Finding different and sustainable revenue streams for online games is definitely one tough cookie to crack. Auran is trying it with their now freely downloadable Fury title, but it seems to be the end for another Australian made online game.
Kwari, which was developed at Micro Forte Canberra, had an interesting idea where you could purchase virtual bullets using real money in the multiplayer online first person shooter game, and in return you could also win real money while playing. The news over at gamesindustry.biz is that Kwari is getting shut down, and Kwari Limited, the publisher behind Kwari, has gone into receivership. Slightly more details as well as a very interesting old interview with the Kwari Limited marketing manager over at gamesindustry.biz...
Dodgy devs
Thing is is tho, I don't think anyone expected this to work, right?
Gee I wonder why it failed.... from Wikipedia
The reviews for Kwari have been poor, with GamesMaster Magazine described the graphics as "laughable" and "a decade out of date". They also said it was "very, very standard online shooting, with no innovation or imagination." Friday's Gamer said the game was "pointless, unenjoyable, and unreasonably expensive", scoring the game just 07%, the second lowest score in the website's history after High School Musical: Sing It! received four.
- Another MicroForte masterpiece.
Developers are still in
Developers are still in their deluded fantasy worlds, where they can't see that what they're creating is garbage. Wake up.
Was Kwari a studio or what
Was Kwari a studio or what or was it just part of Micorforte?
Kwari was the game
Kwari was the name of the game, Kwari Limited was the publisher behind Kwari. Micro Forte Canberra developed the title.
Micro Forte
Micro Forte is also the studio which cancelled Citizen Zero in 2007. What is the next game using Micro Forte's BigWorld engine?
Marty
From memory, it was licensed to a developer in the Asian region for an MMO? Souri?
Yup. Globex is the latest licensee...
...and they're based in China. BigWorld tech has roughly around 40 licensee's, including publishers like Sierra Online, developers like Slipgate Ironworks (headed by John Romero), and Perth developers Interzone Games.
Micro Forte
To be fair, Microsoft cancelled Citizen Zero when they announced the XBox360 platform and dropped a whole bunch of in-development XBox titles, and Interplay dropped the Fallout game MF were working on when they went under.
Still. 3 cancelled games in a row has to hurt.
I hope their Bigworld technology licencing is enough to keep them going. It would be sad to see such a long-standing Aussie game company close shop.
I don't wanna sound like an apologist...
but some of those cancellations weren't entirely Micro Forte's fault. From what I can remember, and memory is a bit hazy (I will have to look up the exact circumstances of the Fallout sequel getting pulled, although I don't think it was officially publicised) but from what I can recall, Interplay screwed over MF on that one.
Citizen Zero, well, if you can remember how quick Microsoft were to totally drop the Xbox when they started talking about the Xbox 360, they were as equally as eager to do the same for Xbox titles they were funding. Citizen Zero was dropped as the Xbox's life cyce was coming to a close, and heck, True Fantasy Live Online was even dropped too.
I thought Citizen Zero looked pretty cool for an Xbox game...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrWdvIoV9GI
damn it, fuck you Kwari
I think Kwari had a good chance of being succesful in the U.S. Problem is they shut down in the month it was supposed to be out in the U.S. not even giving people a chance to try it!
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