Mr. Galt’s Sunday Night Martini Grille
Thursday, March 29th, 2001
Unless you were living under a rock for the past few weeks, you have heard of the death of UO2. We here at The Corporation had mixed feelings to say the least. Part of us cheered the lack of regard EA had for their fanbase, as well as the utter senselessness of the act because, after all, isn’t that what huge conglomerate corporations are supposed to do? I caught Mr. Poppinfresh taking notes on how to be an evil borg-like entity with such glee, I feared he had gotten into the nitrous again. At the same time, we mourned the passing of a game with such potential and began to wonder why.
Clearly, I thought, the stage was set for some sort of rational, intelligent discussion of this topic. And that brings us here, to the first weekly installment of Mr. Galt’s Sunday Night Martini Grille. The conversation was at times, rational, mostly intelligent but was about as linear as a circle. I have attemped, where possible, to highlight as much of the discussion as I could. For those of you who simply need to see the full conversation, you need look not further than here.
I knew I was going to be in trouble the minute that despicable baboon Mr. Bojo opened his mouth. Mr_Bojo: Yes, it is the beggining of the end for UO
Mr_Bojo: next topic? Clearly, I was going to have to play devil’s advocate, and quickly.Mr_Galt: Origin has a history of short term goals, and often times mismanagement.
Mr_Galt: maybe EA realized this and cut their losses? I mean, I KNOW that there is no good reason for EA to have done what they did, and though speculation to their goals was to come later, both Lum and Mr. Poppinfresh offered their perspectives on EA. I, of course, have my own theories.Lum: I suspect you're giving EA far too much credit
Lum: Like every other dot.com this quarter, they are trying to inflate their bottom line as quickly as possible to be one of the few stocks left listed on NASDAQ.
Lum: To do this they gutted EA.COM, which most analysts pointed to as EA's most bloated division
Lum: unfortunatly, their cuts took out bone marrow, not fat
Mr_Poppinfresh: we were going to invite someone from EA, but then I remembered they were all assholes I hate after how they treated me at E3
Mr_Galt: i have a suspicion that they are shifting their resources to majestic
Mr_Galt: which boggles the mind
Mr_Poppinfresh: Galt, you may be right...Majestic is gonna be a heinous pig in terms of operating costs
Mr_Poppinfresh: all those long-distance calls
Soulflame: MAJESTIC?
Mr_Poppinfresh: yeah
Mr_Galt: my thought on that, though, is that they are two very differnt entities.
Soulflame: The mind boggles.
Mr_Galt: UO, you use to escape the real world
Mr_Galt: Majestic is a frothy cup of paranoia
Mr_Poppinfresh: it's going to have the worst CS costs around
Mr_Poppinfresh: all those people, getting woken up at 3am
Mr_Galt: just what the folks in america need
Soulflame: THEY ARE COMING FOR YOU
Mr_Poppinfresh: Drysart was at GDC or whatever, and he said that the only thing that he could possibly come up with in stupid speculation would be if they were killing UO2 to create buzz before they picked up the rights to Shadowbane after Take 2 drop-kicks 'em.
Mr_Galt: hmmmm.
Soulflame: no way in hell... I just can't see that happening.
Mr_Poppinfresh: which makes as much sense as anything else in this sordid mess
We are now faced with many of the possible motivations for EA dropping UO2. But what about the mongbats? What about Britain, Yew and Trinsic? What would be the fate of these figures of gaming lore, now that they were confined to UO? While one might hope that the resources liberated from the death of UO2 would be focused on UO, that doesn’t seem likely.Mako: Nothing will spell the death of UO for the foreseeable future, but the resources from the death of UO2 will not be used correctly either.
Soulflame: Since the only person kept from UO2 was Cynthe, and some of the UO Live team is also rumored to have been let go, there are no resources to improve UO with. So of course, if UO isn’t going to die, what exactly will it do? Lets take a good look at the market that UO is currently residing. It holds it’s own against it’s rivals, EQ and AC, but what of the future? Will it be able to stand up to Anacrhy Online, Shadowbane, Dark Ages of Camelot? How about all of the other MMORPG’s and vaporware hinted at?Mako: UO won't die for a long time, even if no new content is implemented. That's the nature of these games.
Mako: But don't look for a sudden surge of content in UO, either.
Mako: Slow decrease in usership, sure, but with the levels they have now and the way they've sustained the hits of EQ and AC, they're good for a while. One thing, however, is clear from EA’s actions: They have just realased a development team en masse, and a certain someone’s non-competition clause is just about to end. Mr_Poppinfresh: does it even matter?
Mr_Poppinfresh: Garriott is going to hire them all and make his next crazy-ass game
Mr_Galt: well, garriot is alive and kicking
Mr_Galt: and was just handed a dev team
Soulflame: On a silver platter.
Mr_Galt: and not just any dev team, either
Mr_Poppinfresh: with garnishes
Soulflame: Ahriman even indicated that he was already going to work with Garriott too.
Mr_Poppinfresh: correct me if I'm wrong, but itsn't Garriott a rich bastard?
Soulflame: extremely rich
Mr_Poppinfresh: like, couldn't he fund any projects he starts himself, at least initially? And yea, the discussion continued late into the evening, and slowly diverged away from talk of UO2. Somone brought up Black and White, and we learned ever so much about Lum’s mental state. Lum: I WANT TO BE CRUEL TO THE DANCING BEAR Eventually, it turned into a shouting match over video game consoles and the fate of Atari, Nintendo, Sega and Sony. Had we been in a old western movie, this would have been the part where the chair flew threw the saloon window, as the bar quickly emptied out. As it was, we still had to convince Delthalaz to put down the beer bottle he had broken and was gesturing wildly with. But the candles are burning low, my friends, and that is tale for another time.
Stay with The Corporation, my friends, for Mr. Finnegan is preparing an interview for Bob “GBob” Rowland, formerly of Origin, and a few anonymous EA employees as you are reading this. It is sure to not only be informative, but to change the wild speculation seen here to actual fact. And now it is time for us to part. Be sure to come by next Sunday, at 10pm EST in #corp on Sorcerynet for the next installment of Mr. Galt’s Sunday Night Martini Grille, because it simply wouldn’t be the same without you.
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