True a late release will be awful for funcom. There is far too much competition(pirates of the burning sea and the carribean, warhammer, huxley, fallen earth, gods and heroes, aion, tabula rasa, star trek online, and several other mmos). So we're talking over a dozen new mmos will hit the market around the end of 2007 and early to mid 2008. Plus all these games are bringing something new to mmos so Age of Conan has to make it to the market first, before another epic mmo can take the spotlight. The best time for them to release age of conan is probably christmas time
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way. -Will Rogers
Originally posted by ThaneB Unfortunately i have nothing to keep me busy. No games, sports, or anything. I just moved to a new state in the U.S and my boredom level just hit the maximum.
You just moved to a new state and your bored? Here's an idea, trying getting out and seeing the sun. You know explore your new home, maybe make some offline friends.
Well i'm a foreigner and the U.S isn't really all that great. I've already seen enough of it and if i could leave i'd do so right away. I mean the U.S has lots of money, yet places like Washington D.C look like crap. But yeah i have explored the state, but i'm more used to traveling to diffrent countries so a new state isn't much of an adventure.
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way. -Will Rogers
Its not a theory, just facts and beside its been delayed for two years now. Q2/2006 more than 1Mio $ loss (with income 2,6 Mio $ from Dreamfall) - for me it is about 3,5 $ loss each quarter you don't have extra income from other products.
Q3/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q4/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q1/2007 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
-----------------------------
total about 10 Mio $ loss until 31.March 2007
(and 2/3 loss from the delay)
Any arguments against ?
If not - then we all have the information we need and this thread can be closed ...
Originally posted by Fion
Is it me or does Battlekruze desperately want Funcom to fail here.
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
OPERATING INCOME
-1.2
-0.4
-1.0
-1.2
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
NET INCOME
0.7
-1.2
3.2
-0.2
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
The capital structure at Funcom N.V. does not rely on leverage. Because of this, the company can be considered to have low financial risk. Accounts Receivable are among the industry's worst with 65.53 days worth of sales outstanding. This implies that revenues are not being collected in an efficient manner.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
TOTAL LIABILITIES AND EQUITY
61.6
59.2
63.5
63.1
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Funcom N.V. has a strong Balance Sheet and has consistently grown its cash reserves over the last Four years to total $37.4M.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
In 2006, Funcom N.V. increased its cash reserves by 41.86%, or $11.0M. As a percent of revenues, this was among thebiggest increases by any company in the Software industry. By looking at the Cash Flow Statement, analysts can easily see the sources and use of cash generated throughout the year.Cash Flow from Operations (CFO) is the only sustainable source of cash and represents earnings from the day-to-day business of a company. In 2006, this company earned $286.0K from its operations for a Cash Flow Margin of 0.03%. Cash Flow from Investing (CFI) is a measure of the cash used to maintain and grow the business, also called Capital Expenditures, or CAPEX. In 2006, management spent only 1.83% of its revenues in attempting to spur growth in its operating business lines. That was among the lowest in the industry and indicates that this company either does not feel it is necessary to or is unable to invest as much as others in the group. Cash Flow from Financing (CFF) describes the inflows and outflows between a company and its owners or creditors (although interest paid is part of CFO). In 2006, CFF totaled $19.8M or 1.83% of revenues. This consistently positive value over the last 4 years, tells us that this company looks to the capital markets for fuel to help it grow.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
If I was Battlekruse I would be more worried that E.A own Mythic instead of posting wrong information.
Good information regarding Funcom... I interpret it a bit differently than you do, but all in all it provides good insight into Funcom and their products. (Too bad you really can't find out the same information about the people making Darkfall).
I'm not too worried about them missing their Oct 30th date...... seems low risk at this point.... but hey, anything can happen..we'll soon find out.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Well, as a registered company on the stockmarket finding out if Funcom loses money or not is very simple, as it's public information by law.
That being said, Funcom is in a period between games. AO is on the sinking end (as any game would be after 5 years, mind you) and Conan is in development. The development of a new game to triple-A standards is very costly, and not losing money in that period is near close to impossible, unless you have several major projects running to pay the bills. AO still makes some money and Dreamfall brought in a bit, and still does.
A few notes about Funcom...
According to their 2006 annual report, Funcom's revenue for 2006 was $5,291,000. In 2005, it was $5,705,000 - so they made less in 2006 than in 2005. Their operating results were $-1,312,000 in 2006, compared to $946,000 in 2005 (although it says 947 in another spot, so there may be a typo..).
So, to answer the Battlekruze comment: Yes, Funcom is losing money (or at least it was last year). Do the new agreements help? Yes. Should we all be worried? Not really. Due to the IPO, the company had a decent amount of cash. Of course, that opened up another can of worms, as it means the company has to take investors into account and do all sorts of other crazy things...
Other interesting notes:
According to the Q1-07 report, Funcom made more money in the first quarter but also ended up losing more due to increased size and operating costs of Age of Conan. So both AmazingAvery and Battlekruze was right in some way around. They both choice to hidden some information from the share report. Geee
Spoils of War - The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it.
Well, as a registered company on the stockmarket finding out if Funcom loses money or not is very simple, as it's public information by law.
That being said, Funcom is in a period between games. AO is on the sinking end (as any game would be after 5 years, mind you) and Conan is in development. The development of a new game to triple-A standards is very costly, and not losing money in that period is near close to impossible, unless you have several major projects running to pay the bills. AO still makes some money and Dreamfall brought in a bit, and still does.
A few notes about Funcom...
According to their 2006 annual report, Funcom's revenue for 2006 was $5,291,000. In 2005, it was $5,705,000 - so they made less in 2006 than in 2005. Their operating results were $-1,312,000 in 2006, compared to $946,000 in 2005 (although it says 947 in another spot, so there may be a typo..).
So, to answer the Battlekruze comment: Yes, Funcom is losing money (or at least it was last year). Do the new agreements help? Yes. Should we all be worried? Not really. Due to the IPO, the company had a decent amount of cash. Of course, that opened up another can of worms, as it means the company has to take investors into account and do all sorts of other crazy things...
Other interesting notes:
According to the Q1-07 report, Funcom made more money in the first quarter but also ended up losing more due to increased size and operating costs of Age of Conan. So both AmazingAvery and Battlekruze was right in some way around. They both choice to hidden some information from the share report. Geee
So all that means this. Funcom isn't going Bankrupt. Every day they don't have AoC on shelves they're not making that money, and instead spending it, but thats the same with every big game development. Does this mean they will, or will not release on October 30? Nobody knows. What we do know is, they are telling everyone that they will. We know Historicaly Q3 is the best time to launch almost anything, as its when most people are spending money. I'll be at my PC on October 30th, I won't plan a Vacation around then that much is certain.
Sorry I was unable to read all replies, but there are some things stated that are misinformation.
AO Launched too early, be it computers not able to handle it, or bad code (I cant speak for them), but either way if it can not run smoothly, its a bad launch. Regardless of the reason, the only thing a player sees is bleh.
As for the choppiness during E3. If it is at all Frames Per Seconds we are talking, no matter what connect they had, it should not be choppy. Now if we are talking about characters popping around and lag induced issues, or delays in power use then the connection can be blamed. Sounds to me that it is purely performance of the machines they chose to use. I was not there so I am not sure what the spec was.
All we can hope is that Funcom has learned from their experiences and applied the proper solutions to them. Being a fan of Robert E Howards work, I really hope this pans out to be a good product.
Sorry I was unable to read all replies, but there are some things stated that are misinformation. AO Launched too early, be it computers not able to handle it, or bad code (I cant speak for them), but either way if it can not run smoothly, its a bad launch. Regardless of the reason, the only thing a player sees is bleh. As for the choppiness during E3. If it is at all Frames Per Seconds we are talking, no matter what connect they had, it should not be choppy. Now if we are talking about characters popping around and lag induced issues, or delays in power use then the connection can be blamed. Sounds to me that it is purely performance of the machines they chose to use. I was not there so I am not sure what the spec was. All we can hope is that Funcom has learned from their experiences and applied the proper solutions to them. Being a fan of Robert E Howards work, I really hope this pans out to be a good product.
Well Jorgen did say that it was laggy, splitting 3mbit between 85 vendors, to a server in Oslo half a globe away.
Sorry I was unable to read all replies, but there are some things stated that are misinformation. AO Launched too early, be it computers not able to handle it, or bad code (I cant speak for them), but either way if it can not run smoothly, its a bad launch. Regardless of the reason, the only thing a player sees is bleh. As for the choppiness during E3. If it is at all Frames Per Seconds we are talking, no matter what connect they had, it should not be choppy. Now if we are talking about characters popping around and lag induced issues, or delays in power use then the connection can be blamed. Sounds to me that it is purely performance of the machines they chose to use. I was not there so I am not sure what the spec was. All we can hope is that Funcom has learned from their experiences and applied the proper solutions to them. Being a fan of Robert E Howards work, I really hope this pans out to be a good product.
Well Jorgen did say that it was laggy, splitting 3mbit between 85 vendors, to a server in Oslo half a globe away.
Unforntunately people often times refer to lag that is really more of a client performance issue. Its become an overused term to describe to many things in a game.
Unfortunately i have nothing to keep me busy. No games, sports, or anything. I just moved to a new state in the U.S and my boredom level just hit the maximum.
Maybe he just doesn't know where the quests are or that making RL friends gains double XP.
This release date will stick. They've never advertised a release date untill now. Sure media outlates were told a rough timeframes like Q2 2006, but they've never set a date. They've been pushing this date at every possible media outlet that would listen. Reguardless of the games state of readiness, which NONE of us are in the situation to comment on, because NONE of us have played it. This game will most likely release in October. Anyone that thinks they will, try giving some good reasons why you think they would not. Every thing I've seen has lead me to believe that it will most likely release, but I'm open for good factual information to help me better make a judgement, but thus far the evidence points to a positive release date.
I was thinking along the lines that first, we never have seen any videos on PvP or the Sieges. We have no idea how it works and I highly doubt it's finished if they have not showed us anything on it. Also, the've stated that the females model are not finished yet. They are polishing it, but it is currently not finished. The other women you've seen in the game was the first model that they trashed (stated they didn't like it).
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
/played-mmorpgs
Total time played:9125 Days, 21 Hours, 29 Minutes, 27 Seconds Time played this level: 39 Days, 1 Hour, 24 Minutes, 5 Seconds
lol NMShadey too bad you didn't read my reply and learned the fact that i'm not a nerd and actually do have friends and read my replies i didn't just say i didn't have any games to play i said i have no sports to play(i love soccer), or any fun because i'm a foreigner and i think America sucks... and Americans have the crappiest attitudes of all the people i've met ,although i've met several good americans so that somewhat contradicts what i just said.
Now back to the topic at hand, i'll stick with my high hopes for a late 2007 release date for Age of Conan.
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way. -Will Rogers
lol NMShadey too bad you didn't read my reply and learned the fact that i'm not a nerd and actually do have friends and read my replies i didn't just say i didn't have any games to play i said i have no sports to play(i love soccer), or any fun because i'm a foreigner and i think America sucks... and Americans have the crappiest attitudes of all the people i've met ,although i've met several good americans so that somewhat contradicts what i just said. Now back to the topic at hand, i'll stick with my high hopes for a late 2007 release date for Age of Conan.
I was only messing around dude :-) Nothing wrong with being a nerd, I love it personally
This release date will stick. They've never advertised a release date untill now. Sure media outlates were told a rough timeframes like Q2 2006, but they've never set a date. They've been pushing this date at every possible media outlet that would listen. Reguardless of the games state of readiness, which NONE of us are in the situation to comment on, because NONE of us have played it. This game will most likely release in October. Anyone that thinks they will, try giving some good reasons why you think they would not. Every thing I've seen has lead me to believe that it will most likely release, but I'm open for good factual information to help me better make a judgement, but thus far the evidence points to a positive release date.
I was thinking along the lines that first, we never have seen any videos on PvP or the Sieges. We have no idea how it works and I highly doubt it's finished if they have not showed us anything on it. Also, the've stated that the females model are not finished yet. They are polishing it, but it is currently not finished. The other women you've seen in the game was the first model that they trashed (stated they didn't like it).
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
He raises some good issues. I mean I really think that if they had PvP ready, they'd be showing it to us by the gallons. I mean they did that with fly-bys and the single player portion of the game.
That and if they had sieges ready, we would have already seen that instead of the NPC version. I just think they spent soooo much time on the armor and scenery, that their game mechanics haven't been polished up enough to show to the masses.
I think that if they push the game back again, they're going to lose fans. Hopefully they really do have everything on track, and their marketing team is just made of poo, but I really doubt it.
--------------------------------------------- I live to fight, and fight to live.
NMShadey I wasn't being sarcastic when i said lol I actually laughed when I read your post, so you don't have to apologise or anything.
I agree with what the above poster said about pvp. I mean that is one of the primary features of Age of Conan and several other mmos. I'm surprised they showed only one seqence of gameplay in the entire E3 video. I was hoping for an epic siege to took place or something, or at least some 1v1 or small group pvp scenes. So I definitely believe they are constantly changing the release date at every major meeting, so they get every extra day they can to polish the game. Either way I still think this game has lots of potential, and I hope AOC will be released soon
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way. -Will Rogers
This release date will stick. They've never advertised a release date untill now. Sure media outlates were told a rough timeframes like Q2 2006, but they've never set a date. They've been pushing this date at every possible media outlet that would listen. Reguardless of the games state of readiness, which NONE of us are in the situation to comment on, because NONE of us have played it. This game will most likely release in October. Anyone that thinks they will, try giving some good reasons why you think they would not. Every thing I've seen has lead me to believe that it will most likely release, but I'm open for good factual information to help me better make a judgement, but thus far the evidence points to a positive release date.
I was thinking along the lines that first, we never have seen any videos on PvP or the Sieges. We have no idea how it works and I highly doubt it's finished if they have not showed us anything on it. Also, the've stated that the females model are not finished yet. They are polishing it, but it is currently not finished. The other women you've seen in the game was the first model that they trashed (stated they didn't like it).
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
Your saying, because you have not seen some things yet, you doubt it will release on time.
Have you every actualy seen 10 Million Dollars? IF you haven't, does that mean it doesn't exist? Just because you haven't seen it doesnt mean its not there. Germany is going to see the first PvP Video. FYI Most games arn't done befor they hit shelves, thats why EVERY game you get has a patch soon as you install it. The female models arn't complete, but you think 90 days isn't enough to finish them?
This release date will stick. They've never advertised a release date untill now. Sure media outlates were told a rough timeframes like Q2 2006, but they've never set a date. They've been pushing this date at every possible media outlet that would listen. Reguardless of the games state of readiness, which NONE of us are in the situation to comment on, because NONE of us have played it. This game will most likely release in October. Anyone that thinks they will, try giving some good reasons why you think they would not. Every thing I've seen has lead me to believe that it will most likely release, but I'm open for good factual information to help me better make a judgement, but thus far the evidence points to a positive release date.
I was thinking along the lines that first, we never have seen any videos on PvP or the Sieges. We have no idea how it works and I highly doubt it's finished if they have not showed us anything on it. Also, the've stated that the females model are not finished yet. They are polishing it, but it is currently not finished. The other women you've seen in the game was the first model that they trashed (stated they didn't like it).
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
He raises some good issues. I mean I really think that if they had PvP ready, they'd be showing it to us by the gallons. I mean they did that with fly-bys and the single player portion of the game.
That and if they had sieges ready, we would have already seen that instead of the NPC version. I just think they spent soooo much time on the armor and scenery, that their game mechanics haven't been polished up enough to show to the masses.
I think that if they push the game back again, they're going to lose fans. Hopefully they really do have everything on track, and their marketing team is just made of poo, but I really doubt it.
It's advertising, and they're doing it right. Look at Apple with the Iphone, they didnt make a big stink about it untill they were ready to release it. People heard about it, but they waited so that the Buzz will be fresh. So when people say "You seen that New IPHONE?" people are like "No, you have?" "Yeah, its awsome" instead of... "You seen that new Iphone?" "Yeah 4 months ago" You don't show your cards too soon, people get bored easily, not everyones a die hard fan, like us.
Did you guys know that Funcom recently got 30 million $ from private investors which expect from AoC to be a awesome commercial success, so that they get their money back and some additional bucks extra?! Now that sounds really good to me..; i would not invest my money in a project if i am not totally sure that it will work out..
Don't worry, It won't make the fall release date... it has no chance in hell. Early 2008 is your best bet.
Care to wadger on this?
Funcom has money invested into that release date. They've got partnerships with Nvidia and Microsoft, and all of which have been even stilli insisting Oct 30th release date. I don't think they can push that release date so easily as some people would like for you to believe.
They can and will. No software ever gets released on time, unless it's full of bugs.
Companies are either like mythic, where they insist on high quality releases and push dates back, or they release stuff nearly on time and buggy as hell like SOE and Turbine.
Most companies follow the "An imperfect product today is infinitely better than a perfect one a year from now" mantra and release, damn the torpedoes, because chances are, if they push it back a year, it will still be buggy as hell, and they need to pay the rent.
Most bugs in a very complex system such as a game can only be found when 10s of thousands of people are using the software anyway. No company can afford a QA team that big, so the users become QA testers. Betas don't find everything because most beta testers are hard core gamers and they do different things than someone who's new to the genre or a casual player, who will do some really weird unexpected stuff, or exploiters who find loopholes in the rule set.
I'd rather have a game with some bugs now, than have to wait another year for a game that will be buggy anyway. All of them are buggy at first. It's the nature of the beast.
Its not a theory, just facts and beside its been delayed for two years now. Q2/2006 more than 1Mio $ loss (with income 2,6 Mio $ from Dreamfall) - for me it is about 3,5 $ loss each quarter you don't have extra income from other products.
Q3/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q4/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q1/2007 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
-----------------------------
total about 10 Mio $ loss until 31.March 2007
(and 2/3 loss from the delay)
Any arguments against ?
If not - then we all have the information we need and this thread can be closed ...
Originally posted by Fion
Is it me or does Battlekruze desperately want Funcom to fail here.
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
OPERATING INCOME
-1.2
-0.4
-1.0
-1.2
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
NET INCOME
0.7
-1.2
3.2
-0.2
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
The capital structure at Funcom N.V. does not rely on leverage. Because of this, the company can be considered to have low financial risk. Accounts Receivable are among the industry's worst with 65.53 days worth of sales outstanding. This implies that revenues are not being collected in an efficient manner.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
TOTAL LIABILITIES AND EQUITY
61.6
59.2
63.5
63.1
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Funcom N.V. has a strong Balance Sheet and has consistently grown its cash reserves over the last Four years to total $37.4M.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
In 2006, Funcom N.V. increased its cash reserves by 41.86%, or $11.0M. As a percent of revenues, this was among thebiggest increases by any company in the Software industry. By looking at the Cash Flow Statement, analysts can easily see the sources and use of cash generated throughout the year.Cash Flow from Operations (CFO) is the only sustainable source of cash and represents earnings from the day-to-day business of a company. In 2006, this company earned $286.0K from its operations for a Cash Flow Margin of 0.03%. Cash Flow from Investing (CFI) is a measure of the cash used to maintain and grow the business, also called Capital Expenditures, or CAPEX. In 2006, management spent only 1.83% of its revenues in attempting to spur growth in its operating business lines. That was among the lowest in the industry and indicates that this company either does not feel it is necessary to or is unable to invest as much as others in the group. Cash Flow from Financing (CFF) describes the inflows and outflows between a company and its owners or creditors (although interest paid is part of CFO). In 2006, CFF totaled $19.8M or 1.83% of revenues. This consistently positive value over the last 4 years, tells us that this company looks to the capital markets for fuel to help it grow.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
If I was Battlekruse I would be more worried that E.A own Mythic instead of posting wrong information.
ROLF. Even so that you accused me of so many thing I can still laugh. You have posted false information and I have my objection!.
First of all dear Mr. AmazingAvery. I strongly advise you to read the real report instead of reading you own personal report and post it on the forum. I write the link down so you can read it ASAP for you own concern, link: http://www.newsweb.no/atmnt/070725+Q2-report.pdf?id=45180 . Now we break the report down so we can understand it. When we look the result we can se that Funcom have a good year until Q3 2006 where are starting to loss money. There sales growth goes down to minus 51,9% and they end that quarter in -353. In Q4 2006 its even worst where they end with -1,017. At the start of year Q1 2007 there is minus 1213 and at the end of Q2 2007 there ended in a total of minus 1,460. This is far worse then predicted. This is due to loss account from Funcom. So basic the company are lossing there customer from the games, aka Anarchy Online. There are selling few units, but thats because they are not selling any new units. Now lets take a look in the Profit and loss account in the report. At year 2007 they had a total operating revenues at 10,822 and we scroll further in 2007 (of cause it only second quarter) we are down only to 1,593. Of cause Funcome have also lower there operation expenses but we all know that was because they closed there other deparment. But still it pretty bad. Just look at the earning after tax, year 2006 is was high 3,236 and now its only 776. You write that Funcom are stable company, really ?. No it not, its a company in a high risk. There are not selling any units and they are lossing money like, well - just very fast. Funcom also expects it become even lower until to the launch and they not even mention anything about the release date to Q3 this year, funny enough or sadly should I say. You also write that Funcom has assets for over $60 million, but that is rather low if you ask me.
Then final you write that I am troll, bla bla bla. I think more it is you there is maybe a hmmm, Age of Conan Fanboy?. For me is seems more that you blind support something, even ignore plain and simple logic, facts and well thought out arguments.
Lets take a summary:
Age of Conan have 100,000 signed up for beta test
Warhammer Online have over 300,000 signed up for beta test
At E3 Age of Conan won the IGN award for "Best PC Persistent" online mmorpg because Warhammer Online did not appear to the Show. Mythic have enough money to launch there own private show around the world.
Funcom had and will loss a high amount of capital until the launch of Age of Conan. There hole company rest only on AOC and if that product fail then it the doom for Funcom.
If cause I wish the best for Funcom and I will also want to try Funcom, hopefull to Q3 2007 . But I just saying this because it is the truth. I am not hiding anything. You can read it all in the report. Funcom have made some pretty bad mistake with there company and I wish they had a better marketing at least. I just fear they maybe have not learned from there mistake from Anarchy Online and that was the worst lanuch ever for a MMORPG, maybe Vanguard was worse, dunny. Anyway one of the highlight in report was that EA/Myhic have postponed the launch date of Warhammer Online which seem to aid Funcom.
Its not a theory, just facts and beside its been delayed for two years now. Q2/2006 more than 1Mio $ loss (with income 2,6 Mio $ from Dreamfall) - for me it is about 3,5 $ loss each quarter you don't have extra income from other products.
Q3/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q4/2006 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
Q1/2007 = 3,5 Mio $ loss
-----------------------------
total about 10 Mio $ loss until 31.March 2007
(and 2/3 loss from the delay)
Any arguments against ?
If not - then we all have the information we need and this thread can be closed ...
Originally posted by Fion
Is it me or does Battlekruze desperately want Funcom to fail here.
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
OPERATING INCOME
-1.2
-0.4
-1.0
-1.2
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
NET INCOME
0.7
-1.2
3.2
-0.2
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
The capital structure at Funcom N.V. does not rely on leverage. Because of this, the company can be considered to have low financial risk. Accounts Receivable are among the industry's worst with 65.53 days worth of sales outstanding. This implies that revenues are not being collected in an efficient manner.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
TOTAL LIABILITIES AND EQUITY
61.6
59.2
63.5
63.1
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Funcom N.V. has a strong Balance Sheet and has consistently grown its cash reserves over the last Four years to total $37.4M.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
In 2006, Funcom N.V. increased its cash reserves by 41.86%, or $11.0M. As a percent of revenues, this was among thebiggest increases by any company in the Software industry. By looking at the Cash Flow Statement, analysts can easily see the sources and use of cash generated throughout the year.Cash Flow from Operations (CFO) is the only sustainable source of cash and represents earnings from the day-to-day business of a company. In 2006, this company earned $286.0K from its operations for a Cash Flow Margin of 0.03%. Cash Flow from Investing (CFI) is a measure of the cash used to maintain and grow the business, also called Capital Expenditures, or CAPEX. In 2006, management spent only 1.83% of its revenues in attempting to spur growth in its operating business lines. That was among the lowest in the industry and indicates that this company either does not feel it is necessary to or is unable to invest as much as others in the group. Cash Flow from Financing (CFF) describes the inflows and outflows between a company and its owners or creditors (although interest paid is part of CFO). In 2006, CFF totaled $19.8M or 1.83% of revenues. This consistently positive value over the last 4 years, tells us that this company looks to the capital markets for fuel to help it grow.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
If I was Battlekruse I would be more worried that E.A own Mythic instead of posting wrong information.
ROLF. Even so that you accused me of so many thing I can still laugh. You have posted false information and I have my objection!.
First of all dear Mr. AmazingAvery. I strongly advise you to read the real report instead of reading you own personal report and post it on the forum. I write the link down so you can read it ASAP for you own concern, link: http://www.newsweb.no/atmnt/070725+Q2-report.pdf?id=45180 . Now we break the report down so we can understand it. When we look the result we can se that Funcom have a good year until Q3 2006 where are starting to loss money. There sales growth goes down to minus 51,9% and they end that quarter in -353. In Q4 2006 its even worst where they end with -1,017. At the start of year Q1 2007 there is minus 1213 and at the end of Q2 2007 there ended in a total of minus 1,460. This is far worse then predicted. This is due to loss account from Funcom. So basic the company are lossing there customer from the games, aka Anarchy Online. There are selling few units, but thats because they are not selling any new units. Now lets take a look in the Profit and loss account in the report. At year 2007 they had a total operating revenues at 10,822 and we scroll further in 2007 (of cause it only second quarter) we are down only to 1,593. Of cause Funcome have also lower there operation expenses but we all know that was because they closed there other deparment. But still it pretty bad. Just look at the earning after tax, year 2006 is was high 3,236 and now its only 776. You write that Funcom are stable company, really ?. No it not, its a company in a high risk. There are not selling any units and they are lossing money like, well - just very fast. Funcom also expects it become even lower until to the launch and they not even mention anything about the release date to Q3 this year, funny enough or sadly should I say. You also write that Funcom has assets for over $60 million, but that is rather low if you ask me.
Then final you write that I am troll, bla bla bla. I think more it is you there is maybe a hmmm, Age of Conan Fanboy?. For me is seems more that you blind support something, even ignore plain and simple logic, facts and well thought out arguments.
Lets take a summary:
Age of Conan have 100,000 signed up for beta test
Warhammer Online have over 300,000 signed up for beta test
At E3 Age of Conan won the IGN award for "Best PC Persistent" online mmorpg because Warhammer Online did not appear to the Show. Mythic have enough money to launch there own private show around the world.
Funcom had and will loss a high amount of capital until the launch of Age of Conan. There hole company rest only on AOC and if that product fail then it the doom for Funcom.
If cause I wish the best for Funcom and I will also want to try Funcom, hopefull to Q3 2007 . But I just saying this because it is the truth. I am not hiding anything. You can read it all in the report. Funcom have made some pretty bad mistake with there company and I wish they had a better marketing at least. I just fear they maybe have not learned from there mistake from Anarchy Online and that was the worst lanuch ever for a MMORPG, maybe Vanguard was worse, dunny. Anyway one of the highlight in report was that EA/Myhic have postponed the launch date of Warhammer Online which seem to aid Funcom.
Um...mythic sold out because they had NO money...EA bought out Mythic, the show is running on EAs money.
and as veteran UO player I'm entitled to eternally despise everything EA does...they took best PvP mmorpg ever and turned it to PvE happyland.
Also, check DAoC...they barely breach 10 000 simultaneous users while AO is almost 50k and is a much older game.
Thats old an public information. Mythic sold part of there company to get the Warhammer license from Games Workshop because they so a lot of potential there. Then EA Games also saw that a Warhammer Online based mmorpg would have a highly potential so they brought a great share and yes outbuyed Mythic company
Originally posted by Fion
Battlekruze you should really try shutting your mouth once in a while. Cause when you open it you reveal what a MASSIVE hard-on you have for Mythic and WAR. Your such a freaking fanboi, and your blinders make me laugh my arse off. Your talking about Funcom and money problems? When Mythic had to sell their damn company! LMAO.
Now that that laugh is over. I don't go to WARs forums and bash and flame and troll like a little pansy. I talk about my concerns with the game (such as instanced PvP playing a major role in 'zone capture' and that having no death penalty and no loss from death in PvP (corpse looting. I know you loot enemies and get randomly generated treasure, but they loose nothing) is totally carebear. But I don't spend my time smearing the game with every chance that I get. So I can say this without being a hypocrit. GTFO the AoC forums.
If don't have any solid arguments, then...........
Comments
True a late release will be awful for funcom. There is far too much competition(pirates of the burning sea and the carribean, warhammer, huxley, fallen earth, gods and heroes, aion, tabula rasa, star trek online, and several other mmos). So we're talking over a dozen new mmos will hit the market around the end of 2007 and early to mid 2008. Plus all these games are bringing something new to mmos so Age of Conan has to make it to the market first, before another epic mmo can take the spotlight. The best time for them to release age of conan is probably christmas time
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way.
-Will Rogers
You just moved to a new state and your bored? Here's an idea, trying getting out and seeing the sun. You know explore your new home, maybe make some offline friends.
Well i'm a foreigner and the U.S isn't really all that great. I've already seen enough of it and if i could leave i'd do so right away. I mean the U.S has lots of money, yet places like Washington D.C look like crap. But yeah i have explored the state, but i'm more used to traveling to diffrent countries so a new state isn't much of an adventure.
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way.
-Will Rogers
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
Good information regarding Funcom... I interpret it a bit differently than you do, but all in all it provides good insight into Funcom and their products. (Too bad you really can't find out the same information about the people making Darkfall).
I'm not too worried about them missing their Oct 30th date...... seems low risk at this point.... but hey, anything can happen..we'll soon find out.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Well, as a registered company on the stockmarket finding out if Funcom loses money or not is very simple, as it's public information by law.
That being said, Funcom is in a period between games. AO is on the sinking end (as any game would be after 5 years, mind you) and Conan is in development. The development of a new game to triple-A standards is very costly, and not losing money in that period is near close to impossible, unless you have several major projects running to pay the bills. AO still makes some money and Dreamfall brought in a bit, and still does.
A few notes about Funcom...
According to their 2006 annual report, Funcom's revenue for 2006 was $5,291,000. In 2005, it was $5,705,000 - so they made less in 2006 than in 2005. Their operating results were $-1,312,000 in 2006, compared to $946,000 in 2005 (although it says 947 in another spot, so there may be a typo..).
So, to answer the Battlekruze comment: Yes, Funcom is losing money (or at least it was last year). Do the new agreements help? Yes. Should we all be worried? Not really. Due to the IPO, the company had a decent amount of cash. Of course, that opened up another can of worms, as it means the company has to take investors into account and do all sorts of other crazy things...
Other interesting notes:
According to the Q1-07 report, Funcom made more money in the first quarter but also ended up losing more due to increased size and operating costs of Age of Conan. So both AmazingAvery and Battlekruze was right in some way around. They both choice to hidden some information from the share report. Geee
Spoils of War - The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it.
So all that means this. Funcom isn't going Bankrupt. Every day they don't have AoC on shelves they're not making that money, and instead spending it, but thats the same with every big game development. Does this mean they will, or will not release on October 30? Nobody knows. What we do know is, they are telling everyone that they will. We know Historicaly Q3 is the best time to launch almost anything, as its when most people are spending money. I'll be at my PC on October 30th, I won't plan a Vacation around then that much is certain.
Sorry I was unable to read all replies, but there are some things stated that are misinformation.
AO Launched too early, be it computers not able to handle it, or bad code (I cant speak for them), but either way if it can not run smoothly, its a bad launch. Regardless of the reason, the only thing a player sees is bleh.
As for the choppiness during E3. If it is at all Frames Per Seconds we are talking, no matter what connect they had, it should not be choppy. Now if we are talking about characters popping around and lag induced issues, or delays in power use then the connection can be blamed. Sounds to me that it is purely performance of the machines they chose to use. I was not there so I am not sure what the spec was.
All we can hope is that Funcom has learned from their experiences and applied the proper solutions to them. Being a fan of Robert E Howards work, I really hope this pans out to be a good product.
Well Jorgen did say that it was laggy, splitting 3mbit between 85 vendors, to a server in Oslo half a globe away.
Well Jorgen did say that it was laggy, splitting 3mbit between 85 vendors, to a server in Oslo half a globe away.
Unforntunately people often times refer to lag that is really more of a client performance issue. Its become an overused term to describe to many things in a game.
Time will tell
Originally posted by ThaneB
Unfortunately i have nothing to keep me busy. No games, sports, or anything. I just moved to a new state in the U.S and my boredom level just hit the maximum.
Maybe he just doesn't know where the quests are or that making RL friends gains double XP.
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
Total time played: 9125 Days, 21 Hours, 29 Minutes, 27 Seconds
Time played this level: 39 Days, 1 Hour, 24 Minutes, 5 Seconds
lol NMShadey too bad you didn't read my reply
and learned the fact that i'm not a nerd and actually do have friends and read my replies i didn't just say i didn't have any games to play i said i have no sports to play(i love soccer), or any fun because i'm a foreigner and i think America sucks... and Americans have the crappiest attitudes of all the people i've met ,although i've met several good americans so that somewhat contradicts what i just said.
Now back to the topic at hand, i'll stick with my high hopes for a late 2007 release date for Age of Conan.
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way.
-Will Rogers
I was only messing around dude :-) Nothing wrong with being a nerd, I love it personally
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
He raises some good issues. I mean I really think that if they had PvP ready, they'd be showing it to us by the gallons. I mean they did that with fly-bys and the single player portion of the game.That and if they had sieges ready, we would have already seen that instead of the NPC version. I just think they spent soooo much time on the armor and scenery, that their game mechanics haven't been polished up enough to show to the masses.
I think that if they push the game back again, they're going to lose fans. Hopefully they really do have everything on track, and their marketing team is just made of poo, but I really doubt it.
---------------------------------------------
I live to fight, and fight to live.
NMShadey I wasn't being sarcastic when i said lol I actually laughed when I read your post, so you don't have to apologise or anything.
I agree with what the above poster said about pvp. I mean that is one of the primary features of Age of Conan and several other mmos. I'm surprised they showed only one seqence of gameplay in the entire E3 video. I was hoping for an epic siege to took place or something, or at least some 1v1 or small group pvp scenes. So I definitely believe they are constantly changing the release date at every major meeting, so they get every extra day they can to polish the game. Either way I still think this game has lots of potential, and I hope AOC will be released soon
You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way.
-Will Rogers
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
Your saying, because you have not seen some things yet, you doubt it will release on time.
Have you every actualy seen 10 Million Dollars? IF you haven't, does that mean it doesn't exist? Just because you haven't seen it doesnt mean its not there. Germany is going to see the first PvP Video. FYI Most games arn't done befor they hit shelves, thats why EVERY game you get has a patch soon as you install it. The female models arn't complete, but you think 90 days isn't enough to finish them?
If you ask me. Building your own place and sieges are a pretty big deal in this game, so that is why I'm sticking that they will push the game release back until early 2008. I just don't understand why they would hide any detail about the sieges and PvP from us unless it's not done.
He raises some good issues. I mean I really think that if they had PvP ready, they'd be showing it to us by the gallons. I mean they did that with fly-bys and the single player portion of the game.That and if they had sieges ready, we would have already seen that instead of the NPC version. I just think they spent soooo much time on the armor and scenery, that their game mechanics haven't been polished up enough to show to the masses.
I think that if they push the game back again, they're going to lose fans. Hopefully they really do have everything on track, and their marketing team is just made of poo, but I really doubt it.
It's advertising, and they're doing it right. Look at Apple with the Iphone, they didnt make a big stink about it untill they were ready to release it. People heard about it, but they waited so that the Buzz will be fresh. So when people say "You seen that New IPHONE?" people are like "No, you have?" "Yeah, its awsome" instead of... "You seen that new Iphone?" "Yeah 4 months ago" You don't show your cards too soon, people get bored easily, not everyones a die hard fan, like us.
Did you guys know that Funcom recently got 30 million $ from private investors which expect from AoC to be a awesome commercial success, so that they get their money back and some additional bucks extra?! Now that sounds really good to me..; i would not invest my money in a project if i am not totally sure that it will work out..
Care to wadger on this?Funcom has money invested into that release date. They've got partnerships with Nvidia and Microsoft, and all of which have been even stilli insisting Oct 30th release date. I don't think they can push that release date so easily as some people would like for you to believe.
They can and will. No software ever gets released on time, unless it's full of bugs.
Companies are either like mythic, where they insist on high quality releases and push dates back, or they release stuff nearly on time and buggy as hell like SOE and Turbine.
Most companies follow the "An imperfect product today is infinitely better than a perfect one a year from now" mantra and release, damn the torpedoes, because chances are, if they push it back a year, it will still be buggy as hell, and they need to pay the rent.
Most bugs in a very complex system such as a game can only be found when 10s of thousands of people are using the software anyway. No company can afford a QA team that big, so the users become QA testers. Betas don't find everything because most beta testers are hard core gamers and they do different things than someone who's new to the genre or a casual player, who will do some really weird unexpected stuff, or exploiters who find loopholes in the rule set.
I'd rather have a game with some bugs now, than have to wait another year for a game that will be buggy anyway. All of them are buggy at first. It's the nature of the beast.
-Viz
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
ROLF. Even so that you accused me of so many thing I can still laugh. You have posted false information and I have my objection!.
First of all dear Mr. AmazingAvery. I strongly advise you to read the real report instead of reading you own personal report and post it on the forum. I write the link down so you can read it ASAP for you own concern, link: http://www.newsweb.no/atmnt/070725+Q2-report.pdf?id=45180 . Now we break the report down so we can understand it. When we look the result we can se that Funcom have a good year until Q3 2006 where are starting to loss money. There sales growth goes down to minus 51,9% and they end that quarter in -353. In Q4 2006 its even worst where they end with -1,017. At the start of year Q1 2007 there is minus 1213 and at the end of Q2 2007 there ended in a total of minus 1,460. This is far worse then predicted. This is due to loss account from Funcom. So basic the company are lossing there customer from the games, aka Anarchy Online. There are selling few units, but thats because they are not selling any new units. Now lets take a look in the Profit and loss account in the report. At year 2007 they had a total operating revenues at 10,822 and we scroll further in 2007 (of cause it only second quarter) we are down only to 1,593. Of cause Funcome have also lower there operation expenses but we all know that was because they closed there other deparment. But still it pretty bad. Just look at the earning after tax, year 2006 is was high 3,236 and now its only 776. You write that Funcom are stable company, really ?. No it not, its a company in a high risk. There are not selling any units and they are lossing money like, well - just very fast. Funcom also expects it become even lower until to the launch and they not even mention anything about the release date to Q3 this year, funny enough or sadly should I say. You also write that Funcom has assets for over $60 million, but that is rather low if you ask me.
Then final you write that I am troll, bla bla bla. I think more it is you there is maybe a hmmm, Age of Conan Fanboy?. For me is seems more that you blind support something, even ignore plain and simple logic, facts and well thought out arguments.
Lets take a summary:
At E3 Age of Conan won the IGN award for "Best PC Persistent" online mmorpg because Warhammer Online did not appear to the Show. Mythic have enough money to launch there own private show around the world.
Funcom had and will loss a high amount of capital until the launch of Age of Conan. There hole company rest only on AOC and if that product fail then it the doom for Funcom.
If cause I wish the best for Funcom and I will also want to try Funcom, hopefull to Q3 2007
. But I just saying this because it is the truth. I am not hiding anything. You can read it all in the report. Funcom have made some pretty bad mistake with there company and I wish they had a better marketing at least. I just fear they maybe have not learned from there mistake from Anarchy Online and that was the worst lanuch ever for a MMORPG, maybe Vanguard was worse, dunny. Anyway one of the highlight in report was that EA/Myhic have postponed the launch date of Warhammer Online which seem to aid Funcom.
I agree and his interepretation of the information linked is wrong too. Bare with me and i'll show you why.
Further more he failed to neglect to say that Funcom has generated 11 million gross profit over those 4 quarters his listed.
After all operating income for those 4 quarters we listed as
Which overall provided: $2,5 income for those 4 quarters listed.
Financial Statement for the Quarterly Income Statements commented on:
Compared to the same quarter last year, Funcom N.V. has seen net income shrink from a gain of $612.0K to a loss of $204.0K despite relatively flat revenues. A key factor has been an increase in the percentage of sales devoted to SGA costs from 111.42% to 146.07%.
What our war friend/troll Battlekruse failed to mention or even look at too was the Quarterly Balance sheet statement on the same site he linked - let me post what it says:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
To statement posted on said site and copied here above is pretty unstandable. I.E. LOW FINANCIAL RISK, Sales still outstanding to be posted, hence the quarterly report due in 4 days time. It doesn't say that there aren't revenues just that it implies there aren't being collected effiiciently.
Also there 4 quarter trend for the same period, taking into account their liabilites and equity (in + $millions):
Looks pretty stable to me over the last 4 quarters..
"In 2006, CFF (Cash Flow from Financing) was negative, which tells investors that this company did not need to attract significant financing from outside sources."
Growth over prior year in Gross Profit as an Industry Comparison = 108.01%
Total Revenue over prior year = 78.29%
Oh btw Battlekruse did you even bother to click the yearly reports? In my experience these show how a company stands up more that the last 4 quarters. hmmm for the sake of it here are the comments made by the website link you posted concerning the last 4 years;
Income Statement Comment:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Year over year, Funcom N.V. has been able to grow revenues from $5.3M to $10.8M. Most impressively, the company has been able to reduce the percentage of sales devoted to income tax expense from -0.11% to -24.36%. This was a driver that led to a bottom line growth from a loss of $1.6M to a gain of $3.3M.
Balance Sheet Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Finally the Cash Flow Statement:
Financial Statements for Funcom N.V.
Has the game been delayed for two years now??? where is your proof? From a Press Release:
"Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005" It was only 2 years ago they officially announced the game Troll... And this time last year they announced their publisher Eidos.
I would like to apologise for posting so much, but the link is there for everyone to see for themselves. Battlekruse has no interest in AoC whatsoever and takes any opportunity he can to slate it. Worst of all he slates their financial history with his totally out of focus and hate for the game. He didn't post all the facts and I thought it would be necessary to post them here. I don't like seeing misinformation.
The facts are:
Funcom is a proven financially stable company
Funcom has assests over $60 million
Whenever, the game is going to be released on time 30th October 2007 or whenever, the playing public will be the judge on how good it is.
Battlekruse is a troll, and an AoC hater, He posted up non factual and not the whole story in a further attempt to put Funcom and AoC down, he is also the lover of a game which will compete with AoC for subs at some point = war. (what does this tell you?)
But, the main point is, the company is stable enough to put out a game, there is no financial constraints atm. The development / Beta testing has never been hinded by any constraints of any financial type because there were none.
ROLF. Even so that you accused me of so many thing I can still laugh. You have posted false information and I have my objection!.
First of all dear Mr. AmazingAvery. I strongly advise you to read the real report instead of reading you own personal report and post it on the forum. I write the link down so you can read it ASAP for you own concern, link: http://www.newsweb.no/atmnt/070725+Q2-report.pdf?id=45180 . Now we break the report down so we can understand it. When we look the result we can se that Funcom have a good year until Q3 2006 where are starting to loss money. There sales growth goes down to minus 51,9% and they end that quarter in -353. In Q4 2006 its even worst where they end with -1,017. At the start of year Q1 2007 there is minus 1213 and at the end of Q2 2007 there ended in a total of minus 1,460. This is far worse then predicted. This is due to loss account from Funcom. So basic the company are lossing there customer from the games, aka Anarchy Online. There are selling few units, but thats because they are not selling any new units. Now lets take a look in the Profit and loss account in the report. At year 2007 they had a total operating revenues at 10,822 and we scroll further in 2007 (of cause it only second quarter) we are down only to 1,593. Of cause Funcome have also lower there operation expenses but we all know that was because they closed there other deparment. But still it pretty bad. Just look at the earning after tax, year 2006 is was high 3,236 and now its only 776. You write that Funcom are stable company, really ?. No it not, its a company in a high risk. There are not selling any units and they are lossing money like, well - just very fast. Funcom also expects it become even lower until to the launch and they not even mention anything about the release date to Q3 this year, funny enough or sadly should I say. You also write that Funcom has assets for over $60 million, but that is rather low if you ask me.
Then final you write that I am troll, bla bla bla. I think more it is you there is maybe a hmmm, Age of Conan Fanboy?. For me is seems more that you blind support something, even ignore plain and simple logic, facts and well thought out arguments.
Lets take a summary:
At E3 Age of Conan won the IGN award for "Best PC Persistent" online mmorpg because Warhammer Online did not appear to the Show. Mythic have enough money to launch there own private show around the world.
Funcom had and will loss a high amount of capital until the launch of Age of Conan. There hole company rest only on AOC and if that product fail then it the doom for Funcom.
If cause I wish the best for Funcom and I will also want to try Funcom, hopefull to Q3 2007
. But I just saying this because it is the truth. I am not hiding anything. You can read it all in the report. Funcom have made some pretty bad mistake with there company and I wish they had a better marketing at least. I just fear they maybe have not learned from there mistake from Anarchy Online and that was the worst lanuch ever for a MMORPG, maybe Vanguard was worse, dunny. Anyway one of the highlight in report was that EA/Myhic have postponed the launch date of Warhammer Online which seem to aid Funcom.
Um...mythic sold out because they had NO money...EA bought out Mythic, the show is running on EAs money.
and as veteran UO player I'm entitled to eternally despise everything EA does...they took best PvP mmorpg ever and turned it to PvE happyland.
Also, check DAoC...they barely breach 10 000 simultaneous users while AO is almost 50k and is a much older game.
EA will drive Warhammer into the ground. All the forum posting in the world doesn't sway Fanboi's they need to see the FAILURE for themselves.
Thats old an public information. Mythic sold part of there company to get the Warhammer license from Games Workshop because they so a lot of potential there. Then EA Games also saw that a Warhammer Online based mmorpg would have a highly potential so they brought a great share and yes outbuyed Mythic company
If don't have any solid arguments, then...........
I do, however