CCP Games to Cease VR Development, Close/Restructure Studios

[Tachya]

http://www.mmorpg.com/eve-valkyrie/news/vr-development-at-ccp-games-comes-to-an-end-1000046174

(Icelandic Original Source):

http://www.mbl.is/vidskipti/frettir/2017/10/30/syndarveruleikinn_settur_a_is_hja_ccp/


The Atlanta, Georgia, and Newcastle studios are closing or being sold.

EVE Online development supposedly remains unaffected, perhaps getting even more focus. Project Nova development (the PC shooter), also supposedly is continuing.

I'd post more detailed thoughts, but I'm a bit occupied at the moment. The main takeaway I guess is that they're sort of a quite unsuccessful studio riding off what almost seems like a fluke now in EVE Online. Lots of failed projects (that made it out of development.) Really odd.

 

[Flandy]

I wonder what this means for Eve Valkyrie since it's not VR only anymore

 

[shepcommandr]

Wouldn't call EVE a fluke, especially considering it's struggled as well, having to drop the subscription model. Plenty of studios find success with one title, but can never follow it up.
It's unfortunate, but it happens.

 

[Seeya]

Wouldn't call EVE a fluke, especially considering it's struggled as well, having to drop the subscription model. Plenty of studios find success with one title, but can never follow it up.
It's unfortunate, but it happens.

Click to shrink...

I didn't realize that they dropped the subscription model? Is the game down from its prime of 300k subs? Or is it making more money on F2P.

 

[Deleted member 3058]

I didn't realize that they dropped the subscription model? Is the game down from its prime of 300k subs? Or is it making more money on F2P.

Click to shrink...

I'm not sure.

I wish the studio the best. I really do.

Been a while since I played but I always enjoyed their vision.

 

[davidnolan13]

I've got friends at the newcastle studio. That's shitty.

 

[Tachya]

Wouldn't call EVE a fluke, especially considering it's struggled as well, having to drop the subscription model. Plenty of studios find success with one title, but can never follow it up.
It's unfortunate, but it happens.

Click to shrink...

I didn't realize that they dropped the subscription model? Is the game down from its prime of 300k subs? Or is it making more money on F2P.

Click to shrink...

They didn't drop the subscription model. What they did was essentially offer an unlimited trial state. Unrestricted access to the game still requires a subscription, paid through money or PLEX. They do seem to be putting a fair amount of focus on selling ship SKINs and skill extractors as micro-transactions though: that seems to be doing well for them.

I wonder what this means for Eve Valkyrie since it's not VR only anymore

Click to shrink...

I'm not sure exactly, but the transition from VR to not (with the Warzone update) was a massive flop. It couldn't have been doing that well as a VR exclusive title before then either.

 

[Deleted member 9237]

Fucking CCP man, they're such a frustrating company. They get all their money from EVE and they burn it on half assed projects. It took a community revolt for them to get their shit halfway in order.

There was a brief period of time when they put their full force behind the game and put out by far the best expansion, but that was eight nine years ago. I weep for what could've been.

 

[Rygar 8Bit]

Fucking CCP man, they're such a frustrating company. They get all their money from EVE and they burn it on half assed projects. It took a community revolt for them to get their shit halfway in order.

There was a brief period of time when they put their full force behind the game and put out by far the best expansion, but that was eight nine years ago. I weep for what could've been.

Click to shrink...

They even sat on Vampire the Masquerade IP. They could of had a good thing going with that one as well.

 

[mutantmagnet]

Wouldn't call EVE a fluke, especially considering it's struggled as well, having to drop the subscription model. Plenty of studios find success with one title, but can never follow it up.
It's unfortunate, but it happens.

Click to shrink...

It offered an alternative to subscriptions 10 years after it launched. It still remains to this date as one of the handful of MMOs that had consistently grown in size for several years instead of dropping off immediately after year 1.

It is a successful MMO and neither UO, EQ or WoW could avoid seeing a decline 10 years into their existences either.

As for their various side projects it's not surprising they all failed but it's a shame they squandered so many decent ideas. Even with Eve Online CCP Games had a very bad tendency to release expansion content that 8 out of 10 times was half baked and they wouldn't fix half of those concepts until a year or 2 later. They had a very bad culture when it came to staying focused on a task.

I wish these guys a lot of luck in whatever new gaming studios they drifted to. As for those at CCP HQ I hope they are satisfied with the direction of their bread and butter.

 

[Dead Meat Pete]

It's interesting that EVE: Valkyrie was re-released without VR exclusivity, that completely passed me by.
I was looking to pick it up this month for more things to play on my PSVR, perhaps I'll wait to see if the game stays online for long after this.