WoW Down to 7.6 Million Subscribers

anyone else noticed the name of the picture ? 'alphasoonlol'

Not surprising.. summer is coming and people are taking breaks until WoD.

That's it. Pack it up, WoW is dead. Hail our new ESO overlords. Abandon Azeroth while you can, the ship is sinking. Might as well just cancel Warlords while they're ahead. No point. By time it drops WoW will have 15 subs and 10 of them will be WoW Devs. It's been a good run though. Goodnight, sweet prince.

Originally Posted by Myzou

You should really check twitter and the forums then. People care.

I couldn't care less if tier is raiders only. However, don't give us leftover crap looking gear because we aren't raiders.

ANd because of that, I won't be renewing. I had been contemplating returning this month, but when they announced LFR was losing tier, it gave me a very firm no to ever returning, because Blizzard made it painfully obvious they don't care about casual players, and essentially said "Shut up and do normal, because we made it easier to find a group."

It's interesting, it seems whatever Blizz do, they can't please everyone. Back in TBC, when there wasn't LFR a lot of people liked to check out those raiders in shiny gear they didn't have and that gave them an incentive to start raiding. In WoD those raiders will be more distinguishable (as some of those raiders wanted) and the more casual gamer feels left out.

I don't see it as that big of a problem really. Like someone else said, there is transmog and I doubt people only raid for the nice looking armor. They also want to experience the content. I am one of those casual gamers btw.

Originally Posted by Ainatan

Nah, WoW didn't even have LFR during its most populated times.

Difference is, back then the game was designed for casual players. Naxx was tuned for pick up groups. They introduced new 5 man dungeons during every patch.

Now its tuned towards raiders, when they've specifically said 90% of the current playerbase are casual who do mostly LFR.

They took aware the motivation for LFR from a very large amount of people. It's going to bite them in the butt. Even if not in the next quarter, the quarter after the expac releases, they'll see the hurt when people run out of stuff to do because LFR gear looks horrible, and you gear up fast, but they can't do Normal Mode because people will be elitists like usual and say unless you have prior experience and already have a lot of normal mode gear, you're not joining.

Originally Posted by Raysz

It's interesting, it seems whatever Blizz do, they can't please everyone. Back in TBC, when there wasn't LFR a lot of people liked to check out those raiders in shiny gear they didn't have and that gave them an incentive to start raiding. In WoD those raiders will be more distinguishable (as some of those raiders wanted) and the more casual gamer feels left out.

I don't see it as that big of a problem really. Like someone else said, there is transmog and I doubt people only raid for the nice looking armor. They also want to experience the content. I am one of those casual gamers btw.

Back in BC, as I said, they had a ton of content for casual players to do though. They kept 5 man dungeons current with the content. They had ENOUGH 5 man dungeons where they wouldn't burn you out. And when people finally did get burnt out, they added Magister's Terrace. Normal Mode was fine, and Heroic gave casual players a challenge. The same thing happened in Wrath. They added a ton of dungeons,, and when people got burnt out due to LFD being added, they added a new dungeon with each patch. Regular Icecrown 5 mans were simple. Heroic gave a challenge. Cata was the same. Until they made Dragon Soul last a year, Cata was amazing for their sub numbers.

Then came mists. Barely any dungeons, and replaced all content for casual players with LFR. People left in droves. They realized their mistake, but it was too late. WoW has never recovered from the sub loss in Mists.

WoD has 6 dungeons. They MIGHT add more. They won't even give a concrete. They specifically say they "MIGHT."

LFR IS content for casual players, and taking away stuff from LFR to make raiders feel special is not ok.

The minute Blizzard started ignoring adding content for casual players that wasn't hand me down from raiders is when sub numbers started dropping like flies. Yes, they're still doing the same thing with raids. That's fine.

But they stopped doing things for casual players, and that's not.

7.5 million subs with a new exp around the corner. yeah blizz is shaking in their booties LOL.

- - - Updated - - -

is in reality the last 12 months they have lost only 100k subs? thats really fucking impressive for a 10 year old game

Originally Posted by Myzou

You should really check twitter and the forums then. People care.

I couldn't care less if tier is raiders only. However, don't give us leftover crap looking gear because we aren't raiders.

ANd because of that, I won't be renewing. I had been contemplating returning this month, but when they announced LFR was losing tier, it gave me a very firm no to ever returning, because Blizzard made it painfully obvious they don't care about casual players, and essentially said "Shut up and do normal, because we made it easier to find a group."

Oh, sure, there are people who care. I just don't think they're that many.

For the record, I think Blizzard cares a lot about casual players. The casuals are the majority of players. LFR exists for casual players.

Originally Posted by Myzou

Difference is, back then the game was designed for casual players. Naxx was tuned for pick up groups. They introduced new 5 man dungeons during every patch.

Now its tuned towards raiders, when they've specifically said 90% of the current playerbase are casual who do mostly LFR.

They took aware the motivation for LFR from a very large amount of people. It's going to bite them in the butt. Even if not in the next quarter, the quarter after the expac releases, they'll see the hurt when people run out of stuff to do because LFR gear looks horrible, and you gear up fast, but they can't do Normal Mode because people will be elitists like usual and say unless you have prior experience and already have a lot of normal mode gear, you're not joining.

Certain people can be very elitist indeed. But you could start a casual raiding guild or join one perhaps? I'm a very casual raider nowadays and I joined a somewhat casual guild and it worked out well.

A 10 year old game still holding over 7 million subs and another xpac on the way...hardly struggling imo.

Wish we could get region-specific numbers instead. I don't really care how many players we have in Asia. It doesn't matter to me. But I guess Blizz loves to flaunt with high numbers.
I wonder what they think of the 4kk drop within 4 years though....

Not bad, 200k subs is nothing, im suprised.
I wonder if their telling the truth however, i know so many that have quit temporarily including myself, that it is 200k, sounds just wierdly low.

200k drop even with boost 90s..oh dear.
Welp, ima call 500k more in Q2 due to lack of content.

This loss is still at the same time the Expansion pre-sales and boosts started. So while I doubt that brought in a ton of subs, I'm sure it brought in quite a few and they still suffered a 200k loss.

Originally Posted by Myzou

Even if not in the next quarter, the quarter after the expac releases, they'll see the hurt when people run out of stuff to do because LFR gear looks horrible, and you gear up fast, but they can't do Normal Mode because people will be elitists like usual and say unless you have prior experience and already have a lot of normal mode gear, you're not joining

That's pretty much bs. Those so-called elitists are not as numerous as people claim they are. Hell, even I, raiding only LFR untill 5.4, could get into nice casual guild (that was advertised on Timeless Isle) that was doing flex. We had many really undergeared players (and we helped them gear), we had a tank that was completely new to the game, we failed horribly but we still had fun. There is a barrier for raiding - not those evil elitists, but laziness. With the new tool to make groups, catching up into casual riding normals in WoD will be even easier.

Complaining about elitits is just excuse, nothing more.

Seems negligible.

Let the endless sub pissing contest commence.

Oh it already has.

Originally Posted by miguelcrespo85

WoW is a dying game, every expansion is just Copy and Paste content... this is why FFXIV is the best MMO on the market atm

I got axe for you?

200k is fairly modest... compared to the 2m some people were predicting the other day.

They're still 6.6m people over the 1m they planned for when they originally launched the game nearly 10 years ago.

I do think that Warlords is make or break for the continued future of the game though. If subs continue to slide, I do think WoW will begin to take a lesser place in their pantheon of games. It will still be around. It won't go away and it won't end for a very, very, very long time. To think it would is ridiculous - look at the games that predate WoW that are still around with a lot less players. But I don't think it will always be Blizzard's flagship.

most of those subs are from China. They are struggling to hold on to the EU/NA numbers.

WoW is going back to over 10M for WoD. Probably stay with 9m players if they do it right. yay! #fuhaters

Originally Posted by miguelcrespo85

WoW is a dying game, every expansion is just Copy and Paste content... this is why FFXIV is the best MMO on the market atm

Yea, you keep thinking that.

200k not bad, seems like it's stabilizing a bit. Prob lose a bunch next quarter from pre-xpac content drought, then go up a bit with WoD.