire/Republic conflict. The starting points are more about defining your character, and the situation your character finds themselves in at a local level. It seems like a set-up where you can learn as you go along, so I think someone unfamiliar with the Star Wars story would be OK.
However, there are die-hard SW fans that would never consider a paid-MMO subscription for anything less than the STAR WARS branding. I'll keep my opinion of those fanatics to myself...
I predict success.
It doesn't look like Star Wars.
Begun, the poo flinging, already has.
My one and only EA purchase of the past 2 years. Activision can talk as much crap as it wants, it will not deter me from my Star Wars experience.
First, No MMO profits right out of the gate. Its VERY naive to think one will/does, and I'm pretty sure those who say they have aren't telling the full truth. It takes most MMO's over a year after their launch to turn a profit, and I forget what the term is for that year but it amounts to being placed on deathwatch from the womb. Some games -like Rift or WoW- make it. Many games -Like DCUO- don't even make it the full year. Some games make it a full year and still crumble under that weight (Many Cryptic games come to mind)
So that's something Bobby is probably talking about. The license is going to profit Lucas because I'm pretty positive (if I understand licensing right) its already been paid for, and he'll get kickbacks from the sales and subscription fees. EA won't turn a profit in the first year, even if they weren't working with/for Lucas, and if they even turn one after that (I think they will, but that's just an opinion) Lucas is still probably going to get a cut of it, which only eat at those profits.
2) Lucas is going to be kind of dicky with those rights (like Kotick is implying most of all). And he probably will, Lucas' intentions are always kind of sketchy.
Personally, I don't believe he'll bleed EA dry, but I can imagine that kickback percentage is going to be high enough to place a limit on EA will do with the game -And I hope it won't cause the game to suffer from it. Plus, I'm pretty positive the license is going to extend to other products.
I think there's already talk of character plushies being made for some of the games companions, so I don't think its far fetched to say that -since its Lucas- a full line of toys will be made at some point. Then theres the flat out collectors market; I mean they've already sanctioned a statue to be packed with the collectors edition, its not out of the question that the buzz for this game will be so big that they'd want to cash into the same sort of thing Blizzard did 3-5 years into WoW's life, right off the bat. And I'd hate to see the kind of profit he could turn doing something with his own FigurePrints (http://www.figureprints.com/) or at least working with them on making player characters into artwork.
Overall, I'd be surprised if EA will have any control at all over any of those parts of the license beyond helping Lucas shill his wares and running -what sounds like from Kotick's statement- his game. Lucas will most likely hold those cards close to his chest, specially since he could turn a buck on them with or without the game being up and running.
Hopefully EA will be able to better deal with Lucas then Sony seemed to. This sort of thing could very well be one of the building blocks that lead Sony to go down such a shitty path with SWG -another Star Wars MMO that had a huge amount of promise when it was about to launch.
Numerous times myself and other players spammed the chat with WoW comments about how we were just space-rogues and where the barrens chat might be.
I am sure it will have a sturdy fan base, but the hype will end eventually. Hopefully though it holds on to make a profit and keep the players happy who enjoy it.
I think you are wrong there. I want a new science fiction MMO, not necessarily looking for Star Wars. When I played TOR, often I felt like I could have been in some non-Star Wars universe, and I was perfectly fine with that. I could have been playing Anarchy Online's long lost cousin of a game. It seems to have just enough Star Wars to make it a Star Wars game, without cramming it down my throat. I think it borrows from Mass Effect and WoW a lot on the mechanics, which isn't a bad thing.
Potential to build on? It has it. I had fun. We shall see in 6 months, but it will have a good enough start to last.
I think EA will be fine with this game. How is Lucasarts taking some off the top and adding little in return different from Activision's relationship with Blizzard?
Warcraft Already has a large portion of the MMO public in their pockets.. The few that stray to this will eventually get sucked back.. Anyone who has played Warcraft for a long enough period of time knows what I'm talking about here.
Sadly I'm sure bioware has spent a lot of time and put a lot of love in this.