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Star Wars: The Old Republic: EA Sinks $80 Million into Development
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
EA has invested $80 million in the development of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Additional revelations include the fact that LucasArts will score a 30% share of profits after EA recoups its initial investment in the development, licensing, marketing and distribution costs.
"We estimate that EA will cover its direct operating costs and break even at 500,000 subscribers (actual number is closer to 350,000 subscribers), meaning that with 1.5 million paying subscribers, EA will have 1 million profitable subs," said Pachter. "We estimate that the incremental operating cost for each subscriber above break even is around $5 per month, so if the revenue split is 33 percent to LucasArts ($5 per subscriber per month), EA will be left with $5 per subscriber per month in operating profit. At 1 million profitable subscribers over the last six months of its fiscal year, EA should generate $30 million in operating profit from subscribers."
EA also announced this week that the launch of "Star Wars: The Old Republic" may be delayed until January 2012.
Read more about the Star Wars: The Old Republic investment financials.
Thanks to AmazingAvery for the tip!
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Comments
Sorry, I've been out of the loop for a while....if they are claiming this will be delayed until Jan '12 ...what was the previous "estimated date" ?
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There wasn't one, they were just winging it basically with extremely vague estimations of when they would probably announce an estimated release date. lol...
I guess they didn't have enough cut scenes.
"Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever." - Noam Chomsky
I think I've seen dates from Now until Late November 2011. So a little after Xmas into 2012 isn't a huge pushback.
I think EA will try to get it out for the holiday season as hard as they can, but they also know that releasing the game "unfinished" is a sure disaster.
EA may in a bit of a quandry now, because if they need to spend more $$$ to get the game finished, it may also push the needed sales and subscriptions for making a profit into unrealistic territory. It's entirely possible they've already gotten there.
So the developers might be in the bind of needing to do X amount of more work to get the game ready for release, but loathe to spend more money to do it. Interesting times...
Avatars are people too
I do question a few things. well one really. Wasn't that delay until January of 2012 just an outside chance. Meaning the chances of it happening are very slim... Did this change over night because last night that was still the case. This makes it sound like it has a higher chance of happening (say like 20 percent) where as EA made it sound like it was more of a slimmer chance (like 1 or 2 percent).
If it hasn't changed then the article might want to be aware of that slim chance and that Reid came around and stated that it is very likely they will release in Q2-Q3 of this year.
Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.
Is ToR going to be good? Dude it's Bioware making a freaking star wars game, all signs point to awesome. -G4tv MMo report.
Eh, did they really have to hype the game for so many years? I wonder how many people and resources where wasted giving out tiny bits of info and rumors since it was in development.
Now 2012? Af is people wouldn't have been interested if it had been announced one year before real launch accompanied by solid info.
Hehe, almost all articles and threads I read about this left out the 'at least' bit and present the 80 million as a fixed number rather than a given minimum.
My brand new bloggity blog.
This is old.
Guild Wars 2's 50 minutes game play video:
http://n4g.com/news/592585/guild-wars-2-50-minutes-of-pure-gameplay
Everything We Know about GW2:
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/287180/page/1
If the game isn't ready than it simply isn't ready and needs to be pushed back. BUT they really need to get it figured out and set a final date because it's starting to get a little bit ridiculous. While there's never been an officially set release date but there's been constant "reliable estimates" on their behalf. First it was summer of 2010, then winter of 2010, then summer of 2011, then winter of 2011, now the beginning of 2012. They just need to stop talking about it until they've got a set date.
I keep a pretty close eye on TOR and I've never seen a mention of any 2010 release estimate. That estimate was placed out there by the future consumers.
EA/Bioware has only ever given us estimates in Spring-Late 2011 and now possibly beginning 2012.
"If you're going to act like a noob, I'll treat you like one." -Caskio
Adventurers wear fancy pants!!!
Humm, I was off a bit in my estimates. I was predicting around a 120 million budget.
On the other hand the podcast EA sounded like they were hedging a late Q2 / early Q3 release date but did not want to release the date. I would expect EA to release an official date at a big gamer conference (ala maybe E3).
I did see in the financial report that the primary box sales, all of it, goes to EA. The estimated cost for marketing/distribution etc was 5 mil. If the 'BOX' sales equal 1 million the the result (at $50 per box) is 50 million with an EA profit of 30 million towards profit. If sales are at 2 million the profit is 60 million on initial sales. Before LucasArts gets the 33% cut.
I am confident that the 2 million mark sales is probable, including mine. Subsequent sales will depend on game itself and that is as yet to be seen. PVE and Solo players make up the majority of long lasting subscribers (PvP and hardcore power levelers tend to buiy, play a few months then go to the store for the next game). Just check out the games that hype their PvP and 'endgame' content. After the huge release they have a sharp drop off curve in population. The game EVE (a fully PvP centric game) has held their PvP players well but their total subscriber base is relatively small compared to other MMOs.No complaint here but I see they are trying to bring in more PvE players with their updates and improvements. Doing the sensible and profitable thing IMO.
If nothing else this financial review shows that the rumors of 150-300 million guesses have probably been 'way way off'. A delay til Q1 in 2012? Sigh, guess I will just have to wait. My money is ready. For those of you who just hate (Bioware TOR and its players) then chill out and keep on trolling. Won't stop me from deciding where and when to spend my money.
Really hate the title, please change it. EA did not "sink", they have invested. Sink gives the wibe of waste, whereas investment is good.
Guild Wars 2's 50 minutes game play video:
http://n4g.com/news/592585/guild-wars-2-50-minutes-of-pure-gameplay
Everything We Know about GW2:
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/287180/page/1
To be exact they stated it would release sometime between June and December 2011, with an OUTSIDE change of it slipping to Q1 (January quater, in their words) 2012.
So yeah. Extremely vague as in bascially sometime in the next 10 months, but more likely sometime this year.
I'm expecting this game to be released when it's ready for release, no sooner or later. If it gets "delayed again" there's nothing unexpected in it again. Worst scenario would be they release it when the customers demand (this summer/fall) and it would be badly unfinished.
They've only shown small bits of the game and even they have been buggy and unbalanced as the testers have said, I seriously hope this game gets delayed as much as it needs to be to be ready for release. Only thing this release scenario is suffering is too early announcement of the game (like every mmorpg), if they had waited till 2010 with the announcement in the first place people wouldnt be so impatient
I was shocked Blizzard announced Titan and no info on it, it's gonna be a project that can be followed from the first drawn pixel up till the release and it will be amusing to see how completely frustrated people will get who are looking forward to it with a wee bit too much excitement :P
"It will be released when it's ready for release."
This article takes the release date out of context, as well as the article that is linked. I wish people wouldn't do this just to get people riled up for no reason other then to click their website.
They went from saying it was releasing Spring 2011 to now lat 2011-early 2012... Nearly an entire year delay
Bioware should just scrap this game after it flops after launch and work on an MMO for one of their own IPs so they don't have to pay Lucas royalties.
Only $ 80 Millions????
EA will recover that just selling the boxes
Vanguard budget was $ 60 Millions and they managed to launch the game half done..............I hope Bioware can at least finish it in time
yea alot of sites have jumped on that "at worst jan 2012" and poorly reporting it as if there is a good chance of it. im not saying no chance but the EA guy(his name escapes me at the moment) was pretty clear that, that was a worst case scenario
http://darthhater.com/2011/05/04/electronic-arts-4q-earnings-live-blog/
(link not directed at you whilan as i know you have seen it)
"While we fully anticipate launching Star Wars: The Old Republic in Q2 or Q3, the low end of our guidance range assumes the outside possibility of a January launch."
Weren't they originally saying 300 million dollars? Maybe a year ago or so they put out that number.
The Stranger: It's what people know about themselves inside that makes 'em afraid.
It'll be out next May.
neither EA nor Bioware ever said 300million dollars. that number was given by a former mythic employee that was ranting on his blog in which he later retracted statements he made regarding TOR, saying he made the statements while angry and not having the full facts.
ah, ok. I was sure I had seen that number at some point.
The Stranger: It's what people know about themselves inside that makes 'em afraid.
No. A super duper ultra secret unnamed source said 300 million, and of course this source never offered up one iota of proof to back up his claims. Bioware never confirmed nor denied this number. So on the conspiriacy theory meter of truth that means this number must be absoloutely true.
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