Rumor - SOE to purchase VG?

[Frax]

If its barely profitable isn't this a case of throwing good money after bad? I had much higher hopes for this game :/

[Moontayle]

Thread up for over 24hrs. No response from either Smed or Brad, and I can't imagine someone from SOE/Sigil doesn't drop in here at least once a day to check the headlines. So either a) it's true or b) some version of the truth. Most companies are quick to kill spurious rumors, especially of this magnitude.

[Eomer]

Most companies are also quick to kill completely true rumors. Look at the pissing match Kotaku and Sony got into over Sony's online plans. Everything they claimed turned out to be true, but that didn't stop Sony from initially blackballing them.

No one responding to this rumor doesn't tell you a damn thing about it's accuracy. It's an indication that Smed, Aradune, Nino, and other SOE/SGO devs have been posting here very infrequently lately.

[Maxxius]

Originally Posted by redjunkopera

"Running a business" works a little different than "running a large privately held corporation". . . .

Since when was Sigil a LARGE privately held corporation? Presumably it was two guys, Brad and Jeff, as owners who talked MS into feeding them monthly money to develop a game. I guarantee you Sigil's biggest expense over the years was meeting payroll and I guarantee you MS didn't just "forgive" all the money it lent. If SOE is taking over it is a forced monetary move more than anything else.

[Kazgrim]

The station pass lost value when they increased its price to equal 2 full MMOs when they barely have 2 MMOs worth playing in their stable.

It's more beneficial to most people to cancel station pass, sign up for one SOE MMO and be free to pick and choose any other MMO on the market for the same cost.

Basically...think itzena covered this as well. SOE got scared of Vanguard cannibalizing their EQ2 subs so took Brad & co back so they could put what they saw as their direct competition on their Station Pass. With the rediculous amount of money poured into Vanguard so far they must have expected the game to atleast do EQ2 level subs (200k or so) Many of which would be EQ2 subs themselves so figured they could justifiably raise the cost of the Station Pass to recoup some of their expenses with Vanguard. Basically they could keep all their EQ2 sub revenue and a cut of Sigils as well with the $30.00 Station Pass price.

But Vanguard totally shit the bed which has left SOE up shit creek without a paddle. The Station Pass price hike without atleast 2 "heavy" hitters is a joke, and now SOE is stuck keeping the lights on and paying the rent over at Sigil. I'm pretty sure Sigil has been broke since SOE took over publishing, the last of their development budget went into buying back the publishing rights from MS for probably pennies on the dollar. SOEs only options now are to take the game off of sigil's hands and try to lifesupport it and eventually recoup their costs or simply drop sigil and write the whole thing off as a loss.

Still looks like they have >30K active, and it's not some massive fall-off, it's a slow decline if you can even call it that with any kind of statistal significance. EVE operates with that much...

Uh no, Eve operates with that many concurrent users on a single world server. They have far more total subscribers than Vanguard does.

[redjunkopera]

Originally Posted by Slick Willey

Rejunkopera: "There are no Americans in Baghdad! I repeat, there are no Americans in Baghdad!"

Hardly.

This thread is a congregation of wild speculation and second hand rumors (actually 3rd hand at this point). Nothing of substance aside from the NPD comment has been added.

[Twobit Whore]

Originally Posted by Kazgrim

But Vanguard totally shit the bed which has left SOE up shit creek without a paddle. The Station Pass price hike without atleast 2 "heavy" hitters is a joke, and now SOE is stuck keeping the lights on and paying the rent over at Sigil.

What's funny (yet sad at the same time) is that instead of SOE making a little cash off of Vanguard, it is likely costing them money to operate, host, and support it.

[Kazgrim]

yeah but they can keep billing cancelled accounts and blame sigil and vice versa. I'm pretty sure they are doing that so the Sigil paychecks don't bounce.

[Cuppycake]

I think Kazgrim has hit the heart of the issues spot on. I think SOE might be in a scenario where they almost *have* to buy Vanguard to keep it from tanking altogether and therefore losing the revenue from its presence on Station Pass as well. I personally think that Sigil no longer has the funds to keep this game progressing and cannot pay their developers to put much support into it.

I think its less of a matter of SOE wanting the game so that they can make a profit off it and turn it into something good, and more of an issue where Sigil are dropping the ball on all aspects of the game and leaving SOE with having to promote and support a sinking title with little contribution from Sigil. I think its a catch 22 for SOE because they're stuck with having the product on their lineup regardless.

[tad10]

Originally Posted by Eomer

Most companies are also quick to kill completely true rumors. Look at the pissing match Kotaku and Sony got into over Sony's online plans. Everything they claimed turned out to be true, but that didn't stop Sony from initially blackballing them.

No one responding to this rumor doesn't tell you a damn thing about it's accuracy. It's an indication that Smed, Aradune, Nino, and other SOE/SGO devs have been posting here very infrequently lately.

Generally (which is to say 99.99%) most companies will offer the following response with respect to any rumor:

"It is company policy not to comment on rumors or speculation in any way."

I find it unlikely that Smed, Aradune or anyone else would comment on this rumor unless it was to post an official press release annoucing such (if it were indeed to come to pass) and then commenting briefly on the official press release . Companies have this type policy so they don't get sued.

[Twobit Whore]

Originally Posted by Cuppycake

I think Kazgrim has hit the heart of the issues spot on. I think SOE might be in a scenario where they almost *have* to buy Vanguard to keep it from tanking altogether and therefore losing the revenue from its presence on Station Pass as well. I personally think that Sigil no longer has the funds to keep this game progressing and cannot pay their developers to put much support into it.

I think its less of a matter of SOE wanting the game so that they can make a profit off it and turn it into something good, and more of an issue where Sigil are dropping the ball on all aspects of the game and leaving SOE with having to promote and support a sinking title with little contribution from Sigil. I think its a catch 22 for SOE because they're stuck with having the product on their lineup regardless.

This is a very interesting point. Now that they have raised the station pass and cited Vanguard as the main reason why, they can't just shut VG down and keep it at the same price... and they aren't likely to lower the price back to 24.99. It would be a monumental clusterfuck and only end up pissing off everyone who had the pass, especially those who had it and never even bothered with Vanguard but kept it anyway.

I guess at this point they are probably waiting for the big billing day to roll around, the 28th? 29th? whichever, to make the announcement.

[kcxiv]

Originally Posted by tad10

Eh. I always though his posts were like mine -- viz. VG has issues but we're still having a pretty good time. I guess I don't really care that you and etc. didn't enjoy the game. I did and still do.

This is the problem with discussing VG here -- if you play the game and try and make some constructive criticism everyone who hates the game will seize on that criticism and come up with a post like this.

God forbid i like something other then the mighty WoW or Lotro now. lol

[Maxxius]

Originally Posted by Kazgrim

. . . . SOE got scared of Vanguard cannibalizing their EQ2 subs so took Brad & co back so they could put what they saw as their direct competition on their Station Pass. . . .

I really don't think this was the case. A more likely scenario was when E3 convention was coming up, MS suits wanted to see what product Brad was going to show off. They saw the piece of crap he had. They decided to pull the plug. With no more monthly funds coming in from MS and no product actually producing income yet, he ran to the only option he had, SOE.

SOE literally bailed his ass out. Quite possibly they have a deal with MS to pay them maybe 10 cents on the dollar owed (pure speculation). The subs aren't meeting minimum expectations, The best course of action is to consolidate Sigil into SOE and eliminate alot of duplicating jobs and costs.

Quite frankly, and trust me I am no fan of SOE, but all you VG lovers should be blessing Smed's ass, because without SOE involvement Sigil was destined for bankruptcy and no game on the market.

[Slick Willey]

Originally Posted by Eomer

No one responding to this rumor doesn't tell you a damn thing about it's accuracy. It's an indication that Smed, Aradune, Nino, and other SOE/SGO devs have been posting here very infrequently lately.

That's irrelevant. This rumor is all over the internet on pretty much every VG-related forum. The SV dev tracker doesn't have any response to the rumor from any message board. So its not just a "We are staying away from FOH's board."

[Itzena]

Originally Posted by Cuppycake

I think its less of a matter of SOE wanting the game so that they can make a profit off it and turn it into something good, and more of an issue where Sigil are dropping the ball on all aspects of the game and leaving SOE with having to promote and support a sinking title with little contribution from Sigil. I think its a catch 22 for SOE because they're stuck with having the product on their lineup regardless.

SOE has the money and resources to spent 18 months on a game ripping out the Vision(tm)-type grindtastic suck and remoulding it into something decent (see: EQ2). I very much doubt Sigil has the same.

And hey - at least SOE only funded about a year of development. Poor old Microsoft got suckered into paying for four.

Originally Posted by redjunkopera

Still looks like they have >30K active, and it's not some massive fall-off, it's a slow decline if you can even call it that with any kind of statistal significance. EVE operates with that much...

30K characters, not 30K subscribers. How many people do you know that don't have at least one alt?