How much is "ultima online" worth to EA?

[Thunderz]

simple question, how much is this game worth to EA? 1mill a year? 100 mill a year? i'd like to know without trouling through business profiles... surely they need someone who's been playing for 10 years like me to finally buy the game off them and get it back to UO as it was, id go all out and buy the rights off EA tomorrow $2 million if they'd sell it..

 

[Azureal]

I think its more of a case of what it might be worth in the future (UO2, etc etc) than what its worth right now.

So long as it covers the cost of server maintenance and the wages for Jeremy, Draconi, Regine and the Automated Customer Service Robots (aka GMs) they employ, it will still be here tomorrow.

 

[NBG]

ummm even if they sell it to you....

Do you have enough leftover to keep it running during the transition?

There are still alot of mouth to feed behind the scene that makes UO run...

 

[Eros]

I think they probably make around 20 mil a year. So, I doubt they will take the 2 mil that you are offering.

 

[Azureal]

I think they probably make around 20 mil a year. So, I doubt they will take the 2 mil that you are offering.

Before expenses, maybe.

Even at the higher monthly rate of $15, theyd still need around 110k accounts to get close to 20mil a year, before expenses.

**EDIT**

Ahh, thats without the dollars generated through uogamecodes.com

Gotta love speculation posts.

 

[Ender]

Having a player buy the rights to UO and change it to "what it should be" is probably the absolute worst thing that could happen to this game. Everyone has different ideas of what would make UO a good game, some have insanely crazy/stupid ideas, a few are genuinely good... I say just keep it in the hands of the current devs.

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

simple question, how much is this game worth to EA? 1mill a year? 100 mill a year? i'd like to know without trouling through business profiles... surely they need someone who's been playing for 10 years like me to finally buy the game off them and get it back to UO as it was, id go all out and buy the rights off EA tomorrow $2 million if they'd sell it..

Well ... serious offers and inquiries ... would need the services of a corporate type attorney ...
I forget which specific breed/flavor ... BUT one of them could pry-out a "real" number for you ...
or a FIRM "no interest/no thankyou"

again ... not sure of the specific "title" ... but one specializing in Intellectual Property could likely steer you in the right direction.

(2 mill ...nah ... not likely)

 

[Sunrise]

Crazy idea this is...I love UO as much as the next person. hence why I still pay to play. BUT Why buy UO???? Why not hey make your own game? seriosuly. There are enough hungry Devs out there looking for work. So right there they are cheaper than paying jer and draco.

make the game how YOU want it played. Put your own mark out there. Sink or fail what do you have to lose? I mean look where UO is going? We are staying steady. Maybe not the best as we once where but on the same token...we are still playing so...

UO is one mans dream..make your own. When and if you do tho please tell me. Im always up for a new challenge someone throws at myself. Thanks

 

[FrejaSP]

simple question, how much is this game worth to EA? 1mill a year? 100 mill a year? i'd like to know without trouling through business profiles... surely they need someone who's been playing for 10 years like me to finally buy the game off them and get it back to UO as it was, id go all out and buy the rights off EA tomorrow $2 million if they'd sell it..

Why do you think you could do better?
You may have ideas for UO but who say the customers share them?
We all have out wishes for the future of UO, some want it to be like being in heaven, others want to be a wild and dangerous place.
How will you success please all the different kind of players?

Also would you be better to see how a changes to the game would act on a live server with players who want to abuse it for their own winning?

It's not an easy job to bring UO back to life.

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

"Worth" is a subjective context.

According to this interview:

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/warhammer-time

UO is "wildly profitable" and has approximately 100k subscribers.

One of the reasons EA bought Mythic, I think, is that Mythic understands the MMO business model, where the actual dollar amounts aren't necessarily big but the return on investment is high.

Basically, it seems from articles in business publications that once you make up your initial investment, maintenance costs are so cheap that even smaller games can make a really good return on investment, and get you a nice, steady income flow.

EA was probably enjoying UO's income flow....But, other than make the money from it? What do you do with it? We're EA. Messing with stuff is what we do.

Darkscribe persuaded them that what you needed to do was pour lots of money into it, make a new client to attract new players, and attempt to grab a hunk of WoW's audience.

This by and large doesn't seem to have worked.

So EA bought Mythic, and will be using a new game, WHO, to take on WoW, and Mythic will decide what to do with UO.

But we have no indication whatsoever that UO's in any actual danger other than our own persecution complex and the fact that, somewhere in our heads, we're comparing UO now to UO at its peak, and that just ain't a fair comparison. UO will never be at its peak again; we need to deal with that. But it can be lively, fun, and vibrant....And, on the business end, profitable.

-Galen's player

 

[Eslake]

Why do you think you could do better?
You may have ideas for UO but who say the customers share them?
We all have out wishes for the future of UO, some want it to be like being in heaven, others want to be a wild and dangerous place.
How will you success please all the different kind of players?

Personally, I would please them all by first making them all very angry - and doing a complete game wipe.

But.. I would follow it with a replacement series of servers in categories rather than Blue and Seige.

FFA servers : Anything goes but scripting. Skill gains are accelerated and insurance costs are reduced a bit. PvP is always an option.

Classic servers : Similar to the current Blue servers but no magics or skills which were added after LBR, and a 30 minute lockout on facet crosses. (iow - go to fel, you can't exit to tram for 30 minutes.
(I doubt removing item properties would be even a remote posability at this point, the entire game has been rebuilt around them so taking them out would mean a whole new game)

Grueling Taskmaster servers : no GGS. Area spells don't effect hidden/invis characters - only Detect does. Telikinesis is removed. Cartography can only be gained drawing maps to 60.0. 1 resource / active gather of any kind. Shops pay 1/4 the normal value for items. Recall and Gate move up one circle in difficulty - and are unusable anywhere but Guard Protection areas... and so on. (I would love this server myself!)

And a couple for the current 2 systems.


Neon would be extinct except for extremely rare - extremely hard to get items (and only a small % chance on those).

BODs would be changed from a delayed activity, to a flat out 10 tickets / day / account. (the same basic types/skill as now)

Veteran Rewards would be based on Account Ownership rather than account age. If you have paid 10 years, your accounts are 10 year veterans. (rewards would only be available to Claim on accounts paid for that time tho.) If you transfer to someone who has no account, they are 0years.

No more than 6 parrots for a house. No more than 4 active statues at a time. No more than 2 heralds. etc. Deco is fine, but spam is pointless.

Only human/elf NPCs would carry gold on any server. Why would a mongbat have gold anyway?

Anyone caught scripting or using any form of 3rd party cheat would be CC banned (every account on that credit card permenantly gone) without any prior warnings.

 

[Dig]

When war hammer's subscription eclipses UO's then its done. You take the resources working on UO and shift them to WHO. The increased man power improves the product and your subscription's increase further. Any profit lost by killing UO is easily replaced with a new fresh product.

And now your only supporting ONE product and not two.

The only way UO lives is if WHO dies.

 

[Azureal]

The only way UO lives is if WHO dies.

Choo choo! All aboard the Doom Train!

 

[FrejaSP]

Personally, I would please them all by first making them all very angry - and doing a complete game wipe.

But.. I would follow it with a replacement series of servers in categories rather than Blue and Seige.

FFA servers : Anything goes but scripting. Skill gains are accelerated and insurance costs are reduced a bit. PvP is always an option.

Classic servers : Similar to the current Blue servers but no magics or skills which were added after LBR, and a 30 minute lockout on facet crosses. (iow - go to fel, you can't exit to tram for 30 minutes.
(I doubt removing item properties would be even a remote posability at this point, the entire game has been rebuilt around them so taking them out would mean a whole new game)

Grueling Taskmaster servers : no GGS. Area spells don't effect hidden/invis characters - only Detect does. Telikinesis is removed. Cartography can only be gained drawing maps to 60.0. 1 resource / active gather of any kind. Shops pay 1/4 the normal value for items. Recall and Gate move up one circle in difficulty - and are unusable anywhere but Guard Protection areas... and so on. (I would love this server myself!)

And a couple for the current 2 systems.

Ok I read enougt, this would make me quit. EA is doing far better than you ever would do.
What you wish for UO is so far from what I want from UO and from the UO I love. Alot would feel that, even when their wishes for UO is very different for mine.

Why would you buy UO to wipe it and total rebuild it. You think the name alone would make you keep the customers?

I only know one who could do that, that's Richard Garriott, the founder of UO.

I'm sure you have a dream for a game, but it is not UO and will never be. You have to build your own game, get your own fame.

It's much like when a Guild lose it's founder and someone else try run the guild. In most cases it will kill the guild. I had even seen players try to buy a famed guild tag to rebuild a guild, it's a bad idea and will fail badly in most cases.

EA had keeped UO alive for 10 years. Well done, even when it did not take the direction I wanted.

 

[FrejaSP]

When war hammer's subscription eclipses UO's then its done. You take the resources working on UO and shift them to WHO. The increased man power improves the product and your subscription's increase further. Any profit lost by killing UO is easily replaced with a new fresh product.

And now your only supporting ONE product and not two.

The only way UO lives is if WHO dies.

UO may very well survive WHO, Warhammer are a different game, noone know if it will be a success or fail badly.

 

[Sunrise]

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

UO may very well survive WHO, Warhammer are a different game, noone know if it will be a success or fail badly.

I am increasingly inclined to think that UO will outlive WoW, simply because the latter game's expectations are set way too high, and because sooner or later it'll become obvious that they have padded their subscription numbers.

WoW is the kind of business where expectations are set so high that it'll be making boatloads of cash, and someone will cancel it because they will think that it should be making more boatloads.

Like American Idol. Still the number one show.....But it used to be number one by more, so now people are calling it in trouble.

Whereas UO's been getting creamed in terms of raw subscription numbers since Everquest came out. So we're used to it. UO just keeps right on doing its thing.

-Galen's player

 

[Sunrise]

Hrm..so UO is like the energizer bunny? It just keeps going and going. Even with all the bashing and people saying its dieing it keeps just plugging along..or actually swinging along

 

[Zooithion]

Warhammer must be a success for UO to be a success in the future.

 

[Zodiac19]

"Worth" is a subjective context.

According to this interview:

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/warhammer-time

UO is "wildly profitable" and has approximately 100k subscribers.

One of the reasons EA bought Mythic, I think, is that Mythic understands the MMO business model, where the actual dollar amounts aren't necessarily big but the return on investment is high.

Basically, it seems from articles in business publications that once you make up your initial investment, maintenance costs are so cheap that even smaller games can make a really good return on investment, and get you a nice, steady income flow.

EA was probably enjoying UO's income flow....But, other than make the money from it? What do you do with it? We're EA. Messing with stuff is what we do.

Darkscribe persuaded them that what you needed to do was pour lots of money into it, make a new client to attract new players, and attempt to grab a hunk of WoW's audience.

This by and large doesn't seem to have worked.

So EA bought Mythic, and will be using a new game, WHO, to take on WoW, and Mythic will decide what to do with UO.

But we have no indication whatsoever that UO's in any actual danger other than our own persecution complex and the fact that, somewhere in our heads, we're comparing UO now to UO at its peak, and that just ain't a fair comparison. UO will never be at its peak again; we need to deal with that. But it can be lively, fun, and vibrant....And, on the business end, profitable.

-Galen's player

UO has 100K subscribers? X $12.99 a month = meh 15 mil. Lets say 100 employees at an average of $50k a year? Thats a 10 Mil profit a year. I'd be down for 10 mil a year......

 

[FrejaSP]

Warhammer must be a success for UO to be a success in the future.

why?

 

[Mythic]

Heres an odd thought, If anyone bought UO(Like EA Did) they would own and control your house, rares, gold, all your wealth and power, Imagine all the hours spent and real cash ppl have paid out over the years. Its not yours, Its all EA's. weird huh, they can just pull the plug tommarow, and there it all goes.(Im afraid enivatbly it would happin, when, who knows)

 

[Raina]

I've never ever seen EA do anything of the sort. Honestly they are much more likely to shove the Ultima IP on a shelf and let it rot. I'll tell ya, they'd MUCH rather do that than sell it to someone and see them do something successful with it.

Over the years EA has purchased and burried many great games/universes 'etc.

I don't think there is even a question of if, because almost assuredly they won't.

~Rai

 

[Ender]

The only person that would be able to purchase UO and turn it into a success again would be the great Richard Garriott in my opinion. Pretty much every player would just turn it into what would benefit their own playing style.

 

[Godra]

Well, I have seen changes. Changes in UO and others like. But sum this up in one small post. SWG!!! Think about it, Sony (or some say George Lucas) killed most of their accounts. EQ2 just came out few months to 1 year before and was successful. But when the SWG revamp hit, the game went down the tubes. But its still up today. It will most likely be there tomorrow and the day after that. Yes, Sony could pull the plug at any time. So could Turbine with LOTRO, Stormreach with DDO, EA with UO........

Most will not, some of the MMO's are still young and strong. But my point is, eventually, our home will be gone. But I do not think it is any time soon. I know it has not been great lately. It is not a peak time for UO. But I think the Devs are a good group, EA needs to back off and let the UO team run with what they have. The game is aged, the techno stuff has been progressing on a steady pace, but the game has not. The new Kingdom Reborn was a nice face lift to the 3D client that we all have enjoyed, but falls way way way short to the MMO's that are hitting the shelf today.

MMO's that come out today are not looking to compete with UO. They are looking to out do each other. Like stated in an earlier post, steal paid accounts from WoW or LOTRO. Both very strong. AOC is another just came out, then WHO. But UO is unique. The greatest asset is us. The vets who still pay for 2 or 3 accounts and never leave. Some still pay for the account and pay for other MMO's. I have 3 UO accounts, have a lifetime membership for LOTRO, quit EQ2 to go with LOTRO, did not like DDO and just started a AOC account. But what I call home is UO. Nothing like it.

Ok, post was not as short as I wanted, but needed to be said. If u want to pay 2 million US dollars for UO, go right ahead. But it is worth much more than that to EA. Plus keep one thing in mind. If you were in the gaming industry such as EA, Sony.... Would you want to be the first one to kill a MMO? I mean pull the plug for good? That would be like a PR nightmare!!! I can see the headlines now

EA CHARGED WITH MASSIVE EXTINCTION OF MMO

Yeah, that will sit well with the MMO community, let alone all gamers.

 

[Sunrise]

EA CHARGED WITH MASSIVE EXTINCTION OF MMO

aye Very bad. Not only this title tho but also this. Remember UO is the first online game and in the record books as being the longest online game.

 

[Godra]

EA CHARGED WITH MASSIVE EXTINCTION OF MMO

aye Very bad. Not only this title tho but also this. Remember UO is the first online game and in the record books as being the longest online game.

Yeah, that was the short post I needed Sunrise. UO is not going anywhere. Just going through changes. Most hate changes, but remember when you log into any MMO title; and states right on box: Online gameplay subject to changes. If you cant, or don't like changes, then go buy a single player adventure game that you can play and play and play again that will most likely never change on you. Because if you cant take the changes, then MMO's are not for you.

 

[Eslake]

EA CHARGED WITH MASSIVE EXTINCTION OF MMO

aye Very bad. Not only this title tho but also this. Remember UO is the first online game and in the record books as being the longest online game.

I see these UO was first comments every now and then, but I should let you know - UO was not the first at anything, and is not the longest lived. There were many MORPGs before UO - both text and graphical, and there are some of those that are still online. I still play the Realm from time to time, and its about 15 years old. Admittedly it is far more cartoonish than UO, but it isn't the only older game still up and running.

UO simply became the most famous in the early years. It was easy to point to as an example due to the popularity of the single-player series and the pretty dragons.


Yes, it is dying out. No, they aren't making any effort to prevent it.

The net effect of the current decline in customers = shard consolidation (it costs 1/2 as much to run 10 shards as it does to run 20).
This will mean lost houses, guilds, inevitable lost characters and items due to glitches and so on.
Which means many closed accounts (more over time) and eventually further consolidation.

It has happened in other games, it will happen in UO.
Even EQ (in the million players club still today) has consolidated game servers at least the once that I know of. It cost them over 100,000 accounts but they consider it a victory since it reduced their operating costs by about 30% (I don't remember the exact % they said).

UO stopped leading the pack long ago and started following (UO:TD as evidence, AoS, SE, and KR also trying to copy characteristics of the competition) so they will no doubt follow in this manner as well.

 

[Vesta]

How much is "ultima online" worth to EA?

As much money as they can squeeze out of us.