Star Wars: The Old Republic a big risk for EA, say analysts, everyone else on Earth

by Richard Mitchell on Dec 21st 2011 1:25PM

It's no secret that EA has a lot riding on the success of Star Wars: The Old Republic. What is a secret, however, is just how big a risk the recently launched MMO poses for the company. As reported by Reuters, Robert W. Baird & Co analyst Colin Sebastian believes that EA may have sunk more than $300 million into the development of The Old Republic. Others estimate somewhere between $100 million and $300 million but, either way, it's a hefty investment to lose if Sith fever doesn't catch on – not to mention the loss of expected monthly subscription fees.

EA revealed in February this year that its Old Republic business would be profitable at 500,000 subscribers and at least one analyst, Sterne Agee's Arvind Bhatia, believes the game should handily reach that quota. Bhatia expects the game to sell 3 million copies and lasso 1.5 million subscribers by the end of the year. Should The Old Republic fail, Bhatia believes EA's 2012 earnings could be reduced by up to 20 percent.

It's also worth pointing out that one analyst, Cowen & Company's Doug Creutz, believes The Old Republic may have already hit the 1.5 million player mark. Of course, the best way to learn of the MMO's success is simply to crack open your window, because you can bet that EA will be shouting it from the hills the moment The Old Republic starts turning a profit.

Via: Huffington Post

Tags: pc, Star-Wars-The-Old-Republic, The-Old-Republic

Reader Comments (56)

Why does it feel like everyone either wants or assumes that The Old Republic will fail? WoW can't reign supreme forever

@xHotPotatox
Also, Why does everyone think an MMO has to "beat" wow in order to be successful? I'm sure everyone at EA would plenty happy if Sw:Tor hits 50% of WoW's player base

@Naukuga Wait, not just one but TWO people that speak sense on the internet?! Bookmarking this page.

@Naukuga

Yeah, that's true. I mean, then again EA's been ultra-competitive lately, primarily on the side of CoD and BF, but WoW is still considered a major asset to Activision, in addition to CoD, and EA must resent that.

@xHotPotatox I hate when people say that. If a game's good, a game's good. And WHEN a game's good, and has good advertisement, people tell other people about the game and more people play it.

Believe me, I used to play WoW from the end of Burning Crusade to the end of Wrath, and it's fallen to utter shit. Ever since 3.2 was released, Blizzard was catering to casuals and bads with everything on a golden platter, which was bad enough... but when Cataclysm was released it just got stupid. They changed too many things, and dropped all challenge.

The final end-game boss in Cata was an enormous dragon that was imbued as the aspect of earth. His fight encounter? A massive tank and spank.

@xHotPotatox

I hate EA and won't be playing SWTOR because of them, but this game's going to be a success. They'll profit off the box sales alone even if every one of the people decided not to play after their free month...we all know that's not going to happen.

Plenty of MMO's are profitable without beating WoW. I still don't understand why people love to yell "FAIL" when they've never tried anything.

@xHotPotatox
It strikes me as extremely ironic that I read "WoW can't reign supreme forever" in Tirion's voice from the Fall of the Lich King cinematic.

Doing business with EA is a big risk for consumers.

In fact many of the people I know who aren't buying this....it's because they don't trust EA to handle this correctly.

@Timjoy Fortunately Origin is not involved with this game, Bioware has its own downloader/launcher.

@tonyn84 Good thing you have factual basis that points to Origin has being a bad thing...oh wait. The only problems with Origin have all be solved for 90%+ of it's users...and it downloads far faster than Steam, and uses less resources. The only downside is that it's new and lacks a huge library. Quit hating on a program just because you can.

@Kougeru good to see you're using factual basis as well. Why don't you look up some of the horrifying customer service stories, and then come back and rep Origin?

Forgive my ignorance, but I don't understand how it can be estimated that sales will reach 3 million, but only 1.5 million subscribers. Does this mean that post the 30 day initial time period, they will retain half of the player base? That's a fairly hefty drop in people in 30 days.

@AirEgo Also not uncommon with MMOs. Pretty much all MMOs experience a post-launch population drop a month after launch. The question only is how big it will be SWTOR.

@macnbc

Is that what they consider "subscriptions", though? Anything past the the initial 30? I suppose that makes sense, given that you aren't charged for the actual period of gameplay until after the initial out of box experience. Thanks Mac.

@AirEgo

Essentially yes, sales will be huge but retention not so much.

Most MMO games get hammered by tourists that will stick around for the first few weeks maybe a month or two after their free 30 days.

Which is why most MMOs have such horrible launches. Because the host company knows that they are going to get hammered but a lot of those won't stay beyond the first 30 days so they refuse to invest in the server overhead to handle all the initial interest in the game.

Well I bought it and I rarely ever have played mmo's. The setup & sign up process was needlessly cumbersome & difficult. I'm getting ready to fire it up today! Can't wait! One of the things I think is lame is that you have to either assign a credit card or a game subscription card before you can use the 30 free days that came with the game. That's deplorable.

@Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell
fortunatly for me you can also use paypal

@Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell
Wow when i went to get the game at gamestop the clerk tried to tell me you dont need a game card for your activate yuor free month.

@Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell

oh ps this is common practice among all mmos, at least ones that dont offer a free to play option... if you end up not liking the game enough to continue just cancel the sub before the time is up and you will not be charged... they just want a payment method in place so when the free time is up they can automatically charge you so you can have uninterupted service for when you switch over from the free 30 day sub to a paid sub

@Special Agent Bob whoever said that obviously dont know how mmos operate..., besides, if you get the game and a gametime card why not redeem the time card? so really it shouldnt be a issue

I picked up starwars, and its very fun.
The major difference I have personally found is that in WoW i just skipped all the story stuff and followed the arrow to my quest, and when I think about it I actually have no idea whats going on in WoW story wise.
Something about a dragon that burned some area I was running around in one time.

In starwars, the cutscenes are kinda long, but the choices are fantastic, and it kinda makes you "know" whats going on in the star wars world.

There are some bugs, que times and UI gui stuff, and other things I am sure will get fixed. But the game is great.

I'm not saying WoW was bad at all, I have a couple of 85's on the thunderhorn server, (Goldsounds). Star Wars is different enough to get me excited to play it, and the story is strong enough to make me want to stick with it for awhile.

I'm waiting till April to make the jump into the game. If the population is healthly then I'll bite, if not, well that money can be used elsewhere.

I'm buying Guild Wars 2 Day one though. =)

Conflicting opinions within my mind! Yowzers, I'm not huge on MMOs but I love my Star Wars...and BioWare...and many other Star Wars games...and The Joystiq Show was pretty much all over it...Urgh.

But I stray off-course from the subject. i think many were sold on this from the get-go, immediately following the debut of the CGI trailer at E3 in 2009, which elevated to even more "Yes-es" when they revealed the other CG trailer, and then the one after that. The beta and early access ballooned the hype even further, and the notion of experiencing a specific MMO for the first time with everyone else, and discovering its little charms with everyone else was pretty appealing.

My point is that everyone's already sold on this, whether it be for over two years now, 1 year, or a few weeks ago. Thinking of the best case scenario for the outcome and reception of the game, which was assured as a success given it's BioWare, who wouldn't want in?

I love GW2. I've been waiting for it since I destroyed the Lich in Prophecies. I've been active in the community for almost five years. That being said, I cringe every single time someone brings GW2 up in a SWTOR post. Really people, c'mon.

I played SWTOR in beta, and I enjoyed it for the short time I played it. Nothing revolutionary, but it was solid, and it's Star Wars. I'm not personally going to get it, but I wish it success.

@MGTrey

HNGNNH GW2... MUST NOT FAP.

Damnit I hope it comes out soon (but not really because my social life will disintegrate)

$60 for a subscription-based MMO (on PC no less, which is generally $10 cheaper than consoles) is a little rough to me.

@RickGhastly
Especially when you consider it will probably be half that in a few months or so (after the queues have died down and some of the obvious glitches and bugs have been hammered out).

Bought it, mostly for my son. Hoping it will retain me up to 3 months for the release of The Secret World. So far, it's not a bad game but it is really nothing new.

Space battles are fun. Crew Skills are very cool. Story is really nothing interesting, we heard these stories a hundred of times from many angles. The voice acting are really nice tho, and the traduction (playing in french) is perfect. Graphics are better then what i expected from screenshots of Betas.

Overall 7/10.

Let me get this straight...

-Bioware- is making a -Star Wars- game, and it's an -MMORPG-.

There's a risk here? Am I missing something?

@killias2

Not sure if trolling, but...

SWG was generally considered a failure, though fun for it's niche playerbase. Bioware screwed up kind of hard on their last KotOR game, though a lot of that was the publishers fault. Nearly every MMO to come out in the last 6 years has failed.

Unless you're just being sarcastic, then yes...you're missing something.

@Premaximum Bioware has not ever made a title that was not profitable, in the last two console generations. (unless I am mistaken or am missing one)

KotOR II was made by Obsidian Entertainment, not Bioware. While the public might not know that minutiae, the fact remains that Bioware games sell ridiculously well and are critically approved.

I am not defending this game at all, as I don't have vested stock in it and I dislike the direction that Bioware has been heading the past few years, but just wanted to clarify.

@Premaximum
Err... Obsidian screwed up the last KOTOR, not Bioware. Also, it still ended up an awesome game.
In the end I think SWTOR is as safe of a release as it could be: proven WoW mechanics within a proven Star Wars universe. If implemented well, not much can go wrong, really.

@beavisrocks
KOTOR 2 wasn't made by Bioware. It was made by the, now defunct, Obsidian.

@killias2
the only risk taken here is that it is biowares first mmo...

they have already shown that they can make a good game based off of star wars... and all games they produced are major successes... oh and kotor II was not made by bioware.. so that can be easily omitted from this discussion

@(Unverified) You might want to tell those guys who did Fallout New Vegas, Dungeon Siege III, and who are working on the South Park RPG that they're defunct. I don't think they know.

I am LOVING this game.

I hope the risk pays off so that we see a ton of support down the line for new content. :D

Just give it to LucasArts. They're the ones in charge of Star Wars games, after all.

EA is still charging a sub for Warhammer Online. This game will do just fine. I have a sour taste for anything EA so I'm staying out till this lives and breathes a few months but Bioware + SW = instant purchase for millions.

EVE is the real "star wars".....

This is nothing more than a mass effect game with multiplayer coop and 8 different characters to play through their storyline. (4 empire, 4 republic)

If you like the star wars movies, you'll like this game just for the story. If you don't have any interest in star wars, you'll probably cut yourself for buying it and wonder why you're not still playing Skyrim....

300 million...wtf was someone thinking!! Or was 1/2 that the pay off to George Lucas??
:D

@(Unverified)

"This is nothing more than a mass effect game with multiplayer coop and 8 different characters to play through their storyline. (4 empire, 4 republic)"

You say that like it's a bad thing......

Really wish that this wasn't a MMO, I mean everything about it screams "BUY IT" to me except monthly fee.

@Comet 20 Here's what I don't get about this. The game cost 60 dollars, with that you get 30 days of play time. That 30 days should be enough for you to explore the story lines, gameplay mechanics, and most everything the game has to offer on launch. How long do you play normal RPG's for? Personally I tend to beat them once, maybe twice if it's good enough, and after that they sit on my shelf for the most part. Here you have a 60 dollar game with a crap load of content that you can only play for 30 days. Not the best deal in the world, but there it is. I plan on paying for the initial game, playing it for a month, and then based off that month I'll either move onto another game or pay a small amount of money to play this one a little longer. In the end paying 75 dollars for a star wars bioware game isn't the end of the world for me.

Don't forget Age of Conan had great numbers at launch as well, and was an awesome game despite the greatly exaggerated number of bugs. The thing WoW does great, or did great rather...was the number of content-changing patches that kept the game fresh.

@Kougeru yea i love wow however i decided to quit for now and try something new... i will eventually come back to it but for now its star wars

I have a few friends who have played WoW for years, and they all were pretty excited to start playing this. Two of them have been pushing for me to get a new computer just to play this with them. Plus, as a non-MMO person, the game looks pretty fun to me. I hope it does well, and think it will.

@Duke

If you aren't an MMO person, you won't enjoy TOR. Gameplay is 95% identical to all other MMOs.

It's funny how many people will quite WoW to play TOR, only to quickly realize they are essentially playing the same game.

@dogmaticatheist

You're getting TOR mixed up with rift; after 6 years of wow and 6 hours in rift I thought I was playing the exact same game. I've never had that feeling playing TOR, but to each his own right? But I'm also guessing you haven't played it and you're making assumptions from videos.

I understand some people don't like bioware's storytelling (look at the people saying it's nothing special). I think the story is fantastic and right now is my main retaining point.

This game looks crazy boring. With how many unsuccessful MMO's come out and have to switch to free to play or just die I don't know why companies even try anymore.

@thechaos Do you know what "money" is?

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Star Wars: The Old Republic

Star Wars: The Old Republic a big risk for EA, say analysts, everyone else on Earth

Reader Comments (56)

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:27PM xHotPotatox said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:38PM Naukuga said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:56PM ashleydb said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:58PM Shadowbender said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:36PM MrPistachio said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:01PM Arcaria said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:17PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:30PM Timjoy said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:12PM tonyn84 said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:32PM Kougeru said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:35PM x4str0m3ch said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:36PM AirEgo said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:40PM macnbc said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:13PM AirEgo said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:18PM Scuffles said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:40PM Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:23PM Teus said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:30PM Special Agent Bob said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:32PM Teus said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:34PM Teus said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:44PM Golds said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:47PM xiLeShadow said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 1:53PM Shadowbender said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:03PM MGTrey said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:56PM whatkey said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:03PM RickGhastly said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:08PM babywolfman said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:04PM DeadDreamer said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:06PM killias2 said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:51PM Premaximum said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:14PM AndrewPending said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:15PM beavisrocks said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:17PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:27PM Teus said

Posted: Dec 22nd 2011 11:30AM radioactivez0r said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 2:07PM SpikePoint said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 3:56PM tendoboy1984 said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:13PM foomchee said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:13PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 22nd 2011 9:12AM Damn Dirty Ape said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:26PM Comet 20 said

Posted: Dec 22nd 2011 12:46AM covertpetersen said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:34PM Kougeru said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 4:38PM Teus said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 5:50PM Duke said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 6:12PM dogmaticatheist said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 6:02PM dogmaticatheist said

Posted: Dec 22nd 2011 9:43AM niakori said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 6:39PM thechaos said

Posted: Dec 21st 2011 7:08PM Beltyra said

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