Well it wouldn’t be a week without at least discussing the flurry of activity surrounding EA CEO John Riccitello’s ‘misunderstood’ comments regarding BioWare’s upcoming Star Wars MMO: The Old Republic.  Nick Breckon and Chris Faylor at shacknews first broke the story on Wednesday at 1 in the morning, and ignited a series of comments, forum posts and he said/she saids.

The comment(s) from Riccitello in question:

“We are continuing to stick to the plan relative to building out our direct-to-consumer models which include microtransactions and subscriptions,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello in a conference call today. “The recent launch of Warhammer [Online] is a great example of that.”

“Other initiatives we’ve announced, for example [the] Star Wars online MMO, are mid-session games which are microtransaction-based,” he continued. “You’ll be hearing more about those in the February [conference] call.”

As shacknews goes on to point out, other “mid-session” titles in the EA stables include FIFA Online and NBA Street, both of which are free and then supported by microtransactions.

EA obviously has a valid interest in microtransaction based titles, but with their flagship Battlefield Heroes still mired in the springtime mud outside of Moscow, perhaps EA is looking to other titles to test the waters with?  To be clear, I’m quite certain that EA has no plans of dropping Battlefield Heroes anytime soon, but based on the relative success of their “mid-session” microtransaction based games, especially FIFA in Asian markets, perhaps they’re comfortable with testing other waters?  During the conference call, Riccitello did discuss online gameplay and monetization (read: microtransactions) as a “global, not just Asia phenomenon.”

The Old Republic is currently being billed as a large-scale MMO (AAA title) with a number of single player attributes including dynamic NPC’s that will act as companions.  BioWare co-founder Ray Muzyka has been quoted as saying, “Knights of the Old Republic] 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and beyond,” with the official FAQ stating, “the majority of the game can be accomplished by playing alone.”  If that doesn’t sound like a launching board for microtransactions….I’m not sure what does.

Duly noted: shacknews did receive word from EA, and appropriately updated their post with “no statements have been made about the Star Wars business model,” and attributing Mr. Riccitiello’s comments to a misunderstanding.

So is that a yes, or a no?  Obviously, EA is going to respond in that manner, as an admission of microtransactions in a western top tier game would certainly rock the proverbial boat.  Looking at the context of Riccitello’s comments, and where Star Wars falls in the EA hierarchy, could this have been an accidental slip o’ the tongue?  Certainly John’s got 99% of what he’s going to say prepared, but perhaps there was a bit of a slip in the heat of battle?  Who knows.  Maybe I’m complete off here, but then again, shacknews and a number of other commenters have already started the pro and con vocalization.

Either way – EA/BioWare just got the kind of publicity you can’t buy.

Related articles

• Star Wars: The Old Republic, now with microtransactions
• EA’s Star Wars MMO may be microtransaction-based, or maybe not
• Star Wars Old Republic MMO To Be “Microtransaction-Based” [Star Wars: The Old Republic]