Luke wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 21:20:
now if blizz said "We got 100 mill subscribers" you would still belive them....

Considering you're liable to shareholders for your customer count, that'd be a bad idea.

There is one thing I think everyone can agree on... World of Warcraft broke all the rules. Before WoW, if ANYONE had claimed a MMO would make over a billion dollars in subscriptions in a year, they would have been laughed off the planet.

Cutter wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 20:16:
Obviously the numbers will fluctuate up and down. even if it was only half of that, that's still an obscene amount of players and revenue.

[bold added]

This is exactly why I think its pointless to argue if blizzard inflated by a few hundred thousand or a million or two. What difference does it make?

I'm sure that some people leave between expansions, and I'm sure that people leave period, but enough new people come in that WoW is still growing, albeit much more slowly.

now if blizz said "We got 100 mill subscribers" you would still belive them....

Mr. Tact wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 11:25:
It's been a while since the 11M announcement. There had been pretty wide speculation their numbers were actually starting to come down some -- so much for that idea...

Bluntly? Wrath was a terrible expansion, most people stopped their accounts, or quit after Mally. Everything was ez-mode, way too easy. Epics everywhere, no need to try and even think on the content. If I said it was boring, that would be an understatement.

Having played the cata beta for a good while however, I will say that if you like vanilla, and the polish of TBC, you'll enjoy Cata. No more infinite mana, players can't stand in the fire and wait for a healer to heal them. And so on. Active thinking required.

Obviously the numbers will fluctuate up and down. even if it was only half of that, that's still an obscene amount of players and revenue.

I really just want Cat out the door so we can get on to Diablo 3 and I really want to know what their secret MOG is. It's about time for a new one. I don't know how much further they can go with WoW. I think I'm more typical of a WoW player where I'll grind the new content for 3 months and when it's gone so am I. I'm currently enjoying the hell out of LOTRO though.

I got lucky a few years ago and met a woman that had played Zelda and the Sims. I introduced her to WoW and....well she's a pretty amazing disc priest. She does do a lot of research on her class.

What I've found on our server is that the peeps who are progress driven tend to quit after they've "beat the game" and disappear until new content comes out. These people are however a minority on our server. My guild is casz; come and go as you please, no rules except respect your guildies. We've all got our kingslayer titles, got our 310 protodrakes from ulduar, and now have 10/12 ICC bosses down on heroic, with sindragosa I suspect the next run. With the imminent patch and the expansion only a number of weeks away, our timing is pretty good. Having said all this, our core group is small, tight-knit, and we've known each other for over 4 years now. I also don't play everyday like I used to years ago, there are many other games that I'm into, so I don't really get tired of it.

.....I do have to admit that having a woman that plays it a lot does get me to play!

Activision-Blizzard is a corporation. They live from good news and die from bad ones. From my experience such numbers are often vastly overstated. If they really had those numbers, they would be proud of them and would show the population numbers on the server list. But they dont.

Anyway, Im going to play again too in winter. For whatever reason I would really enjoy leveling and some Battleground PvP again with my Druid and Mage.

This comment was edited on Oct 7, 2010, 20:35.

It's fun watching people "Nerd Rage" about WoW dripping with hate...

I don't understand why a bunch of people have a problem with the numbers. Of course not all of them are paying $15 a month. But, WoW products have been in the top 10 PC game sales forever month on month, along with The Sims crap. So what if you take out the chinese gold farmers, and the internet cafe people, it still leaves plenty of millions of subscribers and plenty of money for BlizActi. Its like saying OMG apple only sold 4 million ipads instead of 5 million OMG. So what, does it really matter?

Also, look at the financials, they were broken out when blizzard joined activision, and they support those kinda numbers. There's NO evidence that blizzard is way off base about this, and plenty that they are close to accurate.

kxmode wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 15:53:

bhcompy wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 13:32:

SlyBri wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 12:56:
WOW is probably the only MMO that's actually worth 15 dollars a month.

I think you mean EVE

EVE is for people who enjoy spreadsheets and space.

And WoW is for people who enjoy spreadsheets and Dragonlance

You're right, it's not a unique situation -- but it is one of the more exaggerated examples. I'm probably just overly sensitive to the situation having been on the wrong side of a less severe (but just as annoying and painful) example.

Mr. Tact wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 11:42:
Here's a thought for you...

How many people are working at Blizzard who have been there since before WoW was released (Nov. 2004) and are not independently wealthy? I'll bet the answer is dozens if not 100s. That would annoy the living hell out of me, especially with an idiot like Kotick making over $100M in exercised options this year...

Well if it's like the rest of America it has made a dozen odd people extremely rich and the rest of the companies hundreds of employees are still making $30k a year working 10 hour days.

:p


On topic I just recently went back and am having a lot of fun (after 2.5 years away). I am not in beta but have tested 4.01 extensively and am super psyched for it's release. Though I'm a bit worried about a cookie cutter talent build issue becoming even worse.

As to the numbers being wrong I don't think they are. On my server at least the population has easily doubled since I've returned and there are new guilds recruiting every single day. The streets of Dalaran and Stormwind are so packed it takes a few minutes for everything to pop in when I login. My friends on play on the server moved to it about a year ago when it was new and they are now really worried that the population is so high they are afraid when Cataclysm hits it'll have a login queue, and they are probably right.

Mind the game certainly is piquing. I think a lot of people are returning after some years away like I am, certainly part of the reason the game had a million more players. Mind that's a million more players over 2 years. When previously the game was gaining at least that every year, and when the game went from vanilla to BC it jumped from 4 to 8 million players that year alone. I wouldn't doubt if they'll announce 13, perhaps 14 after Cataclysm hits but I don't see it ever getting much higher.. and clearly they aren't going to make an announcement when subscriber numbers dip.

This comment was edited on Oct 7, 2010, 18:30.

The numbers include about 8 million people in China and Korea that might have a minute left on their prepaid card (because they don't pay by the month there).

Oh joy, now watch the investors continue to line up to give money to anyone developing anything MMO related, regardless of the high failure rates.

True, some pay much more, when you factor in Lost work Productivity, credit card interest rates, lack of income, cheetos, soft drinks, cigarettes, health costs, internet fees, and buspasses. I wonder if Blizzard makes a cut from that too. ;p

Optional nickname wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 16:27:
12,000,000Wowtards X 15measlybucks x12months = 2,160,000,000.

As has been said over, and over, and over, and over.. not everyone pays $15 a month.

I logged in to do the math for fun. correct me if I'm wrong.

12,000,000Wowtards X 15measlybucks x12months = 2,160,000,000.

Thats 2.16 Billion Dollars a year.

anyone care to comment on % of this goes to admin and maintenance?
even if 50% (which is less for sure), Blizzard still pockets a Billion a year.

bhcompy wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 13:32:

SlyBri wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 12:56:
WOW is probably the only MMO that's actually worth 15 dollars a month.

I think you mean EVE

EVE is for people who enjoy spreadsheets and space.

Prez wrote on Oct 7, 2010, 12:40:
Obviously WoW has peaked. Thank God.

That's what she said!®