In a recent interview, Crytek's Harald Seely gave his thoughts regarding the current issue about various Asian MMO developers licensing Western engines, which are not always set up to work effectively for an MMO setting.

With regard to video game engines such as Unreal Engine 3 and CryENGINE 2, these engines are developed for a specific game first, like how CryEngine 2 was made for Crysis.

Eventually, it will then be offered to be used by game developers and online game developers. Having this kind of situation, Seely wasted no time and discussed about CryENGINE 2's stand on the situation. He said:

It was created to support the game, but it was also created with the idea that it would become standalone middleware which was capable of supporting more than one kind of game.

MMOs were definitely always figured into the process, but in the rush to get a game out, you always take some shortcuts that later you have to go back and do more thoroughly.