Orlock Perspective: Can a game be TOO big?

[News]

I was reading the interview with Josh Drescher over at gameindustry.biz and Josh made a few comments relating to the success of WoW and quoted the magic "10 million Subscriber" number a few times, most of this to me made a lot of sense.  What got me thinking was one line of it and that line was:

So you don't need 10 million subscribers to be successful...that doesn't mean that we wouldn't love 10 million subscribers.

Now my gut reaction, and I don't know why, was NOOOOOOOOOOOooooooOOOooOOoooOOooooooOOOoooooooo ! ! ! ! !
Then I thought to myself, hey why do I have an issue with a game becoming THAT successful, so I sat down and had a little think on the topic.
Now the benefits for such a large subscriber base for a company are pretty darn obvious... enough green every month to buy a small island in sunny climes that you can start your own utopian society on.  With this money the company is then free to do pretty much what they want as the financial security allows them to develop games that there is an unsure market for, they can also ensure they have the brightest and the best developers in the biz working for them as face it, Big Talent = Big Pay Packets.

Let me preface the rest of this article with the fact that I am speculating, I in no way am saying that any of the scenarios below will happen, I am just trying to convey the ramblings that run through my brain when I over think a situation.

I won't go any further into the upsides but rather, again, why my gut screamed in terror at the thought of 10 million global subscribers to the Game I am preparing to devote way too much time, money and calories towards.  The first answer that came to mind was this, normally when a company gets bigger you start to get an extended line of communication between the guys at the bottom who deal with the player base and the guys at the top who call all the shots.  This extended route of communication leads to the fact that in a lot of companies it certainly seems that the guys calling the shots have absolutely no clue what their customer base actually want or how their company actually works.  This to me seems like a bad thing as the guys making the decisions could very well make decisions which may seem logical but are without the input of those of us who actually pay their wages *grin*

Then there is a line that would run very close to this, that of where EA who untill now have pretty much let Mythic do their thing and have complete creative control.  Question is if the game was to become a screaming juggernaut of player base and revenue, would the Fat Cats be able to resist sticking their thumb in and trying to use the product in some nefarious scheme to increase the market share of other titles "WARSims" anyone?

Ok so maybe I am being a little cynical about the way things work within the company, but here's a thought thats a little less cynical... Manpower... as the success of the game increase so too will the need for aditional manpower in all sectors of the company, from development to accounting to customer support, the whole kit and kaboodle.
My question is this, as it grows how can you ensure that every last person that is employed has the same drive, determination and love for the title that the current staff has?  You start getting people in the boat that aren't "in to" the game and then you will start to lose that magical glow that comes on things when they are hand made by the blood sweat and tears of the truely devoted.
What about when the customer support department becomes so overworked and someone thinks... "oooh dear look at how much we are paying for support, I know LETS OUTSOURCE!!!" and as a result we get customer support that may well be able to speak understand and communicate English, just not in the same manner as the rest of us and as a result general feelings of dissatissfaction arise.

Ok heres something that I think has tanked many a MMO and with a HUGE MMO I can see this being more of an issue.  The vocal minority screaming for change that when implemented reduces the enjoyment for the silent majority.
With a smaller title I can see it being a lot easier for people to go "well it's only a handfull of people saying it" but what about when instead of a handfull it's "HOLY MACKERAL ONE MILLION complaints about this" thats still only 10% of the player base and yet I could see it being hard to resit bowing to that kind of pressure.

Anyway head over to the forums and let me know what you think on the subject, whether being a Gaming Juggernaught with 10 million subscribers is a good or a bad thing?

[Karl]

Well....its good and bad just as smaller is good and bad also.

I agree that the larger he company the less personal it seems to be with the clients. You are just one in 10 mil inseatd of 1 in 100k. Big difference.

One of the problems is that Blizzard did not think they would have near this many subscribers...thier business analysts let them down big time.If Vivendi had known that there would this response they would have let beta go for another quarter which is what was needed to iron out the game. They wasted a buttload of money raming up the way they did ATT made out like a bandit for short lead time bandwidth expansions and things of that nature. Just imagine how much they pay for thier bandwidth every month.

Because of things like this the system that developed was trown together and if it eveen worked kind of they went with it. Then they get so big that they cannot change any more.


What I am getting at is that 10 mil subscribers are not a bad thing...if and only if the company from the beginning is able to handle it. And that means prepareing for it. I think Mythic is preparing for manysubscribers and thier espansion of service plan seems to be formulated...I hope they are ready for WAR.

[kathmondar91]

Thank you for writing this post! this is what i've been worried about WAR since the start; having too many people. I mean, I know for RvR a lot of people is nice...but when you start "stealing" from WoW's players (and just new players period), you may start to get people who don't care about the background or the setting or the plot of the MMO--they just care that you RvR/kill people, and it's fun. And, as we all know, a game can't be good without having a solid plot.

I was reading an overview earlier, and it said that whatever race you chose, the game inspires a sense of nationalism for players; you want to see your capital grow and your race prosper, while simultaneously hating and destroying your opposing race.

I don't want to see the work that these great designers and developers have done gone to the 'MMO dogs' So I'm not saying only Warhammer fans should play it, but I would really really not like to see WAR's community end up like WoW's, and/or like crap.

I can see that 10mil is nice for the guys up top, who's pockets are lined with dough, but players get less attention and game support is overworked and definitely not as helpful. However, 10mil for a game like WAR...just seems like too much. They'd have to make more servers, which would screw with the population distribution. And of that [supposed] 10mil...how much do you think actually knows more about the Warhammer world than "it has an MMO, and it's all gothic and cool"? (maybe not that little, but still, how many would be tabletoppers or actually read through all the quests and background to experience the world as it should? not many)

[Ladithief]

   10million wow, Either way it would be staggering. Even to think of $10million. The one thing I think of if the numbers grow enough is that the game will grow. If (and I am only avoiding being presumptuos) the game lasts to an expansion I feel a large fan base is required to guarantee content (of the expansion) that is well deserving to the company and the fan base.
   Now I try not to mention other MMO's on here but Mythic has a chance here coming up to do something that WoW never has yet and that is make an impact with an expansion. WoW has done a good job with the first in my eyes but not an excellent job. I think they grew to fast and as Orlock said "the chain of communication grew between the top and the bottom" all this said only time will tell and I hope it tells an excellent success story for WAR.