First of all, you have to consider Eastern Vs Western Markets, MMO shelf life, box sales, pre-orders and sub fees. Then balance that against salary for coders, programmers, quest / lore folks, character class balance people, customer service, tech supports and upper echelon people.

Would look something like, aion, knows they have a 22-24 percent MMO market share (wow has a 66) but 4.5 million subs at 15.95 a month with 2.5m pre orders and a western / EU Launch.

But it takes 1.5-2.5 years to get into profitability.

Wow shocked us and increased subs thru almost 6 years now, passing its shelflife .. and why?

They had a good product, they made an MMO for the people (masses) not a niche product with a big name (like LOTRO ect) marketed it aggressively, rest spready by WOM (word of mouth)

Ideally, to succeed you need to time your release, Aion will do well western markets initially because wow players are restless …. however aion is a pvp centric game, people are axing pre-orders and its western shelf life might not make the 2.5 year cut for an mmo …. Western gamers hate “korean grind fest and pvp centric games”

We want PVE, lore, a game that offers a smooth experience, customized characters, detailed quests, lots of gear options and graphics, pvp options that are meaningful, but not a center part of the mmo. We want balanced stats, and not nerfs or abilities or gear that give x while taking away y … we want to see our characters progressively get stronger given out time and money investment.

We want crafting options and lots of it (and meaningful) we want main jobs and sub jobs (not like GWs something like FF11) and a new gimmick …. like tank / healer / dps archtypes are fine … but have it so a healer is a B almost A class DPS’er as well, and tanks throw out impressive damage ….. and the pure DPSers or hybrid specs wreck havoc each with their own niche …. none of this overlap BS blizzard threw at us!

If you want to bust open the market, you need a game that offers sustainability, beta tested, nearly bug free with lot sof options … great story and I mean something like 12-14 classes at launch, 1000 point customized character feautuers, high server populations, the ability to solo and group .. and choose the mo focus …. PVE particularly, and base your game on that, don’t switch to apease the lower pvp population and nerf your classes ….

This is what is eroding wow … along with the casual overhaul from the vanilla wow days .. raid groups of 12 seem to be the magic number .. 25 might be a little much, I would launch one 12 man, 8 mid and 6 on the low end with parties making up of 4 max … that way guilds can run multiple events, not get upset with gear because ff you read this, there will be a ton of it and another thing .. dont flood your game with purples … an established loot system!

Make the just rare gear hard to get and most comon end game, a tier up very hard to get and 1-2 upgrades past that, with the final having a drop plus solo effort plus x. Immerse us, make us feel like we have a world to explore and cant wait to get home and log on ….

Also RMT … for little bonuses .. maybe guilld houses and player houses … expanded features, name changes … server xfers ect .. its a huge cash influx.

Lastly factions, most games do good vs evil (or similiar) wow alliance . horde – aion elyos vs asmodes ect … make 3-5 factions, make various worlds even for 1-2 each and a couple end game places where they all meet. Have a good archtype, and nuetral, an evil, and hell make a genre of class that is on par with the enemy NPCs …

Mounts – flying world – I mean it has to have it all, but in a new fresh and dynamic way … Its hard for me to explain here … I am actully a market research analyst and avid gamer here in Manhattan …. I have tracked this and picked winners and losers for a very long time. (and very accurately)

There is room to develope a new MMO, and new brand but you cant get greedy and mistime it, launch it with not enough content or beta testing, not market and hype it, not go thru the pre-order process ect … it needs to be polished and feel like a luxury mmo .. (not like bargain budget LOTRO for example with their band aid nerfs and bridges the size of tooth picks lol) or cartoon graphics wow with casual feel .. or pvp centric aion that will piss a lot of western gamers off when they relaize pve is an after tought haha!

Learn lessens from games like Ragula and Warhammer that launched too early with too many bugs that didnt catch on main stream … or stubborn genres like FF11 online that never adapted …

You could even take another whole direction and make a FF tactics type MMO too that would do well and not cost a whole lot to develope either … but thats another thought.

Startgate … I am sorry niche market at best, and people will lose interest to Studio 38s new MMO, Aion, the hardcore wow population, KOTRO MMO, Diablo 3, star trek, starcraft, Champs and ff14, lest we forget blizz plans a next gen MMO too announced at blizzcon and other sin the pipeline.

So yes there is an opportunity … but most people have no idea what the bulk of players want, what makes us leave an MMO and what really matters …. it’s sad really but thats the present MMO climate.

As a customer, I dislike being deceived. Even if Stargate Worlds ever goes into Open beta, I won’t try it. Customers need to start saying No to unethical business practices at the outset – before they’ve invested any time or effort into the game, and the social and psychological ties make it harder to get out.

Dan Ellgren leaving, something I left out of the post, posed to be a huge setback and would scare most interested parties away.

We will know by monday if there is going to be one, and it would be a shame for all that hard work and sacrifice to go down the toilet. However, that’s how this industry works I believe.

Entirely because betting on a subscription MMO is highly risky. If you have tons of money to throw at the prolonged development, and can be patient enough to wait for the proper amount of polish I think MMO investing is a good choice. The constant return is VERY enticing, but of course it comes with a huge upfront risk.

Because no one cares. It is not getting funded because people know it would flop. Would you want to back a loser out of the gate when Star Wars and Star Trek are coming out?