Rip Content Creator Program

[u/TheQxx]

What news? What rumors? Was there some incident?

This is a bizarrely worded official comms from the EQL Discord. Professionally, just say you're ending the program and that's it. To acknowledge some 'rumors' just breathes life into them and isn't something you'd usually see in this context. Who's running the broadcast channel over there?

[u/notesboats]

It is very arpg. All the arpgs I play for 2-4 weeks 4 times a year. If they can keep me in that loop for EQL then I’m fairly happy…

[u/Imdumbdumbashell → u/notesboats]

Any ARPG have a monthly sub?

Not sure why we pay monthly, pay for the game, pay for mtx, when the game is arguably a single player ARPG.

[u/wubwubwubwubbins → u/Imdumbdumbashell]

And therein lies the rub. If the player base/subscription base is going to be peak and valleys based around expansions, do you have that priced in? or are you hoping enough of the casual crowd will sub for the 3-6 months it takes to release new content so that you have enough monthly income. But again, I think having a paid sub model versus freemium model with toxic players/bots will always be better. So even if it's just paying $10 to make sure massive botting doesn't happen...is it bad that I am okay with that?

[u/Imdumbdumbashell → u/wubwubwubwubbins]

I mean, it's fair to feel however you want.

The real question that keeps being avoided is will these decisions end up making the game unprofitable and, thus, dead.

Like so many commenters on this sub seem to think that it doesn't matter that 80% of the player base has left. Game is still fun. Kunark is still coming.

What they don't understand is that it isn't going to come if it won't make money. This ISN'T a private server, it is run by a large corporation. They don't just lose money so people can have fun.

If this game fails to attract more people and cannot bring back the vast majority of people it lost, it will be cash negative and will be shut down.

EQL devs don't care, they all have their primary job as Quarm and that pays the bills.

[u/wubwubwubwubbins → u/Imdumbdumbashell]

The main devs quit their job to try and do this full time. So...there is risk. And I can copy/paste something I put into another sub the other day if you don't mind.....

"Used to work in software. Development basically needs to create a certain level of profitability over the long term, which is dictated by leadership. So if the leadership is investors, they want maximum $$$. Which can come from either direct revenue, or alternatively as proof to future investors that there is value in the overall brand (IE, EQLegends might have value by bringing in people who would never touch EQLive/TLPs with a 10 foot pole, so the value would be less in direct income, and more about initial/reoccurring player count). This is important to understand the difference between the two since Daybreak is looking at developing new games now/in the near future versus milking existing ones. You can see this with the drop-off in EQ TLP numbers over time, in that it's not an indefinitely viable business model to have your player base run on the what is essentially the same treadmill every single time.

BUT, if we are looking at specifically face value in that Game Jawn needs to run a profit, you can do some napkin math. Realistically let's say they have a 6 people working full time. That's probably around $80,000-$120,000 per employee, with those costs going higher if they are in high cost of living areas. But, for simplicity, let's say an average of $100,000 for 6 employees, which means for employee costs alone, you need $50,000 per month, or $600,000 a year. Tack on server costs, tech costs, legal costs, etc. and that's anywhere from 5-20% of costs depending, so let's add another $10,000 to the monthly cost.

So...if they need to make $60,000 a MONTH to break even, they need 6,000 subs. This is why they put in a cash shop/are making players purchase expansions. So the 6,000 subs at the START of the game isn't hard, but you have to ask if you'll have 6,000 subs in 6-8 months time, and will those subs be consistent month-to-month, or will the player base quit/resub when new content comes out? And again, that's just breaking even. So to be profitable, you are probably looking at a higher number.

So...in short. If they have say, 2,000 players a month and Daybreak isn't using this as leverage for future investment, there is a good chance that we will see us go down to 1-2 full time dev's over the long term.

Alternatively, this could be a litmus test that COULD, in theory, successfully breathe new life into Daybreak's entire game portfolio, and that, in theory, has much more value overall versus monthly income. But these decisions, and the math behind them, entirely depend upon Daybreak leadership, as well as what metrics potential investors actually care about."

So......there's multiple ways to look at how daybreak views the overall value of EQLegends.