So... constant updates with new pve and pvp content.... a new expansion on the way... tons of money being spent on cartel coins.... yep, those sure are signs of a doomed mmo... lol

 

How many more times does this thread need to be posted? Can't we just sticky one so that people will stop?

I dont think anyone is subjecting subscription numbers to profit for doom or its alive. The money some people are throwing at cartel coins is insane and the bulk of those doing it are subscribers who are now throwing years worth of subscription equivilent money at cartel items like packs.

what proof do you have they went under 500k?

 

key word YOU THINK. What proof do you have that's what they were aiming for?

They were around 700,000-750,000 at the last call, and server usage dropped a LOT in the months after that.

~500,000 (or less) would be about right.

Success in an MMO is whether there is enough money coming in to pay fixed costs + repay investors and get themselves out of the red.

So how successful an MMO is really depends on the fixed costs of said company vs. how much money that game is making...in so long as the game is making 1 dollar more than the fixed costs to run the game then it is successfully running. Now $1 is clearly not enough profit for anyone to keep it going, but profit is also a subjective thing. EA expects big returns on their investments and that is why the referred to SWTOR as a "failure" with 750,000k subs back during the last call.

SoE, Turbine, Trion and other MMO companies don't seem to have as high expectations (That and their games didn't cost as much to make as SWTOR) so they are perfectly happy to run their games with only 100, 200, 300 thousand subs.

I remember reading an article (though its be a while back) with an MMO lead dev who was saying that people would be shocked at the actual overhead of running an MMO. When you take staff out of the equation it costs companies virtually nothing to continue to run servers (I believe the article said an MMO could easily be run on less than 10,000 subs) and that those costs were going down due to cheaper technology coming out and this was many years ago.

The real question is how many devs are on a project and what their salary cost is.

At the end of the day it doesn't matter. EA will never shut this game down because they paid a ton of money to have it made. They will just keep cutting staff until this game is running on just a handful (less than 10) devs and will leave it to just generate any profit it can so it can recoup as much loss as possible.

They were around 700,000-750,000 at the last call, and server usage dropped a LOT in the months after that.

 

~500,000 (or less) would be about right.

ok so you say that subs were under 500k

now you are saying 500k is about right?

also what do you THINK Trion, SOE, and Turbine would consider successful?

also what do you THINK Trion, SOE, and Turbine would consider successful?

I answered your question in my post btw

Clearly all 3 of those companies are very happy with thei 200-400k subs that those games sit at.

Success in an MMO is whether there is enough money coming in to pay fixed costs + repay investors and get themselves out of the red.

 

So how successful an MMO is really depends on the fixed costs of said company vs. how much money that game is making...in so long as the game is making 1 dollar more than the fixed costs to run the game then it is successfully running. Now $1 is clearly not enough profit for anyone to keep it going, but profit is also a subjective thing. EA expects big returns on their investments and that is why the referred to SWTOR as a "failure" with 750,000k subs back during the last call.

 

SoE, Turbine, Trion and other MMO companies don't seem to have as high expectations (That and their games didn't cost as much to make as SWTOR) so they are perfectly happy to run their games with only 100, 200, 300 thousand subs.

 

I remember reading an article (though its be a while back) with an MMO lead dev who was saying that people would be shocked at the actual overhead of running an MMO. When you take staff out of the equation it costs companies virtually nothing to continue to run servers (I believe the article said an MMO could easily be run on less than 10,000 subs) and that those costs were going down due to cheaper technology coming out and this was many years ago.

 

The real question is how many devs are on a project and what their salary cost is.

 

At the end of the day it doesn't matter. EA will never shut this game down because they paid a ton of money to have it made. They will just keep cutting staff until this game is running on just a handful (less than 10) devs and will leave it to just generate any profit it can so it can recoup as much loss as possible.

actually Bioware Austin has been hiring people now that it went F2P. So it doesn't look like they are cutting more jobs anytime soon. Seems they are actually using the profit they got from F2P to put back into the game.

http://www.bioware.com/careers/austin

ok so you say that subs were under 500k

 

now you are saying 500k is about right?

 

also what do you THINK Trion, SOE, and Turbine would consider successful?

I said ~500,000 or under, so yes 500,000 is about right.......... not sure how that could be any clearer really.

SoE seems to be going after WoW with its new MMORPG, certainly.

Trion probably not so much, but then it had (and has) a tiny budget and Dev staff compared to SWTOR (or WoW) and yet they put out a phenomenal amount of content.

Turbine with LOTRO? Their biggest problem was not releasing in the early 2000's when LOTR fever was at its peak.

actually Bioware Austin has been hiring people now that it went F2P. So it doesn't look like they are cutting more jobs anytime soon. Seems they are actually using the profit they got from F2P to put back into the game.

 

 

http://www.bioware.com/careers/austin

You cannot assume that they are hiring those people BECAUSE of F2P - Perhaps those positions are from people who quit to go somewhere else but are essential positions (Note 3/4 are Senior positions) so they must be filled out of necessity.

Just because a company is hiring doesn't mean its increasing its staff size lol! I am a teacher and we hire new teachers all the time to replace retiring people or teachers who quit, but we never add more teachers to the overall number at the school.

So your point there has 0 traction...sorry.

actually Bioware Austin has been hiring people now that it went F2P. So it doesn't look like they are cutting more jobs anytime soon. Seems they are actually using the profit they got from F2P to put back into the game.

 

 

http://www.bioware.com/careers/austin

Considering the speed of content creation they do in fact really NEED to hire more staff, at least 50% more really.

I said ~500,000 or under, so yes 500,000 is about right.......... not sure how that could be any clearer really.

 

SoE seems to be going after WoW with its new MMORPG, certainly.

 

Trion probably not so much, but then it had (and has) a tiny budget and Dev staff compared to SWTOR (or WoW) and yet they put out a phenomenal amount of content.

 

Turbine with LOTRO? Their biggest problem was not releasing in the early 2000's when LOTR fever was at its peak.

again, you haven't provide ANY evidence. 0 ZIP ZILCH. So I ask again what proof do you have of their expectations.

Considering the speed of content creation they do in fact really NEED to hire more staff, at least 50% more really.

you realize 6 weeks between content patches is incredibly fast. Blizzard averages 4-5 months their record is 11 months between content patches. The only game that might be faster is Rift.

You are also missing the bigger point which is F2P is a success for SWTOR, and they are putting that money BACK INTO the game.

again, you haven't provide ANY evidence. 0 ZIP ZILCH. So I ask again what proof do you have of their expectations.

Now now, let's not be a hypocrite - you are saying things too that you have no evidence of either.

For instance you said that Bioware is making money on F2P and putting that money back into the game? Where is the proof of that? How do you know that? What if all the extra cash from the Market is going back to EA? You really have no proof of any claim your making too.

Now now, let's not be a hypocrite - you are saying things too that you have no evidence of either.

 

For instance you said that Bioware is making money on F2P and putting that money back into the game? Where is the proof of that? How do you know that? What if all the extra cash from the Market is going back to EA? You really have no proof of any claim your making too.

.... ummm they ARE HIRING NEW EMPLOYEES. You don't hire new employees who cost around 100k+ a year if your game is losing money.

.... ummm they ARE HIRING NEW EMPLOYEES. You don't hire new employees who cost around 100k+ a year if your game is losing money.

Now prove that those employess are going to be working on SWTOR.

.... ummm they ARE HIRING NEW EMPLOYEES. You don't hire new employees who cost around 100k+ a year if your game is losing money.

Oh Im sorry did you miss my post completely debunking your theory on this issue or are you just choosing to ignore it lol!?

Let me repeat it for you:

You cannot assume that they are hiring those people BECAUSE of F2P - Perhaps those positions are from people who quit to go somewhere else but are essential positions (Note 3/4 are Senior positions) so they must be filled out of necessity.

Just because a company is hiring doesn't mean its increasing its staff size lol! I am a teacher and we hire new teachers all the time to replace retiring people or teachers who quit, but we never add more teachers to the overall number at the school.

So your point there has 0 traction...sorry.

Now prove that those employess are going to be working on SWTOR.

wow you are a kid if you don't know how to read

lets read what one of the job postings at BIOWARE AUSTIN has to say

BioWare Austin is searching for a Senior Technical Artist to join our team.

hmm how many games does Bioware Austin have? Just 1 it's called SWTOR.

You lost kid, go home.

Oh Im sorry did you miss my post completely debunking your theory on this issue or are you just choosing to ignore it lol!?

 

Let me repeat it for you:

 

You cannot assume that they are hiring those people BECAUSE of F2P - Perhaps those positions are from people who quit to go somewhere else but are essential positions (Note 3/4 are Senior positions) so they must be filled out of necessity.

 

Just because a company is hiring doesn't mean its increasing its staff size lol! I am a teacher and we hire new teachers all the time to replace retiring people or teachers who quit, but we never add more teachers to the overall number at the school.

 

So your point there has 0 traction...sorry.

i'm a teacher as well and 2 weeks ago they had 6 positions for entry level programers and 3d artists.

So yes you can assume that because of F2P they are hiring more people to fill their ranks.

wow you are a kid if you don't know how to read

lets read what one of the job postings at BIOWARE AUSTIN has to say

 

BioWare Austin is searching for a Senior Technical Artist to join our team.

 

hmm how many games does Bioware Austin have? Just 1 it's called SWTOR.

 

You lost kid, go home.

What other projects are they working on?

wow you are a kid if you don't know how to read

lets read what one of the job postings at BIOWARE AUSTIN has to say

 

BioWare Austin is searching for a Senior Technical Artist to join our team.

 

hmm how many games does Bioware Austin have? Just 1 it's called SWTOR.

 

You lost kid, go home.

Sorry read the ad's more closely.. they list several games that they have.

And several locations... including in Canada.. strange that.

But, for their senior tech ad they do mention he'll be working on SWTOR. Which is very interesting if you follow the consumer service forum....

What other projects are they working on?

none it's bioware Austin

i'm a teacher as well and 2 weeks ago they had 6 positions for entry level programers and 3d artists.

 

So yes you can assume that because of F2P they are hiring more people to fill their ranks.

Haha! You know what assuming does don't you? You have no idea what or why they are hiring those people all you have is conjecture and assumptions.

Please tell me your a coach or something because if you teach anything that children really need to know then I feel very sorry for your students.

none it's bioware Austin

Prove it.

And btw...if you really are a teacher, and don't realize the illeteracy rate among adults, then I don't know what to say.

Sorry read the ad's more closely.. they list several games that they have.

 

And several locations... including in Canada.. strange that.

 

But, for their senior tech ad they do mention he'll be working on SWTOR. Which is very interesting if you follow the costumer service forum....

yes the job application for Bioware Austin mentions all the games that Bioware has produced however if you took 5 seconds to read the jobs

BioWare Austin is searching for a Senior Technical Artist to join our team.

https://performancemanager4.successfactors.com/sfcareer/jobreqcareer?jobId=12967&company=EA

The 6 jobs that were previously up said the same thing.

yes the job application for Bioware Austin mentions all the games that Bioware has produced however if you took 5 seconds to read the jobs

 

 

https://performancemanager4.successfactors.com/sfcareer/jobreqcareer?jobId=12967&company=EA

 

The 6 jobs that were previously up said the same thing.

You still have zero proof if those jobs were new jobs or jobs replacing other staff who quit for whatever reason.

They recently fired a ton of people, Why? It could be cause they were temp help...it could be because the game was not doing well...it also could be because they were poor performing people and they used that time to get rid of them so they could perhaps find new talent...

You have no idea why they are hiring people...stop acting like because a company is hiring it means they are adding staff...You have no idea!

At the very least don't call people out for not having "evidence" when you yourself really have no evidence behind your statements either.