Triggerhappytel
Member
So anyone who doesn't think it looks great is a "bandwagoning asshole"? Wow.
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Kotaku's Superannuation: The Elder Scrolls Online has cost $200 million
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
So anyone who doesn't think it looks great is a "bandwagoning asshole"? Wow.
VibratingDonkey
Member
Zenimax could just maneuver the studio into a corner and force themselves to sell as usu...oh wait.
Pre-emptive links.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=61569025&postcount=155
http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/05/what-went-wrong-with-human-heads-prey-2
Pre-emptive links.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=61569025&postcount=155
http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/05/what-went-wrong-with-human-heads-prey-2
OpinionatedCyborg
Member
the fuck? this is a Curt Schilling-esque misuse of money.
I feel this is going to bomb harder than ToR. At least that had the story missions going for it.
Heresy!
Heresy!
metalslimer
Member
I wonder if this will be the last high profile MMO underperformance or if anyone is actually still taking 5 years to build one of these things.
King Tubby
Member
Why did you post this? We already have a Giant Bomb thread.
NaDannMaGoGo
Member
Hmm...
Shogun1337, would you be so kind and point me to a video that doesn't display animations that give me a throwback to games like.. I dunno, Gothic 1 and 2?
Really, this is amazing animation for an MMORPG?
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
How do you recoup $200m by selling 1m x $60? That's $60m at best, and Zenimax won't be seeing all of that money. Not even half of what they spent on the game. It would have to have the most explosive launch in MMORPG history to recoup off box sales alone. It will not have this because it is a bad game with zero hype and bad word of mouth (justifiably).
500k subscribers is a pipe dream. It's going to bomb because it's awful. This will go down as one of the most poorly managed MMORPG projects in history, and that's pretty impressive, because almost all MMORPG projects are poorly managed money sinkholes.
BattleMonkey
Member
Any MMO investment is long term. And from over a decade of MMOs, no company can be stupid enough to expect to be rolling in the money right away.
200 million seems about right for an MMO. The decision to make this game was made at least 5 years ago when it was believed making an MMO was highly profitable. Most people don't know blizzard almost sank the company making WoW.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Evidence of this?
ScreenSplitter
Member
Oh deary me. Between this and buying iD when they hadn't made a decent game in nearly 15 years, Bethesda are full of excellent ideas.
Cliff Bleszinski on the pointless podcast. Never googled it though, figured it wasn't something that you could fact check.
BrokenSymmetry
Member
At least TOR had some amazing trailers (still the best thing to come out of the game), and the class stories were pretty good, with some great voice acting (although the non-class content was too repetitive). ESO doesn't even have anything like this.
Piercedveil
Member
I hope this doesn't do as badly as I'm imagining.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
FTFY
Shit's changed, mang.
Vivendi was not in the best of financial status in 2004, and WoW came out early yet miraculously good under those conditions. And WoW has always been expensively lush.
Find podcasts and interviews with the guys and gals who worked on WoW during its alpha/beta about those times. They're fascinating.
metalslimer
Member
Except what we've seen is that long terms MMOs go F2P that are not WoW.
NeededSleep
Member
So many people are gonna lose their job from this 
. Probably gonna be one of the largest bombs ever.
. Probably gonna be one of the largest bombs ever.Titan's been brewing for nearly as long, got completely rebooted recently, and will be widely considered a failure if it doesn't launch to 10m or so subs. We can also probably expect an FF17 to launch before people are really done with FF14 and struggle at first even if it's good.
It's huge, but it doesn't necessarily have to be AS huge as five-eight years worth of AAA titles. A lot of design, writing, balance, and quest work can be done with a skeleton staff, and then fleshed out when it goes into crunch.
However, things like English-language voice (TOR) or building on one engine/scrapping/redoing (FF14 as a whole, TESO) complicate things a lot.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Cliff Bleszinski and random people who worked on the game during alpha/beta?
I know Vivendi wasn't doing all that great, but this is really the first I've heard that Blizzard came close to "sinking" as a result of WoW's development. You'd think there would at least be a write up somewhere about this topic, but Google is turning up nothing for me.
Uncle00Jesse
Banned
Why is everyone so quick to say the game and this model will flop?
People fucking love Skyrim and the preceding games. ESO has the unique characteristic of being an online extension of a well known and loved series. Yes SWTOR was in the same boat, but lets be honest the game was and still is a piece of shit. Bethesda is by leaps and bounds a better studio than EA and we can be safe to assume they'll make a good game with the 200 mill.
People fucking love Skyrim and the preceding games. ESO has the unique characteristic of being an online extension of a well known and loved series. Yes SWTOR was in the same boat, but lets be honest the game was and still is a piece of shit. Bethesda is by leaps and bounds a better studio than EA and we can be safe to assume they'll make a good game with the 200 mill.
BattleMonkey
Member
And? It bring in money and can make a game profitable, that's all that matters. People love to claim failure on countless games but their transition to f2p turned things around, they are operating and making money for years.
MMO is long term investment, it doesn't matter if they switch from subs to f2p, all that matters is that the company gets a constant revenue stream for years to come.
Jawmuncher
Member
Given the amount of marketing EA put into Star Wars, unless Elder Scrolls exceeds that and truly brings something new to the table. I see us with a 200 million dollar F2P title by 2015.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
1. Bethesda is not developing this game.
2. This is not an online extension of a well known and loved series except in name.
3. People fucking love Skyrim because it was a good game.
If you had seen this game in action, you would know immediately that it's going to be a flop. Hell, even if you hadn't seen it in action, you should know from the complete lack of hype that isn't paid for.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
They ain't random anyone, they're the ones who made the game. The only one I remember (and there are several) was an interview Brad Shoemaker did a few years back with 3 guys who are now spared out thru the industry; they specifically mention money (or lack thereof) being a major factor as to WoW releasing holiday 2004. It should be on GB somewhere, and the various other WoW veteran interviews mention it as well, but I can't for the life remember the specifics of the rest. Really though, at this point they'd all have to be lying or deluded for it not to be true.
NullPointer
Member
Gotta chase that Shadowrun money.
TheFLYINGManga_Ka
Member
I don't know. MMOs nowadays look like a tough sell.
Good luck to them though.
Good luck to them though.
Triggerhappytel
Member
At the very least enough funds for developing The Elder Scrolls VI and Fallout 4 plus marketing.
And those two are games people actually want!
The Dutch Slayer
Member
Seriously asking they are not public?
tinfoilhatman
all of my posts are my avatar
I'm not sure people REALLY want to play Elder Scrolls Online, I personally I have zero interest in an online only ES game.
Hesemonni
Banned
Why does this company not understand that their their customer base would be perfectly happy with with TES and Fallout game + expansion packs every three years? Hell, they can even use the same engine for both.
Main reason I would have been interested in this are the interesting design challenges a first person only MMO would have introduced, but since they allow 3rd person they can design it like every other WoW-like MMO and anyone with a zoomed out view will probably have an advantage during PVP, bosses, etc.
OldAsUrSock
Banned
No, a lower monthly fee would have to be necessary to recoup those costs in a timely fashion. $15 a month is too much for a new MMO to enter into and F2P would not earn them the revenue they need.
Cato the Censor
Member
EA is not a studio. Bethesda is not developing this MMO. People who played the game found out that the only thing they could be safe to assume about it was that it sucked.
Hope springs eternal, though. Like lint.
Kabuki Waq
Member
Zenimax Media is a private company, yes. They probably were the largest private gaming company in the west before Steam really took off. I would imagine that Valve is bigger now.
piratepwnsninja
Member
Is that ever coming out?