WoW Down to 7.6 Million Subscribers

Regardless of what people say, 7+ million players is still a ridiculously high player base. They are a great franchise and, even though I don't play anymore, I think they should be commended for being able to retain so many people through the years.

Originally Posted by Durandro

The game is aging, and so is the playerbase. Being able to recover more subscribers is next to impossible at this stage of the game.

But the fact no newer MMO has even approached WoW's popularity since implies the market itself is moving on. I doubt any game in the next generation will top WoW's success. We're all moving onto FtP microtransaction games, it seems. And there are so many that none of them can 'corner the market' and get massive playerbases.

The market has definitely changed.

MMOs aren't going anywhere, but their pricing and the amount of competition has changed.

It's going to be increasingly difficult for WoW to keep their "corner of the market.".

Originally Posted by Durandro

And at this rate WoW will be dead by...

2023.

It won't "die" per se, but will probably enter it's "laggards" period and continue it's downward trend, sooner or later entering the F2P market like the peers of it's era (EQ, EQ2 ... etc.) - or it could "live on" like FFXI. /shrug

Originally Posted by Thirdofherne

Well That makes sense. By that curve the game will be all but gone mid-late 2016.

Since ActiBlizz can read this curve as well as anyone, it explains why they're not putting that much effort into a foregone conclusion. WoD will be the last hurrah of the old girl.

They seem to be expecting big things for 'Destiny' given they're investing $500,000,000 into it and are expecting it to run for 10 years, with continuous expansion. It just puzzles me why they're keeping it off the PC. Is Titan still planned to fill the WoW gap there, I wonder?

If I'm right, most companies try to overlap their product cycles so their income will be relatively stable - when one is on the decline, another is growing.

Now that you mention it, it does seem Destiny is being set up as Activision's WoW replacement revenue-wise.

Doing better than I thought they would. The true test is from now until WoD. Hopefully they can keep hanging on, and use all that money to make the game better... bwahahaha! Well at least they will still have healthy profit margins.

*EXAMPLE*
Imagine some guy is bleeding on the street after a knifefight, he has 12 million blood in his body at first, but then he starts losing it down till 7 million, the ambulance gets there, gives him a bloodbag/expansion and he goes up to 9 million blood, then he keeps dropping down to 6.5 million 12 days/Aka months later, He gets another bloodbag and the blood goes up to 8.5 million and then waits another 12 days/aka months and is down at 6.3 million, he gets another bloodbag and he is up to 7.5m, u see where i am going with this?, everyone who is saying its not dieing dont know the defenition of dieing, his wound cant heal and he cant get back to his 12 million blood and the doctors realise he only got some time to live, but they know at some point in a few years he will be low on blood. i hope this fixes the guys brain who keeps saying its not dieing BLABLA, he is infact dieing, Everyone kept saying the loss of blood *always come back* but now they release he will never get back all of it. they can give this man bloodbags to slow the process but as years pass it will get lower and lower and he will fade away.

Okay WoW is dying. From the first day it was released, it is dying. From the first day we're born, we're dying. This topic is useless imho. It is a product, has anyone of you really expected WoW to last FOREVER? 200k subs is nothing wait to see the next quarter. Then WoD will spike the subs, then they're going to normalize, then drop again, then when Blizzard decides, they will stop producing new content and the game is over.

I am sure this post is full of know-it-all doomsayers. After ten years, I really can't be bothered to read them. I am also sure that this thread is full of people who understand how the game works, how the community works and how expansion lulls work.

The numbers will go up when Warlords comes out. It will fluctuate as people get used to the changes and decide to stay or leave for awhile again. When content takes a while to come out, the numbers will drop. When the expansion is "over", the numbers will drop. When the next expansion comes out? Back up again, not all the way to the top but still they will rise.

WoW still has a lot going for it, but the decline is definitely here.

I personally started bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in 2004, and I have invested a lot in the game over the years. I support Blizzard overall, and the game, so I keep my subscription active even though I tend to play very little (if at all) come the end of an expansion. SoO is carrying on for far, far too long. Just like ICC. Just like Dragon Soul.

I'm anxious for Warlords of Draenor to arrive.

Originally Posted by Anjerith

I am sure this post is full of know-it-all doomsayers. After ten years, I really can't be bothered to read them. I am also sure that this thread is full of people who understand how the game works, how the community works and how expansion lulls work.

The numbers will go up when Warlords comes out. It will fluctuate as people get used to the changes and decide to stay or leave for awhile again. When content takes a while to come out, the numbers will drop. When the expansion is "over", the numbers will drop. When the next expansion comes out? Back up again, not all the way to the top but still they will rise.

You should have read them. You have said exactly the same as everyone else. Which can only mean that you are describing yourself in your first sentence. If you want to make a blanket claim as you have, at least have the decency to actually make an effort and read something. It's not that hard. If not don't bother posting.

lol I love all these idiots that have to post on articles like this and assume every time they can say "Wow's dead I told you it's dying". 200k loss isn't really bad at this point in an expansion. I love how people declare 7.6 million sub as a dead game. Even ESO with it's rant and rave is what 500k? And typically that's pretty successful for a MMO. Losing 200k on an MMO release is good too considering how it usually dips.

You people are just more or less retarded(at least those that ride the doom boat). Hell the game is still fun. People act like it's some horrible game and nothing is fun about it. But it's still about the best experience out there. And I seen a lot of posts on FFXIV being better. It's just perspective. That entire game was copy and pasted content. 1-50. It's not a downfall, it's an MMO standard.

If only this number actually reflected how dead and lifeless wow looks and feels now (my realm).

Originally Posted by Nienor

The numbers are simply amazing. Only 200k lost for wow and 2,7 mil copies sold for a game as bad as diablo... It's baffling.... People simply dont care for lack of content, empty servers, poor pvp etc etc. They just want to give their money....
I check this site every now and then just in case i find a reason to subscribe again, only to be disappointed every single time.

Or, Some don't PVP, still have lots of content to get through, and like empty servers so that it's easier to mine/herb.

Lets be honest here wow will die when the hardcore fanbase and i mean the ones that play it because they love wow no matter what changes when the day that fan base dies in real life thats when wow gets shutdown its the truth and you know it!

Originally Posted by mikencarly

Lets be honest here wow will die when the hardcore fanbase and i mean the ones that play it because they love wow no matter whats changes when the day that fan base dies in real life thats when wow gets shutdown its the true and you know it!

Making a blanket comment that applies to just about any game, movie, band, etc doesn't mean much of shit.

So much circlejerk.

WOW ISN'T DEAD, LOOK AT SWTOR, LOOK AT EOS HAHAHA THEY(never) ALWAYS CLAIM TO BEAT US HAHAH LOSERS, WE REIGN SUPREME.

Originally Posted by Orkwuzhere

How dare people post on a forum for a game they don't play anymore because they're not fanboys like you!

It is of course fine to post where ever, but it's they way some of those ex wow players express themselves that really can be annoying. It's as if they almost want to see Wow fail so they can say "I told you so' or strengthen their believe that Wow is a bad game and they made the right decision to quit.

It's amazing how much hate there is amongst ex Wow players. On other game forums some people refer to Wow as 'that other game ' or 'that game that shall remain unnamed'.
I was in a guild in another mmo where it was prohibited to talk about Wow in guild chat because some officers (ex Wow players) hated the game.
I'll never understand it. If you're done with a game, move on.

Originally Posted by Raven

Lucky for all the doomsayers that they always will have next time. this time wow is dying ohh it didnt die, ohh well next time im sure it will die, ohh crap it didnt die this time either ohh well im 100% sure that the next time will be it.

.

Exactly. Four to six years down the road when Blizzard announces that they are ending development on WoW these same dummies will come out of the woodwork crying "See? See?! I told you so!!!!!!1!1"

Originally Posted by miguelcrespo85

WoW is a dying...

Aren't we all?

its this time again

Why are so many people raging on about 'people saying WoW is dying'? The figures are what the figures are. WoW IS in decline, simple fact. We're not harking on that fact, we're just discussing what we think that will mean for the game as it declines. Don't get so defensive.

What people need to understand is how any population works.

Traditionally there are 3 stages. Growth, Stability, and Decline.

However there really is 4. Growth, Overshoot, Stability, and Decline.

To explain further growth is as anyone can expect a population grows when resources increase or in this case a game grows in popularity.
Overshoot is where you grow past your resources to an unsustainable level, quite common, and this occured during wrath in my opinion. The amount of subscribers that the game had reached was just unrealistic. There was no way they could keep everyone happy.
Next we have stability. This is where something reaches a point of equilibrium. I think we are getting there in wow now.
Then decline, which is slow decrease until cease of existence.

Doubling subs from BC -> Wrath was always a bit crazy. Now we are beginning to drop back down to BC like numbers and now the amount of subs going down is slowing down. Over the next year you may even see growth without influence from WoD. However you will never see growth like we did from BC-> Wrath. Lets all enjoy what I believe is going to be wows stability phase.