The Friday Funspot for May 10th

Greetings, Programs! (sorry, just rewatched the original Tron..)

Let's see what's going on.

Blizzard's World (of Warcraft) is getting smaller

Latest quarterly subscriber information is in, and the numbers are getting worrying for Blizz.. down another 1.3 million or so subscribers, down to about 8 million. Now, don't get me wrong, that's still the 800 lb gorilla of the MMO world, but it's got to cause some worries for the suits at ActiBlizzard. They've managed to commoditize (spell check says that's not a word, I say whatever) their other games (the Diablos, the Starcrafts) well, although that has it's own set of problems (see Blizzard shutting down the Real Money Auction House for days due to a gold duping bug that was introduced in the latest patch).

It's very hard for "pay" to compete with free, and that's what Blizzard has to do, with the competitors offering little or no initial buy in. It's very hard to convince someone to pay $200 a year or so to play your game while other people are offering the base game for free.

Again, don't cry for Blizz, they've made tons of money, and still will make money (albeit a lower amount), going forward, but at some point, the latest $50 expansion gravy train is going to grind to a halt, and it'll be very interesting to see where they go from there.

Precursor Games rises from the ashes of Silicon Knights

You remember Silicon Knights, right? The company that bought rights to use the Unreal Engine, made a crappy game, sued Epic Games for not sharing the secrets of, you know, not making crappy games, got countersued for misapproriation of trade secrets and misuse of the license, and got taken to the legal cleaners as a result?

Well, the folks from that studio have started a new company (Precursor Games) and are trying to crowdfund  a sequel to their hit Eternal Darkness.

Somehow, I have a feeling they'll have a problem finding someone to license a graphics engine from..


Guess Who's Back, Back Again, Sid Meier's Back. Tell a friend.

Yes, that is a dated reference. So are most of the actual games that Sid Meier actually worked on, as recent versions of the games he's known for (like the Civilization series) have had nothing really to do with him except crediting him as the originator of the series.. is back.. but before you start to salivate, here's the details..

It's a semi-port of a World War I flying game, turn based, for Iphones/pads. Not saying it's a bad thing, but it's a far far way away from making games that "stood the test of time"



Sony's thinking everything will come up roses with PS4 launch

Fresh off making their first profit from their games division in five years (and that mostly because they don't actually, you know have to make the consoles as much anymore), Sony recently said they do not forsee "major losses from the launch of the PS4, unlike the PS3".

Honestly, I'm a cynic here. In this market, releasing a new system at a rumored high price point.. the only way that this doesn't lead to a major loss for Sony is if they sell really well, something I don't see with the high price point in a recovering economy


And Finally... "Rock Not Included"

They announced the goodies that will be in the Rome: Total War Collector's Edition (what I call the Shiny box), retailing for $155. Amongst the items, a Total War Card Game, an ancient Roman Board Game, Ancient Roman Dice (back when the phrase "Rolling the Bones" meant literally that).. and the big seller here.

A kit that allows you to assemble your very own Roman Siege Catapult (called an onager).

If you remember the movie line say it with me now..

"You're going to put someone's eye out with that thing.."