Auto Assault Goes to the Big MMO Graveyard In The Sky
This past Monday, the word came down from NCSoft, and the word was that Auto Assault would be shut down as of August 31st, 2007. The reason cited by NCSoft was low sales and monthly subscriptions.
When Auto Assault was first announced to the public, it had the feel of a Mad Max-meets-Autoduel type game. Fans were champing at the bit to play the game. But when the public beta came out, the people never showed up. Six months after launch, there were rumors that there were only 4500-6000 paid subscribers. The game was plagued by bugs and a lack of players.
This is not the first MMO to go down and it won’t be the last. Developers keep looking for that golden goose to bring them a WOW-sized financial reward. Unfortunately, beyond WOW, Everquest II, and SWG, it is hard for an MMO to survive. And some are designed with a flash-in-the-pan idea that looks like a moneymaker, but just does not pan out. Remember when they wanted to make a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon MMORPG game? Most kind of gave the idea strange looks. Even good ideas are not immune from the noose. Motor City Online seemed like a natural progression for the series, but it did not last six months. And EA and everyone else on the planet thought The Sims Online would be able to print money, but people realized that what you do in the solo game does not transfer well to the online world.
But so long, Auto Assault, we hardly knew you. It is worth mentioning that the source code was retained by NetDevil, the developer, but the IP name and concept is owned by NCSoft, so maybe we will see a single player game based on the universe in the future.
via GameDaily Biz.
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