Around 1.5 million have signed up for SWTOR beta

EA CFO Eric Brown told attendees at the Lazard Capital Markets Technology & Media Day presentation that around 1.5 million people have signed up to be beta testers for BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Listened in on by Gamasutra, Brown said at the conference that "over one million, closer to 1.5 million," have signed on to be a potential tester.

"It's a great indicator in the interest level in the franchise," he said. "We're not that concerned about generating initial demand. For us it's about creating the right experience for expanding from tier 1 and the tier 2 users to getting people who have never played an MMO before, but are interested in Star Wars, to engage and give it a try."

Brown also said the firm would need to balance the seesaw by keeping both seasoned MMO players and newcomers alike happy.

"If we do that, our addressable market is well beyond 12 million people ... into more of a general gamer population, pretty much anyone that has a minimum spec personal computer," he said.

Brown also told the audience that currently, EA is sticking with the traditional monthly-fee model for the MMO, but is still looking at the possibility of adding microtransactions on top of it, something he said calls for "some careful decision making."

SWTOR is out sometime this year, after July 1 of course.