Michael Pachter Says Call of Duty is a Failure

[Spygon]

This is so wrong activsion has managed to brainwash players that they need to buy a new installment every year and that they need to buy all the dlc map packs.

Activison has an subscription service they just dont tell you that is what it is that is much more clever.

I hate activison and think they are the worse company in gaming but they know how to run a business.It seems this guy just has not recornised how activision work and how much of a success story on how to get more money out of gamers COD has become.

 

[paketep]

Why do you keep posting about this guy again? What exactly has he done in recent years? Analysts make shit up.

This. What exactly has he done EVER other than 50% completely obvious predictions and 50% total BS?.

If there's anything in the gaming industry that's even more of a failure than Call of Duty, that has to be Michael Pachter. Can't for the life of me understand why any idiocy he spews goes directly to so many webs' homes.

 

[Vivi22]

Activision has made Elite a free service again and gone back to offering DLC a la carte. It didn't take off because, as Pachter pointed out, Activision has conditioned its audience to expect free online play. That's going to be tough to overcome.

I don't think it's just a question of Activision conditioning their audience to expect free multiplayer. Online multiplayer modes in pretty much every FPS since Doom have been free from the get go. If Activision had wanted to charge for it, there was never a good time to introduce it. Charging for it before the series exploded would have driven people away, and charging for it now would do the same thing. Customer expectations matter, and your game is going to have to be pretty damn amazing if you're going to charge a fee for something everyone else gives away.

 

[Narcogen]

One thing Pachter's analysis is missing is network effects. WoW commands the premium it does and can get recurring revenue because you give up a lot going to another franchise, because no other franchise has as much content, updates it as often, or has as large a playerbase.

Beyond a certain point, a large playerbase doesn't benefit a shooter as much. Sure, you get a match quicker when lots of players are online, but if CoD has paid multiplayer and Halo's was free, lots of people could probably switch. That just isn't true of WoW. The only one in a position to mandate that all the FPS games on a platform go for paid only multiplayer is the platform holder, and for Windows PCs and Xboxes, that's Microsoft-- and they are getting their take on multiplayer by charging for XBL gold. I'm not sure what incentive MS has to enforce this when it could mean titles leaving the platform, or why they'd want to unless third parties are giving them a cut of subscription fees.

Nobody's going to be able to just do what Halo or CoD does and start charging for it. It'll have to offer something other games don't, and it will have to have network effects that amplify the value of those features so that the more players play it, the more valuable it is to everyone who plays it. It'll have to be something like Planetside, and it's worth noting that Planetside's sequel is moving away from the subscription model to free to play, which is the way just about everything is going that isn't WoW. There's only one WoW.

 

[RJ 17]

Sooooo the secret to success in the eyes of this douchebag is. "In order to make more money with your game, you should be making players constantly pay for it." Wow, this guy is a speaker at a summit and that's the brilliant advice he has? Charging people numerous times for the same game will let you make more money with the game?

No. Fucking. Way! No one could have thought of that brilliant idea! Except for EA, of course.

Seriously, it's fuckers like this that need to shut their god damn mouths. "The problem with Activision is that they're not greedy enough! Sure they made over a billion dollars in sales, but they could be making so much more! You just need to become money grubbing pigs like EA and Blizzard!" The douche is actively encouraging corporate greed. Did he ever stop to think that maybe Blizzard-Activision already has the number one subscription-based game in history (WoW) under its belt and as such wants to keep the title of having the most popular FPS ever by NOT pissing all over the faces of those that buy the game?

 

[rayen020]

he obviously isn't taking into account the people who give up CoD if they went to a subscription multi-player. Alot (or at least i think alot) of these players are 14-29 year-olds with not alot of disposable income. attach a subscription and you'll lose customers who just can't afford it, and go to games that don't have a subscription fee.

 

[tautologico]

"Prediction: The next Bungie game will be single-player only; the multiplayer aspect of that game will be subscription only," he said. "Activision's going to try it, because they're greedy pigs, and they're bold."

Pachter also predicted that Nintendo will become "completely irrelevant" with the Wii U, that Activision will buy Take-Two and that THQ is pretty much screwed.

...

Shit, if this is the future of the game industry, I think we're in for another collapse. Or, more hopefully, a grand "reckoning", if you could call it that, of consumers finally saying enough and bucking against the likes of EA and Activision and their shitty business practices.

He's right about Activision being greedy pigs, but that little comment about them buying Take-Two and that THQ is screwed sends more then a few shivers up my spine.

Unfortunately the situation for THQ is looking quite dire, and you don't need to be an "analyst" to see that.

Urgh...I hate to ask this, since I don't want to instigate something, but...how so? I mean, what makes you figure that? Most of their games seem popular enough to keep them afloat, and they just got done with that Humble THQ Bundle. I'm sure they're not in too dire of a situation...right?

There's plenty of information around about THQ's financial troubles. Recently they announced great losses, their stock price plummeted, and many big releases were postponed. They brought in a company as financial advisor and this could mean a good number of things for the future actions of the company, including the possibility of filing for bankruptcy. The Humble Bundle certainly helps, but I doubt it's enough to solve their problems (they lost 21 million in the 2nd quarter alone).

You can read more about it at the PA Report, for example:
http://penny-arcade.com/report/editorial-article/thq-earnings-call-displays-lack-of-confidence-and-clarity-in-companys-finan

 

[Vrach]

I find it hilarious how 1 billion dollars just doesn't seem like enough anymore. I mean sure you could make COD a subscription based game and tons would pay the price but damn who needs more than a billion dollars anyways? Who needs a million for that matter (well I do cause I want a jetski and a yacht but that's besides the point.)

It's not one person making a billion. It's a company and a company can NEVER make too much money. And for all our hate of CoD as a franchise, ActiVision ripping that playerbase off is good for everyone who hates it, because it means more leeway for trying other things.

In theory. In practice, ActiVision will just stick to what gets them the most money and barely ever try anything new, despite well being able to.

 

[Sylveria]

If CoD was a subscription game, the shooter fanatics would just find the next best shooter that wasn't subscription based and CoD would vanish in to obscurity. The shooterbros who play CoD aren't going to fork over , knowing Activision, $15 a month + Xbox Live Gold fees when they could play Halo or Battlefield for free and get basically the same experience.

 

[Lattyware]

This is just stupid from a business perspective. MMORPGs require constant investment to keep going, which makes it incredibly hard to provide one without getting a constant revenue stream (not impossible however, see Guild Wars). FPSes, on the other hand, are easy to provide very cheaply. Given this, if any company starts asking for $x a month to play, a rival can easily undercut them to $x-y a month, and they'll continue until someone just asks for an up-front fee. COD-style multiplayers are easy to make, and gamers would move on very quickly if they had to pay like that.

The much better business model is TF2's - let people spend more money on other stuff if they want to, but don't force them to. That way you don't alienate people, but you still have a revenue stream.

 

[Archereus]

I honestly feel like there is no reason to believe this guy. The fact of the matter is there is still a lot of money in free gaming. The ultimate proof of that is League of Legends, no major content is locked away from people who don't pay and paying doesn't give you an edge over the free players. It mostly all skins and getting champions a little easier. Despite all of that League of Legends is making a HUGE profit, enough that they can give away a few million bucks to teams winning their tournaments every year to two years so.
This guy is honestly full of shit, I am sure I would be like most gamers on this, if Call of Duty was pay to play costed 60 dollars and didn't add anything substantial to the game play for needing to pay for it, its buying base would drop a huge amount. Sure people are going to pay the subscription but the biggest selling feature to Call of Duty, you pay 60 bucks and you got a lot of fun and frustration for a whole year.
His predictions in my opinion are way off and I don't think they would actually every happen, the game industry is perfectly happy with the current model it is using. One big fee for a game, map packs and other little things every few months or so, is still bringing in a lot of money, and I doubt their going to want to change that working model any time soon.

 

[Nomanslander]

Um...he didn't say it was the CoD series was a failure. He said they made a mistake in one regard. Why the misleading, sensationalist headline?

That my friend, is journalism for you. Tell people the truth by misleading them. Well, actually, get their attention by heading with something that sounds bold, but correct yourself in the context of the rest of the article to cover your ass. Of course, I doubt most readers get past the header and couple of sentences, so the readers are mislead either way. =/

 

[DugMachine]

I find it hilarious how 1 billion dollars just doesn't seem like enough anymore. I mean sure you could make COD a subscription based game and tons would pay the price but damn who needs more than a billion dollars anyways? Who needs a million for that matter (well I do cause I want a jetski and a yacht but that's besides the point.)

It's not one person making a billion. It's a company and a company can NEVER make too much money. And for all our hate of CoD as a franchise, ActiVision ripping that playerbase off is good for everyone who hates it, because it means more leeway for trying other things.

In theory. In practice, ActiVision will just stick to what gets them the most money and barely ever try anything new, despite well being able to.

Oh I realize it's not just one person that makes a billion. I just find it funny that in this day in age we can say "Oh I just made a billion."

 

[Kargathia]

"Patcher says sky is blue" would probably get 50K hits.

Judging by how he'd make it sound like he's the only one to ever think of that.... I'd consider it worth a click, if only for entertainment value.

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

Um...he didn't say it was the CoD series was a failure. He said they made a mistake in one regard. Why the misleading, sensationalist headline?

Because this site has no journalistic integrity.

Also, fuck you, Mr. Patcher. Eat a dick, sir

 

[More Fun To Compute]

If it was that easy to make money from online play for FPS then John Carmack would be living on the moon right now. But in a way I expect Pachter to be right in that Activision will try becuase they are obscenely greedy and are driven to show growth in a market that is not really growing. Whether we actually see any of those attempts or ideas and if they succeed if we do is another thing. But one company has worked out how to get this subscription money for online FPS racket working and that is Microsoft with xbox live. Because it's not like many pays that sub for any reason other than to play FPS online.

 

[Something Amyss]

See folks? This is how those soulless f'ers think and every time you buy some game or DLC from EA, Activision, Ubisoft and the like, you reward and perpetuate that thinking. The day gaming suffocates under the weight of mass monetization, DLC, DRM, sequels, ect. it will ultimately be because of gamers who paid good $ time and again to reward those who do it.

No. Patcher is batshit even by the standards of the games industry.