ZeniMax Online’s Matt Firor told players back in April that the console versions of The Elder Scrolls Online had “opened the game up to millions more new players,” and he’s not backing down from that statement. In a new interview on GamesIndustry.biz, Firor clarifies his comments.
“That’s actually new players,” he tells GI.biz. “It’s been huge. Bethesda doesn’t talk numbers, but it’s been huge. […] It was way beyond our expectations, and it was mostly because players could knew they could buy it just like they did with Oblivion and Skyrim. Most of them didn’t even know there was a store in the game.” Success, he says, is “mostly because we didn’t go free-to-play” and alienate core Elder Scrolls players.
He’s also angling to redefine MMOs. “MMO now refers to a technology, not to a game design,” he argues. “Any game that allows millions of people to play together is an MMO. I wouldn’t even say that ESO is a true MMORPG; I mean, it has common features, but it also has features that don’t belong there. ESO is its own thing.”
