Is Old Republic the Most Expensive Video Game Ever?

bpmurrGT said:
Something doesn't seem right about having to buy a game that you then pay monthly for. Just make the game free to install and charge the monthly fee. Isn't the residual income where the money is made anyways?
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lol I have been saying this for years. But EA is the king of screwing people on EVERY possible angle. Look at BF3 lol. Pay for the game outright, still need to grind upgrades, still must use origin. Pay more for a basic extra set of levels.

I never understood how people would pay money for a game then pay a subscription on top of that. Well I guess if the product is worth it then so be it.

But everytime I turn around and do not understand a new trend it just keeps growing.
 
If subscriber falloff in SWTOR is as nearly as rapid as it was in Warhammer Online, I think this will be the end of the huge budget MMO. SWTOR might be good, but the current trend for most MMOs is a huge marketing blitz, selling tons of copies, lots of excited people, then watching subscribers start dropping like a rock before they get to 3 months because the game is "Just another MMO".

I think a lot of people would rather see more original MMO games with smaller budgets. Then those teams would work to constantly improve the game and increase subscribers instead of going for everything right at the launch. SWTOR doesn't bleed quality like a 200 million game should, and I bet that still had a lot of that money to work on things people want them too.

Love it or hate it, EVE Online was fairly basic at launch and managed to be successful through constant improvement (which sometimes backfired, but at least they tried)
 
Post above should read...

" I bet they wish they still had a lot of that money to work on things people want them too. "
 
So one little question... other than analyst estimates, where's the data to indicate how much EA/Bioware actually spent developing TOR? So far as I know, the actual figures have not been released and everyone is just making their best guesstimate. The $200M number seems to come from an LA Times article, but no mention is made in that article where they got that number from, and most of the article is fluff. It's nearly all original, unsourced work by the authors and a number of unrelated quotes from various sources strung together.

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the budget were that large, but people are throwing that $200M number around like it's canon, when there has been no comment from EA/BW about the actual development costs.

That said, regardless of its faults, TOR is hardly a bad game. It hooked me in a way WoW never managed to, as I never had the slightest interest in the Warcraft lore and it has always had utterly atrocious art direction. It took many of the things WoW did right without being a full-on clone, and incorporates some of the elements that are more hit than miss from other BW titles.

I fall into the casual category, as I just don't have the time or energy to play any MMO hardcore, so a lot of the things people are harping on the most (buggy endgame, etc.) are not things I've yet experienced, and as I don't plan to spend 5 nights a week raiding my face off, I doubt they'll ever fill me with such rage that I have a massive internet QQ fest.

I've had relatively few issues with bugs - one mission got an NPC stuck behind a door, but resetting the phase (which cost me about 2 minutes of my life... most of that spent figuring out which conversation options I could milk for the most affection) fixed it.

I've had a few graphical glitches, but I'm not sure if they're Hero engine problems or CF problems. Given AMD's recent issues with CF, I'm not ready to point the finger either way just yet. A friend playing on a similar system with a single graphics card hasn't seen any of the graphical issues I have. I am let down by the poor AA implementation in the game, and it is one of the few major annoyances I have that will not be simple to patch up in the coming months.

After some other MMO launches I've been through, I can't help but think TOR launched fairly well. With as much as the game cost, the launch should've been even better, but on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being the FFXIV launch and 10 being peoples' rose-colored spectacle recollection of the WoW launch (in other words, an MMO launch which has never happened), it's probably a 7 or an 8.

I doubt TOR will be as profitable as EA was hoping, but it should hardly be a money pit, and if the developers actually follow through on their plans, subs should stabilize at a healthy level. It probably won't ever maintain WoW numbers, but I doubt any other MMO ever will, it was the right game at the right time to capitalize on a market. With a decent pace of development, it'll become an even more solid game, and with any luck the devs will learn from what did and didn't work at launch and adjust accordingly going forward (especially encounter design).
 
I beta tested SWTOR, and after a few days I didn't bother playing any more. Pretty bad when you can't be bothered to play a free game. If I wanted to play WOW I would have played WOW.
 
All I want is one hell of an epic SINGLE PLAYER continuation of X-Wing vs Tie Fighter.

I mean seriously, with the advances of the last decade behind us it should be possible to create a game that is simply outrageously good, has at least fifty hours of gameplay and spends some serious time both in and out of ships building story.

Hard to say if it even needs to be sandbox, it just needs to tell an extremely good story.

Which MMOs NEVER manage to do.

And for that matter what was wrong with the Jedi Knight series of games? How did they manage to screw things up so badly that we ended up with Force Unleashed? It's like Lucasarts took the success and the building blocks of all the former games and said 'Let's change this completely because obviously people don't know what they want!"

I ENJOYED the Jedi Knight and Jedi Academy games and in particualr their game mechanics. It was moving in the right direction.

So getting back on track, other than money why are they pushing a 200 million dollar MMO on the Star Wars franchise? It's the story, the universe and the endearing characters that make a Star Wars experience memorable. An MMO can provide the universe but the current generations of MMO games are terrible in the extreme at providing story or deep character interaction.

But I didn't like WOW either, and yes I've played a few of the popular MMOs over the years but after the original Everquest I have more or less hated all MMOs mostly because nothing has really changed the genre and they're all stagnant and uninteresting.
 
200 million dollars? How? I gave up after 20 hours of running around cut and paste corridors spraying gravel at legions of robots and indistinguishable humanoids. Apart from the voice acting and the party conversations it was one of the most boring MMOs I've played. If it wasn't Star Wars it would have disappeared into the sea of free-to-play MMOs in the first month.
 
SixFootDuo said:
Star Wars really had to play to it's strengths. One of those being the lore that everyone knows and loves. Why you can't raid with Yoda helping you is ... beyond me. Why Darthvader isn't some big bad ass raid boss is, again, mind boggling. That's turning away millions and millions of potential dollars by not allowing the player base access to that well known lore. Some guy over at Wired.com said it best when he destroyed Swtor. Swtor really is a casual / social game and it's quickly running out of interested customers.

Space .... rail .... combat? ... well, o-k then lmfao. One of the many many blunders.

They screwed up Dungeons and Dragons. they screwed up Star Trek, they screwed up Lord of the Rings, they are bombing out with Swtor. Let's pray to god they get Fallout MMO right.
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You realize the SWTOR universe is set 3000 (well, 2700 years, technically) in the past, right? Players were asking for Knights of the old republic 3 and this is essentially what they got instead. Same timeline and 300 years after the initial stories.

That's why there is no Darth Vader or Yoda and honestly that would be kind of silly anyway; people already know what happenes to both, future tense.
 
Unsurprising honestly.

Frankly the requirement of an origin account should of been enough to steer most intelligent people clear of this game.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
Unsurprising honestly.

Frankly the requirement of an origin account should of been enough to steer most intelligent people clear of this game.
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I've been playing swtor since the week before release, and I have never logged into or knowingly created an origin account. I refused to purchase Battlefield 3 for exactly that reason. I purchased a box edition of SWTOR, and downloaded the game through the swtor website. No EA Origin on my system. I'm not sure where this FUD comes from.
Did they create an origin account based on my swtor account? Ok, do I care that they can see I play swtor? Not really.
 
I don't know how much they spent - but they really screwed up their first major patch for pvp. Lvl 50 imps have it made now because they can still get 3x the valor in ilum and deck out their toon in battlemaster gear...which pretty much makes high level pvp impossible for others - when all you face are pimped out imps.
 
Cantonious said:
I've been playing swtor since the week before release, and I have never logged into or knowingly created an origin account. I refused to purchase Battlefield 3 for exactly that reason. I purchased a box edition of SWTOR, and downloaded the game through the swtor website. No EA Origin on my system. I'm not sure where this FUD comes from.
Did they create an origin account based on my swtor account? Ok, do I care that they can see I play swtor? Not really.
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It isn't FUD.. It comes directly from their FAQ. http://www.swtor.com/info/faq
 
I have origin on my system, I also bought ToR via origin, but origin doesn't start or run during ToR. I also know that a friend doesn't have an origin account and is in ToR without ever signing up to the service.

It could possible that it automatically creates an origin account when you create your ToR account (same s/n&pw).
 
$50 for the game, then i have to pay $15 a month for a game i just purchased. Down with subscription games of any kind imo. Let it fail.
 
Budwise said:
$50 for the game, then i have to pay $15 a month for a game i just purchased. Down with subscription games of any kind imo. Let it fail.
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It's 60 for the game in this case.

I don't really agree with the complete dismissal of subscription fees though. When you really enjoy an mmo, it usually becomes the only game you even bother to play for a while, in which case 15 a month is like 50 cents a day for a game you're having a blast with. And like others have said, most big MMO's include content for that cost. Every major patch, i.e. x.1, x.2, etc. usually involves new dungeons, new raids, new quests, changes to mechanics, etc. It's been like this in a lot of MMO's for a while.

Of course, this only rings true if you actually enjoy MMO's, for those that don't, then yeah I see The point. Also, I think GW2 may be a game changer. If that game manages to deliver a top tier MMO experience, with no sub fee and just the cost of the game, it could be a real winner, even attracting people who have been turned off by sub fees so far.
 
ocellaris said:
After EA messed up Warhammer Online so badly, I am surprised they would throw this much money into another MMO.
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Warhammer fanbase is a tiny dot, compared to the amount of revenue that is produced using the Star Wars universe.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
It isn't FUD.. It comes directly from their FAQ. http://www.swtor.com/info/faq
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Jaer44 said:
I have origin on my system, I also bought ToR via origin, but origin doesn't start or run during ToR. I also know that a friend doesn't have an origin account and is in ToR without ever signing up to the service.

It could possible that it automatically creates an origin account when you create your ToR account (same s/n&pw).
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This is exactly what I mean. I understand that their FAQ discusses Origin. But I have had zero interaction with Origin since my purchase. I don't login to it, i don't load it, I didn't have to run it, or download it, the game works fine "without" it.
 
They might have better sales if they didn't region lock the freaking game. I tried getting the game through Origin but they wouldn't let me because of my IP. I thought of using a free proxy to get around that, but didn't feel comfortable sending credit card details through it.

Steam has never discriminated against me because of where I live, so they get my money.
 
Budwise said:
$50 for the game, then i have to pay $15 a month for a game i just purchased. Down with subscription games of any kind imo. Let it fail.
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Yes exactly... and it's $60, not $50!

If it was free or $30 I might try it. But I am not interested in MMO action, I just want KOTOR 3. If it goes down to $30 with an included month or two of pair time I might try it. But I would hope to knock it out before I have to start paying $15 a month for it.
 
Burticus said:
Yes exactly... and it's $60, not $50!

If it was free or $30 I might try it. But I am not interested in MMO action, I just want KOTOR 3. If it goes down to $30 with an included month or two of pair time I might try it. But I would hope to knock it out before I have to start paying $15 a month for it.
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There is no "knock it out" with an MMO, you play it until you are bored with it. I'm enjoying SWTOR more than I thought I would. I remember a year ago saying I wasn't interested in it at all, but after having played it I'm glad I reconsidered, it's a fun game.

I actually hadn't seriously considered it until the beta invite I received in October. Until that point I had no desire to purchase it, let alone read about it.
 
You can tell Bioware spent a lot of time and effort into the game. Despite minor bugs, it is worth the $ when compared to past MMO-releases.
 
Advil said:
All I want is one hell of an epic SINGLE PLAYER continuation of X-Wing vs Tie Fighter.

I mean seriously, with the advances of the last decade behind us it should be possible to create a game that is simply outrageously good, has at least fifty hours of gameplay and spends some serious time both in and out of ships building story.

And for that matter what was wrong with the Jedi Knight series of games? How did they manage to screw things up so badly that we ended up with Force Unleashed? It's like Lucasarts took the success and the building blocks of all the former games and said 'Let's change this completely because obviously people don't know what they want!"

I ENJOYED the Jedi Knight and Jedi Academy games and in particualr their game mechanics. It was moving in the right direction.
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^This and add in Kotor 3 would be ok too althought I feel like with Mass Effect 1/2/3, another Kotor game might be underwhelming at this point b/c being made by Bioware potentially would be like ME2-3 with a facelift.
 
Here's how far $200 million goes:

Average 150k per employee including administrative overhead
(average employee making ~$80k)

= 1333 man years / development time =employees

Assume 4.5 years development time then they had roughly 300 employees. I'm not sure how many people it takes to make a game, but I'd venture most game devs have less than 100 people per game.

If they spent $200 million and if each purchaser ends up paying for 3 months, then they're making roughly $85 per customer. They need 2 million subscribers to break even.

They're more than halfway there.
 
My buds and I are having a total blast with TOR. Maybe we're just part of the minority (or the majority who doesn't post on forums), but the more detailed story (compared to other mmos) right out the bat helped bring us in and has kept us playing casually. Give that there are 8 separate story lines, it will easily take me 8 months just to view all the release content not to mention what is released between now and then.

About the only thing that could make it better would be eve-online integrated into the space component and more eve style pvp. If I kill another player, I want to loot everything he had :D
 
Strict forum rules, horrible support, EA at the time supporting SOPA/PIPA, the game is fine stop whinning attitude... etc etc

I just think that SW tried too hard to appeal to the casuals with the SW license and ignore the hardcore mmo'ers, as opposed to WOW who first got the hardcore players in then made it casual.
 
6 years and they are finally getting to basic functionality? lol. I do have to say that the space battles look great.
 
LAiN_OfTheWired said:
I tried WoW once and could not get into it at all. SWTOR, however, has kept me (not an MMO player) interested. It's not horribly buggy, I've only stumbled on one actual bug and a small number (less than 5) of graphical glitches. I really wish the monthly rate would be lower, though. I'm not sure if I'm willing to go more than 3 months max at $14.99/month ($13.99/month if you pay into the 3 month renewal plan).
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That is ridiculous, not surprised, it's actually pretty typical EA protocol. Hype and quantity over
quality and substance. I wouldn't be surprised if that $200m wager isn't considered a success by the big wigs if it doesn't at least generate a billion in revenue, that's how greedy they come off to me. $4.99 would have been a sweet spot for a monthky fee, how am I expected to pay almost triple then my Xbox live account, EA deserves to take a dump on this, how else will they learn.
 
Maximus825 said:
Except it does have every one of those things...
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You just don't launch a space based mmo and not have ships, space combat, upgrades, trading, exploration etc etc etc.

You have multiple ships with different stats to choose from? Space combat that's less complex than 10+ year old games such as Wing Commander, Freespace, and a game they should have used to base it on; Xwing vs. Tie Fighter. Where's the exploration? You pick a planet and go. So no, it doesn't have all of that. It's unfortunate that space is simply a backdrop in TOR.

TOR is WoW with a space theme. There were numerous areas where they could have really taken advantage of the Star Wars name and differentiated themselves from every other MMO out there but reskinning WoW and giving it some Star Wars lore was what they did.
 
I don't play MMO's but a space sim game without space is kind of stupid don't you think?
 
Bambi said:
Strict forum rules, horrible support, EA at the time supporting SOPA/PIPA, the game is fine stop whinning attitude... etc etc

I just think that SW tried too hard to appeal to the casuals with the SW license and ignore the hardcore mmo'ers, as opposed to WOW who first got the hardcore players in then made it casual.
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Thing is if you want to have a reliable subscription base, it pays to cater to the hardcore players who will sub for years.

There's a reason drug dealers don't sell gold watches. No one becomes addicted to that.
 
BTW, does anyone else get the feeling that if they'd just made it a sandbox like SWG was initially it might have been a lot better?

A game where anything worth having can only be had through grinding mobs or looting stuff is not a sandbox. You could play SWG for years without fighting a single mob, or raiding anything, or grinding rep.
 
There is space exploration, slave trading, cargo, spices, materials, containers, etc, that sorta of thing? Ship upgrades? Large and small ship space combat? Like the real Star Wars Universe?
 
Isn't EA still in the habit of banning Origin accounts for saying something bad on a forum?
 
If it didn't cost $60 up front plus $15/month, I'd try it out.

But I'm not about to front $60 to try a game I may or may not like. (A 15-day free trial would be nice, like how WoW did it. Give me a chance to decide if it's worth it.)

With an offline or Deathmatch game, it's all about the game itself, and reviews are sufficient. With an MMORPG, it's about the online experience. And that can vary massively from person to person, and needs to be tested.
 
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