Bandit LOAF said:
You don't really know what you're talking about, though. They tried to develop "UO2" several times -- and each time market research showed that the only people they'd be competing with would be themselves. EA very correctly determined that there's a set user base for MMPRPGs, not an unlimited source of players -- this is something they *failed* to do with regards to Full Motion Video in games, and then crushed the market forever with Wing Commander IV. It's a very intelligent choice on their part. (Sony has discovered exactly this problem as it tried to expand its MMP base -- there are only so many people who'll play these games, and it's hard to justify multiple ten million dollar development runs for a user base you already have.)
I know about the aborted UO2's. But the thing with market research is knowing which question to make. WoW has reached huge numbers of players, and a lot of those people probably didn't play MMORPGs before. MArketing management is in fact Demand management. You could just try to find some unknown demand and supply it, but nowadays the tendency is CREATING the damned demand. Sony actually managed to consolidate their user base with the Station Pass, but that probably cuts the profit a bit.
Anyway, if Blizzard bought these market researches that EA used, they wouldn't publish WoW. And there it is, a big success. These "oh, we already have all MMORPG players in our game, there isn't anyone else left" arguments are BULLSHIT in the present time. WOW, GW, CoH and to a certain extent FFXI proves them wrong. Mind you, these games all lack several features present in UO. a new and improved UO2, true to the original AND offering the new features presented in the newer contenders could be a success.
UO is in the "cash cow" stage of a product's life cycle, but it could go back to the "golden boy" stage. It has a bit of market share, but little to no growth potential. A new UO could enhance this.
BANDIT Loaf said:
As for 'replacing' UO, they tried - Origin developed an entirely new 3D client for Ultima Online. What was the result? People preferred - and still prefer! - the original 2D client. UO is on "life support" in that it's still profitable so they still release expansions for it - they're certainly not propping the game up beyond its means. (In fact, just believing that they would would seem to counter your own argument -- a company doesn't keep a game on 'life support' when it's making a profit.)
Sincere question: How many people are still activelly playing UO? I'm really asking it, i wanna know.
Anyway, IIRC the so called 3D client was REALLY bad. But that's not the point. If Origin didn't make Ultima 5 and 6, people would still be playing RPGs with stick figures and black backgrounds. They would tell you that stick figures and black backgrounds are great. There is no need to "upgrade". But BANG, OSI did it, people gnashed teeth, they complained and cried, and everybody loved u6 and u7.
Bandit LOAF said:
Actually, it proves exactly what you just demanded of it -- that the better game sell more copies. That was *your* requirement, not Chris'. If you think that the fact that a more expensive game that has been out for less time doesn't have *anything* to do with its quality, you're crazy.
Eh? what? didn't get it. I was lamenting how inferior games sell very well while better games languish, while wishing that the opposite was true. I pointed that unfortunatelly the number of sold units is not a measure of quality. What is wrong with that?
Bandit LOAF said:
The whole EA sports issue is such a non-argument -- in that the people who actually play these games don't complain about them. Slashdotians like to take the fact that EA releases a new football game each football season and complain about... well, horribly mindless crap... but the people who are buying a new football game each football season happily choose the EA brand.
I disagree, I have seen several sports games fans complaining about EA. And again, I never read Slashdot at all. Care to provide some evidence that the only guys and gals who complain about Madden are EA haters?
The fact that MAdden is so established as THE american football game among the more casual sports-gaming onyl crowd is the reason why they didn't make a new engine since 2001. the game looks worse than the other competitors, and also plays worse. If EA had to work harder to make those people buy Madden, they wouldn't rest on their laurels so bad.
BTW, AFAIK, the situation is better in other sports genres. Fifa really has to impress people, given that Winning Eleven is so popular...
Bandit LOAF said:
First of all, no, it wasn't. There was no such announcement because no Wing Commander project after Secret Ops was ever announced. Second, you must know that even if a PR person said this (which they didn't), that it was a complete lie -- those "resources" were fired and sent to go work at Sony.
Well, i seem to recall that kind of information, but as I possess no way of proving them, I won't press the point. Anyway, I was refering to resources in general (time, cash, people), not just personell.
Bandit LOAF said:
Third, you're misrepresenting the timeline -- UO took off well before Prophecy and Secret Ops came out. If anything, UO's grand success meant EA kept funding Origin through the development of these other games which the company *didn't* believe in - SO in particular, which was fashioned very much to find a new 'followup' to UO's incredible success (which, incidentally, was a brilliant risk on EA's part that unfortunately for us and them didn't take off).
Even then, LOAF, overhead on UO's operation did continue to grow after the early success. And what did EA do with the people and money invested in WCOnline and Priv3 and etc after cancelling them? What other game did OSI have?
Well, I really question some of EA's decisions at the time. They could have been a bit bolder and supported some of these titles. Didn't they perform market research BEFORE commiting them into development? Was it really so necessary to cut the losses and write that investment off?
Bandit LOAF said:
You could have fooled me -- because here's that generic internet rant about monopolies. Well, here's a cold, hard truth: Electronic Arts isn't a monopoly. Electronic Arts will never, ever, ever, ever, ever be a monopoly, no matter how many times the kids on the cool part of the internet say so.
It will be competing with giant companies like Nintendo and Sony and Paramount and FOX and Microsoft until the end of time. And yes, it will buy small development houses. That's how, as this thread started, Wing Commander came to be what it is today. But you know what? If EA doesn't buy TinyCompanyCo, Nintendo, Sony, Paramount, FOX or Microsoft *will*. In all likelyhood, that's why the people who run TinyCompanyCo started the business in the first place -- to make money from such a sale. There's no loser there - everyone is doing exactly what they set out to do. Picking on EA - for personal reasons - when it's part of a giant system of similar companies upon which the entire industry is based is a poor, poor argument.
EA is already the monopoly in NFL branded games... I wasn't refering to them as the Big Brother of ALL THE GAMING INDUSTRY. But they're getting closer to being the Microsoft of PC gaming. Their stake in Ubisoft is one of the evidence. Most of the other competitors are focusing on console gaming. And you have to understand that there are several different markets in gaming. Dance Dance Mario is not fighting with Shadow of the Colossus for the marketshare, and neither of the two are really competing with Battlefield2 for the PC.
And I don't know about the tinycompany example. It is one thing to be bought by 1990's EA and another to be bought by them now. Sure, all biggies buy the small ones. But EA is really the more aggressive predator here. For instance, MS seems to have settled down a bit. The only other company that seems comparable to EA today is Squareenix in Japan. And already they seem to be losing focus in their games and gameplay.
I'm no pink commie, loaf, I do think that free enterprise and profiting and all that is ok. I'm no idiotic angsty teenager ranting on the itahweb about how all corps are evil. But there is a reason why something like the SEC exist, and why stuff like the MS monopoly law suits happened. Sometimes some of those corps become... a little too greedy for their own good. No, actually it is too greedy to OUR own good. Corps aren't EVIL, but they sure as hell aren't NICE either.
I like to have option. I like the fact that I can pick between City of Heroes and WoW, or Splinter Cell and MGS, or maybe even play all of those. But if Ubi goes down or Sony fully consolidates the console (pardon the involuntary pun) market, some of these choices will disappear.