Headline RePLAY – 12.19.11

Today on Headline RePLAY: a woman embezzles $166,000 for Facebook games and Star Wars: The Old Republic already has over 1.5 million players.


Bettysue Higgins of Gardiner, a former administrative assistant, pleaded guilty last week to embezzling $166,000 from the Maine Trial Lawyers Association, which a prosecutor claimed much of it was spent on Facebook games.  

An investigator found that over the most recent 18-month period, Higgins had 78 checks deposited directly to her personal accountant and paid out the funds to Zynga’s YoVille and Mafia Wars.

Defense Attorney Ronald Bourget added that Higgins personal bank account record for February 2010 alone showed that she spent more than $4000 into the games.

“Apparently she was buying virtual coins for virtual property in a virtual world,” said Leanne Robbin, an Assistant Attorney General and prosecutor of the case.  



Ahead of tomorrow’s official launch date, 1.5 million players are already roaming the galaxy in Star Wars: The Old Republic, an analyst estimates.

“Based on the numbers of servers now in operation, and the relatively high densities thereon, we feel fairly comfortable estimating that the game already has an excess of 1 million players, and potentially could have as many as 1.5 million with the official launch date of the game,” wrote Doug Creutz, an analyst from Cowen & Company.

Creutz’s methodology is based on the number of servers in operation in comparison to World of Warcraft in North American and Europe, the average player density relative to server capacity and the estimate that World of Warcraft has 4.0-4.5 million subs in North American and Europe.

However, the analyst admits that there are “missing pieces” in his analysis and he doesn’t know the “relative capacity” of The Old Republic vs. World of Warcraft servers nor what the ‘full’/’very heavy’/etc. labels signify.

*Source: CVG

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