Norwegian publisher FunCom will launch its persistent online game Anarchy Online on June 27.
Norwegian publisher FunCom’s new persistent online game, Anarchy Online, will be released in North America and Scandinavia on June 27. The boxed game will retail for $49.95, with monthly subscriptions of $12.95 for players to continue playing online – approximately $3 higher than the competition.
FunCom enters a market so far dominated by two games, Ultima Online from Electronic Arts and Everquest from Sony. FunCom is competing against two of the biggest games publishers in the world with both Ultima Online and EverQuest having established business models, loyal user bases and well supported marketing campaigns.
Yet the Norwegian firm can count on several competitive advantages. Anarchy Online is the first new persistent online game for 18 months. Unlike its competitors, Anarchy Online has a science fiction setting, a popular genre that has so far been untapped. The game also boasts superior graphics.
Anarchy Online has already gathered interest from the market. Previews of the beta release have been positive and, more importantly, 100,000 gamers have volunteered to beta test the game. Although FunCom cannot expect to convert them all into paying customers, it demonstrates a real interest among consumers. The challenge will be to establish a user base quickly to start recouping the $12.5 million spent on developing the game.
The commercial success of Ultima Online and Everquest has attracted the attention of many publishers and developers. Unlike the unprofitable free gaming portals market, persistent games offer the prospect of significant, stable revenues. Therefore, several new persistent games will be released in the coming months.
However, the arrival of these new games could kill the golden goose. Although new games will undoubtedly appeal to new gamers, market saturation could arrive rapidly as this category of games appeals to hard-core gamers and is currently restricted to PCs – a relatively small customer segment. Even so, the release of Anarchy Online is another sign that the online gaming industry is quickly realizing the need to introduce subscription and pay-per-play business models.
