Why make great MMO as long as it breaks even

Because they havent made a profit yet.

Assume the development cost is $200 million (so many numbers flying around, so lets just settle on a middleish one).

Assume from each box sold they get $30 (which is half the box price give or take).

Sold 2 million copies: $60 Million

Sold 1.7 million subs for 2 months: $51 Million


They have only recouped $111 million, or about half the development cost (dont forget they have also had overheads for the last 2 months of actually running the game).

IF they manage to maintain 1 million subs for the next 6 months they will break even and then start to make profit.

However they are also having rolling area expansions in that time and additional subscribers (pacific region next) so based on that additional income they will break even some time around May.

while it is theoretically possible to abandon an mmo, it is not profitable.

Firstly, is you have to realize these people make money via game development, its what they do, the only way they can continue to make money is by making and selling games, so if they want to make more money, they have to develop new product.

However it is cheaper to make games with existing engines and worlds, basically it is easier/cheaper to develop a game, once you get the initial early development out of the way.

Also for a new game they develop, a lot of money is lost on packaging distribution, marketing etc. out of every sale they probably only see at best half of it as profit in truth, probably way less. An MMO is direct money to the company minus probably some costs associated with billing.

keeping servers up is not expensive, the most expensive maintenance fees they have to pay here, is probably in the form of customet service, and keeping programmers for bugs and what not, but the programmers they probably would need to pay no matter what content they make.

so really its not profitable to quit after initial sales, the longer the game runs, the cheaper it is to maintain, and the easier it is to develop for. It is also a comparitively steady revenue with less risk after the initial investment. This is why people want to get into the MMO making business, because if it succeeds its profitable, the longer it goes on the more profitable it is.

While it probably doesn't cost as much as the development did, it does cost quite a bit to keep hundreds of servers running with enough bandwidth to support hundreds of thousands of players simultaneously. A significant electricity bill, if nothing else.

I have absolutely no idea what hardware they are using, but I am almost certain a "server" isn't an Acer i3 laptop with the screen closed.

Those games you'd finish in a month you OWN for the money pay for them, you might pay $60 the day it releases you might pay $50 a couple weeks later or you could pay $25-30 or less a year or more later. At any time after you buy it other Players can make add ons for those games to let you do things, might not happen but those cost you nothing. You can play it later as much as you want for FREE, cause you don't need to pay someone $15 to use it for a month.

Now you might not have any desire to ever play it again after you beat it BUT you have that option. You have that option because that was the deal you got when you gave them the money for the game.

Now the developer can make an expansion and sell it for $35 or so. If they made a good game that did well they can make a sequel and sell it then you can buy it if you want. You aren't forced to buy it to keep playing what you bought already.

SWTOR isn't 10 games, it at most is 3-5 and in all honesty it is pretty much the same 3-5 games. The stories/missions are the 'same' the worlds are the 'same' the dungeons are the 'same' and so on.

The reason it is 'more than' one game is they took that one game and extended it. Much like in some games you'd hit level 20 and then there is no more well here they let you go to 50. Those other games could let you play longer by repeating the same 'missions' which swtor does and it would be longer. They could let you choose other classes if they didn't and add some different content based on that then reuse 75% of the rest then do that 3 or 4 more times. Then they could mirror that and give you the option of running through it all several more times and charge you several more times for that.

That is the 'milking' because they don't just extend their games by coping their content, that you don't own, to drag money out of you to play it. They make (usually) a polished, finished product that works well for what they let you do in it and ask nothing more than their initial sale price. Maybe they charge you for the expansion if they make it but again they'll give you 'quality' for that money and you don't need to buy it. When they make you pay again they'll, usually, deliver another polished finished gaming experience that you can play as much as you want not for 30 days.

Your movie analogy is right you pay $15 for a movie ticket and can only see it if you pay another $15 at the theatre. Yet if you buy the DVD or the Blueray you can see it whenever you want.

MMO's are the theatre except you can't see it all after going 'once' you have to keep going and paying. SWTOR isn't even that good at being an MMO yet you pay for the access all the same.

You only save money on an MMO if you buy all your games at their highest release price and not the sale prices then play them for 6+hrs a day to finish them in week. If you play games and finish them in a day you'd be insane to pay full price. And I'd wager you'll be 'done' with SWTOR in a couple months unless you like doing the same things over and over behind a different looking avatar. If you do, great, SWTOR is the game for you.

The subscription model is a rip off if they aren't providing significant content at regular intervals. Those intervals might be 3 or 6 months but to be 'worth it' they need to give you extra stuff because unless you play only a couple hours a day you'll get through the majority of game like SWTOR in 2-3 months. With you finishing games in a day or week you should be done a lot sooner.

I don't see anyone crying about $15 a month and since when is "$15 isn't a lot of money" an argument to pay it? $15 isn't a lot of money, send it to me,you can just send me $15 a month for 6 months that's a deal right?

I refuse to pay another cent to a company that manages their mediocre product as this one does. Nor will I pay them and not have them deliver the content that a sub dictates, as I see it, you may not agree. The argument "be quiet and give them $15 it's nothing" is really pathetic if you think it is worth it pay it and play it. If you don't then cancel your sub and don't pay them.

I have no problem paying $15 a month and I'd get a 6mo-1yr sub. I'd do that only *IF* the company managing this game could show me they have any clue what they are doing, were actually interested in what their customers wanted, cared about them, were honoring the sub value with significant new content or were really interested in making the game better over a long period of time. I'm not convinced of any of those things and so I won't support them not even with a penny.

Because the game is designed by artists. Being an artist is like being a mother or a father. You don't have a child and hope that it survives well enough just to get by. When corporate interests and artistic interests collide, this is the result.

These forums continue to boggle my mind with people that think they know what they are talking about.

I really don't see why a company would want to lose money on something. I mean, really? You think this huge game can run itself?

2 months in and people have been talking stupid for since beta. I really can't stand these forums.

Welcome to the fact that games are 'business' now.

Back when I first became a 'gamer' (with games such as Loderunner, Joust and Rescue Raiders) games were made by hobbyists for hobbyists.

That is no longer the case; games are now big business and as such must be treated like any other 'marketable' and 'consumable' product on this planet.

Sorry thats utter nonsense. I just did a quick search for Lode Runner and low and behold it was made by a guy who submitted it to games companies who rejected it and he re-did it and resubmitted it and they published it and gave him a wad of money.

It was a business back in 1983 and its still a business today.

I don't remember saying 'hobbyists' did it for FREE!

It was a 'sale' of the fruits of a hobby back in 1983.

The point being that today if you can't turn your game into a 'business' as stated in my initial reply you don't have much.


EDIT:
I suppose in an effort to not make you spout off "utter nonsense" I could have suggested that most game coders back then did it (or started doing it) as a hobby. Just as 'video gaming' many years ago was a 'hobby' and not considered mainstream entertainment. I personally knew a few programmers (who coded for business) who in their free time made a hobby of coding simple 'games' (none of which were ever sold). Of course those who sold the fruits of their 'hobby' were looking to make money. It's just that 'video gaming' wasn't the 'big business' it is today.

Well the difference between 1983 and EA in 2012 is that EA is a huge multinational corporation. You can have hobbyists and artists working, but everyone is still submit to higher corporate management, and all they need to see is maximization of profit. So i agree with someone who said, if its profitable to spout updates theyll do it, if its profitable to merge servers theyll do it, if its profitable to produce expansions theyll do it, if its profitable to shut down the game tomorrow theyll do it, if its profitable theyll do it.