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Warhammer 40K MMO Profitable With Less Than A Million Subs
Riding high off the company's improved financial outlook yesterday, THQ CEO Brian Farrell also pointed toward their high hopes for the future with the upcoming Warhammer 40K MMO being worked on by Darksiders developer Vigil Games.
Gamasutra reports on Farrell's revelation that they have carefully controlled costs for this MMO and will be able to make money off of it much more easily. "We started with a very small and experienced MMO team who gave us the very wise advice to prove out all the technology and world-building tools before you start adding to the team and really ramping up all of the content that an MMO requires," Farrell explained. "That's why we think our budget is going to be very competitive."
Farrell noted that the initial cost for development of the game will be on par with what a high-end non-MMO would cost, avoiding the bloated budgets that often accompany MMOs. To drive the point home, he explained how they can be successful with less than a million subscribers: "...We don't need the kind of subscriber levels that people throw around, like a million subscribers, to make a lot of money on this title. If we get anywhere near that level, we'll be making a lot of money."
Plenty of MMOs have survived on a relatively tiny number of subscribers, but it's rare for a publisher to flaunt that they can not only last but make money on that.
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