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  1. #521
    Quote Originally Posted by igame View Post
    Actually, the industry considers SWToR to be a failure.
    I linked proof that the industry doesn't, so what do you do? You quote my proof and say 'nope thats wrong' with no proof of your own. Good job...

  2. #522
    Warchief Duravian's Avatar
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    I don't understand, every single game gets hyped and disapoints people. Why do people hate swtor so much. WoW Clone? dafuq, Rift was MUCH more like WoW at launch.
    It's pronounced "Dur-av-ian."

  3. #523
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    I could see 300 million being right if you count the Austin studio itself. If I recall correctly, that studio was opened back in 2006. Before the crash so I could easily see the property, building, etc, costing in the tens of millions. Of course the number is pretty meaningless at this point. Its all "hindsight," so to speak.
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  4. #524
    Herald of the Titans Achaman's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ixuzcc View Post
    Precisely. RIFT never tried to be the WoW killer, though some fans certainly wanted to paint it in that light early on. RIFT does it's thing. That's why it doesn't feel like such a failure.
    really? did you not see the ads constantly going on about it being better than azeroth or whatever...

  5. #525
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  6. #526
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Duravian View Post
    I don't understand, every single game gets hyped and disapoints people. Why do people hate swtor so much. WoW Clone? dafuq, Rift was MUCH more like WoW at launch.
    People who don't like TOR don't like it for various reasons. For some its just trolling. For some its for valid reasons. What makes TOR's "fall from grace" fascinating is that it had just about everything a game could possibly wish for, going for it. Publisher with deep pockets? Check. Developer with great reputation? Check. Veteran MMORPG developers? Check. Popular and well known brand? Check. Lots of time in development? Check. Hype from sites even as vaunted as Penny-Arcade? Check.

    Despite all that and more, TOR failed to live up to many people's expectations. Even its publisher's. Combine that with the name recognition among the body count that's followed? Seriously jumbo-sized popcorn worthy.
    Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot.
    Who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor.
    Who had almost stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol.
    And who had personally wet himself, at the Battle of Badon Hill.

  7. #527
    Quote Originally Posted by Profyrion View Post
    The fact is, none of us knows for sure.
    Which was my point, it only seems to be that way if you have something positive to say about the game though.

    Quote Originally Posted by Profyrion View Post
    So repeating the claim that it cost $300 million is as frivolous and irresponsible as claiming it cost 10 bucks.
    Yet you provide no evidence that it couldn't have cost that much.

    Quote Originally Posted by Profyrion View Post
    Basing an opinion (namely one of failure) on that number is just outright stupidity.
    If the person could argue he's numbers validity I'd be willing to listen, again, seems like any number is wrong if you have a negative view of the game and the people claiming the negative posters are wrong have immunity when it comes to evidence or proof.


    Just to give you some food for thought, 400 employees @ $50k/year for 6 years will run you $120 million, this is without any taxes nor benefits something that will run the bill at the very least another 10-15%. BF3 had a marketing budget in excess of $50 million, while SWTOR might not have had as high I'm quite sure it was at the very least $25 million.

    These are very conservative numbers that quite easily make for $160 million, still think that a number above $200 million isn't plausible?

  8. #528
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    Don't forget that property values were still running white-hot back in 2006.
    Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot.
    Who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor.
    Who had almost stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol.
    And who had personally wet himself, at the Battle of Badon Hill.

  9. #529
    The Unstoppable Force Kelimbror's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Alyssa View Post
    Just to give you some food for thought, 400 employees @ $50k/year for 6 years will run you $120 million, this is without any taxes nor benefits something that will run the bill at the very least another 10-15%. BF3 had a marketing budget in excess of $50 million, while SWTOR might not have had as high I'm quite sure it was at the very least $25 million.
    I highly doubt two things:

    1) That they pay even 75% of those people 50k
    2) That they include these salaries as part of the development cost, considering that many of them might have already worked for the company in various capacities.

    Whether point #2 is evidence that most games cost more than stated or if it even matters is up for debate. I would wager that they count production costs as some portion, but not all of salary, IP rights, tech licensing, any property leased/purchased for solely this development (which may not be right at all, since not many companies buy property for one game), and advertising.

    I can easily see how EA would spend a lot of money, but I can see how people blow up the estimate as well. Most of the things people factor into the high end estimates probably shouldn't be factored at all.

  10. #530
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    Actually had this pop up a couple of days ago.



    "What" you count towards the "cost" I imagine varies significantly. Especially for big public companies like EA.
    Last edited by SirRobin; 2012-10-15 at 03:41 PM.
    Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot.
    Who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor.
    Who had almost stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol.
    And who had personally wet himself, at the Battle of Badon Hill.

  11. #531
    It is a failure not because the game sucks, but because the game was so overhyped being called a wow killer.The game had potential obviously but i think the direction they took after release was just plain horrible. I was so turned off by the idea of having a sith race jedi making no sense at all. It felt like they just didn't give a **** about the outcome just to get money out of what they made that was going down the drain because of (lack of content) at 50. Good ideas spread out just plain bad execution on many things.

  12. #532
    Elemental Lord Sierra85's Avatar
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    non fun pve. general mess of a game. didnt enjoy it. No polish.

    i'd call it a failure. but thats my opinion.
    Hi

  13. #533
    Quote Originally Posted by Kittyvicious View Post
    I highly doubt two things:

    1) That they pay even 75% of those people 50k
    2) That they include these salaries as part of the development cost, considering that many of them might have already worked for the company in various capacities.
    The first point I looked up and the numbers for EA code monkeys I found was around 75k, I used 50k to be conservative but overall average is probably higher as anyone above code monkey will make more. Second isn't really debatable either, if they worked on the game full time their salary can be attributed to the development of the game, if they did something else they would be attributed to that project, only thing that is in the grey zone would be floating staff working on multiple projects at the same time.

    Quote Originally Posted by Kittyvicious View Post
    I can easily see how EA would spend a lot of money, but I can see how people blow up the estimate as well. Most of the things people factor into the high end estimates probably shouldn't be factored at all.
    Any cost associated with making, selling and marketing the game should be counted as cost to develop, it basic economy when producing something.

  14. #534
    Quote Originally Posted by Alyssa View Post
    Yet you claim it to be a myth...
    Oh god.

    You just used the "ancient aliens" defense.

    ---------- Post added 2012-10-15 at 03:51 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Achaman View Post
    really? did you not see the ads constantly going on about it being better than azeroth or whatever...
    They didn't say it was better.

    It was a PSA explaining that the land in their game is called Telara. Not Azeroth.

    /Moreyouknowrainbow.
    Last edited by Bardarian; 2012-10-15 at 03:52 PM.
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  15. #535
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    Don't forget the brag factor too. What is told to inhouse folks could be completely different from what is disseminated to the outhouse tours. I could definitely see a "manager" bragging to his crew that they are working on a three hundred million dollar "project" but being excessively liberal with how he calculated that number. EALouse didn't read like he could even see the top of the corporate ladder. So any inside info he was privy too was probably disseminated for morale purposes as anything else.
    Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot.
    Who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor.
    Who had almost stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol.
    And who had personally wet himself, at the Battle of Badon Hill.

  16. #536
    The Unstoppable Force Kelimbror's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Alyssa View Post
    The first point I looked up and the numbers for EA code monkeys I found was around 75k, I used 50k to be conservative but overall average is probably higher as anyone above code monkey will make more. Second isn't really debatable either, if they worked on the game full time their salary can be attributed to the development of the game, if they did something else they would be attributed to that project, only thing that is in the grey zone would be floating staff working on multiple projects at the same time.

    Any cost associated with making, selling and marketing the game should be counted as cost to develop, it basic economy when producing something.
    As great as that graph looks and you want to point out, I can guarantee you that people don't make that much money. Not even Blizzard employees do. Most of them make entry level salaries @20-30k. Seriously, just look it up on Glassdoor. You will laugh to know what Blizzard employees make. It's probably one of the reasons they make so much money. I would have to take a paycut to work there and do what I do.

    The higher salaries are for the senior members and managers of teams. I know someone who works in QA for Ubisoft and they don't make shit. This is not any different than any company works. Your average of 50k might be accurate considering the number of higher level people I'm sure they employed.

  17. #537
    Quote Originally Posted by Kittyvicious View Post
    As great as that graph looks and you want to point out, I can guarantee you that people don't make that much money. Not even Blizzard employees do. Most of them make entry level salaries @20-30k. Seriously, just look it up on Glassdoor. You will laugh to know what Blizzard employees make. It's probably one of the reasons they make so much money. I would have to take a paycut to work there and do what I do.

    The higher salaries are for the senior members and managers of teams. I know someone who works in QA for Ubisoft and they don't make shit. This is not any different than any company works. Your average of 50k might be accurate considering the number of higher level people I'm sure they employed.
    Random site of google search suggests that 50k is low balling it for most game developers.

    According to Glassdoor a Senior Software Engineer II at Blizzard makes 98-157k, a Cinematic Artist 58-85k, the rest I can't see as I refuse to have FB, I doubt we're talking less than 50k for anyone that has a reasonable education.

    Same site, EA Software Engineer avg salary $77,575.

  18. #538
    Immortal SirRobin's Avatar
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    Definitely, I saw forty-seven grand for a QA tester and pondered, "which alternate reality is that one in and how do I get there?"

    It was quoted in the "why so much" part of Chris's new project and last I recall he was still down Austin way. Not the cheapest area, at least when I was there years and years ago, so maybe that's accurate nowadays. Still, I would hazard a guess that that is more for the "highly qualified" types.

    However, it does give us a ballpark kind of figure to work with. From GDC we know that "at peak" they had 280 QA, 140 artists, 80 engineers and programmers, 75 designers, 40 platform engineers, and 30 producers. Even just using the first column turns that into one hefty chunk of change.
    Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot.
    Who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor.
    Who had almost stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol.
    And who had personally wet himself, at the Battle of Badon Hill.

  19. #539
    Simple. Is SW:TOR making a profit?
    If yes, the answer is no.
    If no, the answer is yes.
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  20. #540
    Quote Originally Posted by SirRobin View Post
    However, it does give us a ballpark kind of figure to work with. From GDC we know that "at peak" they had 280 QA, 140 artists, 80 engineers and programmers, 75 designers, 40 platform engineers, and 30 producers. Even just using the first column turns that into one hefty chunk of change.
    That's 365 non QA staff at 50k which I'm still thinking is conservative, 280 QA at lets say 25k to be really conservative and we exceed my example of 400 @ 50k by loads and I doubt those numbers include outsourcing as total number of people working on the game has been quoted at over 800 towards the end.

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