Console MMO market, that is

Mar 21, 2008 14:24 GMT  ·  By

Codemasters is prepared to reach out and touch someone. Or rather something, as its aim is in producing two MMOs targeted at the gaming consoles, especially the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3.

The Codemasters Online Gaming or COG division has already launched four MMO projects aimed at the PC market and there's another one in the pipeline, in the form of Jumpgate Evolution, from NetDevil. And as the PC market for MMO games is dominated by World of Warcraft, Codemasters thinks that success is now easier to achieve on consoles.

David Solari, who is the vice president and general manager of Codemasters Online Gaming, declared for GamesIndustry.biz that "The time is right for some good console MMO games. There's two titles that we're really interested in for taking to console right now and that's something I'd like to see happen in the next year or so, but it's got to be the right game."

He then admitted that the console MMO presents considerable risks and that costs can skyrocket pretty quickly, mainly because of the fees that the consoles makers themselves ask from third party developers who want access to the consoles. This will be one of the main issues that Codemasters will take up with Sony and Microsoft in the following weeks and they expect to come to some sort of agreement on cost reduction that is profitable for both sides.

There is also the issue of what console gamers want from a MMO. He remarked: "It's a little more challenging because of the restrictions of a console - certain games aren't going to work. Final Fantasy was very successful on 360 so I just think you need the right game, and I think there's a really good opportunity there because there's not enough companies there right now". In other words he's saying "let's fill this niche before Blizzard sees this opportunity".

Solari did not name the projects Codemasters is working on and didn't elaborate on estimate release dates.