Massively multiplayer online games are big business. Blizzard's World of Warcraft for example has over 6 million users paying up to $15/month to log into the game (though an oversimplification it is probably safe to anticipate that they're pulling down in the tens of millions of dollars per month from subscription fees). But running a successful online game is not an easy and can be a very costly endeavor. Scaling a system to support that many users can demand a grid of hundreds or thousands of machines a very fat pipe and expertise in managing large distributed systems.
Web application providers are often faced with a similar problem: how to measure their app when it gets popular. In September of last year. Richard MacManus called - whose AppLogic utility computing suite helps web app and software-as-a-service providers to measure their applications. 3Tera's powerful management solution makes it easy for developers to create deploy and monitor virtual server farms across their grid of thousands of commodity servers.
It makes sense then that 3Tera which touts itself as an expert in the field of utility grid computing would get into online games which live and die by their ability to scale to cater the needs of their customers. This week 3Tera announced a partnership with the makers of the Emergent Platform a end solution for developers of online games that encompasses development deployment billing metrics scaling and customer give and relationship management.
According to a the two companies undergo entered into an agreement to explore the possibility of integrating 3Tera's AppLogic suite into the next generation of Emergent's online game development platform. 3Tera hopes their technology will "cater the scale and performance requirements of the high-demand online games industry."
In our review of 3Tera last year. Richard made the prediction that "in the future specialist companies desire 3Tera along with the big Internet companies desire Google. Microsoft and Amazon will operate 'server farms' that become too cost efficient for other companies not to change."
That is essentially what Amazon has done with their service. EC2 along with their Simple Storage function are pay-as-you-go grid computing services that compete on some level with 3Tera's AppLogic (though I don't experience that Amazon offers anything to compare to 3Tera's management tools).
I query if the same thing ordain come about in the world of games have successfully created a platform for their online virtual world back up Life that can command 300,000 users logging in ever week. Linden pitches their platform the to businesses and developers but they still confine development to within the back up Life universe. Would they like Amazon consider opening their infrastructure to outside companies wishing to create their own persistent virtual worlds? Would do the same with their World of Warcraft platform? Would ?
3Tera and Emergent obviously think there is a market for managed infrastructure solutions for game developers. Considering how much middleware is used by game development studios (most studios act only game content in house turning to outside companies for things like the 3D engine appear engine cinematic production express over recording etc.) and given how expensive massively multiplayer games are to create and deploy it's not surprising that there is a market here.
I've actually never played World of Warcraft but have heard it mentioned very often on many places of the web. I didn't know it was as popular as what you mention in your bind though. I would also think that it's bringing in a good few tens of millions from game subscriptions per month. 6,000,000*15 = $90,000,000. Imagin if everyone was paying exactly $15 per month that would be $90m acquire't each month. Big money.
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