58 replies to this topic

[Maka]

This is a excerpt from Gravity's financial Form 6-K, released 11/17/10. You can view the full thing here: http://www.sec.gov/A.../c08663e6vk.htm

BUSINESS UPDATES â?¢ Ragnarok Online II delayed to the second quarter of 2011 The launch schedule of Ragnarok Online II, a sequel to Ragnarok Online and a massively multiplayer online role playing game (â??MMORPGâ?), has been delayed to the second quarter of 2011. After the managementâ??s careful consideration, the Company has decided to postpone the schedule as it has become clear that more time is needed in order to reflect usersâ?? feedbacks and to refine the game. Mr. Toshiro Ohno, the President and CEO of Gravity said, â??While we are certainly aware that another delay may come as a disappointment to many fans, our inevitable decision has been made as we put the importance on the degree of completion. We are very hopeful that the additional time will result in the best and most immersive game.â?

It seems this game will never see a release. Honestly I don't know if it would do well if it were to be released or not. It doesn't seem to redefine anything. Which is what is needed now in the ever growing MMO market. To me it still looks like a game made for 2006. I'm still excited about it, but knowing it's going to have the same point, click combat and grinding of every other game in the world, I can't see a future for it. Maybe they are afraid to up the system requirements because their current flagship product doesn't ask for much from its users. If it's just Requiem set in the Ragnarok Online universe... Then I don't think GRAVITY will be around for too many more years. They stated in a form a year or a few months ago, that they really need Ragnarok Online II to be a commercial success to sustain their buisness. Oh here it is.

ITEM 3.D. RISK FACTORS

RISKS RELATING TO OUR BUSINESS

We currently depend on one online game product, Ragnarok Online, for most of our revenues.

Most of our revenues have been and are currently derived from a single online game product, Ragnarok Online, which was commercially introduced in August 2002 and currently commercially offered in 59 countries and markets. We derived Won 42,290 million (US$37,385 thousand) in revenues from Ragnarok Online in 2009 and Won 38,949 million in revenues from Ragnarok Online in 2008, representing approximately 73.7% and 73.3% of our total revenues in 2009 and 2008, respectively.

Ragnarok Online has been in the market for nearly eight years and has reached maturity in most of our principal markets. The life cycle of an online game generally lasts from four to seven years and reaches its peak popularity within the first two years of its introduction after which usage gradually stabilizes and begins to decrease over time. The number of users of Ragnarok Online worldwide reached its peak in the first quarter of 2005 and has continued to decline since such time. Our failure to maintain, improve, update or enhance Ragnarok Online in a timely manner or successfully introduce it in attractive new markets is likely to lead to a continual decline in Ragnarok Onlineâ??s user base and subscription revenues and royalties. This will likely lead to a decline in our overall revenues, which would materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In order to grow our revenues and net income, we must develop, acquire, license, launch, market or operate commercially successful online games in addition to Ragnarok Online that will retain our existing users and attract new users. In addition to Ragnarok Online, we currently offer three other massively multiplayer online role playing games, or MMORPGs, Requiem, Emil Chronicle Online and R.O.S.E. Online, and one casual online game, Pucca Racing. We are currently conducting open beta testing of an MMORPG sequel to Ragnarok Online, Ragnarok Online II. We recently entered into license agreements to publish an MMORPG, tentatively named, Estar, which is being developed by Naru Entertainment Co., Ltd., a Korean company, and a web browser-based casual MMORPG called Canaan, which was developed by Xpec Entertainment Inc., a Taiwanese company, and is currently being localized and prepared for beta testing.

None of our other online games to date have proven to be as commercially successful as Ragnarok Online. We stopped offering Time N Tales, an MMORPG, in March 2009 as the game did not prove to be popular. We discontinued developing a massively multiplayer online game, Ice Age Online, for which we had licensed the right to use the theme, characters and storyline from 20th Century Fox Licensing & Merchandising, the trademark licensor. We stopped development around the end of 2009, as there were disagreements between us and the trademark licensor over the general concept of the game and the trademark licensor sent to us a written notice of termination of the license agreement in November 2009.

None of the games we currently offer are as successful as Ragnarok Online. In addition, we have experienced significant delays in and cost overruns related to the launch of many of our online games. For example, although we have been conducting open beta testing of Ragnarok Online II since May 2007 and had indicated our plan to release Ragnarok Online II at various times over the past few years, the launch of this game has been significantly delayed on a number of occasions for a variety of reasons, including as a result of technical difficulties and corrective actions taken in response to market feedback during the testing and development phase. While no assurance can be given that we will be able to meet our current anticipated launch date, we currently intend to launch Ragnarok Online II in the fourth quarter of 2010. Due to the continued delay in the launch of Ragnarok Online II, certain licensees of Ragnarok Online II have delayed remitting royalty payments otherwise payable for Ragnarok Online. Any continued delay in the launch schedule of Ragnarok Online II could result in financial losses, including termination of certain license agreements, which could damage our reputation and have a material adverse effect on our business, prospects, financial condition and results of operation.

In addition, no assurance can be given that when launched, Ragnarok Online II will gain market acceptance and popularity and be profitable for us. The success of Ragnarok Online II will be subject to many factors, including the quality, uniqueness and playability of the game and the launch by our competitors of other games that may gain more market acceptance than Ragnarok Online II. See ITEM 3.D. â??RISK FACTORS â?? RISKS RELATING TO OUR BUSINESS â?? As we introduce new games, we face the risk that a significant number of users of our existing games may migrate to our new games without any net gains in the overall user base or overall improvement to our total revenues.â?

As we introduce new games, we face the risk that a significant number of users of our existing games may migrate to our new games without any net gains in the overall user base or overall total revenues.

We expect that as we introduce new games, a certain number of our existing users will migrate from our existing games to the new games. If the net gains in new users is significantly lower than our expectations, then our revenue growth and profitability is likely to be materially and adversely affected.

In particular, there is a high degree of uncertainty about the potential impact of the commercial launch of Ragnarok Online II on the user base of Ragnarok Online. While we believe that the game environment and the overall game experience of Ragnarok Online II will be meaningfully different from those of Ragnarok Online, we cannot assure you that the overall user base will grow and that the net migration away from Ragnarok Online will not be significant and detrimental to our total revenues and as a result our net income.

Again you can view the full form here: http://sec.gov/Archi...58e20vf.htm#108

Maybe it's just me but all of that sounds rather grim.

Edited by Maka, 19 November 2010 - 08:26 PM.

[Tassie]

Nooooooooo! Not this again, especially since "Legend" seems even more promising than Gate of the World (and I really enjoyed playing that during the beta). I'm really hoping it doesn't die out before international players get a chance to enjoy it.

[Maka]

Oh Ice Age Online was canceled too. Didn't see that the first time I read over that. That deal with FOX was a chance to get some recognition.

My favorite line..

Any continued delay in the launch schedule of Ragnarok Online II could result in financial losses, including termination of certain license agreements, which could damage our reputation and have a material adverse effect on our business, prospects, financial condition and results of operation.

Keep in mind this was said in June.

Yet almost 6 months later they've delayed it again.

Edited by Maka, 19 November 2010 - 08:36 PM.

[Cleffy]

Sounds honest to me. You will find any publisher today saying the same thing. Even Blizzard is facing declining sales.

[Maka]

Sounds honest to me. You will find any publisher today saying the same thing. Even Blizzard is facing declining sales.

*Activision Blizzard

Declining sales isn't GRAVITY's problem. The aforementioned company has many other IP's that generate a great amount of revenue. They are in no danger of going under. GRAVITY on the other hand really only has Ragnarok Online going for them, and that's been going downhill for years now.
They really really need something new and fresh to stay in the market. At the very least internationally.

Edited by Maka, 19 November 2010 - 08:43 PM.

[porty]

I'll be honest, i never found RO2 to be a patch on pre renewal RO1. A lot of what RO2 had to offer a few years ago was old then, so anything in the future really needs to be something special and looking at the current developments of RO2 i don't think it has anything to offer which isn't already out there and i think to rely on the current RO players to migrate to RO2 would also be a foolish move.

RO2 in its current form will be a total commercial flop. They need to scrap it altogether and start again.

And with renewal basically ruining RO1 they had better pull thier finger out and get something done ASAP before both games lose thier income altogether.

[Luckywhiterabbit]

Renwal is hardly 'ruining' RO1 9_9 come on now. I'm loving Renewal, it's much more comfortable to play than pre-renewal RO anyday. All it needs is a bit more TLC and balancing.

[Scott]

I'm enjoying renewal, too. They just need to tweak a few things, but levelling before 100 is much better.

[Mwrip]

They can start by renaming RO2 from "Legend of the Second". Much like "Rush on Seven Episodes", the title makes no sense whatsoever, and when people see an Engrishy title like that, they assume the game is going to be terribly translated. Use "The Second Legend", the "The Second Age/Epoch/Era" or well, anything along those lines, and you get the same point across without a screwy title.

Last I saw of RO2, it seems like more of an RO expansion than really a new game. Sure, it has a few new cool mechanics, but I didn't see anything in there that's going to impress anyone not already playing RO1... which sucks, because RO has SO much potential. The character design of RO and the way you can play with builds is awesome, but the nothing but grind world really diminishes it.

Even in RO1, every time they try to modernize the game, it feels like a token effort. Hey, let's add cool instances... and then make a whole 3 worth running, 2 of which are 15 minute things. Let's add battlegrounds... and break them with a system that rewards farming instead of playing, and then not fix that, despite there being at least 10 different easy ways to fix it. Let's add a fully operational quest log... and allow you to get something like 3-5% of the exp you need to max out from questing.

If they would just take the time to finish what they started with this stuff, the game would be a LOT more successful. Hopefully they'll learn in time for RO2... but I'm not counting on it to say the least.

I'm enjoying renewal, too. They just need to tweak a few things, but levelling before 100 is much better.

Yeah, but it's on a 150 curve. Leveling before 70 pre-Renewal wasn't any harder, and that's about equivalent to 100 now.

They need to do more than tweak. If you want to play something that isn't melee, in a style that isn't solo, or both, Renewal does not allow this.

So yes, if you're casual enough to never make it to 130+, and you play melee exclusively, and you play this as purely a single player game, Renewal is great.

The *idea* of Renewal is awesome, but it needs one hell of an overhaul.

[Catt]

Is it just me, or has no one thought that they should just do an extraordinarily large overhaul or revamp to Ragnarok Online 1, and bring the graphics to a much higher 3D level, along with implementing many of the concepts of Ragnarok 2(i.e. offline player job shops).
They don't need a NEW game.
They need to TRULY RENEW the ONE GAME that is keeping their company ALIVE.
Ragnarok 1 with the graphics of Ragnarok 2 would be great! People could keep all of their hard-earned items and well loved characters! All of that time the entire player base invested wouldn't go to waste.

I've never played Runescape, but one of my friends showed me a before and after of a graphics overhaul, and it looks like a different, much better, game.

A new game is risky, but a great, much needed improvement on a well loved game is bound to succeed.
Don't waste time and money on something you can't count on.
I'd love to see RO2 happen, but I'd much rather see RO1 with all of my characters waiting for me, looking better than ever. If they have to take the game down for a week or more to actually implement this, it'd be worth it.(Not to say it'd take only a week, just a week of downtime to update the actual server to implement it)
I'm sure everyone would love to see their Assassin Crosses, Rune Knights, Arch Bishops, or Warlocks, in the full 3D beauty of the Ragnarok 2 characters.
I think this is something that 90%+ of the Ragnarok player base would agree with and LOVE to see happen.
Gravity is throwing away a perfect opportunity to truly make the majority of their RO players happy.

[ZeroTigress]

I'm of the mind that RO2 was created in order to bring the RO experience to a 3D world. However, I and many others happen to PREFER 2D sprites over 3D ones because they're more complicated to program and more interesting to look at. Don't believe me? Just look at how many 3D MMORPGs there are out there compared to 2D MMORPGs. I don't mind that they're making RO2 in 3D, but leave the original the way it was originally: 2D on 3D environments.

[porty]

Renwal is hardly 'ruining' RO1 9_9 come on now. I'm loving Renewal, it's much more comfortable to play than pre-renewal RO anyday. All it needs is a bit more TLC and balancing.

I agree it is not ruining RO it HAS ruined it. Completely.

RO is now boring, unchallenging and more repetitive than ever. The drop nerf is terrible, my rune knight still uses trans skills to level (and hardly any STR in his build (WTF???)), the monster high dex buff means its now become a total potfest, the EXP nerf if you want to try more challenging monsters means you spam pots to death for less EXP, MVPs are now rediculously hard to solo without specific mega expensive items/ armours, WOe in its current form is unworkable and the repetitive nature of renewal is mindblowingly boring. I have no decent items/ God gears, HEBMs or healslaves and believe me 110+ is rediculously mundane and repetitive, spamming CS 1000's of times over hour after hour in the same map, on the same monsters. Not seeing any movement on the EXP bar when you are STILL 40 levels from 150 is a piss take really, especially on the +10lvls 40% bonus monsters. Renewal also has been geared to milk the kafra shop and make play almost useless without a kafra shop item or 2 (BMs for one). I buy from the kafra shop, foodstuffs and buff scrolls but this should be through choice not a necessity.
I havn't played for 4 days now, i just don't have the interest anymore. I come on the forums, check the top few posts, reply to a few and then switch off.

Renewal has its good points, yes 1-99 trans is now well balanced and a determined player can make a good trans 99 in a short time if he puts in a few hours a day. Rare drops seem to show up more often since renewal, i've personally had shields, armours and weapons falling surprisingly often since renewal. There are some nice changes since renewal but the fundamental basics are utterly screwed and the key element to any good game, FUN, has been totally removed from the game.

[GuardianTK]

I'm of the mind that RO2 was created in order to bring the RO experience to a 3D world. However, I and many others happen to PREFER 2D sprites over 3D ones because they're more complicated to program and more interesting to look at. Don't believe me? Just look at how many 3D MMORPGs there are out there compared to 2D MMORPGs. I don't mind that they're making RO2 in 3D, but leave the original the way it was originally: 2D on 3D environments.

I agree with this post. There's something about the 2D sprites that have always kept me entertained. :3 Plus, it also means less system requirements to play. If RO1 were converted to RO2, then you'd need faster computers and better internet connections. Not everyone has both.

[Kadnya]

Renwal is hardly 'ruining' RO1 9_9 come on now. I'm loving Renewal, it's much more comfortable to play than pre-renewal RO anyday. All it needs is a bit more TLC and balancing.

Deppends on if you play one of the classes which got the pretty face of renewal for them or the classes who got left forgotten by renewal... also deppends if your class can do well past third job.

For a class with good future after third job, solo and mob killing skills and one of the 1HKO or very strong damage skills for pvp-woe, I guess renewal must look amazing... for the others who are forced to make a royal guard to self leech our charas left partyless in a dying woe where few people care to fight being punished for partying or going to strong monsters nerfed mvps, nerfed our skills, or just don't see much point in grinding boring thousands of the same monsters... renewal was the most boring update ever.

[Hacks]

it's nice to see they know what the problem is, "Our failure to maintain, improve, update or enhance Ragnarok Online in a timely manner ", but why they continue to ignore the problem is beyond me. the reason other online game companies are so much more successful (profitable) is that they have a much narrower range of risk to manage. gravity is spread too thin on too many titles. they'd be much more better off working on just 3 or 4 titles instead of the uhh... i cant be bothered to count now, 12 or so they are working on. and outsourcing for new products? why bother, all they're doing with all this is making more competition for themselves. they also seem to realize this in that they know their users migrate from the old to the new. all this causes is more overhead for the same revenue resulting in a loss of profit.

[SisterGoat]

Square Enix rushed on releasing RO2 and most people HATE it due to all the technical problems. Better than to wait and have a good game than rush and have it sucky. RO2 is their baby and they want it to be as best as possible. If it weren't for their old CEO laundering the company's money, they might have been more ahead at this point.

Why don't we have ECO yet? I hear the English company handling it now is absolutely terrible.

[Symm]

tl:dr

Summarize the 2nd part for me.

[Maka]

Square Enix rushed on releasing RO2 and most people HATE it due to all the technical problems. Better than to wait and have a good game than rush and have it sucky. RO2 is their baby and they want it to be as best as possible. If it weren't for their old CEO laundering the company's money, they might have been more ahead at this point.

Why don't we have ECO yet? I hear the English company handling it now is absolutely terrible.

They don't have the english version anymore. They converted it to the Chinese version a few months ago. RunUp was horrible. I don't understand why Gravity doesn't have ECO yet either. They keep on R.O.S.E which is just... awful. Sorry R.O.S.E fans. But won't get a game that has much more appeal like ECO.

When I see comments like this,

I'm of the mind that RO2 was created in order to bring the RO experience to a 3D world. However, I and many others happen to PREFER 2D sprites over 3D ones because they're more complicated to program and more interesting to look at. Don't believe me? Just look at how many 3D MMORPGs there are out there compared to 2D MMORPGs. I don't mind that they're making RO2 in 3D, but leave the original the way it was originally: 2D on 3D environments.

I can't grasp why Gravity would think it's not a good idea to localize a game, which I believe is the true successor to Ragnarok Online.

Edited by Maka, 20 November 2010 - 11:07 AM.

[ZeroTigress]

I can't grasp why Gravity would think it's not a good idea to localize a game, which I believe is the true successor to Ragnarok Online.

It's because they've bitten off WAY MORE than they could chew with multiple titles and no long-term successes other than RO, which is only hanging on by a thread at this point.

it's nice to see they know what the problem is, "Our failure to maintain, improve, update or enhance Ragnarok Online in a timely manner ", but why they continue to ignore the problem is beyond me. the reason other online game companies are so much more successful (profitable) is that they have a much narrower range of risk to manage. gravity is spread too thin on too many titles. they'd be much more better off working on just 3 or 4 titles instead of the uhh... i cant be bothered to count now, 12 or so they are working on. and outsourcing for new products? why bother, all they're doing with all this is making more competition for themselves. they also seem to realize this in that they know their users migrate from the old to the new. all this causes is more overhead for the same revenue resulting in a loss of profit.

They've recognized their shortcomings, so now they need to do something about it.

[Talvis]

...MVPs are now rediculously hard to solo without specific mega expensive items/ armours...

Why do people keep thinking mvps should be soloable? They are meant to be something that a party is needed to take down. No game boss monster should be soloable.

[Kadnya]

I think he was being sarcastic, since now you can solo even valk rangdris and santa morroc...

[Talvis]

Oh, I wasn't aware of that. I don't mvp much, I thought renewal had made mvping much tougher now. Well, they need to be made more challenging then if that's the case.

[Cleffy]

I also think Gravity should address the problems they so clearly pointed out in this investment report. This is clearly a management issue, and they should replace their management that is causing this mess. They should also address their companies deficiency in programmers. Right now Gravity is working well below the industry standard. For example an artist is expected to be able to model and texture 2 complete armor sets in 1 day. They are expected to model and texture a 20m squared area in a week. This is only one artist, and I imagine there are dozens working for gravity. When you are working with a company of size, its expected you will lose some of that speed. You get that speed back by proper management which is clearly not here considering Gravity's games are not rolling in variety.

Considering Ragnarok II and Requiem will be on the same engine, you would expect development of both games to be 30% faster. However, it isn't. Considering the Day 1 problems still plaguing Requiem, this will need to be addressed if Gravity wants to make Ragnarok II a success. The most obvious change that needs to happen is a complete revamping of the netcoding, and storage structure. They also need to get with the times in programing and tech. We have a Gigaflop GPU, yet they are not using this incredible resource with OpenCL to make the servers calculate faster. We have had multi-core processers for half a decade, yet the games only use 1 core. We have had 64-bit processors since 2003, yet we are still locked into the limitations of 32-bit. We are about to advance into Shader Model 5.0, and they are still floundering on 2.0. All this requires a good programming staff. Programmers are the single most needed person in any video game, and it sets a bad tone when this is obviously deficient.

[BlackPotato]

RO 2 = death of RO 1

[porty]

RO 2 = death of RO 1

I would agree with you if RO2 wasn't so bad.
RO1 is dead in the west now anyway, and for RO2 to break into the market it has some serious modernisation to go through. This game is still stuck in 2006 and compared to modern MMos on offer today it really pales in comparison. The modern MMO market is so competitive only the most outstanding games will break into todays market and unfortunately RO2 is a million miles away from being outstanding.
The Pacifica/ Asian market has responded badly to the teasers and trailors and i believe that may be the reason for its latest delay. If RO2 was released into the asian/ pacifica market tomorrow it would sink faster than the titanic.