During Electronic Arts’ fiscal year 2010 update call today, CEO John Riccitiello cited Star Wars: The Old Republic as a key driver of the company’s digital business, noting that the MMO was making “great progress towards a spring 2011 launch”.
With all of the character classes revealed, new planets being added to the game’s Holonet on a regular basis, and stirrings of beta tests surfacing as early as September of last year, one would think the game was closer than a year and change away. Not so, according to EA’s CEO.
“One key driver is going to be the launch date of our major MMO. As it stands today, the game is making great progress towards a spring 2011 launch,” Riccitiello said. He then went on to explain that due to the volatile nature of the MMO market and the fact that they have not announced a specific date, they would not be including revenue from the game in their fiscal year 2011 outlook.
EA’s fiscal year 2011 runs from April of 2010 to March of 2011.
We’ve contacted Star Wars: The Old Republic developer BioWare for comment on Riccitiello’s statement, and will update should more info arise on the status of the eagerly anticipated title.
Korwin
January 12, 2010 at 11:37 AM
Good still a lot of beta time then. Biggest problem with most MMO’s is they launch to buggy for people to really jump in. In a post WoW world polish goes a long way to ensuring success.
Report PermalinkJosh
January 12, 2010 at 12:17 PM
The visuals for the game already look a bit dated. 2011… Awww man, wont they have to upgrade their visuals or something?
Report PermalinkShambrook
January 12, 2010 at 12:41 PM
Not really, look at the visuals in WoW, they get by with a strong asthetic as technicly the game is full of low poly models, low res textures etc.
Report PermalinkBen
January 12, 2010 at 1:20 PM
The visuals, while not bad, certainly aren’t fantastic either. However, this is a common trait for MMO’s, as the game needs to be able to run on a wide variety of computers with vastly different specifications. Push the graphics up too many notches and you shut out whole sections of gamers.
Report PermalinkJosh
January 12, 2010 at 2:20 PM
But WoW is dated now days, when it came out it looked impressive. I just dont want TOR to look dated from the get go.
Report PermalinkMarathon
January 12, 2010 at 3:40 PM
I remember reading somewhere that they were aiming to keep the art style similiar to that of the KOTOR games. Take it with a picnh of salt though since I can’t find the link to the interview at the moment.
But ben is right, with these type of games you want it to be accessible to the majority of players, not just the hardcore.
Report PermalinkPixarian72
January 12, 2010 at 5:47 PM
So long as the storytelling that Bioware does so well and the action sequences are awesome then it’ll be really good.
Decent customisation that sets people’s characters apart helps as well.
Another year! Even Diablo 3 will be done before then…
Report PermalinkAaron
January 12, 2010 at 10:29 PM
I’v noticed that MMO’s with great GFX seem to do worse then ones with Lesser Quality GFX.
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