The Road to Mordor: Could Lord of the Rings Online end in 2014?

[Edrogar]

As far as NOT renewing the license from SZC for LOTRO ...

From the 2010 boston.com coverage of the WB purchase of Turbine:



http://www.boston.com/business/ticke...bine_sold.html

I've been saying all along that the license for the game is something that WB will want to keep regardless of how well the game is going, simply because it can be used for future games. The only license worry i would have is if SZ don't offer it for renewal, which is very unlikely.

[Belnavar]

I don't think people need to panic about this.

1. The license has an option for extension to 2017. My understanding is that Turbine is the party that chooses whether or not to extend, not SZC, as this has already been written into the contract.

2. There is significant room for further extension, particularly with the Hobbit films coming out over the next two years. Tolkien fever is as strong as ever.

3. Turbine is silent because it is a legal issue. All companies are generally advised not to comment on things like this, especially if negotiations are ongoing.

-Bel

[Kongas]

I don't think people need to panic about this.

1. The license has an option for extension to 2017. My understanding is that Turbine is the party that chooses whether or not to extend, not SZC, as this has already been written into the contract.

2. There is significant room for further extension, particularly with the Hobbit films coming out over the next two years. Tolkien fever is as strong as ever.

3. Turbine is silent because it is a legal issue. All companies are generally advised not to comment on things like this, especially if negotiations are ongoing.

-Bel

I think you're probably right. I'm more concerned about game quality and that is to some extend always going to be coloured by preferences and expectations. I'm probably one of those players wh's a little sad that the game is moving so far away from what it was that grabbed us originally that it is leaving us behind and struggling to understand why people are happy with what they are getting.

The answer being - that's what the type of player Turbine wants to attract, wants. And if that's not what I and an unknown number of other people want then that's just the breaks. Nothing goes on forever. I might think Turbine is making a mistake but I bet WB have a bunch of MBA's and a Mount Doom tall stack of spreadsheets saying I'm wrong.

They probably can make a ton of money from churning FTP players through the store to cap and don't need to spend much on development.

The MMO market is different from 2007. I personally think it sad that (from my point of view) LOTRO has gone from a great, engrossing and challenging MMO to a Store with an online increasingly single player oriented game attached but others disagree.

In the end all people like me can do is look out for a game that wants to appeal to the more Old Skool market.

[Morons]

I've been raiding, grouping, mounting up, doing dailies, soloing, and PvMPing -- and loving all the content. I've an old-school crpg'er and have quite high standards for what I want to see in a rpg game. Turbine almost always meets or exceeds these standards for me. To say that all the content released in the past 1 -2 years is low-quality is in my opinion the height of contemptible trolling. It’s insulting to all the devs, artists, world-builders, and others who have put long-hours into developing some pretty cool quests and systems. Maybe you personally haven't liked it, maybe there are ways it could be improved, but to say it's low-quality is such off-base, hyperbolic, trolling it makes me lolz.

You,re right , so you mean when you buy a game and can't paly it that we have to cheer the wonderful dev and turbine?
Memory leaks since rohan , can't log your main since u10 and no1 in turbine help at all only reinstall the game and other useless thing.
i can understand the game works fine for you but pls stop defend turbine there are people that have problems and no one is willing to help them in turbine so if i can i'm gladly insult the devs ( thanks turbine for your refund policy )

[Thorwyn99]

I think you're probably right. I'm more concerned about game quality and that is to some extend always going to be coloured by preferences and expectations. I'm probably one of those players wh's a little sad that the game is moving so far away from what it was that grabbed us originally that it is leaving us behind and struggling to understand why people are happy with what they are getting.

The answer being - that's what the type of player Turbine wants to attract, wants. And if that's not what I and an unknown number of other people want then that's just the breaks. Nothing goes on forever. I might think Turbine is making a mistake but I bet WB have a bunch of MBA's and a Mount Doom tall stack of spreadsheets saying I'm wrong.

They probably can make a ton of money from churning FTP players through the store to cap and don't need to spend much on development.

The MMO market is different from 2007. I personally think it sad that (from my point of view) LOTRO has gone from a great, engrossing and challenging MMO to a Store with an online increasingly single player oriented game attached but others disagree.

In the end all people like me can do is look out for a game that wants to appeal to the more Old Skool market.

I agree actually the whole gaming market has changed, MMOs especially. The writing was on the wall for a long time though it's what happens if you aim for mainstream.
I'm just lucky it concides with a change in my gaming habits and wants, so it's in parts an advantage for me.
If the change is good in the long run i doubt, the mainstream is fickle, but it won't change before some kind of crash again.
And seeing how bloated the gaming industry is today that's gonna take a LONG time.
My point just is that i will play and pay as long as it's fun to me, if it isn't anymore i'll leave, life is too short to gripe about computer games anymore lol.

If you're looking for games with old skool appeal i'd look to the indie market, it's where i get most of my single player games nowadays.

[Kongas]

If you're looking for games with old skool appeal i'd look to the indie market, it's where i get most of my single player games nowadays.

i've missed out on a lot of good single player stuff in the last few years. Of course I played Skyrim, but that is never-ending. Recently i've come to appreciate the focused story-telling of Dragon Age 2. A game I can reasonably expect to finish with a little effort. I'm still looking out for a new MMO but as I need my imagination engaged I tend to want something based on a world i'm familiar with. I think a competent Elder Scrolls will attract more Old Skool players but who knows what their business model might be and most things look world-beating before you get to play them.

I had hoped Neverwinter would be good, but it's clearly just a giant cash-grab by PWE and makes no apologies about that whatsoever. You can have plenty of fun playing it as a single player action game with the minimum of cash expenditure but as soon as you venture into group content it's all about the gear and the gear is all about your credit card. Plus the fact that it seems to attract the worst sort of people to judge by the exploiting, the abuse and the outright unabashed cheating.

[Thorwyn99]

i've missed out on a lot of good single player stuff in the last few years. Of course I played Skyrim, but that is never-ending. Recently i've come to appreciate the focused story-telling of Dragon Age 2. A game I can reasonably expect to finish with a little effort. I'm still looking out for a new MMO but as I need my imagination engaged I tend to want something based on a world i'm familiar with. I think a competent Elder Scrolls will attract more Old Skool players but who knows what their business model might be and most things look world-beating before you get to play them.

I had hoped Neverwinter would be good, but it's clearly just a giant cash-grab by PWE and makes no apologies about that whatsoever. You can have plenty of fun playing it as a single player action game with the minimum of cash expenditure but as soon as you venture into group content it's all about the gear and the gear is all about your credit card. Plus the fact that it seems to attract the worst sort of people to judge by the exploiting, the abuse and the outright unabashed cheating.

I usually go here for my single player game checkup http://www.rpgwatch.com. If you like focused story telling i would try the witcher 2 i really liked the story telling there.

As much as i'd like a new D&D game i had very little hope for Neverwinter. PWE is not known for much else but cash grabs and cryptic isn't the beacon of great games either heh.
TES might be good but if you're hoping for a very group oriented MMO i think you'll be disappointed, it's pretty much even worse clashing audiences over there than over here lol.

[Kongas]

I usually go here for my single player game checkup http://www.rpgwatch.com. If you like focused story telling i would try the witcher 2 i really liked the story telling there.

As much as i'd like a new D&D game i had very little hope for Neverwinter. PWE is not known for much else but cash grabs and cryptic isn't the beacon of great games either heh.
TES might be good but if you're hoping for a very group oriented MMO i think you'll be disappointed, it's pretty much even worse clashing audiences over there than over here lol.

Thanks for the link. I didn't like Witcher much. The world and the character you have to play just didn't appeal. Drakensang is in the sale in amazon so I'll give that a go. Which usually means it goes on a pile and never gets installed but I can live in hope. TESO claims to cater for a lot of styles and gets into grouping after the early levels. It's the way LOTRO forbids grouping that gets me.

'This is a Solo Instance' bottlenecks everywhere. It's not like there is any sort of challenge in these instances anyway so who cares if a team do it for RP purposes?

NW is quite funny really. I'm way more forgiving of Turbine's amateur hour efforts to loot us having experienced PWE's approach to such matters.

[Edrogar]

If you like strong story lines then you might like The secret World the whole game is story driven and FC have done really well with it.

[Frisco]

"MMOs exist because of addiction." Frisco

Say what? I think that needs an explanation. Some people may become addicted to MMOs, or games in general. But what you are saying there is like saying alcohol was invented by alcoholics. MMOs exist because of table top social games, not because of gaming addictions.

They may have been created because of tabletop games. They thrive and profit because of varying degrees of addiction.

And once again I will point out that the random door prize is not gambling. If you can't lose you aren't gambling. Simple as that.

Nonsense. There are varying tiers of reward, and you can pay real money in the form of Mithril Coins to purchase the chance to win one of the top tier prizes. It is most certainly a gamble, no matter how many times you have tried to point out otherwise. If I pay 80 cents to open a gold Hobbit Present and win a piece of teal armour for a L80 character, I have lost.

I would like to intro some folks to a word "desensitization". It goes on consistently in games and TV. Once you except something mentally, it's a short step to physically. Do you think watching a generation of TV smoking didn't encourage people to smoke? If smoking and drinking in a game is acceptable it must be ok in reality, right? If every one on TV uses violence to solve issues, violence must be an acceptable problem solving tool.

Don't put words in my mouth. I never said that drinking fake alcohol could never result in real addiction. I only implied that it is far less likely to be a causing or enabling factor in addiction than *ACTUAL GAMBLING*.

And no, it's not such a short step. Even if desensitization got more people to smoke, there's still another very big step before it becomes an addiction. Now, getting kids hooked on gambling mechanics in a video game, where the stakes are low or where there may not even be real money involved *IS* a small step from raising the stakes and using more money to satisfy that same craving for variable interval reward.

[Graycient]

Wouldn't be surprised. Hope not though.

[manstan]

I think you are confusing "pastime" with "addiction" and "random" with "gambling". But that's just my opinion.

I'm still intrigued by the notion of the plausibility of the new and old versions of LOTRO running side by side during the cross over. Of coarse that is assuming it goes that far and in that direction.

At present I believe that is the only way this game will survive past the end game.

[Korrigan]

There's something I don't understand in that article though...

It says Turbine doesn't own the right to "The Hobbit" but only to "Lord of the Rings + Appendixes". Hum ok... that was true before WB acquired Turbine, but now Warner Bros obviously owns "The Hobbit" rights since they are making the movies.

Now of course WB's contract could be limited to movies only and not include games. But then how comes they are able make other video games based on "The Hobbit" movies? They obviously also have those rights for video games. Seems to me that LOTRO gets a special treatment, and considering they didn't use the opportunity of the movie coming out to massively advertise LOTRO and to add movie related content to the game, well... there's something fishy here. Something very wrong. We are talking about WB, a media juggernaut, and not Turbine, just "another" MMO development company (no offense meant of course).

[Belnavar]

It says Turbine doesn't own the right to "The Hobbit" but only to "Lord of the Rings + Appendixes". Hum ok... that was true before WB acquired Turbine, but now Warner Bros obviously owns "The Hobbit" rights since they are making the movies.

Turbine owns the rights to make an online LOTR game. WB owns the rights to make normal single-player games. They are not the same, and one does not carry over to the other. Turbine's exclusive rights to the online title is part of why WB bought it.

The Erebor content was about as much as they could do to tie in with the Hobbit movies.

-Bel

[Korrigan]

Turbine owns the rights to make an online LOTR game. WB owns the rights to make normal single-player games. They are not the same, and one does not carry over to the other. Turbine's exclusive rights to the online title is part of why WB bought it.

The Erebor content was about as much as they could do to tie in with the Hobbit movies.

-Bel

Why is there an "Hobbit: Armies of the Third Age" online game then?
Obviously, someone has and gives away Hobbit online game authorizations...

[Belnavar]

Why is there an "Hobbit: Armies of the Third Age" online game then?
Obviously, someone has and gives away Hobbit online game authorizations...

Not exactly the same genre as an MMO.

When WB acquired Turbine, it explicitly stated that Turbine had exclusive rights to make an online multiplayer game for LOTR. Turbine has repeatedly stated that it does not have the rights to The Hobbit. Whether or not that has changed is anyone's guess, but from what we've seen and heard, I think it is the same scenario as ever.

-Bel

[manstan]

Hmm, that is something I hadn't thought of. There is a lot of intervening time between the Hobbit and LOTR. They could just tweak the present maps, rewrite quests to take advantage of this, and practically have a new game. Just a passing thought.

[VeryBeary]

I don't think people need to panic about this.

1. The license has an option for extension to 2017. My understanding is that Turbine is the party that chooses whether or not to extend, not SZC, as this has already been written into the contract.

2. There is significant room for further extension, particularly with the Hobbit films coming out over the next two years. Tolkien fever is as strong as ever.

3. Turbine is silent because it is a legal issue. All companies are generally advised not to comment on things like this, especially if negotiations are ongoing.

-Bel

Thank you for such a sane, calming post. I believe you are right. +rep for being a voice of reason!

[Arutha]

Great presentation Savin

I have been playing LOTRO since I was a early non-public Beta tester in 2006. What a great adventure it has been playing, and experiencing the changes over time as LOTRO evolved. So did Turbine evolve, common in the Tech biz. It's is a fun game until uninstall time.

Although I haven't seen the actual agreement, I've worked on a number licenses deals in a fortune 50 company where we licensed technology or other property rights from another company. In all my career I have never seen an option to extend clause that was not totally at the discretion of the licensee (Warner Brother in this case). Base on the press announcement in 2008 it stated the grant of license was through 2014 and with the right to extend to 2017.

This means that, as long as Warner Brothers sees LOTRO and a continuing product line, they can extend through 2017 with no further changes to the conditions.

I've also never seen a license agreement that did not at least in principle cover how the license might be extended beyond the dates stipulated in the agreement. If such language was omitted then there is a concept that the licensor cannot unreasonably withhold further extensions to a license. For example, perhaps they could double the yearly price, but they could 10x the price unless they could show that had an offer from another party to validate the new price.

Time Warner knows all about copyright and licensing. They have much more powerful lawyers at their disposal that then Tolkien Estate. The Tolkien Estate has shown itself to be somewhat unreasonable at times and that would hurt them in any court case.

The bottom line is that worst case if the license extension beyond 2017 was becoming a problem (because of Tolkien) and the game was losing money or break even, then they might not fight it. But Warner brothers has a reputation for not caving in this area and not giving in to bullying. Why? because if they cave even once then lots of people will start to play games with them.

I wouldn't be surprised if Warner Brothers extended the license through 2025 even if they stopped the game, just to make a point. they have a lot invested in six movies and perhaps some sequels and they aren't going to let little Tolkien Estates try and blackmail them and extort them.

Later,

Savin

[NukeTheLag]

I don't know why everyone keeps talking about the Tolkien estate. The Tolkien estate sold the right 35 years ago. Saul Zaentz Co. is the relevant entity. There is an option to renew which means that without need of any further negotiation there is a fixed trigger WB can pull by paying specified consideration for a 3 year extension on the license. The option must also be exercised by a certain deadline or the option expires. This has nothing to do with who has the best IP lawyers or whatever. In other words, the terms were already negotiated when the option was finalized.

The closer we get to 2014, the greater the likelihood that WB would just pull the trigger if everything was hunky-dory. Axiomatic to this is that the longer we go without hearing that WB has pulled the trigger, this gives reason to believe that they won't renew the option. This has nothing to do with saneness or calm and everything to do with understanding how an option works.

It is possible that instead of just pulling the trigger, WB could try to renegotiate for a longer/shorter renewal, which would allow SZC to alter the terms as well. At that point, the quality of WB's lawyers would matter I suppose, but if that sort of thing is coming into play then it's because WB is choosing to do something other than simply exercise its option.

If so, it could be that WB wants a longer renewal term because their projections for the game's future make it worth their while to pay even more for say a 5 year renewal. If you believe that, I have bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. Quite clearly, if WB doesn't want to just exercise the option it is because they want to see if they can pay less to renew for some period less than 3 years.

So the longer this goes without hearing something definitive, it does become evidence that the long-term health of the game is in question.

(Slight revision: It could be that the terms of the option are contingent on, e.g. LOTRO meeting certain revenue goals, but that doesn't change the analysis. Now that I think about it, the terms could depend on a having certain subscription numbers as measured by the number of daily logins. Hmmm.....)

[Schmidster]

Just a thought/suggestion, but really Turbine/WB have never gone out of their way to announce stuff in advance, short of upcoming content sales, new zones...

There has never been a strong presence in magazines, advertising in general - folks used to complain that there were never enough ads. I don't think they will hint one way or another until the last minute. These forums will continue to fester, ooze doubt and speculation. I have always felt this is the case. Then suddenly - yay more information and a new conversation begins.

[Korrigan]

There has never been a strong presence in magazines, advertising in general - folks used to complain that there were never enough ads.

Well, quite rightfully so. Remember what many people saw during the ads before The Hobbit last December? Ads for Guild Wars 2 and for... Runescape. You will agree that this would have been a fantastic opportunity for a LotRO advertisement campaign... but no, nothing.

[Ragekiss]

Well, quite rightfully so. Remember what many people saw during the ads before The Hobbit last December? Ads for Guild Wars 2 and for... Runescape. You will agree that this would have been a fantastic opportunity for a LotRO advertisement campaign... but no, nothing.

And it is pretty telling that Turbine found the money to advertise in movie theatres now for it's new game Infinite Crisis.

[Lohi]

Well, quite rightfully so. Remember what many people saw during the ads before The Hobbit last December? Ads for Guild Wars 2 and for... Runescape. You will agree that this would have been a fantastic opportunity for a LotRO advertisement campaign... but no, nothing.

Most games don't advertise much, except those intending to make back some dev costs in the first two weeks (ie, idiotic FPS games on consoles). MMOs do not advertise on general media except on very rare occasions. I think I saw 3 Rift copmmercials, but only before it went live, I've seen 2 WoW commercials, and lots of Magic 101, but no others.

Now in game mags it's different. Note however that the LotRO community is not your typical gamer community either, they don't keep up on the trade rags or visit MMO sites.

[Laweh]

I'm ready for some other developer to have the rights to the lore and see what they can come up with using a better engine, fresh outlook and the new tech out there. This engine has about had it and looks dated. Not putting down the artists, some really beautiful areas in game, its just the mechanics of getting about thru glitches, hiccups, freezing and lag that ruins the experience.

LoTR has been wonderful to sticking with the lore and bringing that immersion factor, but I believe other companies competing can bring even more to the experience. I am also over the whole five or six toolbars and skills, and more enjoy the open UI of skyrim and soon to be Elder Scrolls, who is also using one mega server instead of a zillion servers.