Kingdoms of Amalur needed 3 million sales 'to break even,' RI governor says
At a press conference, Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee called Amalur a failure, having not met its required 3 million sales require to "break even."
One of the last tweets from Curt Schilling before his game studios, Big Huge Games and 38 Studios, collapsed talked up sales of their first title, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. "Reckoning, 38 Studios first game, has outperformed EA's projections by selling 1.2mm copies in its first 90 days," he said.
While those are impressive figures, they were not enough to keep the studio afloat. At a press conference, Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee said that the game was a failure and that it would need to sell over 3 million copies "just to break even."
"The game failed, the game failed," Chafee said according to a report by Joystiq.
So, what will happen to the money owed by Schilling's company? Bankruptcy seems inevitable, given Chafee's admittance that keeping the studio afloat would be "very, very expensive," requiring an additional "tens of millions of dollars."
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replyAndrew Yoon posted a new article, Kingdoms of Amalur needed 3 million sales 'to break even,' RI govenor says.
At a press conference, Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee called Amalur a failure, having not met its required 3 million sales require to "break even."-
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Good news though, CEO Curt Schilling was able to repay himself the 4 million dollar "loan" he had given the company. And used taxpayer money to do it!
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Lol it's like RI is running a game business now with these reports
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new ip, little to no advertising, and didnt it launch at $40? as much as people enjoy a good deal, some people have a negative reaction to a game that costs less than what they are expecting. i also seem to remember it launching around near the release of a lot of other good games. from the get go, this was always a steam sale purchase for 5 to 10 bucks because i already had so much going on.
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No, it released February 7, 2012. But everyone was still playing Skyrim at the time.
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That and it was only a month away from Mass Effect 3...
Who in his right mind would launch a RPG between an Elder Scroll game like Skyrim and probably the best new RPG IP in the last decade in Mass Effect?
And they needed to sell 3 million copies.... the same amount that Diablo 3 sold to this day after a 10 year wait...
I really can't figure why this game failed...
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KOA was too average for how much they spent on it. The game was essentially a slightly better Fable. They initially promised that the combat was going to be a blend of spectacle fighters with RPG freedom.
I think they missed both marks. RPG elements are soso, a bit below average when compared to most games true to the genre. The fighting was really stale. They needed to work on this the most.-
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IMO at least. But that's very subjective. You're right though, the RPG elements were a bit lacking. A lot of good ideas here and there but no solid followthrough.
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The game is definitely better than Fable but they had way too many quests for the level progression.
Like...you could max out way too easily. :(
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So that's it? 38 is dead and so is the MMO?
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NM, just read the front page :(
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Crazy:
http://www.golocalprov.com/politics/donna-perry-taxpayers-are-owed-transparent-answers-by-the-edc/
...roughly $50 million of the $75 million dollar loan has already been accessed, yet the company seems unable to come up with a mere $1.1 million dollar “annual guarantee fee” that was due to the state just this past May 1st.
Finally, it’s worth noting there are also reports this week that despite the financial problems, Schilling apparently tapped the loan to pay back himself some $ 4 million he personally invested in the company, and that high-priced creative talent, like writer R.A. Salvatore, is slated to receive over $ 5 million in royalties from the sale of the initial game, “Kingdoms of Amalur” from a revolving line of credit that was created out of the original loan...-
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You just wanted to use kerfuffle didn't you?
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they were able to talk people who know nothing about games into funding the moon, happens all the time in the game industry, gives real developers a bad name.
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In a related optimistic response, Chafee said he believes 38 Studios will be able to hit its payment benchmarks, banking on the "emotional attachment" of gamers to the Amalur universe.
Er, good luck with that.
http://www.joystiq.com/2012/05/24/the-politics-of-making-games-disconnect-between-38-studios-and/ -
$5 dollars and I will pick up Kingdoms of Amalur on Steam, probably just to have it.
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...that have R.A. Salvatore and Todd McFarlane on their payroll.
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See, here's the thing. You don't announce things like "the game failed" unless you want to stop getting any money whatsoever from it. People eschew failure. They stay away from "death". Just ask any MMO with big population drops after the free month.
Chafee is not stupid, but he is a weathervane. He's realized it's time to get away from this as quickly as possible, and is rushing the failure along while assuming a posture of scandalized disappointment. Since he probably greenlighted the loan in the first place, he's got his work cut out for him. I'm not even saying that it's the wrong call. The wrong call was backstopping what was effectively a $100mm loan to a gaming company in the first place. It's sort of like driving drunk and calling the decision to run over the little old lady instead of hitting the telephone pole your first bad decision. You'd be in waaay better shape if you didn't make the first dipshit move in the first place.
I slept horribly last night but I think that last analogy makes at least half an ounce of sense.-
The loan happened before Chafee took office as governor.
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This is why one should not talk unless they do more than skim the headlines. It makes more sense why he thinks speaking so strongly will work to his benefit. Thank you for the correction.
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Games sold on sale might as well have never been sold, in publisher accounting terms.
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Explain this for me. Their development costs are already in the can, and if they're sold online the delivery expense is negligible. Selling at a discount still generates revenue.
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I think the state gave the company like a $70million dollar loan to make the game. The loan is going into default I'm assuming meaning the tax payers get hosed.
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Initial investments if I've read things correctly, the state gave the investment so the company would move to Rhode Island since their unemployment was so high. Created like 450 jobs to make the game there, and now *poof*.
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Fuck it I'm going to buy this game today, lol.
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For a first release of a new IP without a GTA/CoD/Halo style marketing blitz that's pretty fucking ambitious.
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Seriously the game was very much enjoyable, hell i put in at least 115 hrs with one of the dlc, but dragged on near the end, it should have been shorter, or maybe they should have put the lvl cap higher than 40 and made some new monsters, cause fighting the same 20 enemies for 80Hrs ++ got boring after a while.
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Depending on who you believe, the plot thickens:
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1593225&postcount=100
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