Analyst: EA's Spent $500 Million On The Old Republic

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Wait, does the game only cost a dollar? Otherwise your math is a bit... off.

Anyway, notice that an Analyst said this? Michael Pachter is an analyst. That's the level of accuracy we're dealing with here.

It would seem my maths is as good as his. Mine could be better actually, analysts tend to blow things out of proportion somewhat.

 

[Strazdas]

If you're going to make a game that will possibly unseat World of Warcraft, you better go big or go home.

League of Legends have already unseated World of Warcraft. SWOTR while rising quick havent breaten either yet.
Money wont be a problem for EA if it fails. they are cashing in tons with NFS clone stamping.

 

[draythefingerless]

If you're going to make a game that will possibly unseat World of Warcraft, you better go big or go home.

League of Legends have already unseated World of Warcraft. SWOTR while rising quick havent breaten either yet.
Money wont be a problem for EA if it fails. they are cashing in tons with NFS clone stamping.

by that logic, modern warfare beat WoW years ago...

 

[Use_Imagination_here]

500 million my ass. It's probably

For a total of $100 million, they could have made 3 cross-platform single-player KoTOR sequels this generation and sold 2-3 million each, easily. That's what Mass Effect sells, so add the star wars license and they could sell 4-5 million copies each across all consoles and PC.

Three games at 2-5 million copies, they'd be looking at at least 300 million to up to a billion in revenue. Skyrim alone made $650 million in revenue at last count, so for 3 KoTOR games we're just trying to get an estimate of what they could have made. After all costs paid, 200 million or more in profits.

We don't have sales data from Origin for SW:TOR, but based on retail it's in the neighborhood of 2 million copies sold. Let's assume they sell 4 million copies (very optimistic), and hang on to an average of 1 million subscribers for 1 year (very optimistic).

Say the average price per copy is, $60, averaging out sale prices with collector's editions, so $60*4 million = 240 million. The subscriptions would be 15*12*1 million = 180 million. So this very optimistic projection puts them at $420 million in revenue.

Without even considering the development costs, and on-going support costs for a huge online game, we're looking at gross revenue of $500 million. If we believe this article, that would put net profits at roughly zero. Compared to net profits of 300 million to 1 billion that three KoTOR sequels would have brought in by now.

As you can see, these numbers add up to a financial disaster. What were they thinking? It's clear that at some point they thought they could bring in 10 million subscribers, that's the only reason they would have made SW:ToR instead of three KoTOR sequels. The game won't shut down of course, but unless they match WoW numbers it's a clear financial failure compared to the games they could have made, without even taking into account this rumored record-breaking budget.

I seriously doubt they actually spend more 200 million and so should you. One analyst making an estimate with no hard evidence doesn't prove anything.

But that is a good point. I honestly wish theid done that instead anyway.

 

[ThunderCavalier]

-some- Damage? EA would be sitting next to interplay if this fails.

Spending 500 million? That is FIVE GTA IVs on an MMO. Its a demographic that fails on the same rate as RESTAURANTS. Its blatantly irresponsible. For that amount of money, they could have made exactly 25 AAA games at maximum with that kind of money.

EA is repeating the same mistake interplay made over 10 years ago with Fallout: Brotherhood of steel. If this flops, EA will be practically cut off at the knee and Bioware would literally be gone the way of Black isle.

o_o

Oh god, I hope this doesn't bomb.

 

[awsome117]

Please let it fail, please let it fail, please let it fail.

If you really don't care for MMO's (from another post) then why are you commenting on this thread, let alone caring (or not caring in this case) about SW:ToR?

On Topic, Jesus Christ I feel like I walked into 4chan as all I see people saying that it's a WoW (which at this point, I really can't understand as no one called WoW a clone of the previous MMOs before it[then again, WoW wasn't there to be called a clone of WoW]) clone.

I hope this game does last, as I really love the game and would enjoy new (republic players ) coming in.

 

[Vhite]

I haven't played the game but if it's anything like WoW EA won't ever see their money again. Even if it managed to take down WoW from the top MMORPG throne it wouldn't mean much because WoW-like games are going slowly down (thanks to WoW itself and especially everyone who is trying to copy it) and they will be need to replace them with something different. Well that's my theory, my money is on Titan (if it will be an RPG) and Guild Wars 2.

 

[Durgiun]

Please let it fail, please let it fail, please let it fail.

If you really don't care for MMO's (from another post) then why are you commenting on this thread, let alone caring (or not caring in this case) about SW:ToR?

Because I hate anything that'll garner a bigger profit for EA than it deserves.