The developer company of The Secret World, Funcom, has been sailing through stormy weather in recent years. In their financial report, they are now providing updates.
The two oldies Age of Conan and Anarchy Online remain stable at a low level, while The Secret World is falling short of expectations. Funcom’s war chests are empty. With an injection of 5.5 million dollars, the promotional drum for the savior Lego Online is to be beaten. And as if that weren’t enough, they also have a peculiarity of the Norwegian state at home.
The oldies Anarchy Online and Age of Conan are chugging along
If game developers were football clubs, Blizzard could certainly be compared to Bayern Munich – and Funcom to HSV. Somehow, the Norwegians have not had luck for years. In every generation of MMORPGs, something gets in the way.
Anarchy Online launched in 2001, even before the big hype around MMORPGs. It is one of the longest-lasting MMOs and has been Free-to-Play since 2004. Despite an announced graphic overhaul and relatively stable player numbers, Anarchy Online is likely no longer a mainstay for Funcom.
Age of Conan was once considered the next WoW killer, but it never fulfilled its high ambitions or did justice to the renowned license. For years, it has been threatening to disappear from the players’ radar.
Both Anarchy Online and Age of Conan still have a loyal player base, still make money, as Funcom now reports. The numbers for the two games developed “relatively stable, given the difficult competitive situation,” according to Funcom.
Perspectives sound different.
The Secret World is taking on water
Things seem more serious for the situation of The Secret World. The title was supposed to fill Funcom’s coffers but sank against Guild Wars 2 and Diablo 3.
The problem with MMORPGs: In the development phase, a title only costs money. Only when the servers go live and players buy and pay for the title does a game generate money. The Secret World is not managing to recoup the invested money in sufficient quantities.
But The Secret World fans don’t need to panic just yet. Shutting down the servers would be even more expensive for Funcom. Also, further patches and content are planned. However, some compromises and delays are to be expected.
This has economic consequences:
While Funcom was still able to earn 7.8 million US dollars in the last quarter of 2012, it was only 4.3 million in the last quarter of 2013. Profit shrank from 2 million to about 200,000 dollars.
Employees have already been laid off. Furthermore, Funcom is dealing with particularly aggressive NPCs in-house. The Norwegian unit Økokrim is responsible for economic crimes. Funcom announces full cooperation in the report but also expects fines for the coming year.
The Legos as a lifeboat
As a beacon of hope, Funcom sees the release of Lego Minifigures Online. The game is entering beta this summer. To ensure marketing for the title, Funcom has borrowed 5.5 million US dollars from its main shareholder KGL Investments.
Funcom further confirmed in the financial report the new strategy active since 2012. According to this, smaller titles will be developed simultaneously, instead of focusing on a few large titles.
Mein-mmo.de thinks: How one can read from the numbers that “everything is okay, everything is running” is a mystery to us. The market for MMORPGs is becoming harsher. There is no longer room for all titles. While previously full-price titles had the path to free-to-play open, so many MMORPGs have now had that path that it is also getting tight here.
The talented designers of Funcom games and the long-time fans can only hope that the Legos from Lego Online can pull it off.
With the existing titles, Funcom apparently still managed to stay afloat in 2013.
With the upcoming release of WildStar, The Elder Scrolls Online, Warlords of Draenor, Everquest Next and numerous other titles, it seems clear: The flood is coming.
