Email invasion vs EA

[Lord Gandalf]

How about setting a date & time for an "email invasion" vs EA Games for putting spokes in UO players for the last couple years and completely neglecting UO?

A 100 email+ in one day holding different topics and interesting questions should be able to shake them a little bit...

Perhaps we can share some questions & answers in this thread as well?

Let it rain! ️️️️?

 

[redman2k]

I don't think you know how product cycles work. We are essentially in the tail end of the product cycle for Ultima Online.

At this stage, the product owner is trying to maximize profits while putting as little money back into it. They do this by having smaller support and development teams and basically just do maintenance work.

If you really wanted to get EA interested with an email blast, it would have to be from 100+ new prospective users a day claiming they would play based off some changes.

I love UO, but I realize they are just farming the current player base until it isn't cost effective anymore. I'm not attacking you it's just the nature of business.

 

[The Craftsman]

 

[Uriah Heep]

If you really wanted to get EA interested with an email blast, it would have to be from 100+ new prospective users a day claiming they would play based off some changes.

Not sure that would even do anygood. They didn't want to create UO to start with, just gave Garriott a piddlin amount of money to make him go away and leave em alone.
And been trying to figure out how to destroy/close it ever since.

It is what it is, what we ahve is probably all we will ever have. we have to face up to that reality

 

[maji111]

It's a business that has been in decline for about a decade. It's probably at a point where it's running at a significant loss and is being bankrolled for nostalgic purposes to enhance reputation. The irony being that whilst this financial management has caused certain conflicts, there probably isn't the funding for anyone to be paid to read through the emails you want to send.

 

[Fridgster]

It's a business that has been in decline for about a decade. It's probably at a point where it's running at a significant loss and is being bankrolled for nostalgic purposes to enhance reputation. The irony being that whilst this financial management has caused certain conflicts, there probably isn't the funding for anyone to be paid to read through the emails you want to send.

I assure you if EA wasn't making money from UO then UO would no longer exist.

 

[railshot]

I don't think you know how product cycles work. We are essentially in the tail end of the product cycle for Ultima Online.

At this stage, the product owner is trying to maximize profits while putting as little money back into it. They do this by having smaller support and development teams and basically just do maintenance work.

If you really wanted to get EA interested with an email blast, it would have to be from 100+ new prospective users a day claiming they would play based off some changes.

I love UO, but I realize they are just farming the current player base until it isn't cost effective anymore. I'm not attacking you it's just the nature of business.

This. Email or other PR campaigns only work if there is danger of financial loss for the company. UO pop is low enough that even if all of us threatened to quit and EA believed it, it would not bother them much.
And nothing at this point would convince them to throw more money at UO than the pittance that they get from subs. A sad reality that majority of studios do not see MMOs as something that can be maintained in perpetuity with reasonable number of subs if you continue to reinvest significant amount of money into it. They put out a few expansions but the moment graphics become dated, they switch to the milking mode.
It's sad really, because there are successful example of games not much younger than UO whose owners kept them current and whose player base is thriving. But it's not going to happen with EA corporate types calling the shots.

 

[Beldin Brightaxe]

I've actually thought about doing something like this. But specifically to get UO up and running on Steam. I can't imagine it would take much money for them to implement UO on Steam and it would do nothing but help the game.

 

[Lord Gandalf]

I've actually thought about doing something like this. But specifically to get UO up and running on Steam. I can't imagine it would take much money for them to implement UO on Steam and it would do nothing but help the game.

Agreed, especially that they got the green light from steam... not sure why they havent done it yet :/

 

[THP]

Agreed, especially that they got the green light from steam... not sure why they havent done it yet :/

and there lies the issue with UO and EA...

 

[Captn Norrington]

Agreed, especially that they got the green light from steam... not sure why they havent done it yet :/

UO isn't on Steam because not long after UO was greenlit on Steam, EA and Valve Corp (the owners of Steam) got mad at each other. Due to that, now EA refuses to allow any more EA products to be put on Steam, which unfortunately includes UO.

 

[PwnySlaystation]

Want 300+ new subs? Easy and more -

1x European, 1x American, 1x Asian market classic pre-pub16 servers would bring subs back without a doubt.

 

[Restroom Cowboy]

I assure you if EA wasn't making money from UO then UO would no longer exist.

You forget that EA looks to keep hold of the bragging rights to the longest running MMO in gaming history. Even if the game stops making money, it is still a win win for EA. Free advertisement.

 

[The Craftsman]

You forget that EA looks to keep hold of the bragging rights to the longest running MMO in gaming history. Even if the game stops making money, it is still a win win for EA. Free advertisement.

I sort of agree and disagree at the same time. Sure they have the bragging rights, but theyre not exactly shouting it from the rooftops are they? They give the impression of being more embarrassed by UO than they are proud of its longevity and heritage. And as long as it pays for itself then they are happy to keep it chugging along, but once it goes in the red Im not so sure.

 

[redman2k]

Want 300+ new subs? Easy and more -

1x European, 1x American, 1x Asian market classic pre-pub16 servers would bring subs back without a doubt.

Creating a pre-pub 16 server would probably bring back 300 old subs (30k a year) and that is all. The younger/newer player base isn't used to such a harsh rule set not to mention the super dated graphics.

 

[redman2k]

Most younger gamers in their early 20's have never even heard of Ultima Online. So they aren't going to keep it around for bragging rights. The only possible reason they may operate at a loss (which I don't think they do) is if they have some obligation to make or maintain an Ultima game in order to hold onto the rights of the "Ultima" series.

But again, I don't think they operate at a loss. At UO's peak, there were 250k subscriptions, if that number has atrophied to 10% (25k), they should still be generating 3 million dollars a year from subscriptions alone. I have no idea how the relationship between Broadsword and UO works. They probably have some base contact agreement with some sort of bonus added in, based off making milestones. But I can't see them paying them more than 1 million dollars for development/software maintenance costs. I also highly doubt they spend more than 100k on server/power per year. The game was using state of the art machines 20 years ago, I wouldn't be surprised if they consolidated a bunch of "shards" onto one machine, not to mention servers can run for a very long time before dying.

Factor in some hidden costs (400k) and what not, that would leave a profit of 1.5 million dollars, a very healthy business. The real question is, how many accounts are still active? Has the number atrophied lower than 10%, is it 5%? In which case the shuttering of UO is coming much sooner rather than later.

 

[Spiritless]

No-one cares about bragging rights. The MMO genre in general is in decline and has been for awhile. It's kept open because the whole operation is probably running from a server in Mesanna's bedroom at this point and they're still able to milk the whales that still spend money on this game and/or have 50 accounts open. The in-game store and rainbow unicorns is proof if you've ever seen it that their priority is whale-milking.

 

[Merlin]

Sorry, but EA is very unlikely to act. It's all about dollars and cents.

Take a look at their most recent financial reports... EA has gross revenue of $4+ billion dollars.

Let's be VERY generous and assume UO has 15K monthly subscribers all paying the $13 a month rate (rather than discounted rate for buying 3-month of 6-month sub). That's $2.34 million pre-tax revenue. Round up to $2.5million if we assume they get $140K in other expansion and add-on purchases. In all likelihood, the number is less than that when you consider: 1) subs are probably closer to 10K, but I rounded up, 2) large number of those 'subs' are probably on the "cycle", 3) EA likely doesn't collect 100% of Broadsword revenue - I would guess anywhere from 30%-65%.

So what's my point here? UO subscriptions are only a drop in the bucket for EA gross revenue. $2.5m/$4b = 0.0625%. And that's assuming maximum revenue for UO and minimum for EA.

An email campaign will only be wasting your time... time that could better be spent in-game or sharing UO links on social media in hoping you get a few subs to return. I don't doubt the intention here was good, but I wouldn't be getting any hopes up.

 

[Uvtha]

You forget that EA looks to keep hold of the bragging rights to the longest running MMO in gaming history. Even if the game stops making money, it is still a win win for EA. Free advertisement.

There has been no indication that anyone outside of us cares how old uo is. I mean do you care about Meridian 59? It's still running, no one cares.

 

[Restroom Cowboy]

There has been no indication that anyone outside of us cares how old uo is. I mean do you care about Meridian 59? It's still running, no one cares.

Yep, sadly you are correct. Meridian will go on with it's sole AI player, EA will continue to ignore UO since its snubbing of Garriot years and years ago...and we will be left here arguing over who still gives a shi...oh wait.

 

[Kirthag]

Yep, sadly you are correct. Meridian will go on with it's sole AI player, EA will continue to ignore UO since its snubbing of Garriot years and years ago...and we will be left here arguing over who still gives a shi...oh wait.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

[Parnoc]

At this point, I don't think it's the time to call EA's attention to the game, especially negative attention, that just might cause them to throw up their hands and say "dump it". Be happy with what we have right now, it's a lot better than the alternative.

 

[Uvtha]

At this point, I don't think it's the time to call EA's attention to the game, especially negative attention, that just might cause them to throw up their hands and say "dump it". Be happy with what we have right now, it's a lot better than the alternative.

I highly doubt they care anything about any reaction from UO players. If it's making money it will keep going. If not, then it won't. I still think it's headed to having a free client option. I mean look at all the f2p practices they are slowly adding in. Free accounts have to be next.

 

[The Craftsman]

Free accounts have to be next.

Fingers crossed!

 

[MalagAste]

At this point, I don't think it's the time to call EA's attention to the game, especially negative attention, that just might cause them to throw up their hands and say "dump it". Be happy with what we have right now, it's a lot better than the alternative.

I don't know last time I got really ticked and chewed EA they dumped Mythic and sent UO to Broadsword... was that better? I don't know... but it didn't kill UO...

 

[kelmo]

 

[Lady Storm]

While you all figure out how to storm EA's castle (which I for one wish you would not do*) let me throw out a few facts.

Mind you... EA didn't give Garrott the money to fund UO out of a petty cash to get rid of him. They at the time were seeing their opportunity to enter the online gaming venue. Their contract with him was very one sided and to be truly honest at the time the Great White teeth of EA were not seen till after the game had shown promise.
Then they did their famous infiltrate, eliminate, and strip to the bone. Meaning they put their own people in key spots under guise of joining both management teams. Letting go of said team members in the wording of the time freeing up the redundancy of double work force.
Then when Garrott least expected it they striped him of his game and the whole dev team.

Now for current information:
1. EA has washed its hands of UO to the point that it let Broadsword run UO. This is big deal with EA's mantra of "MINE" on any game product they touch.

2. EA's grapevine has it that had the head of Broadsword not taken both DoAc and UO to heart to run.. Both games were slated to go into "sunset mode". For those of you who are not fermiliar with this term... its quite simple a date would be set and on that date the game would go dark forever.
Lights out , lock the door......period. And you would not be told of this fact till the day of its happening. Don't you just love EA...

3. Don't think that right now EA is not in the picture ... the teams of Broadsword are still part of EA in a sort of odd way. See there is rumor of a contract... the content one can only imagine... but I bet my bottom dollar that its something to do with the cash UO brings in... even though like Merlin said we are a mear drop in the bucket.

* = Rattling EA's cage might upset the apple cart.... I like uo... so don't flub it up! I distrust EA as it is...

 

[Tina Small]

While you all figure out how to storm EA's castle (which I for one wish you would not do*) let me throw out a few facts.

Mind you... EA didn't give Garrott the money to fund UO out of a petty cash to get rid of him. They at the time were seeing their opportunity to enter the online gaming venue. Their contract with him was very one sided and to be truly honest at the time the Great White teeth of EA were not seen till after the game had shown promise.
Then they did their famous infiltrate, eliminate, and strip to the bone. Meaning they put their own people in key spots under guise of joining both management teams. Letting go of said team members in the wording of the time freeing up the redundancy of double work force.
Then when Garrott least expected it they striped him of his game and the whole dev team.

Now for current information:
1. EA has washed its hands of UO to the point that it let Broadsword run UO. This is big deal with EA's mantra of "MINE" on any game product they touch.

2. EA's grapevine has it that had the head of Broadsword not taken both DoAc and UO to heart to run.. Both games were slated to go into "sunset mode". For those of you who are not fermiliar with this term... its quite simple a date would be set and on that date the game would go dark forever.
Lights out , lock the door......period. And you would not be told of this fact till the day of its happening. Don't you just love EA...

3. Don't think that right now EA is not in the picture ... the teams of Broadsword are still part of EA in a sort of odd way. See there is rumor of a contract... the content one can only imagine... but I bet my bottom dollar that its something to do with the cash UO brings in... even though like Merlin said we are a mear drop in the bucket.

* = Rattling EA's cage might upset the apple cart.... I like uo... so don't flub it up! I distrust EA as it is...

Something that has always bothered me about Broadsword is that Rob Denton, who heads up Broadsword, has never introduced himself or reached out to the players of UO in any way. No announcements,no letters, no appearance in a video, not even a post here on Stratics or any other UO fan site. It would be nice to hear from him once in a while, find out if he's ever even played UO, plays it now, what his vision for UO is, etc. I imagine he might show up at the 20th anniversary party; however, that won't mean much to the people who can't get to the party.

 

[Uvtha]

Something that has always bothered me about Broadsword is that Rob Denton, who heads up Broadsword, has never introduced himself or reached out to the players of UO in any way. No announcements,no letters, no appearance in a video, not even a post here on Stratics or any other UO fan site. It would be nice to hear from him once in a while, find out if he's ever even played UO, plays it now, what his vision for UO is, etc. I imagine he might show up at the 20th anniversary party; however, that won't mean much to the people who can't get to the party.

I think his lack of presence tells you all you need to know.

 

[Captn Norrington]

Something that has always bothered me about Broadsword is that Rob Denton, who heads up Broadsword, has never introduced himself or reached out to the players of UO in any way. No announcements,no letters, no appearance in a video, not even a post here on Stratics or any other UO fan site. It would be nice to hear from him once in a while, find out if he's ever even played UO, plays it now, what his vision for UO is, etc. I imagine he might show up at the 20th anniversary party; however, that won't mean much to the people who can't get to the party.

In addition to all of that, when a UO player sends him an email he redirects it to someone else as soon as possible and refuses to get involved personally in any way. Every email I've ever seen someone send him came back with a reply pretty much along the lines of "You're a UO player so send the email to Mesanna or EA customer service instead of me". No further replies are given after that.

On the other hand, I have heard when a DaoC player emails him he does try to help and resolve the situation himself.

I guess he only likes DaoC and pushes all the UO problems over to Mesanna to avoid dealing with UO stuff.

 

[Fridgster]

I don't know last time I got really ticked and chewed EA they dumped Mythic and sent UO to Broadsword... was that better? I don't know... but it didn't kill UO...

There are such things as coincidences.

 

[MalagAste]

While you all figure out how to storm EA's castle (which I for one wish you would not do*) let me throw out a few facts.

Mind you... EA didn't give Garrott the money to fund UO out of a petty cash to get rid of him. They at the time were seeing their opportunity to enter the online gaming venue. Their contract with him was very one sided and to be truly honest at the time the Great White teeth of EA were not seen till after the game had shown promise.
Then they did their famous infiltrate, eliminate, and strip to the bone. Meaning they put their own people in key spots under guise of joining both management teams. Letting go of said team members in the wording of the time freeing up the redundancy of double work force.
Then when Garrott least expected it they striped him of his game and the whole dev team.

Now for current information:
1. EA has washed its hands of UO to the point that it let Broadsword run UO. This is big deal with EA's mantra of "MINE" on any game product they touch.

2. EA's grapevine has it that had the head of Broadsword not taken both DoAc and UO to heart to run.. Both games were slated to go into "sunset mode". For those of you who are not fermiliar with this term... its quite simple a date would be set and on that date the game would go dark forever.
Lights out , lock the door......period. And you would not be told of this fact till the day of its happening. Don't you just love EA...

3. Don't think that right now EA is not in the picture ... the teams of Broadsword are still part of EA in a sort of odd way. See there is rumor of a contract... the content one can only imagine... but I bet my bottom dollar that its something to do with the cash UO brings in... even though like Merlin said we are a mear drop in the bucket.

* = Rattling EA's cage might upset the apple cart.... I like uo... so don't flub it up! I distrust EA as it is...

That supposed contract supposedly ends in Sept... Just an FYI.

 

[cobb]

Rob Denton?

Never heard of him

 

[Lady Storm]

Cobb ......
Google it.

 

[Turbo]

i just hope that when the day comes that they turn the servers off they give us the ability to download a copy of our shard to host ourselves and continue playing, or even patch it and play our shard in singleplayer or something. They should owe us at least that for paying subs during its record breaking lifetime.
And one thing that would bring in more subs would be if they spent some money and made a new client with modern graphics and basically re launch the game. This would bring new subs and make younger gamers aware of it. That alone would make the game appeal to new players that couldnt get past the dated graphics, the core gameplay is still great and the older players could still use classic or enh client if they chose not to use the new one.

 

[MalagAste]

i just hope that when the day comes that they turn the servers off they give us the ability to download a copy of our shard to host ourselves and continue playing, or even patch it and play our shard in singleplayer or something. They should owe us at least that for paying subs during its record breaking lifetime.

Doubt that'll happen... but there are plenty of free shards available.

 

[Lord Gandalf]

i just hope that when the day comes that they turn the servers off they give us the ability to download a copy of our shard to host ourselves and continue playing, or even patch it and play our shard in singleplayer or something. They should owe us at least that for paying subs during its record breaking lifetime.

People who think like you are the main reason why uo population keeps going down. *claps hands*

UO Single player! How the hell i never thought about that, what a genius convincing idea!

 

[Turbo]

When they pull the plug i would like to keep playing one way or another, specially with all the chars i have spent so much time on instead of starting again on some modified free shard thats probably high ping in usa. How does that day have anything to do with playerbase when there wont be one at all.

 

[Uvtha]

People who think like you are the main reason why uo population keeps going down. *claps hands*

How so?

 

[Lord Gandalf]

How so?

Make a little study on how many players play uo on unofficial servers and u will know how uo lost most of its population

 

[Uvtha]

Make a little study on how many players play uo on unofficial servers and u will know how uo lost most of its population

I don't see how these two things equate. The guy wants an offline version with his crap intact when the game shuts down, not now. I think it's understandable, and I don't see what it has to do with people leaving for private servers.

 

[Lord Gandalf]

I don't see how these two things equate. The guy wants an offline version with his crap intact when the game shuts down, not now. I think it's understandable, and I don't see what it has to do with people leaving for private servers.

I think he can save his post for later (after uo shuts down) and provide more interesting ideas while sticking to the thread title instead of being so negative... im 100% sure that no-one would ever care about playing UO in single player mode after all.

 

[Uvtha]

im 100% sure that no-one would ever care about playing UO in single player mode after all.

I've actually heard a lot of people express this feeling. I honestly wouldn't mind an offline version with my characters backed up when the game eventually folds.

I think a fully customizable (with UI) personally hosted shard would be pretty fun. I guess that's sort of the idea behind "Shards". Or whatever it's called now.

 

[Arcus]

Fingers crossed!

Fingers crossed it NEVER goes FTP.

 

[The Craftsman]

Fingers crossed it NEVER goes FTP.

Like it or not. F2P is the one and only way this game can survive. It can't keep haemorrhaging subs forever. At some point it'll need a F2P transfusion.

 

[Archnight]

Fingers crossed it NEVER goes FTP.

Honestly I hope it does, but F2P with trial account ruleset... no restrictions will just kill the game in the end. It's been mentioned before even by the dev's "The Endless Journey" and would like to see it happen with the 20th Anniversary

Ultima The Endless Journey Account?

 

[Alex"Drake Iron Heart"CS]

i just hope that when the day comes that they turn the servers off they give us the ability to download a copy of our shard to host ourselves and continue playing, or even patch it and play our shard in singleplayer or something. They should owe us at least that for paying subs during its record breaking lifetime.
And one thing that would bring in more subs would be if they spent some money and made a new client with modern graphics and basically re launch the game. This would bring new subs and make younger gamers aware of it. That alone would make the game appeal to new players that couldnt get past the dated graphics, the core gameplay is still great and the older players could still use classic or enh client if they chose not to use the new one.

It would take years to do, and by the time they managed to do it, the graphics would be already outdated..... If I remember right, Mesanna once said, it would take about 5-6 years to make UO, into modern graphics as they whole code would have to be written from scratch....

I assure you if EA wasn't making money from UO then UO would no longer exist.

Very true, also as a business sometimes, even when one side of the business is losing you funnel money from the other side.



If its true EA, made 4 Billion last year in revenue, trust me, UO losing money wont be an issue for them, they can afford to throw a few bones to keep this dog alive a little more. As stated by someone else, its probably all in a contract of how many subs, how much interest and how many milestones are met, once one of them goals are not met, then maybe EA will think about shutting down. I really doubt it they keeping UO for bragging rights as all modern gamers below 30 years old, wont even of heard about UO....

Now another interesting fact that I see no one has picked up yet about EA, EA Sports/EA Games, all the games they defend or promote has the EA Games in their introduction to the game, UO being owned by EA, has not got any EA advertising in the game...... Is this coincidence or just a prove that all the game now rests on Broadsword, EA just holds the intellectual property rights, maybe as mentioned by someone, they need UO active to hold the ultima series rights.... if not they are lost to Garriot for some sort of contract clause.


I wouldnt be surprised even if DaoC and UO are on the same servers, maybe closing a game would mean having to close the other game, as the hosting costs will go higher, so we will never know really what is going on.

 

[MalagAste]

They did say that updating the Art to "high res" would take several years... years they have squandered... honestly IMO they should have hired a couple of artists... at least 2 giving them 3 to work with and put them to work at this years ago... now it's too late.

Had they done this back when SA update flopped due to the fact that they totally changed the look of the game to something that most people found FUGLY... they would have been done long time ago... but instead they gave us a load of excuses...

They also could have given players the opportunity to help update the art... many players offered this... and were quite good at it. Had that taken that help... in some way even by giving them goods and credit in game or paying them like they do currently with EM's the work would have been done by now...

However... and this has been proven a million times over... most of you all 2d players freak and cry about any change in art at all... so why would they invest in any effort to improve the outdated game??? They wouldn't... its obvious that fewer and fewer of us want high res art.

Those that did most of them... have moved on to prettier games.

The few of us that remain are left.. wanting.

 

[The Craftsman]

However... and this has been proven a million times over... most of you all 2d players freak and cry about any change in art at all... so why would they invest in any effort to improve the outdated game???

Is there any thread that you cant bring down to being a client war?

 

[MalagAste]

Is there any thread that you cant bring down to being a client war?

Hey I didn't start this...