WoW going free to play sooner than later?

[stellvia]

LOTR has been around for 4 or 5 years... methinks the triple profits over subs based is over a longer period than 1 month lol
GW2?
Released as F2P and its growing steadily, making healthy profits too. Has been successful since release.
People who post on these forums really need to do some research before announcing their opinions as 'facts'

Try reading comprehension first. I said F2P conversions. Not titles that launch F2P. And nowhere in my statement did I claim it was triple revenues for only one month. I meant that a F2P game is going to have a cycle of new players trying out the game for 1-2 months, spending a nominal amount of money, then moving on. But there is a large potential pool of those people, so you could maintain a pretty steady revenue off of that. Whereas once a sub cancels they're probably gone forever.

LOTRO sub numbers show them at around 220k before F2P then doubling and slowly declining since then.

GW2 ... it's been out less than a year and launched F2P. A Google search on GW2 revenues comes up with nothing other than the articles post-launch talking about revenues from initial box sales. Where did you get your info from about "healthy profits"? We'll have to wait for Q2 financials to be posted to possibly see what kind of revenues they're actually making off the game.

The content releases for GW2 have certainly been underwhelming since then. A handful of new story events, and Fractals. Thats it.

[Deleted]

Oh c'mon the back tracking is getting ridiculous. If the your statement had nothing to do with how much Blizzard made then why did you follow it up with this?

Hes backtracked on a quite a few of his claims over the past 2 days tbh

I just wish people would analyse and discuss the data with their head rather than their heart...

[DeadmanWalking]

Seranthor refuses to answer my question about having two different models to play the game, one free, and one sub.

I have no more respect for this guy, and will take everything he says in his delusional world with a grain of salt.

Thanks for the grandstanding, as we all care about who you have respect for. Speaking of delusional worlds......

[Jaylock]

To back u up jaylock the 8.3mill subs count was as at 31st March 2013. That was around 6 weeks ago and i think we can all safely say that during those 6 weeks subs have not gone up...




As much as u would love that to be true... ive never lived on a PvP realm so i never even had the chance of ganking lowbies... all my hks were ploughing through wave upon wave of Alliance equal level im afraid

Agreed. Some of the posters on here will still deny that wow is losing ground. They think that nothing can hurt it, or that a massive sub loss like the one just experienced in the first quarter of this year has no effect. If they didnt think so, they would not go to such great lengths to defend their game like they do here on these boards. Its pure denial.

[Pann]

To back u up jaylock the 8.3mill subs count was as at 31st March 2013. That was around 6 weeks ago and i think we can all safely say that during those 6 weeks subs have not gone up...

After Kotick's warning I don't think there is any doubt of this, I have feeling that they are worse than we think there is no way it would have been mentioned if it was not bad.

[Seranthor]

Kotick pretty much said that didn't he? Less subs by year end.

Clearly you missed the point, and I'm not sure you'd get it the 2nd time it was explained... Less subs doesn't mean Armageddon, sorry, it just doesn't.

[Jaylock]

Thanks for the grandstanding, as we all care about who you have respect for. Speaking of delusional worlds......

DeadmanWalking, we all know you will give your life for the success of blizzards cash cow, but you think that makes me care about how you think about me?

Nice avatar btw.

[McTurbo]

you are absolutely right... but, the naysayers want you to ignore all that and believe that the SS Blizzard hit an iceberg, and that caused a fire in the engine room that exploded and killed everyone there and disabled main propulsion, and that the radio is out of commission and that they are sinking so fast that everyone needs to abandon ship right now to survive.

i seen that movie!!! they had to keep the ship up to 55 mph or an asteroid would explode and kill bill and ted.

[Seranthor]

Seranthor refuses to answer my question about having two different models to play the game, one free, and one sub.

I have no more respect for this guy, and will take everything he says in his delusional world with a grain of salt.

Accusing someone of being delusional? really Jay, because I dont find answer your question worth my time? Perhaps you can scroll back and look how someone else answered it... thats just one way to answer the question. And having watched you thru several month, I thank you for distancing yourself from me. I lost all my respect for you long long long ago. however, I've chosen to avoid attacking you personally, seems you dont have that inhibition.

[Conscious]

you are absolutely right... but, the naysayers want you to ignore all that and believe that the SS Blizzard hit an iceberg, and that caused a fire in the engine room that exploded and killed everyone there and disabled main propulsion, and that the radio is out of commission and that they are sinking so fast that everyone needs to abandon ship right now to survive.

Cataclysm was apparently the iceberg, and since then the ship has been sinking slowly.

[DeadmanWalking]

DeadmanWalking, we all know you will give your life for the success of blizzards cash cow, but you think that makes me care about how you think about me?

Nice avatar btw.

You think I care about how you think about me caring about what you think about me caring about how you think about me thinking about you?

Thanks for the avatar compliment, its meant to be sarcastic, just like me.

[Seranthor]

To back u up jaylock the 8.3mill subs count was as at 31st March 2013. That was around 6 weeks ago and i think we can all safely say that during those 6 weeks subs have not gone up...




As much as u would love that to be true... ive never lived on a PvP realm so i never even had the chance of ganking lowbies... all my hks were ploughing through wave upon wave of Alliance equal level im afraid

I doubt the veracity of your claim. however, you dont have it in you to show me those daggers that you were carried to...

[Jaylock]

You think I care about how you think about me caring about what you think about me caring about how you think about me thinking about you?

Thanks for the avatar compliment, its meant to be sarcastic, just like me.

Your game is waiting for you, more mogu to go kill! More Pandaran to interact with, and more great feasts to throw down and be a part of! Throne of thunder beckons you to go vanquish it of the evil foes, and rid Pandaria of the thunder lord!

[Deleted]

LOTRO sub numbers show them at around 220k before F2P then doubling and slowly declining since then.

Now this statement is key for two reasons...

Firstly, the point made above states that LOTR mkaes more money now than it did when it was sub based. That means that with even less subs they are making more cash even though the games free.

Secondly, even though all the Wow fanboys are shouting loud and clear they dont care about whatever subs numbers Wow currently has, and that dropping 1.3mill subs doesnt bother them. Tell me why is it that they still bang on about how many subs other games have and how Wow still has more than them?

That my friend, is a conflict of interest.

If u dont care about how many subs games have then why do u still like to boast just how many more subs your game has over other games out there?

The content releases for GW2 have certainly been underwhelming since then. A handful of new story events, and Fractals. Thats it.

Thankfully the GW2 players like and enjoy the content being released. The playerbase in GW2 is strong and growing and they are happy with the product.

Obviously to your taste u dont like GW2, thats cool then dont play it. But the truth is that the game is a very busy MMO and those playing it are loving it. Your statement about the standard of content is your opinion.

[Conscious]

The hell are we talking about?, we have no clue how much money the Warcraft brand generates. Im telling you, as things stand Blizzard has all the time in the world to adapt their business strat according what better suits the market and their bottom line.

Considering they will be, or maybe already are at or below Vanilla numbers, I'm not sure waiting is the right thing to do.

I think the number was like 14k people quitting every day for that quarter. I'm not a rocket scientist but that's a lot of money going 'bye bye' daily.

[stellvia]

I don't think there are very many people not claiming that WoW subs are in decline, even those content with the game. It's been almost 9 years. These things will happen. It's more a testament to their willingness to tweak the gameplay formula repeatedly to retain them as long as they have.

Also: As far as revenue losses goes -- last I heard, Asian accounts only made up 10% of Blizzards total profits. So assuming the majority of their losses over the last 2 years have been from WoW China etc. it's not nearly as bad yet as some are imagining. The Asian sub numbers have always been rather fickle, so my guess is there is just some new MMOs on the block in China that are drawing away that crowd with games more appealing to Chinese gamers.

[Deleted]

As noted Activation-Blizzard make a more money from WoW subs per month than most games at release. WoW isnt going free to play until it begins to show a massive decline in profit. By the time Titan comes out (in what 2015?) I recon it still will be subscription based. After all they still have at least one expansion to release.

[DeadmanWalking]

I don't think there are very many people not claiming that WoW subs are in decline, even those content with the game. It's been almost 9 years. These things will happen. It's more a testament to their willingness to tweak the gameplay formula repeatedly to retain them as long as they have.

Also: As far as revenue losses goes -- last I heard, Asian accounts only made up 10% of Blizzards total profits. So assuming the majority of their losses over the last 2 years have been from WoW China etc. it's not nearly as bad yet as some are imagining. The Asian sub numbers have always been rather fickle, so my guess is there is just some new MMOs on the block in China that are drawing away that crowd with games more appealing to Chinese gamers.

Also remember that Asians don't pay a traditional subscription, they pay for the time that they play in.

[Karizee]

The content releases for GW2 have certainly been underwhelming since then. A handful of new story events, and Fractals. Thats it.

Don't be silly.

Tons of permanent content including:
More jump puzzles
Daily and monthly achievements
More mini-dungeons
More events
More mini games
2 Pvp maps
Fractals of the Mist
New equipment tier
New enemies
Tons of mini-pets, armor skins, weapon skins
A new zone
New currencies
New emotes
Dance Volume
Tons of polish for existing dungeons, WvW, events and professions
Guesting
Guild Missions
Super Adventure Box
Custom PvP arenas
Spectator mode for PvP arena
Craptons of "temporary" content - one time event dungeons, pvp maps, games and events

[Conscious]

Also remember that Asians don't pay a traditional subscription, they pay for the time that they play in.

But they still play the same game we do.

Population changes affect all of us, despite subscription types.