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Turbine Cuts Out Publishers With Funding Boost

Posted by simoniker on from the say-vee-cee dept.

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to an official press release announcing MMORPG developer Turbine has secured almost $20 million in venture capital funding to help fund Turbine's first self-published PC MMO project, Dungeons & Dragons Online. A GameSpot story quotes a Turbine spokesman as saying the move presents a "total shift in [our] business model. We're taking out the middle man between us and our fans." The Asheron's Call developers are still "partnered with Atari for retail marketing and distribution" on D&D Online, the company it "secured the D&D MMORPG sublicense" from earlier this year, but describes its intent to "[transition] from a developer into service publisher with its newest franchises." Turbine are also still working on The Lord Of The Rings: Middle-Earth Online in partnership with Vivendi.

2 of 32 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Good but... by L7_ · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You underestimate the influence of Ken Karl and the rest of the Microsoft employees that were involved in the publishing of Asheron's Call 1 and 2.

    Ken Karl is known for taking the development updates and content additions in the direction that Microsoft wanted to take. If you look at Asheron's Call 2, you will find that alot (IIRC) of the design choices were not done by Turbine, but rather heavily influenced by Microsoft. Also, when Ken was appointed head of AC1 over at MS, things started to take a different turn in regards to game balance mainly in the realm of awards.

    I haven't played either AC in over a year, so things may have changed a bit, but never, ever bash Turbine in regards to thier ability to put out a quality game product. Instead Bash thier publisher (which in all cases so far has been MS).

  2. Can't wait for D&D Online by stilleon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I can't wait for D&D Online. Long overdue. I love playing computer ROGs based on the d20 system (such as Star Wars:KOTOR and Neverwinter Nights). This should be a good one. One question I have that hasn't been answered: what world is it in. I hope it's Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms. If its some generic new world they made up I will be dissapointed.