Halo Online - The Billion Dollar Game?
A blog called The Mole, wrote a small editorial on today’s Halo news. It speculates about how a Halo MMO game could make a fortune, and thus how the Xbox360 could win the console wars. Of course this is just speculation, but it sounds pretty cool if you think about it. Since Halo is one of the best selling franchises around and MMO games bring in a lot of cash. World of Warcraft with 6 million players online each paying $15 a month, that’s what every publisher dreams about.
The next game will be online. MMOFPS if you want to call it that. Let’s just call it Halo Online. Ok, so Halo Online will be all about being a huge multiplayer battleground. The battle will probably be for Earth and the player can pick a side and battle in huge battles - 100+ people trying to take over a base and 100+ people trying to hold the base. Instead of getting tons of XP to level a character as you would in a MMORPG, players will need to carry out missions to get better equipment, tanks, and just more bases. The game will probably launch this fall, let’s say around November or at the very least will be announced at E3. Halo Online will be as big as World of Warcraft and will be Microsoft’s first “billion dollar game.” Don’t be surprised if this game gets 10 million subscribers paying $10-15 a month within the first three years. That would be over a billion dollars a year in revenue.
i am completely on board.
sign me the hell up.
– mu
God, I don’t know if I would even go for that.
I sure as hell don’t want to pay an additional $10-15 to play Microsoft’s game online, when I’m ALREADY paying them $50 a year.
If Bungie does this, and Microsoft doesn’t come up with some deal for Live subscribers (like, if you’re a gold you can play for free, but if you just want to play this game then you can pay the $10-15 a month) then I may have to pass.
God, I can’t really imagine how terrible the trash talking would be in this. I mean, the battles, yeah, those would be awesome, but having to fight next to that snot-nosed, foul-mouthed, prepubescent kid I crush in Halo 2 might ruin the epic feel of it for me. (assuming Voice chat is still left enabled, which I don’t see why it wouldn’t be)
And why do we pay for LIVE then???? Where does it stop?? Playing for live, paying to play the game…. why dont they charge me everytime i open my console!!!
You do need to understand that they need to pay for the servers they would be just running for that one game.. look at EQ(PC), EQ2(PC), EQ:OA(PS2)
For something that is an MMO it costs a lot of money and 1/2 of that will be to servers, upgrades, time spent making/updating the game. $10 a month is reasonable for a MMO.. well if you compare it to AO, EQ, WoW, and any other MMORP you will see that it is LOWER than those. Making a Halo Online would spark my interest back into Halo after they killed it with Halo 2… just my .02
It kind of sounds like hes hinting theres actually going to be a game like that this november. Screw the extra monthly charges, we are already paying an extra $10 for games that should cost the regular $50. IF there is an extra monthly charge, screw MS and their crappy halo. I mean halo 2 is OKAY in doses, but it sucks because it gets really repetitive and i dont care what anyone says to defend it.
I can’t see this happening, MMO games are a niche; just compare the sales of Halo 2 to say World of Warcraft. One of Halo’s biggest appeals to the mainstream is it’s “pick-up and play” ability. Your average joe is not going to want to invest the time into a MMO.
I played WoW for a while, and though I enjoyed it, I couldn’t keep up with the people who played it nonstop and therefore leveled beyond my reach. I have a job and I’m working on the social life thing, so for me, a game that requires a full commitment is out of the question. I’m not exactly a fan of Halo, but one of the few things I appreciated about it was that you could just play for a little while and put it down and not worry about falling behind from your friends. The online obsession over this game is sort of crossing that boundary I suppose with people playing so much that they know the ins and outs of every inch of every map, but I’m afraid that adding an aspect of an MMO would trap rabid fans of Halo in their homes permanently. Plus it would keep me, and other people like me, out of the game because of the inability to play casually.
I agree with Xploited13 on this one, to an extent… I believe they will release Halo 3 as a regular singleplayer/multiplayer game that will feature amazing graphics and story etc, etc. However, I also believe at the same time they are either working on or starting to develope a MMO version of Halo. Bungie and MS make a bunch of money from the regular version, then use that to help create the ultra MMO version to be released perhaps in 2007. Why cut down your fan base by creating one specific type of Halo? MS and Bungie could easily create both versions actually.
Xploited13; lots of average joe’s on WoW ;).
Please remember that this great editorial is purely speculative, not even a rumor.
Sounds like Planetside.
And that was the laggiest game ever created,,, hope hope it aint true
Id be highly disapointed if this alone is it, I really wanted a strong and exciting single player game and story complemented with a great multiplayer option.
The Rock; It’s NOT true, it’s speculation, wishfull thinking, a work of fiction, something Microsoft COULD do….
“And why do we pay for LIVE then???? Where does it stop?? Playing for live, paying to play the game…. why dont they charge me everytime i open my console!!!”
As Nino is saying, this article is NOT from Microsoft but from a small blog’s editor writing down some speculation about what he hopes/thinks/wishes/fears could happen.
Look at Huxley on xbox 360…
Yknow, I dreamt up an MMOFPS like 2 years ago, and I think it might work, especially if it’s Halo Oriented.
Think:
You and your Guild (Unit) of Marines, Spartans, and Pilots are defending a Base built and maintained by you and your Unit, and a massive Covenant Armada, played by Users and NPC’s, are launching a massive offensive. What will you do? Hold em off for as long as you can? Or run away crying like a little bitch?
It would be awesome. I would give my life savings (all $13 of it…) to play this game.
Love = Halo Online
A nice idea, but I can’t take the lag and wait times as they are now. Also, the vast majority of Halo 2 players are undisiplined and can not collaberate. Though I would love to hunt down and slaghter the 12 year olds as they stand trying to glitch