Mythic Founder to Helm Bethesda Parent Company's MMO Subsidiary

With its Bethesda Softworks division a star performer in the large-scale single-player RPG segment, ZeniMax Media is looking towards the lucrative field of massively multiplayer online games. Today the company announced ZeniMax Online Studios, a new MMO-only division. Heading up the company is Matt Firor, a ten-year veteran of Dark Age of Camelot and Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning developer Mythic Entertainment. Firor served as Camelot's producer. According to an interview on the Bethesda Blog, Firor left Mythic last year, as Electronic Arts was acquiring the company. Since then he has worked in a consulting role with various developers. "I am extremely impressed with ZeniMax and Bethesda Softworks management--their development philosophy closely matches my own, with an emphasis on quality, innovation, and craftsmanship," said Firor in today's announcement. The announcement gave no indication of the setting or platforms being targeted by ZeniMax Online's games, though in his Bethesda Blog interview Firor did indicate that he expects the PC platform to remain the focus for MMOs by independent developers. "I think that independent developers are generally going to stick with PC-based MMOs so they donÂ’t have to negotate [sic] with the console manufacturers to get the games published," he said. "Added to that, the lucrative Asian MMO market is entirely PC based."