Some hope within the Darkness!
Posted: Fri Nov 24, 2006 7:46 pm
I just wanted to add some of my personal experiences with MMO's and how things may go for the future of Ryzom, and hopefully I can bring some hope to the darkeness we are currently experiencing.
A little background on myself first: I used to work for the company Avaria(http://www.mmolands.com) before it was handed off to Rapid Reality(http://www.mmocenter.com) I had worked with Avaria for probably close to 2 years when the "merger" occured. Before that we had been creating a labor of love known as Endless Ages, some of you may have heard of it, some maybe not. Ryzom actually reminds me alot of Endless Ages with it's completely original story line, concept ,and execution. There are however more similarities.
Unfortunately Endless Ages also came to a point in time where it was no longer profitable for the Owner to maintain, so he decided to sell the game in parts, and in doing so, maintained full Intilectual rights, as well as gaining the funding to allow it to be maintained indefinately.
Here is what he did, and this is also possibly what could occur in this situation.
1. He sold non exclusive engine rights to the military (Honestly Cannot disclose more than that)
2. He sold non exclusive rights to an underdog upcomming Asian gaming company. Endless had next to no Asian market, he lost nothing from venture and gained a sizable amount of capital.
3. He sold a slightly different version of his engine to Kaneva (a well known free source mmo engine) once again, non exclusive to any of his current buisness dealings, he still held all intilectual rights and by this time had accumulated a SIZABLE amount of money.
4. He finally decided he wanted to not be the sole decision maker, and quite frankly was tired of all the work, he had plenty of profit, but was still not making anything from upkeeping the Endless Ages servers. All money had been made from the non exclusive transactions he had been able to make. HE was able to actually hire on another person, even though making no profit from Endless Ages supscriptions at this time, he was able to mentor this person and teach him to take over all mundane tasks, as well as more complicated ones.
5. Finally he found Rapid Reality, a new company using a version of the kaneva engine.....HIS engine, who through negotiations, and a bit of investor arm twisting, bought the servers, and physical properties of Endless Ages, while "hiring" the creator and owner of Endless Ages to maintain the engine (his true love) While they maintained the managemant, payment, and servers (his 1 bane, lol)
Here is where I was going with all of this, http://www.mmolands.com is still up, Endless Ages, a game whose quest creation and world building cost me many years of my life, a game that has the names of my family and children as NPC's, I would have been TRUELY saddened to see it go, but it has not, even though it was far more likely to die than Ryzom is now.....Have hope! If Endless Ages can make it, I guarentee Ryzom will make it further!
A little background on myself first: I used to work for the company Avaria(http://www.mmolands.com) before it was handed off to Rapid Reality(http://www.mmocenter.com) I had worked with Avaria for probably close to 2 years when the "merger" occured. Before that we had been creating a labor of love known as Endless Ages, some of you may have heard of it, some maybe not. Ryzom actually reminds me alot of Endless Ages with it's completely original story line, concept ,and execution. There are however more similarities.
Unfortunately Endless Ages also came to a point in time where it was no longer profitable for the Owner to maintain, so he decided to sell the game in parts, and in doing so, maintained full Intilectual rights, as well as gaining the funding to allow it to be maintained indefinately.
Here is what he did, and this is also possibly what could occur in this situation.
1. He sold non exclusive engine rights to the military (Honestly Cannot disclose more than that)
2. He sold non exclusive rights to an underdog upcomming Asian gaming company. Endless had next to no Asian market, he lost nothing from venture and gained a sizable amount of capital.
3. He sold a slightly different version of his engine to Kaneva (a well known free source mmo engine) once again, non exclusive to any of his current buisness dealings, he still held all intilectual rights and by this time had accumulated a SIZABLE amount of money.
4. He finally decided he wanted to not be the sole decision maker, and quite frankly was tired of all the work, he had plenty of profit, but was still not making anything from upkeeping the Endless Ages servers. All money had been made from the non exclusive transactions he had been able to make. HE was able to actually hire on another person, even though making no profit from Endless Ages supscriptions at this time, he was able to mentor this person and teach him to take over all mundane tasks, as well as more complicated ones.
5. Finally he found Rapid Reality, a new company using a version of the kaneva engine.....HIS engine, who through negotiations, and a bit of investor arm twisting, bought the servers, and physical properties of Endless Ages, while "hiring" the creator and owner of Endless Ages to maintain the engine (his true love) While they maintained the managemant, payment, and servers (his 1 bane, lol)
Here is where I was going with all of this, http://www.mmolands.com is still up, Endless Ages, a game whose quest creation and world building cost me many years of my life, a game that has the names of my family and children as NPC's, I would have been TRUELY saddened to see it go, but it has not, even though it was far more likely to die than Ryzom is now.....Have hope! If Endless Ages can make it, I guarentee Ryzom will make it further!