Star Wars: The Old Republic Profitable With 500,000 Subs

[Tom Goldman]

Star Wars: The Old Republic Profitable With 500,000 Subs

EA has revealed the approximate number of subscribers BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic will need to stay in business.

EA CFO Scott Brown has Star Wars: The Old Republic [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/105946-EA-Old-Republic-Doesnt-Need-a-Million-Subscribers] doesn't need to be profitable, but what about the number it does need? According to his comments on a recent conference call: 500,000.

"At half a million subscribers, the game is substantially profitable, but it's not the kind of thing we would write home about," he said. "Anything north of a million subscribers, it's a very profitable business."

Brown had previously said that The Old Republic, confirmed to be EA's hasn't been confirmed [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/100967-Star-Wars-The-Old-Republic-is-EAs-Most-Expensive-Project-in-History].

Even if the venerable World of Warcraft [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/104345-Alleged-Insider-Airs-EAs-Dirty-Laundry], and you've got yourself a few hundred million more bucks to put in the corporate till.

My best guess is that BioWare and Star Wars fans combined would add up to 500,000. As with all MMOs, the trick is to keep players wearing their Mandalorian Armor after the initial purchasing binge at release. Because of its pedigree, it'd actually be a little depressing to see Old Republic fail, so lets hope it has the chops to retain the subscribers it needs.

Source: Gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/32784/EA_Old_Republic_MMO_To_Show_Profit_With_500000_Subscribers.php]

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[PiercisionBass]

Looking forward to this game--hope it lives up to the expectations.

 

[FortheLegion]

While I will probably never play it I hope it will be a good game.

 

[Lyri]

Please don't suck, please don't suck, please don't suck.

 

[ionveau]

Its going to be a copy of War hammer crash, Only wow has perfected the MMO style game.


1 year after its out there will be 100,000 people playing maximum

I saw the game play, its stiff and unnatural, not like the smooth game play WoW has, even though wow is a bad game this wont make people turn over

 

[Rabid Toilet]

That's good to hear. I really want this game to be good and profitable, and 500,000 really isn't that huge of a number to reach. I think Aion is currently at 3-4 million.

 

[JediMB]

I'm ignoring a powerful urge to go nuts as a superhero in DCUO for TOR's sake. Looking forward to it.

 

[Arisato-kun]

$15 a month? I already play WoW and it's a Star Wars game made by Bioware. Consider me on board.

 

[joshthor]

imma be a subscriber for at least 3 months. it looks amazing and i love star wars almost as much as i love bioware.

 

[Ranooth]

I'd pay just to play the beta!

 

[RobCoxxy]

Please don't go APB on me!
EA, learn! Let them finish it!

 

[ionveau]

I'm ignoring a powerful urge to go nuts as a superhero in DCUO for TOR's sake. Looking forward to it.

Go nuts dude, it's going to be a while.

Its going to be a copy of War hammer crash, Only wow has perfected the MMO style game.


1 year after its out there will be 100,000 people playing maximum

One of the general problems with Warhammer Online was that it just wasn't all that interesting beyond Warhammer fans. To a lot of people(including me), it just looked like another Medieval MMORPG trying to move in on WoW's success.

This has a lot more going for it.

like what? being for star wars fans?

 

[Baresark]

EA has to accept the fact that at first it will go well, then it will teeter off and decline, but over the long haul is all that really matters. I just hope they don't decide three months after release they are going to shut her down. I am looking forward to a game that puts the star wars license to good use, even if Lucas does have some kind of say in it.

 

[JediMB]

Its going to be a copy of War hammer crash, Only wow has perfected the MMO style game.


1 year after its out there will be 100,000 people playing maximum

I saw the game play, its stiff and unnatural, not like the smooth game play WoW has, even though wow is a bad game this wont make people turn over

Final Fantasy XI still had 500,000 subscribers after 6 years on the market, and it's still turning in profit after 2 more.

You must not have seen the same gameplay I have. There is a very nice video on YouTube that highlights just how superior TOR's character animation is compared to WoW's.

 

[Exort]

It doesn't look good when the game is not even release and the publisher already go into defence mode.

 

[Sixcess]

500.000?

Yeah right. This is going to be a disaster of... not of APB proportions, but bigger.

100K? Yes.
200K? Maybe.
500K in a year, let alone ten years? Not a hope in hell.

This has pretty much confirmed my worst fears for this game. They're aiming too high in a market that's saturated and still adapting to the F2P boom. The pity of it is that a high profile crash like this one will make a lot of companies reconsider the expense of future AAA MMOs.