The Little Minnow that Could
In stark contrast to GameStorm's titanic approach to the Internet gaming business, Key West-based MPG-Net is trying to profit by providing a tight, integrated service that delivers more customized content to a smaller yet exceedingly loyal following. No browser-based flashy interface here, but rather a conservative (some might say frumpy) custom front end that seeks to provide everything a gamer could want in a game service. One of the oldest and most experienced online games networks, MPG-Net is home to the popular Kingdom of Drakkar RPG, and also boasts a stable of multiplayer games in many genres, ranging from wargames to cards and parlor games, as well as facilities for playing 3D shooters like Quake and Quake II over the Internet. Combining an online software development house, Tantalus, with a complete access and interface system, ICONS (Internet Content Network System) and SAS (System Access Software), MPG-Net now faces its toughest competition not only from rival services like GameStorm, but from independent online games as well.
Steering MPG-Net through the stormy Internet waters is James Hettinger, CEO and chief visionary for the service. Hettinger got into the online game business in the late 1980s, after having something of an epiphany. "Going on to online services, like CompuServe and Genie at the time," he recalls, "we saw text based games that were generating literally a million, two million dollars apiece…very very simple games, and they were charging six to twelve dollars an hour." It didn't take Hettinger long to conclude that the future of gaming would lie with multiplayer, addictive games, especially if they could be moved beyond mere text and made more visually appealing. Forming Tantalus, an online-game development house, in 1988, Hettinger and his cohorts started MPG-Net to provide themselves with a distribution network separate from the big online services of the time, CompuServe, GEnie, and AOL.
Like his counterpart at GameStorm, Hettinger realized that his company had to provide something more than people could get for free. While not an issue in the early days of the service, by the mid 1990s the need to differentiate MPG-Net from the rest of the Internet became crucial. "What we see as our differentiation point," Hettinger points out, "is in having certain content that you really can't get anywhere [else]." He scoffs at the claims of most services to provide exclusive content. "Now I know other people talk about content that they have exclusively, but realistically they don't really have that. Like, I've got Quake on my network, and TEN has it, and Mpath has it, everybody's got Quake." It's the games developed by Tantalus or third-parties that MPG-Net hosts that Hettinger feels are its real strengths, its core values. "We will offer LAN-based games like Quake on the service," he promises, "but long term what we want to do is just put that into a free area, and say, this is a reason for people to come to the site…it's not where we make our money, it's just kind of a service to our customers."
The core of MPG-Net is its stable of multiplayer games that, while short on visual appeal and modernity, are long on community and stability. With an integrated environment featuring chat, email, messaging, and support, the service tries to wrap every game in a familiar interface, not truly Windows 95 compliant but customized for MPG-Net's purposes. Though Quake and Quake II are available, the emphasis is on turn-based strategy games, one large RPG, and a bunch of traditional titles. Unlike GameStorm, MPG-Net isn't planning a slew of new games; two or three are in development, with more likely, but it's a far cry from the dozens of original or indirectly-supported titles GameStorm, HEAT, and Engage are cooking up.
MPG-Net's strategy, though, seems to be slow, steady, and small wins the race (or at least finishes intact). It's not a flashy service. Games are 256 color, and run in 640x480 solely; there is little that is truly Windows 95 standard. While a trifle defensive about the issue, Hettinger admits the graphics aren't up to 1998 standards. "But," he hastens to add, "it's really a cosmetic issue, the play is as solid as it ever was." And the service has several new titles in the works, all of which will sport 24-bit artwork. Still, the service remains small. With an estimated (by Hettinger) subscriber base of under 25,000 gamers paying the now-standard $9.95 a month, MPG-Net is far short of the 150,000 users that GameStorm CEO Chris Holden claims are necessary to break even. Then again, MPG-Net probably has lower costs than GameStorm, and maybe different expectations. The smaller user base makes building community somewhat easier, and the heavy emphasis on a chat-room metaphor for most of the game lobbies on the service reflects this. This is a place where people come to be with each other as much as they come to play.
Of course, making money remains the goal, and Hettinger and MPG-Net have definite plans in that area. "Part of what we see in the future is that a lot of our revenues can be generated from advertising," Hettinger notes. Already, the conference rooms have some ad banners, and more are promised. Eventually, the goal is to introduce ads into the games themselves, but to allow players to turn them off if they wish. "In the game, we've tossed around actually making it so they could turn it on and off, but we'll give them a little bonus if they have the advertising on." Hettinger even looks to the day when gamers might see billboards in a game advertising shrink-wrapped products, which they can order with the click of the magic mouse. "We already have their credit card information and their mailing address, so we can expedite," he points out. "So if there's a new game just coming out, and we just get it, we can immediately get it to them. You know, we can ship it FedEx next day and then they don't have to wait around for it."
Regardless of how practical such a scheme ends up being, the goal is simply to explore all the possible revenue models. Much like their bigger competitors at GameStorm, the folks at MPG-Net realize that the Internet has not been friendly to game companies so far. The key, Hettinger notes, is to develop a model that works. "What we're looking at is we're going to make money from subscriptions, money from advertising, and money from commerce, and we think that advertising and commerce long term will be the largest roles on the service." Of course, many have said the same thing in the past, and the promised bonanza from ads and sales haven't turned up yet, but Hettinger remains confident, saying that for the immediate future the company should be in a very good situation. He admits that GameStorm is his closest competitor, despite having only one real head-to-head game matchup, that being Legends of Kesmai and MPG-Net's Kingdom of Drakkar. Interestingly enough, Holden at GameStorm doesn't share Hettinger's feelings about the two services being in competition; to the GameStorm CEO, MPG-Net is just too small to worry about.
One area, though, where both Hettinger and Holden concur is the importance of Origin's Ultima Online. "I've been rooting very hard for Ultima Online, I've been very pleased that they've been as successful as they have because they're going to grow the market drastically." Hettinger goes on to say, however, that Origin isn't an instant winner. "The reality is …they're very new to the market. They don't really understand online role-playing games. They understand shrinkwrap games, and they know how to make it look nice and pretty, but they don't understand what makes it entertaining and how do you maintain a customer for a year." He plans to take advantage of Origin's trailblazing, though, and hopes to apply lessons learned from watching UO to MPG-Net's next incarnation of Drakkar. And Drakkar is key; it's the most popular game on the service by far. "We view that as our flagship, and that's what we will continue to focus on."
While MPG-Net's role-playing stalwart stacks up well enough with GameStorm's Legends, it shares all of that game's problems as well: dated graphics, cumbersome interface, archaic commands. Hettinger plans to move his service gradually to a more Windows 95 native environment, add more color, and generally overhaul it completely. Still, there's a limit to how far he wants to go, because at its core, MPG-Net is built around the idea that the service is the Internet technology, not the front end. The network is completely modular, and can be ported to virtually any platform. Hettinger notes that he's just negotiated a deal with an unnamed gambling service to provide network support, showing the flexibility of MPG-Net's underlying engine.
The real goal, though, is to port their multiplayer technology to the holy grail of gaming, the console market. "We'd love to really do that, because we think that's a huge growth market for online gaming." Hettinger notes, and one can almost see him licking his lips at the prospect of millions of Playstation or Nintendo 64 owners flocking to his banner. All that is lacking, he says, is reliable, simple connectivity for consoles. "We've built almost everything you need to run an online service into ," he claims. And if that came to pass? "We'd go down to Texas and move in with id!" With a Ferrari in every garage, no doubt.
MPG-Net is taking a low-profile road to success, in terms of resources and scope. Whereas GameStorm is attempting to blow everyone off the dragstrip through sheer power and variety, Hettinger's crew is more interested in slipping through the alleys and back roads of the Internet gaming scene, not exactly picking up crumbs but not challenging the big rigs for road space either. With a host of ideas on how to finance the business, and a willingness to expand beyond the personal computer world, MPG-Net is willing to take chances, but not huge gambles. Its selling point will remain its community, a group of gamers that have been with the service for years, and who have become a loyal cadre of followers.
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