Perry "stunned" by Marvel Universe cancellation

By Oli Welsh Published 14 February, 2008

Thinks Marvel is bigger than Warcraft.

Firebrand developer David Perry has told Eurogamer he was surprised by Microsoft's decision to cancel cross-platform MMO Marvel Universe Online. "That is stunning to me, absolutely stunning to me," he said.

According to the Shiny Entertainment founder, now working on free-to-play MMOs at Acclaim Games among other things, "Marvel, as a property, is more mass-market than World of Warcraft."

Perry said that he had often come up against the attitude that "there's no point making an MMO any more, because World of Warcraft has got everybody."

Confirming the Marvel Universe cancellation earlier this week, Microsoft's Shane Kim said, "If you really look at the data there's basically one [game] that's successful and everything else wouldn't meet our level or definition of commercial success."

But Perry believes the right game with the Marvel licence could easily eclipse WOW's huge subscriber base.

"World of Warcraft sells because Blizzard made it, and Blizzard is a fantastic company, right? The talent at Blizzard is just phenomenal. If you can get a team that's got the same quality and you have that licence, I'll take the Marvel licence every time over Warcraft," he said.

"Think about it. Think about how many Spider-Man fans there are in the world, think about all of the Marvel movies that have been coming out one after the other, and all taking serious bucks at the box office."

Perry concluded that Microsoft most likely felt the game "was probably just becoming too expensive... It's like spinning the wheel, are you going to get that money back?"

He then went on to talk at enormous and brilliant length about his enthusiasm for the "Wild West" market of free-to-play MMOs, which there simply isn't space for here.

So, check back for a full interview with David Perry when our new MMO channel launches soon.

Picture of Oli.

About Oli Welsh

Oli is Eurogamer's acting deputy editor and reviews editor and likes to take things one word at a time. He is among the best dressed people in South London.

Read more articles from Oli by visiting the Oli Welsh archive page.

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Comments (35) Latest comment 4 years ago

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  • tHeReAlPiNkY #1 4 years ago

    "Thinks Marvel is bigger than Warcraft."...yeah say like Star Wars!
    Edited by 1 at 14/02/08 @ 09:48

  • Daymare #2 4 years ago

    How silly it would look, all those Spidermans and Wolverines jumping around..

  • convercide #3 4 years ago

    ...with me as Deadpool mocking them all and making comments about being in a game.

  • Mr_Brown #4 4 years ago

    Not surprising for me. Doesn't have much to do with WoW though...City Of Heroes beat them to it. They wouldn't be able to compete with that.

  • ParmaViolet #5 4 years ago

    @tHeReAlPiNkY

    Very true.....although, Galaxies suffered because they removed most of what made it great and different (the crafting etc). I still know people that get misty-eyed about Galaxies by the mere mention of it - some still harbour some hope that they'll eventually roll it back (obviously, that is incredibly unlikely)....still, I think it's looking to be an interesting time for MMO's in general - there are some titles on the horizon that could end up being amazing, things like Age of Conan and Warhammer should take some of the WoW players - at least for a short time.

    What we need is variation - Eve still stands as a fantastic game (if a little hardcore), WoW is undoubtedly a masterpiece and deserves all the subscribers it has, but I think we need other games that provide different gameplay options and scenarios.....howabout a Wild West MMO? - imagine being a gunslinger on the prairie?....riding your horse around - maybe playing as a prospector....or a cattle herder.....

    To be fair, there are plenty of things that we haven't seen so far - and the skies the limit......except that Sports one that's coming, that sounds crap..

    :-)

  • kangarootoo #6 4 years ago

    "Perry said that he had often come up against the attitude that "there's no point making an MMO any more, because World of Warcraft has got everybody.""

    But to a fair degree... that is a reasonable attitude to take.

    Making mmos was always risky. Making pay-to-play mmos is even more risky now that it used to be, in no small part due to WoW eating up a ludicrous portion of the market. Free-to-play mmos (that run in web browsers) are where the new money is at.

    Plus, the Marvel franchise may be absolutely massive, but that doesn't mean gamers will blindly switch mmo just because it has Marvel stamped on the front of the box.


    "How silly it would look, all those Spidermans and Wolverines jumping around.."

    /sigh. I suspect the game designers would bne a little more inventive than that.

  • Lemming81 #7 4 years ago

    Perry, shut up please.

    The 'Marvel universe' kind of relies on the fact that superheroes are in the minority. So what would happen when you have 500k Wolverine99s running around? It just gets stupid.


    No wonder you haven't produced a decent game since Earthworm Jim.

  • Lemming81 #8 4 years ago

    @ParmaViolet:

    Sorry, but SWG was always shit. Those people who get 'misty-eyed' about the crafting weren't there because of the Star Wars license, IMO. And if you like a Star Wars game because of how you like to decorate your fucking house, then something is clearly wrong with that game, no?

    Star Wars is one of the few licenses that would actually benefit from a 'Warcraft in a Star Wars skin' style MMO. It's got the same sense of adventure and simplicity, and it'd have every chance of competing with WoW because it's Star Wars.

  • NegativeZero #9 4 years ago

    The difference is that you can make a good *game* out of Warcraft. It actually works as an MMO. A Marvel MMO would suck for the same reasons that Star Wars Galaxies sucked - everyone wants to be Cyclops/Wolverine/whatever, just like everyone wants to be a Jedi, and that just doesn't fly well (unless it's Knights of the Old Republic, but they're not doing that because they're apparently allergic to cash)

    Sure, you could make generic marvel-esque superheroes, but then it would just be City of Heroes with a Marvel Stamp of Approval. MS did the right thing canning it.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #10 4 years ago

    The thing about Warcraft is that before it was an MMO it was a well known brand of high quality video games.

    And Marvel-branded video games have been (with the exception of a couple of the Neversoft/Treyarch spider man ones, and that cult Capcom 2D beat-em-up) all shite.

    Plus, wasn't the last Spider Man movie a critical and box-office disappointment?

  • Daymare #11 4 years ago

    Marvel: Ultimate Alliance wasn't bad.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #12 4 years ago

    [in a Wild West MMO] maybe playing as a prospector

    That sounds like fucking great fun.

    * Log on
    * walk to river
    * select prospecting pan
    * press P to 'pan for gold'
    * wait for 15 second panning animation to play
    * "you have found a nugget worth 1 dollar"
    * press P to 'pan for gold'
    * wait for 15 second panning animation to play
    * "you have found nothing"
    * press P to...

    Edited by 1 at 14/02/08 @ 10:43

  • L0cky #13 4 years ago

    Which is why I find MMO's boring.

  • Apostle #14 4 years ago

    LOL @ Mentalist. Very good.

    I don't know, I think I'd play the trial for a Marvel game. But then, I was hyped for The Matrix online, and look how that turned out!

  • login_name #15 4 years ago

    @Lemming81

    Totally disagree. SWG was not shit, it just wasn't finished. What they released was the foundation to a great game, they just didn't put the game in. It was obviously too ambitious a project for the team, who were always fighting an up hill battle against bugs and gameplay issues. LA didn't help with their "get it out the door" attitude. It offered what most Star Wars fans wanted, the chance to live in the Star Wars universe. Yes some people focused on the more social elements (such as decorating their house) but they were essential to create that living, breathing world feeling and it's not like you had to do that. If it was all guns and sabers it would have been far worse. Might as well go play one of the many other sub standard Star Wars action games for free.

    Community builds these games and SWG had one of the best and most diverse communities I've ever played with thanks to the more social aspects of the game. It allowed gamers and non gamers alike to enjoy the same game and be a working part of it. No game has done that since and that includes the all conquering WoW.

  • ParmaViolet #16 4 years ago

    @lemming81

    Sorry, but a lot of people liked 'decorating their house' - the thing is, they made a lot of the subscribers characters redundant with the big change - in the end you had about a million Jedi wandering around....the fact that the game was set during a time when there were supposed to be no Jedi was a bit of a oversight also.

    Also, I don't think that a lot of the older Galxies players would want a WoW engine with Star Wars skins over the top - for most Galaxies players, WoW is far too simplistic....

    @Mentalist(air)

    Yeah, totally see your point on that one....it's obviously the biggest challenge in developing an MMO - allowing a bit of depth in the type of characters and roles you can undertake and keeping it balanced so that it suits everyones choice of archetype.....

    :-)

  • viper_h #17 4 years ago

    Why does everyone say "living, breathing" like living needs to be followed up with further verbs?

    Respiriation is part of the scientific definition of something that is living. Does it really need to be desribed as breathing too? :p

    /pedantic

  • Drpwnage #18 4 years ago

    SWG was unfinished but only and average game, the PVP was dire the character customisation and hugely deep crafting system were the only redeeming features. I played from release for 6 months and that was enough, before leaving for Wow which is an example of how an MMO should be polished before release.

  • kangarootoo #19 4 years ago

    @viper_h

    Insects and spiders don't breathe. Neither do fish. Or amoeba. Or plants.

    Respiration can refer specifically to the act of inhaling and exhaling air, but in biology it can also be used to refer to simply the act of a living entity "gassing" in its environment.

    So respiration and breathing are not strictly the same thing (though dictionaries often unhelpfully refer one to the other).

    "Respiring" and breathing on the other hand appear to mean pretty much the same thing (christ know who makes this stuff up; I bet they were drunk at the time). I.e. the act of drawing breath, which as mentioned, plenty of living things do not do.

    /pedantic squared

    Edit: The irony being, worlds do not breath. Doh!!
    Edited by 2 at 14/02/08 @ 11:30

  • Bangaioh #20 4 years ago

    "So, check back for a full interview with David Perry when our new MMO channel launches soon."

    As if someone gives a toss about what this loser has to say anyway...

  • kangarootoo #21 4 years ago

    "As if someone gives a toss about what this loser has to say anyway..."

    Did anyone else find that funny in an ironic sort of way?

  • login_name #22 4 years ago

    I knew I should have just left it as living.

  • Lemming81 #23 4 years ago

    @ParmaViolet: You misunderstand. I'm saying that the people who liked SWG the first time round were the wrong kind of customer for a Star Wars Licensed MMO. That's why I think it was doomed from day 1. A hand-crafted (how much of SWG looked completely pre-generated or 'building plonked on flat ground'?) adventure world focusing on epic stories and immersion, like WoW, is what suits the Star Wars license. Not the kind of customer SWG in it's old (or current) form appealed to, despite the fact they got to 300k.

    I'm saying a WoW-like Star Wars MMO would net them more subs, just not THOSE SAME 300k.

    Does that make more sense?

  • viper_h #24 4 years ago

    I left school at 15 :p I fail.

  • IronCladChicken #25 4 years ago

    Didnt ID 'own' the FPS market in the mid-ninties? - That didnt stop every other publisher taking a crack?
    Personally, I think the MMO market needs some actual concept development - rather than yet 'another' grinding game

  • kangarootoo #26 4 years ago

    I don't know if ID owned the scene to the same degree though. WoW has such a huge lead on any other mmo I can understand it appearing to be a bad area to invest in.

    Of course a good mmo can sitll make money, but many investors probably think games are risky enough as it is. We have two things in combination here.

    1. WoW owns most of the land already.
    2. Mmos have always been risky at the best of times and shed loads of them close at a loss.

    I'm personally not the least bit stunned if ANY mmo investor gets cold feet and cancels.

  • kangarootoo #27 4 years ago

    @viper_h

    I didn't know all that shit off the top of my head. Not with the internet so close at hand :)

  • TOOTR #28 4 years ago

    Offtopic

    @ kangarootoo

    Spiders Don't Breathe is an excellent name for a band. I can see the SDB massive gathering now.....

    Ontopic

    MMO's - I dip into Guildwars now and then and a few mates do but really who has the time? (apart from the millions of wow subscribers of course)

    How did Dave Perry's on-line Game collaboration thing-a-mig go? I wish it all the best.

    Surely some kind of Facebook MMO app exists by now.....? There's (mostly banal) apps for everything else.....him a schooldaze type mmo would cause a stir maybe....

  • ParmaViolet #29 4 years ago

    @lemming81

    Yeah - I see your point now. I guess that it would make a lot of sense to release a game of that type with the Star Wars license, it'd make a fortune, let's face it - how many sub-standard SW games have been released over the years, yet they still seem to shift a lot of units!.....I think it's also a case that most SW fans love the whole expanded universe side of it, so an MMO is really a perfect fit - who knows?, maybe we will get that KOTOR MMO....be incredibly interesting to see what BioWare would do with it (though, to be honest - I'm just happy that there will be a third coming - MMO or not)

    :-)

  • Chaser #30 4 years ago

    And where is the "other" crazy bandana wearing dave perry these days?

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #31 4 years ago

    apparently here:

    [link url=http://www.gamesanimal.co m/
    ]http://www.gamesanimal.co m/
    [/link]

    but i wouldn't go there, it's a bit scary.

  • Gaol #32 4 years ago

    There are inherent problems with the Marvel universe as a setting for an MMORPG though. The point with Marvel is the heroes, the characters, and the mythos/history. You can't have thousands of people running around pretending to be THE Wolverine, or THE Surfer Surfer, it wouldn't work. Whats more, what small niche there is for a Superheroes MMO is already done quite well by City of Heroes.

    On the SWG point, the original Koster designed sandbox MMORPG was well ahead of its time, there's been nothing like it since. In terms of creating a working economy, relationships between players and building persistant online communities it is unrivalled to this day. If they had worked on the original concept and fixed the imbalances, instead of trying to rip off WoW, they would currently be cashing in on bored WoW vets looking for something new.

  • ParmaViolet #33 4 years ago

    @ResEv1l

    ...but, you have taken the time to post into a forum about something that you claim to have no interest in, so you very obviously are.

    :-)

  • cawley1 #34 4 years ago

    Who gives a fuck about MMO, Perry was ace on the Megadrive with all those Disney licenses...
    MDK was ace as well!

  • Royal Fool #35 4 years ago

    Would a Marvel MMO completely trump World of Warcraft and become the most popular game ever? No. Would a Marvel MMO be a financial success, leveraging the popularity of all the comics and characters under that brand? Most likely, yes.

    I think that's really what Perry was talking about, and I agree with him there. I personally don't understand why they would cancel the game, but it was probably tied to Microsoft's inherent fear of MMOs. They don't exactly have a good track record with them.

    Mr_Brown:
    Cryptic were developing the game, so it would have benefited from their own superhero game experience. I'm certain that a proper Marvel MMO would have eaten up a good share of CoH's population, seeing as how a great deal of the playerbase are superhero fans (and the game originally got into trouble because players were imitating their favourite copyrighted characters).