Many Dramatic Arm Gestures Were Used In The Making Of This Interview

Posted on May 16, 2007 by Scott Jennings| 28 Comments

Michael Zenke interviews the always quotable Paul Barnett of Warhammer Online.

EA basically means that we have a ton of money. And we have more resources than we did before. So when Mythic was making it alone, it effectively had a reservoir of cash, and it had a sort of marketing, and sort of resources and effectively had to make the best game it possibly could with that reality. With EA, and their bountiful riches, and their gold bullion that they send to us every week on the heads of slaves …

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  • http://ve3d.ign.com/ Apache

    I think there’s a lot of potential for EA and Mythic working together. Hopefully, EA can look past using contractors for the majority of its workforce, and keep full-time peeps at EA/Myth together.

  • http://www.mmognation.com Michael

    To give you something to look forward to, I’m going to put up the audio from the interview on Friday. You can hear my whiny voice and Paul exhuberating through the speakerphone.

    From a sound perspective, it’s not the best ever. I’ll be honest, too: I mostly just said random words strung together and let Paul do his thing.

    Totally. Worth it. :)

  • http://www.thisisnotacommunity.org D-0ne

    EA.

  • http://vengeance.parryfive.com Axecleaver

    Paul sounds like an incredibly perceptive guy. I won’t quote everything I found interesting there because, like Lum says, he’s too quotable. Very entertaining interview.

    “I have an English accent, therefore anything I say must be very intelligent and incredibly funny.”

  • Boanerges

    EA basically means that we have a ton of money.

    Best. EA. Quote. Ever.

  • Mist

    Woefully lacking in substance. All the personality in the world doesn’t qualify one to make games.

  • Chacki

    “Woefully lacking in substance. All the personality in the world doesn’t qualify one to make games.”

    All the knowledge in the world doesnt either.

    Personally tho i always produce my best work alongside someone brimming full of passion rather than a disinterested genius.
    Attitude and excitement like Pauls are infectious.

    Interview wise , there wernt any real ‘substance’ questions asked in the first part anyway. Lets see what comes tomorrow.

  • Sweetmeat

    I was worried when Sanya left that Warhammer might be having problems, but from the interview it doesn’t sound like that. His accent came through on the page nicely, and he is British – he wouldn’t lie to us.

    I’m glad they pushed it back, my cousin and I are enjoying LoTRO a lot right now, and I wouln’t want to have to chose between two new titles to play. By the time it comes out, I’ll be ready to try something new again.

  • Nicademus

    Origin was certainly improved by being assimilated. Just think of the wave of cash that went into new development, and oh the sequels!!!

  • Nicademus

    I know my prior post was beyond obvious, but I’m still a tad bit bitter over the f-ers who broke my crack like addiction.

  • Soulflame

    EA hasn’t “done” a successful MMOG yet. They trashed UO, cancelled a number of projects that looked interesting, and haven’t even managed to bring a remotely successful MMOG since… ever. Even their surefire, can’t miss Sims Online turned out to be a laughingstock.

    Their idea of maintaining DAoC appears to be “throw something against the wall and hope it stops the precipitous slide in the numbers of online players”, which shockingly isn’t working.

    No really. Total shock here.

    Given EA’s track record of assimilation and destruction, I’d be doing some serious resume polishing if I were at EAMythic right now. Unless I was looking forward to seeing the maintenance of WH moved to Redmond, and maybe I’ll get to keep my job if I agree to relocate.

  • Walter Yarbrough

    “Their idea of maintaining DAoC appears to be “throw something against the wall and hope it stops the precipitous slide in the numbers of online players”, which shockingly isn’t working.”

    EA doesn’t have a thing to do with the maintenance of DAoC – everyone on the team is a straight transfer from Mythic. And we don’t have a precipitous slide going on – we’ve got good months and bad months.

    UO is finishing up a serious facelift.

  • Walter Yarbrough

    Oops, hit post too quickly -

    UO is finishing up a serious facelift – so progress is being made.

    Anyways, my point is that any problems you have with WAR, UO or DAoC should be directed at the current teams, not EA

  • http://ambernight.com Amber

    Their idea of maintaining DAoC appears to be “throw something against the wall and hope it stops the precipitous slide in the numbers of online players”, which shockingly isn’t working.

    This started before the EA acquisition. With all due respect to Walter and the rest of the great people who continue to be passionate about DAoC, there was obviously a very conscious and high level decision to put DAoC into maintenance mode at about roughly the same time as the ink on the deal with Games Workshop began drying. And I think an argument could even be made that it really started with Imperator.

  • http://ambernight.org Amber

    And criminy I don’t know how I ever got the wrong URL in my browser cache, but now it won’t ever leave. So to the (I’m sure) fine folks over at Ambernight Solutions, enjoy the freebies.

  • Nicademus

    Why would I aim my angst at the current crew when EA screwed UO in nineteen ninety whatever? That UO is going through a facelift is only comic for the fact that it’s still around at all.

    You’d have to be a masochist to sign up for an EA mmog at this point. Not b/c they’re the big bad men in suits but b/c their track record is so horrid in the genre.

    Oh and they totally nerfed my pre-patch hally dewd! I mean like WTF!!!!

  • Rand ‘al Thor

    “ancelled a number of projects that looked interesting,”

    I still miss the Battletech MMO they had got all the way up to beta got really good press and then suddenly *poof* canceled.

  • Octopaganini

    Walt’s a stand up guy and Paul can sling a tasty sound byte in an interesting accent, but the truth is that WAR has inherited Atlantis-itis from ToA and Imperator: inexperienced, inept management compounded with a crippling lack of direction. It has been broken down and rebuilt more times than Istanbul/Constantinople and the resources it has drained from DAoC is as disheartening as it is obvious. Many of the real experience has departed like Sanya and those who are left either don’t know where to go or are too green to know how bad they have it. Manage your expectations, folks, WAR is more Vanguard than WoW.

  • tazelbain

    > WAR is more Vanguard than WoW.

    HULK SMASH!

    …if true.

  • Mist

    Who cares that WAR is draining resources from DAoC? DAoC is a good game that has now run it’s course. No reason to keep it alive at the expense of something that could be much bigger and better.

  • http://ve3d.ign.com/ Apache

    If anything, DAoC is better since EA bought Mythic. Maybe that’s just a side effect of Walt taking over, but the rule changes have been really positive.

  • Loote

    Nice interview.

    I haven’t trusted or liked EA since the UO2 debocle, but if Warhammer looks good I think id give it a try. I hope Mythic learned a lot of lessons on what doesn’t work, (and acutally what DOES work rather well too . . .) from DAOC.

  • http://hgamer.blogspot.com Heartless_

    As much as I would love to bash into EA, I can’t stand by and not admit there is a climate of change around EA. They have sent out a ton of feelers into a lot of bullshit projects like in-game adverts, paid for game guides, and their “eyes closed” mentality to the hugely popular Nintendo Wii. Those feelers got chopped off and it seems they have learned.

    I believe EA learned a big lesson in MMORPG terms when The Sims Online tanked. Big names don’t equal success. Ever since then EA seems to have been very conscious of the Online space and have taken steps to become successful within it. They specifically looked for a company like Mythic to represent them in the online space, where as they didn’t go looking at Westwood (or others) to get a foot into a market. A big difference to be noted.

    Even with that flattery, EA is still on the line. All it will take is a stupid business decision to turn off most of the WAR community… such as forcing MJ to go against his word on RMT. Or in game advertising. Or any number of things that have no place in a fucking game. But that is the “gotta make money” life.

    I truly believe EA is at the stage that SOE was at when SWG was first announced. While EA is obviously a larger entity, the climate feels the same. All new promises and an actual light at the end of the tunnel, but where do they go with it? SOE forced SWG onto the market, and it flopped. EA is giving WAR (and other big titles) the time needed to be finished, something they used to never allow. It looks like EA may take a different road than SOE.

  • Mike Lescault

    “Manage your expectations, folks, WAR is more Vanguard than WoW.”

    Bah, why are programmers named “Dan” always so cynical about everything?!

  • Merkwurdigliebe

    I’ll believe it when it goes gold.

  • scottj

    > Bah, why are programmers named “Dan”
    > always so cynical about everything?!

    I talked to “Dan” last night and he hadn’t a clue what you were talking about!

  • Mike Lescault

    “I talked to “Dan” last night and he hadn’t a clue what you were talking about!”

    Ho ho…I bet he didn’t!!

  • ProgrammerNamedDan

    I can neither confirm nor deny any of the accusations made in this thread.

    -OctoDan