I was thinking the other day... my, oh how neat it would be if we could update the engine, or the textures or the models... The game is great, but it was murdered way too early and had so much potential for expansion....
So it got me thinking, I am just going to assume that EA is well aware of the emulator project, and may probably see it as a cost free advertisement platform as all the original EA content and logos are still in there... And the lack of C&D's flying around (Thank God, because this is an awesome game and I love it)...
But what if the emulator team approached EA with a proposition… Since the donations for the server are pretty well met every month and sometimes early, there may be potential to receive more donations than needed for the server’s cost. What if surplus donation money was pooled into an account which was directly linked to the forums so people could see it and there’d be no issues with transparency, and it could build to a certain amount in which it could be used for purchases.
Now it could be a total long shot as I doubt EA would want to spend a dime on this game, but what if they were to create either small patches or updates for the game, be it new logo’s up to date textures, models, scripting… what have you… For a price?
Ex: Say they were interested in releasing a model pack to update all the game models for a set price.
In order for this to work, the forums can be updated to show the donation status, and beside that a list of features that EA would be willing to sell and their price. That way people will know what they could buy with the donation money and we’d have to raise the money through donations to buy that feature. When it came to the actual feature, it can be voted on or one a time or... That can all be figured out at a later time.
We would essentially be buying updated features from EA, to apply to their client. But in small small pieces so it’s actually affordable. This way they aren’t spending enormous amounts of money on Dev teams and all the other assets that go with an entire game team as they would if they were still running it and developing it.
But this way they are still making money, still getting free advertisements and… If the game started to pick up in popularity again because of updates, they would have a potential to expand the updates (more money for them) or even revive the game (wishful thinking but yah never know).
If they are not up to the idea of creating anything or spending any time or money on updates of any kind… Then perhaps they may be interested in selling select IP rights or ‘renting’ them so the emulator team developers can legally make updates or changes to the client.
I understand that EA will freak out if they see this game is making profit and it’s not going to their pockets, or they see that people are carving it up and changing things without authorization. But I also think they would jump in a second if they could make extra money off a dead game that has no sale value, and all for doing very little or even nothing. It just seems like a smart business decision.
EA could also seize this opportunity to replace the ‘ads’ throughout the game with newer actually updated ads for their games or products (hopefully without taking out the actually game related content).
What do you guys think?
-Tral