EA's shuttered Facebook games a cautionary tale for online-only play

[Nintendesert]

My guess is part of the reason, other than continued labor costs to maintain the systems, is that most of the computer hardware has fully depreciated. Now, that may seem like a good thing, but from a tax perspective, it's not. That fully depreciated equipment no longer provides a tax benefit to the company and re-investing in equipment is capital intensive. Most companies don't capitalize replacement equipment (mine doesn't) unless there is utilization benefit. Well, with non-paying customers and probably a declining enrollment of new customers (decreasing ad base), that utilization (or Return on Investment) is just not there.

So, you're left with aging equipment, continued labor costs, a stagnant or declining user base and most likely reduced advertising revenues.

Companies are not going to shut down a profitable division. They just won't. But, they will easily shut down something that breaks even or is no longer profitable in a heartbeat.

Companies shut down profitable divisions all the time. If they have limited resources and limited say rack space it's like a super market. If something else that's more profitable can better utilize the rack space/supermarket space/ or IT resources they'll drop the less profitable to go with the more profitable item.

I'm pretty sure Star Wars Galaxies was profitable but the potential for TOR was much more so they pulled the license from SWG.

 

[Craig234]

if there's no money to be made why continue running it?

Loyalty to customers who have paid and invested time.

If that's not enought reason for them, it's reason not to buy from them.

 

[BoberFett]

Companies shut down profitable divisions all the time. If they have limited resources and limited say rack space it's like a super market. If something else that's more profitable can better utilize the rack space/supermarket space/ or IT resources they'll drop the less profitable to go with the more profitable item.

I'm pretty sure Star Wars Galaxies was profitable but the potential for TOR was much more so they pulled the license from SWG.

Profitable? Doubtful. But even if it was, you have to include opportunity costs in the profitability equation. Unless SWG justifies the datacenter space and employee resources required to keep it running, they're going to reallocate those things to the highest use.

 

[Newbian]

I wonder how long you can do charge backs for if you actually paid for stuff in those games.

 

[darkewaffle]

I wonder how long you can do charge backs for if you actually paid for stuff in those games.

I don't think many people would take chargebacks for strictly virtual goods very seriously. I wouldn't

Anyone playing an online game with an expectation for it to be there forever just because money is involved is naive. I've donated money to support old NWN servers, but I don't expect them to always be there; eventually there will be too few players or not enough donations to justify their uptime. That'll be unfortunate but if I was the host I'd do the same thing.

 

[CPA]

Companies shut down profitable divisions all the time. If they have limited resources and limited say rack space it's like a super market. If something else that's more profitable can better utilize the rack space/supermarket space/ or IT resources they'll drop the less profitable to go with the more profitable item.

I'm pretty sure Star Wars Galaxies was profitable but the potential for TOR was much more so they pulled the license from SWG.

While I would agree that like any other product, companies, even EA, have specific ROI's they need to meet to continue offering a product, who knows what EA's floor is and what Star Wars Galaxies profitability is. Regardless, if a line is not profitable and there is no foreseeable profitability a company will scrap that product. It's tough enough just to find out video games sales consistently and even when we do, we just get a volume number not a revenue number.

 

[lupi]

First, not sure why so many people are discussing Galaxies since it was a Sony product.

As far as economical viability of maintaining servers up, most of the complaints revolve around the fact that for most pc games publisher support would be irrelevant if they didn't tie a requirement in to the game for it to only use their servers.

For these browser based, nickel and dime the suckers games, not sure how much of a server farm they require, but you'd think it would be easy enough for them to keep something scaleable enough to meet demands at a decent cost...but this is EA so they are most likely only looking at large margins or you will get the big ole FU.

 

[Craig234]

First, not sure why so many people are discussing Galaxies since it was a Sony product.

What does that matter? We're discussing keeping games with persistent environments that people put a lot of time into up. That's one.

 

[paperfist]

We need to put down the mouse and spend time outside ... in the sunlight.

Sure, trade fun for cancer.

 

[lupi]

It matters because the contex is EA decided to stop supporting games with an online required content simply because they don't want to keep it running.

Sony made no such decision and if up to them Galaxies would still be operating, and quite possibly with a larger subscriber base after TOR tanked.

 

[darkewaffle]

Sony made no such decision and if up to them Galaxies would still be operating

How do you figure?

 

[Jeffg010]

Here is how I see it and feel about it.

MMO type games I'd have no problem and know that at some point it would end for ever and have no problem with it because you have to have it always on to play with other players.

Facebook type games I have no problem with it ending because you have to have other players to play the game.

Where I have problems are single player type games that force you to always be on. There should be no need for that shit. If the game play is not being affected either always on or not that is where the game companies are fucking us over.

 

[Craig234]

Sony made no such decision and if up to them Galaxies would still be operating, and quite possibly with a larger subscriber base after TOR tanked.

From Wikipedia:

On 24 June 2011, SOE and LucasArts announced that they had mutually agreed to shut down Star Wars Galaxies on 15 December 2011.[25] According to the SOA announcement, both LucasArts and SOE came to the agreement that "If you are an active subscriber in good standing as of September 15, 2011, then you can play for free for the final months. Players wishing to play through the end of the game and participate in the galaxy-ending event planned for the last week of live service in December will need to re-activate or join the game on or before September 15th. No new or reactivated accounts will be accepted after September 15, 2011."[26] The closure of Star Wars Galaxies was in contradiction to previous statements by LucasArts representatives going back as far as 2008 when LucasArts executive Tom Nichols stated regarding the development of Star Wars: The Old Republic: "We have many other features planned to support Star Wars Galaxies. We see no reason why the two games can't exist together."

 

[Craig234]

It matters because the contex is EA decided to stop supporting games with an online required content simply because they don't want to keep it running.

Sony made no such decision and if up to them Galaxies would still be operating, and quite possibly with a larger subscriber base after TOR tanked.

SWG is still relevant because it was shut down, whoever decided to do so. I bought like 4 copies of the game and never even logged on before it closed.

 

[lupi]

It was mutual all right, mutual in that LA said we're pulling your IP permission unless you ship us a copy of Fort Knox and SOE agreed to have the IP pulled.

 

[tacosrcool]

I guess EA couldn't rip people off as they used to

 

[Raduque]

SWG is still relevant because it was shut down, whoever decided to do so. I bought like 4 copies of the game and never even logged on before it closed.

That reminds me of Motor City Online. My parents gave me a copy when it came out, but I only had dialup so I never was able to play it. By the time I moved to a place where I could get cable, the game was dead.

 

[ultimatebob]

This is kind of smart for EA... they can just pull the plug on other online enabled games in the future (like their horrible new version of Simcity), and force users to upgrade to the fancy new version to play for about $60.

It also does a pretty job of preventing the game from becoming "abandonware" in the future.

 

[Elixer]

...a cautionary tale for online-only play

This is nothing new, any and all games that require a always online connection to play will always have this problem.
As soon as profits dry up, that is what happens.
I predict the same will happen for steam, and pretty much every other entity that sells games with DRM at some point in the future.
All the publishers want their own walled garden.

 

[Jeffg010]

This is nothing new, any and all games that require a always online connection to play will always have this problem.
As soon as profits dry up, that is what happens.
I predict the same will happen for steam, and pretty much every other entity that sells games with DRM at some point in the future.
All the publishers want their own walled garden.

Steam has offline mode so I hope they would announce something before they pulled the plug. You do have to set it while online to get it to work. I'm sure that not everyone has downloaded every steam game they own. That crap would take time as I have like 30 to 40 I never downloaded.

http://www.howtogeek.com/117424/how-to-make-steams-offline-mode-work/

 

[wanderer27]

This is nothing new, any and all games that require a always online connection to play will always have this problem.
As soon as profits dry up, that is what happens.
I predict the same will happen for steam, and pretty much every other entity that sells games with DRM at some point in the future.
All the publishers want their own walled garden.

This is actually something I was a bit hesitant to bring up.


What happens to your games if Steam shuts down?
Probably not likely, but other unforeseen things have happened - D2D is one that comes to mind.


What if Steam was sold/acquired?
No telling what the new Company's policies/ideas on existing properties would be.


How about this one, what if something happens to cause the Steam service to start charging, just to have an account?
Don't laugh this one off folks, I could easily see this coming about.


This is one of the biggest reasons I don't have a Steam account.
I have over a hundred games on GOG, the difference is I have the actual installer/full game on my Computer so I'll essentially never lose a game I've bought.


GOG recently pulled Cryostasis from their Catalog, but I still have the game (installer) and for now I could still download it if need be.
There was no announcement about this, it just happened.

I have a lot of respect for GOG, but things happen - who's to say they couldn't happen to Steam as well?


.

 

[ImpulsE69]

This is actually something I was a bit hesitant to bring up.


What happens to your games if Steam shuts down?
Probably not likely, but other unforeseen things have happened - D2D is one that comes to mind.


What if Steam was sold/acquired?
No telling what the new Company's policies/ideas on existing properties would be.


How about this one, what if something happens to cause the Steam service to start charging, just to have an account?
Don't laugh this one off folks, I could easily see this coming about.


This is one of the biggest reasons I don't have a Steam account.
I have over a hundred games on GOG, the difference is I have the actual installer/full game on my Computer so I'll essentially never lose a game I've bought.


GOG recently pulled Cryostasis from their Catalog, but I still have the game (installer) and for now I could still download it if need be.
There was no announcement about this, it just happened.

I have a lot of respect for GOG, but things happen - who's to say they couldn't happen to Steam as well?


.

All valid questions and mostly unknown really. Steam has said that if they ever shut down everyones games would be unlocked, but yea..u really don't know till it happens.

 

[Elixer]

All valid questions and mostly unknown really. Steam has said that if they ever shut down everyones games would be unlocked, but yea..u really don't know till it happens.

You know, that has been brought up again & again, but nobody has seen this language in the TOS, or have any contract stating this. This means that there is no assurance that this will ever happen.

Speaking of contracts, I bet steam has a contract with all the publishers that force them to keep DRM, and if steam ever does go under, you can bet that the publishers would all try their best to keep DRM intact, which means most paying customers will be SOL, and yet, pirates can keep playing all these games without issue.

 

[Wardawg1001]

You know, that has been brought up again & again, but nobody has seen this language in the TOS, or have any contract stating this. This means that there is no assurance that this will ever happen.

Speaking of contracts, I bet steam has a contract with all the publishers that force them to keep DRM, and if steam ever does go under, you can bet that the publishers would all try their best to keep DRM intact, which means most paying customers will be SOL, and yet, pirates can keep playing all these games without issue.

You could just go out and pirate all your Steam games if they actually did shut down and lock you out of your games, and do it with a clean conscience since you actually paid for the game.

 

[dagamer34]

It's not just "Is it profitable?" but "Are there more profitable things out there?" You only have so many quality developers and I'm sure running web games with a heavy server back end would cost more than making F2P iOS games which heavily rely on iTunes in-app purchases for revenue.

Plus, correlation != causation about the "always-online" thing. SimCity didn't get negative press because it was always-online (that's been known for months). People don't complain about Call of Duty multiplayer basically being "always online". It got negative press because you couldn't play the game very well when it first launched, much like Diablo III, World of Warcraft, and Half-Life 2 before it. If the latest CoD was unplayable at launch for a week, it would get the same kind of shitstorm. The moral of THOSE stories is that if your game has anything to do with online, MAKE SURE YOU HAVE ENOUGH SERVERS.