Funny, any Ultima fan will tell the opposite story.
I don't think the reality is anywhere near so simple as that.
First, keep in mind that EA saved Origin well before most of the Wing Commander games we know and love were a gleam in Chris Roberts' eye. Privateer, Wing Commander III, IV, Prophecy and many others were all developed under EA's watch and with EA's money.
Second, Electronic Arts continued to develop Wing Commander games in exactly the same way that they continued to develop Ultima games after 1998... as massively multiplayer projects. And *none* of those, for either franchise, panned out.
I can't speak to mismanagement or how much corporate interference there was or anything of that nature... but it seems to me that what ultimately 'killed' Origin was their inability to replicate the impossible success of Ultima Online.
They got 'lucky' and invented an entirely new way to make money, which made them the de facto gold standard in that field... so EA went with Privateer Online and Ultima Online 2 (and Harry Potter Online!) instead of Wing Commander 7 and Ultima 10. It just never worked out again.
... but I don't think this story is over yet, do you?
Desslock said:Praise be to Blizzard for not abandoning us. For a while, it seemed Blizzard was so giddy over the truly monstrous success of World of Warcraft that it might shelve its non-MMO Diablo and StarCraft franchises. That decision wouldn’t have been unprecedented, as EA and Origin Systems stopped Origin’s development of non-MMO games and let the legendary single-player Ultima and Wing Commander series lie fallow after Ultima Online launched to unexpected commercial success. Ultima Online attracted up to 250,000 subscribers at its peak, but World of Warcraft has achieved an entirely unique level of financial success by garnering more than 10,000,000 players, so, devoting resources exclusively to similar MMO products would arguably have been even more justifiable. Fortunately, Blizzard isn’t run by dolts.
Blizzard realizes there’s greater value in continuing to develop its brands in a variety of ways. While it’s likely inevitable we’ll get a StarCraft Online and another fantasy MMO that uses the Diablo franchise, we’ll get the opportunity beforehand to play more traditional installments of those classics
EA paid the price for its short-sighted decision to terminate Origin’s non-MMO game development—the Origin team struggled to duplicate Ultima Online’s success and never managed to release another online game. In fact, EA made an incessant series of mistakes in developing online games, a whole slew of which—including Majestic, Ultima Online 2, Motor City Online, Privateer Online, Ultima X, and Earth & Beyond—were either never commercially released or were sustained for only brief MMO life spans. Even The Sims Online attracted a tiny player base compared to the series that inspired it, and soon will go offline permanently. Successful MMOs are the most lucrative PC games, but it’s extremely difficult to attract and maintain a player base that’s sufficiently large and loyal enough to justify an MMO’s development and operating costs. Giant companies like Microsoft and EA have repeatedly failed despite their tremendous resources, and most MMO projects have lost buckets of money.
Blizzard recognizes that more traditional games can generate the sort of large, loyal player community that can ultimately be drawn upon to help successfully launch an MMO. So, Diablo III is on its way, and it looks fantastic. It’s the first 3D game in the series, but it retains the traditional isometric perspective and incorporates interactive environments. It recaptures the original Diablo’s feeling of playing with a cool miniature world, which was partially lost in Diablo II’s muddy and outdated low-res graphics. The inspired monster designs and distinct character classes appear to foreshadow another incredibly addictive action RPG.
Hellgate developer Flagship suspended its subscription service, leaving many subscribers feeling burned
Yet, Diablo III arguably isn’t the first Diablo II offspring. That nod must go to Hellgate: London, which was developed by core team members of the Diablo series, and sadly appears ready to join EA’s annals as another failed online game. Hellgate is an excellent action RPG that was crippled by a disastrous subscription-fee model. Despite offering tremendous value by including a huge campaign and cooperative online multiplayer (as the Diablo games did), Hellgate offended hordes of gamers by asking them to pay a monthly fee for perks, such as a larger stash and additional content. The subscription model utilized development resources that would have been better deployed polishing the game before its release. Optional expansions like those Guild Wars has successfully released have proven a more commercially palatable manner of charging for additional content. Hellgate is an excellent action RPG that a lot of gamers aren’t going to get to enjoy because of its terrible online strategy.
But now, at least we know a true sequel to Diablo is rising from the abyss, and let’s hope Blizzard once again proves it doesn’t make those kinds of mistakes.
Even before the 'onlines' wasn't there a lot of talk about money squandered on countless projects that ultimately ended up canceled (and I don't mean WC or ultima)? By the time of WC prophecy they were in the middle of consolidating?
I think that fact is that we remain WC-less, at least on the PC, the series home platform. The Xbox game was a nice diversion, but it fell pretty short of a full WC game like W1, 2, priv, so on. I mean, the best thing about it, universe-wise, was the manual.
It is wrong to paint EA as the big bad guy, but they ain't no patron saints either. They did us very right in the past, but also fucked up seriously. BTW, I'm an Ultima fan and I weep for the mess the series became after 7. 8 was a let down and 9 was a revolting mess that fucked up the lore royally. Sure, we can put the blame on Origin for that, but Odyssey was looking good, and it got canned.
They do seem to be getting over their Evil Corp complex...
Good article. Blizzard succeeded (and, more importantly, survived, even under Activion/Vivendi/Whatever) where Origin and Westwood failed.
I'm not sure the whole online gaming thing is entirely responsable for that. Anyone remember Bullfrog? It went under without a "World of Syndicate: Bullfrog" to blame. Maxis is still around, in a way, despite failure of The Sims Online.
Survived under the merger that happened... three weeks ago? Origin was still developing Wing Commander games *ten years* after being the EA buyout. There's no way to compare the two at this point
Well, survived until the merger. Anyway, it isn’t much about comparing their current status, but what happened to them in the last decade or so. Blizzard is one of the few companies from the early-mid 90’s still around in a recognizable form – Maxis is another. The article helps explain why that happened.
Blaming the 1991 buyout entirely on the eventual 2004 closure is like saying that someone died because they were born.
One last thought I wanted to add...
The only real reason why anyone of us, specifically, could put the 'evil corp' label on EA is that they stopped making our favorite games after the turmoil of the MMO-frenzy that drowned them. It wasn't really their fault or intention. The market was changing.
Yes, there was a time - for almost a decade - where they formulaically released games. Was that any different than Ultima & Wing Commander titles you'd need to use two or three hands to count? Yes and no. The Ultima and Wing Commander games were good, and evolved (in the case of Ultima, it did a U-turn right at the end). Still, the particulars of EA's more contemporary games were bad design choices, and not so much corporate.
So, to be fair, you could say that they're now making more diverse IP choices and trying to re-balance their strength. I don't think they were ever "evil", or did anything that one couldn't understand. Obviously they've done something right to still be here after decades.
The 'risk' was that the EA/Origin deal could have gone down-hill quick, financially, had the video game industry not experienced an unprecented boom (consider the amount of money circulating the industry between 1990 and today). They didn't burn, and there wasn't many signs that they would. Still, there was more to worry about in that situation than the Activision/Vivendi situation. That's big business. I don't see how Blizzard could get lost in that. However, I could see how Origin could have back then.