[MUD-Dev] Indie MMOG's

[Michael Sellers]

Adam wrote:
> Rob C wrote:

>> I have to agree with the comment that proper funding is the first
>> and foremost problem facing most small development
>> shops. Speaking from the experience of one of these smaller
>> studios, if you can't

> Was it working only on MMOG's though? I'm not making claims about
> the mainstream games industry; the financials of the three main
> business models for an MMOG give indie developers a much better
> chance than those of a mainstream game.

> Hence funding is much less of an issue IMHO.

....

> Failure to get funding is often symptomatic of having already
> failed in other areas. It's not that getting funding is hard, it's
> that it's just the first point at which the management notice that
> they've failed elsewhere, because it's the first time some
> external force puts a brake on their progress in response to the
> underlying failures (which could be ignored up until that point).

I have to wonder how much funding you've raised recently for an MMO
development project, and from what sources.

It's true that the revenue model for MMOs tends to be much better
than for boxed games.  It's also true that the risks involved in
developing and launching an MMO are high -- high enough to make many
investors consider something a lot less risky.  As the market
matures and more products and companies fail, this risk factor is
being turned up, not down.

Raising money to develop a software product (not just games) is
typically incredibly difficult.  People talk about how much more
difficult it is to develop an MMO over other kinds of games (and
they're right); I'd say it's that much harder again to raise a few
million dollars to fund this -- and if you're trying to raise more
than $10M, you better have a sterling track record and a fantastic
team.  OTOH don't forget the process is highly capricious: good
teams with solid ideas routinely go unfunded while questionable
teams with flaky ideas have money showered on them.  No one said
this was easy *or* fair.  To suggest otherwise, or to suggest that a
failure to obtain funding is indicative of failure in other areas,
seems to me to be naïve.

All that said, getting sufficient funding is by no means a panacea.
It's an enabler that makes it possible for you to show what you can
really do -- for better or worse.  Great games can be made on a
million dollars, and utter failures can be made for twenty times
that much.

Mike Sellers
Online Alchemy
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