Interviews
Codemasters’ Marketing Brand Manager Discusses Cancellation of Dragon Empires
“It warms us all that we have such a dedicated community of players and it of course saddens us that we could not reward them with the final game”
On Friday, September 3, instead of announcing the definite dates for its beta, the developers of Dragon Empires for Codemasters made another announcement.
Technical difficulties had been weighed and after deliberation it was decided that further development of DE would be halted. It was a sad turn of events for the community, which had eagerly been looking forward to the title. It was also sad news for the massively multiplayer game community in general, which has seen several titles – including Mythica and Ultima X Odyssey – cancelled already this season, and one title (Warhammer Online) put on hiatus.
Gary Dunn, producer of the title, posted a message on the official Dragon Empires Web site, which stated: “We were experiencing unexpected obstacles with the server code, in particular our ability to serve clients at a scale which would have permitted us to launch the game as an MMO. The resolution of these issues was fundamental to the success of the project and ultimate release of the game. Due to the delays, a detailed analysis and review of the game was undertaken over the period of approximately six weeks in which a detailed study of the viability of the project was undertaken.”
GameZone was privileged to speak with Ed Relf, Marketing Brand Manager at Codemasters, who was asked to shed a little more light on the decision to close production on Dragon Empires.
Question: The decision to close a game that is getting so near to completion must truly be a hard one, although business decisions must be made. How hard is it to let go of a vision that has been near and dear to the heart such as Dragon Empires must surely have been?
Ed: Of course the decision to finally cancel the on-going development of Dragon Empires was an extremely difficult one to make. Our overall vision though to enter the market very much remains intact. Codemasters still has a very aggressive approach to the online subscription gaming market are still very much evaluating other potential opportunities to re-enter the marketplace within the very near future.
Q: When Mythica shut down (within 4 months or so of release) one of the factors that Microsoft cited was that the project would not get the community share Microsoft felt it needed to stay viable. Were these factors at play whatsoever in the decision to close Dragon Empires, or were the decisions based solely on the technical problems?
Ed: Absolutely not, we know that with Dragon Empires we had one of the strongest, most loyal and passionate communities within the online gaming market, the unfortunate overall decision to finally cancel Dragon Empires was purely a technical one. We were and still are extremely proud of our existing community and very much look forward to the opportunity to present to them our new developments within the near future.
Q: Dragon Empires was bringing some very good ideas to the genre in terms of the pending XP idea, and it seems more clan-based than other titles currently on the market or scheduled to be released. Will these ideas march forward with Codemasters commitment to release an MMO, or do you clear the slate and begin anew? What elements of Dragon Empires do you think were the most innovative and mark new ground for the genre?
Ed: The current subscription based gaming market is very diverse and doesn't just involve traditional MMORPG-style games. We are extremely committed to exploring all aspects of subscription-based gaming and as demonstrated with Dragon Empires we pride ourselves in pushing back the boundaries and finding new and innovative ideas to bring to our fans.
Q: Are there ideas for that next MMO lurking in the background, or are you open to just about any ideas at the moment? Would there be a chance that Codemasters' resources would swing behind a title currently in development by an independent studio? Would that next MMO be set in a medieval-fantasy world or is it too early to start thinking about that?
Ed: To be honest it's still far too early for us to comment officially on what exact plans we have. For obvious reasons we are playing our cards close to our chests for now until the time is right that we can unveil our new developments to the online gaming world. Everything you mentioned within your question are all options certainly that we will look to explore but until now we have no firm plans.
Q: What aspects make this particular market such a tough nut to crack?
Ed: Essentially everything comes down to risk. Developing any game is a risk, unfortunately due the amount of variables within developing MMOGs it makes the business of developing and operating a successful MMOG a very costly and risky business. We aren't the first to cancel development of an MMOG and we certainly won't be the last.
Q: You have an amazing amount of assets associated with this title. The artwork, the code - is any of this salvageable for other uses?
Ed: At present we have no plans to re-use any of the artwork or code from Dragon Empires. This is something that we will of course look into but for now we have no firm plans.
Q: Gary Dunn was quoted as stating "We were experiencing unexpected obstacles with the server code, in particular our ability to serve clients at a scale which would have permitted us to launch the game as an MMO." Is there any chance that the game could be redone as a single-player experience or multiplayer-linked co-op?
Ed: Unfortunately once again we currently have no plans to develop Dragon Empires as a single-player game.
Q: What does it mean to the developers and Codemasters to see that the community has started a petition in an effort to save the game?
Ed: All I can say is that obviously for many reasons the cancellation of Dragon Empires was a very, very tough decision to make. It warms us all that we have such a dedicated community of players and it of course saddens us that we could not reward them with the final game. However Codemasters are committed to the subscription-based gaming market and we hope that our current loyal community will like what they see when we announce our full plans in the future.
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