EG7 Acting CEO (and Daybreak Games CEO) Ji Ham Presentation and Q&A

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Fuelforfire, Oct 7, 2021.

  1. Fuelforfire Lorekeeper

    Sharing here as there are interesting changes with Daybreak's parent company (EG7) and how it relates to their new strategy w/Daybreak points included:.

    Aenvar likes this.
  2. Cidran Augur

    At 6:16... "It's not just about investing in new acquisitions but investing heavily in the products we already have"

    I hope that happens!
  3. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    There are some encouraging takeaways:

    • Ji Ham is interim CEO of EG7 but has decided to remain in San Diego.
    • He is not interested in mergers and acquisitions.
    • He wants to focus on reinvestment in current live products.
    • He prefers decentralized leadership and units.
    • He wants studio heads and industry employees to take the leading role in investment and development.
    • His overall tone is professional and pragmatic. He is down to brass tacks and not pie-in-the-sky.
  4. Slasher Augur

    One of the biggest what ifs with daybreak/soe will always be what if they reinvested into what they already had instead of trying to make the next big hit. The hundreds of millions that went into EQ2s development what would that of done to better EQ ? Look at blizzard milking that cow but also reinvesting into it and not being stupid enough to even consider a wow 2.
    Skuz likes this.
  5. minimind The Village Idiot

    For realsiez, thank you for the summary. I absolutely want to listen to it all, but there just ain't no time.
  6. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    It won't. EQ2 - maybe.

    DCOU - definitely. This is a widely-recognized franchise. Investment here has a FAR greater chance of yielding some tangible return.

    For EQ1 - no way in hell. Investing heavily in EQ means too much input for too little output. For every person in the world that knows about EverQuest, there are at least 100,000 that don't.

    I am far beyond hopeful that EG7 invests heavily in EQ1. But they won't. No sense in getting wrapped up in that dream.
    Aenvar and Stymie like this.
  7. Yinla Ye Ol' Dragon

  8. Riou EQResource

    Yinla likes this.
  9. Tatanka Joe Schmo

    LOL
  10. Angahran Augur

    So advertise! if there are 100k people that don't know about EQ for every person that does, that's 100k potential new subscribers!
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  11. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    Had the game, staff, and franchise been maintained and curated for the last two decades instead of raided and plundered? Sure, advertise. As it stands now, the amount of "fixing" alone that needs to occur before fresh blood comes on board in meaningful numbers to a 21 year old game is cost-prohibitive. Darkpaw/Daybreak/EG7 won't take the financial risk to make the fixes and updates required to make the game palatable to non-EverQuest players.

    If I were running EG7 - investing "heavily" into EverQuest is a hard pass.

    Like it or not, the best path forward for the franchise is keep the current EverQuest games afloat and milk the current subscriber base until they are no longer profitable. If the story were any different, we would have already seen a monumental shift toward staffing up and shoring code to quickly make the transition to a 64-bit client.

    EG7 isn't going to stand there wringing their hands over which game to bet on. EQ already makes money. EG7 isn't going to screw with that. They are going to move on IPs that have the greatest potential for upside. EverQuest, for all its charm and longevity, just isn't one of them.
    Stymie likes this.
  12. Angahran Augur

    How is that even remotely the 'best path' ?
    Svann2 and Nennius like this.
  13. Allworth Elder

    Please provide a shred of evidence that "fixing a 21 year old game is cost-prohibitive."

    How much experience do you have in game dev to back up the statement?

    Thankfully bloviators like you are not running Enad Global 7.
  14. Visitor Augur

    Well, first thing for EQ, is that to enhance the viability, need to enhance the player base. To enhance the game, i still believe that would require porting all of EQ to a new engine- and that would take a few years minimum especially guaranteeing that current characters are compatible once a full transfer takes place. An alternate post suggested starting a process in a simple way, new engine with just original zones, run as a sort of TLP- most of the old is under used these days, but, testing that quests work, and that EQ1 characters can properly import is essential. (Few current EQ1 players are going to want to start over from scratch.) If the basic runs, then Game reviewers are going to test it out, and the word will spread, assuming all is well, or even great, new and return players will come. An enhanced engine and enlarged player base, hopefully very enlarged, would make new expansions easier. Still it is all just Jaw flapping until we see what is actually going to happen over the next few years.
    ImaMedievalman and aalith like this.
  15. Slasher Augur

    The only real way to get new players is a new expansion that covers a story and levels from 1 to whatever max is like TSS had with a new starting city,race and zones for each level. That way you can give people a new experience and even better visuals of what EQ is today instead of what it was 20 years ago.
  16. IblisTheMage Augur

    1. Hasn't 64-bit preparations been ongoing for years?
    2. Hasn't DPG increased staff for EQ1 since EG7 took over?
    3. Hasn't the code base increased immensly in quality over the last 5 years?
    My impression is that the above things have happened, but am I just being optimistic?
  17. Elskidor Augur

    EQ2 is a step from the grave it dug itself. They would have to reimage it and replace the lead devs and hope it's enough. I'm not sure it can be saved at this point but the original Everquest is worth working on to increase profits.
  18. Slasher Augur

    I believe all that is true. They have to be preparing for a 64-bit client one way or another if they have plans for eq in the future.
    Skuz likes this.
  19. Alnitak Augur

    Your math and estimations are way off.
    In 22 years between 1 and 2 million people have played EQ1. Yes, the number is that much higher than the current paying user base. Back in early 2000's there was 500K+ active subscribers. They were in their 20's back then. Today those are 40-50-60 y.o. mostly americans (historically happened that way) with plenty of resources to endulge themselves. All you need to do - reach them enticingly and lure them back to try EQ again.
    If ONLY 325 thousand former EQ players are Americans, that would be 1 per 1,000 who knows aboout EQ, not 1 in 100,000 as you estimated.
    And worldwide it's 1,000,000 / 7,500,000,000 = 1 in 7,500 , not 1 in 100,0000.


    That's a very nostalgic and perceptive potential customers pool. Just make an effort to reach them, and even if 1 in 20 responds - you effectively doubled the number of EQ users.
    And yes, I myself came back to EQ a few years ago after long absence, during which I have raised my kid and was dragged along through K-12 and the University. And I came back because I kept getting e-mails from EQ about new expansions and f2p options on one of my long-standing e-mail accounts (which actually predates EQ itself).

    But taht customer base is as easy to lose as to lure in. So, EG7 has to invest into fixing some of the most annoying issues to keep those people in. Things like server crushes, unwarranted lag etc. Just to keep those issues less annoying, not make it ideal. Maybe invest into larger number of hardware servers, maybe upgrade back-office network stuff. Not radically rewrite the code as some people suugest, just fix the most glaring problems.

    And then run the outreach advertisment , trying to welcome back those literally hundreds of thousands of people who are old-time players. That can be a project with massive return on investment.

    And then EG7 can decide who to cater their development to - modern generation players, who used to somewhat different gaming environments, or to older generation of players, who, somehow people forget that, were the advanced geeks and avid gameplayers 20 years ago. That is not a black-and-white choice, it's more of a question of priorities and efforts/investments split proportion. EQ needs both of those crowds for sure.
    Sokki, ImaMedievalman and Skuz like this.
  20. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    Except that there was a WoW 2 in development for several years, it was codenamed "Titan" set to be a sci-fi MMORPG, they decided not to compete with their own cash cow and then took the assets and repurposed them into Overwatch.
    Stymie likes this.