In a recent articles , Bobby Kotick, head of Activision, publicly stated that he felt The Old Republic had little real chance of success, not only because Lucasarts was going to drain most of the revenue their direction, but because the amount EA needs to receive in the number of subscriptions from launch or withing one quarter of launch is simply too high. He went on to describe other minor points of error he felt were important, but they simply weren’t important enough to be restated here.
Experts immediately retorted with accusations that Kotick, despite being one of the biggest heavy hitters in the industry, had no real information or facts to back up what he was saying. One analyst, Michael Pachter was quoted as saying, “Based on used commentary and user surveys, the profit potential for The Old Republic is high.” This outpouring of support from industry experts begs the question of what Kotick actually was trying to do by this unprecedented kidney punch of a statement.
One could easily jump to the conclusion that he feels threatened by ToR, that he’d much rather see it crash and burn than a serious competitor crop up against World of Warcraft. I would much rather not move in that direction in favor of reason or purpose, but unfortunately there just isn’t a lot of either of those in Kotick’s recent moves. Whether driven by worry, anger, or just the need to spread doubt about ToR’s upcoming release, Kotick might be a bit concerned with how much attention it’s garnered.
Fellow Sithizens, I think it’s clear and present that we have a lot to look forward to in the coming months. We’re not going to kill WoW, or be the next best thing since the wheel, but we’ve got a great game moving forward with powerful levels of interest. We can all be grateful of the community we’ve built, no matter what one stuffy CEO says.
Please feel free to read up on these articles, the best ones are posted at Industry Gamers, Kotaku, G4TV, and a few other places around the internet.
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We have an article posted over on the TMI Broadcast website on the difficulty level of The Old Republic, you can read it Here.
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