Subs: Will they start reporting #s again?

[Vichan]

I still don't understand why the wow haters keep coming to forums just to bash it, do you have nothing better to do with your lives?

[Doomaz]

i doubt we will be seeing sub numbers form blizz, maybe from other unconfirmed sources, but blizzard seems to be dead set on not showing those numbers anymore (and im fine with it, avoiding all the doomsayers )

[Caolela]

I still don't understand why the wow haters keep coming to forums just to bash it, do you have nothing better to do with your lives?

I like WoW or what it was, before Blizz wrecked it. Right now, bashing Blizz for that is a better thing to do with one's life than playing WoD.

[HuxNeva]

Not regular quarterly sub reports, but they will spin positive numbers in press releases when it suits them.

[WowIsDead64]

Because sub numbers has nothing to do with a game being 12 years old. It couldn't possibly have anything to do with waaaaay more competition in the market now, it probably has nothing to do with the fact that the greater portion of that competition is F2P and essentially has no barrier to entry, almost certainly couldn't be because newer games feature new tech and game play ideas....right?

The ONLY possible information you can garner as individual from seeing sub numbers is how many subs there are...thats all. You can't find out how active those people are. You can't find out whether or not you'll have people to play with. You can't find out if the graphics, game play or mechanics are fun for you. What you are saying is rubbish. You want to make an informed opinion? Just play the damn game for few hours and figure it out. YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE TO BUY IT. Knowing the amount of subs won't amount to shit if you don't jump in and see for yourself.

Your arguments are so flawed it's hard for me to even grasp how you can have them in the first place.

Is WoW dying? Are the sub numbers an indicator of this? To an extent yes. It doesn't account for why, it doesn't account for how active the remained subs are or aren't, it does't account for much other than how many subs there currently are. What you have is a terrible case of confirmation bias, which for you then leads into logical leaps that are completely unsubsantiated. "Wow sub numbers have dropped because the design for this expac is bad. Numbers are so bad that Blizzard decided to quit reporting numbers. I bet there are down to 3 million subs now" These are your main points. Can you figure out how many of these are actual facts and how many are just confirmation bias and logical leaps?

This may be true in a long term. But short term sub number changes are surely affected by current direction of development. When WotLK had 12M subs and all of a sudden Cata started to lose 1 player every 15 seconds - it surely wasn't due to Wow suddenly becoming old and obsoleted. When WOD had 10M at launch and 5M after 3 months - it wasn't due to Wow suddenly becoming 12 years old or due to half of players suddenly becoming "cyclical". Also Wow isn't so obsoleted - many MMOs still sacrifice graphics to provide better gameplay and scale of the world. Many games has some better features, but they don't have them all - only Wow has almost all modern mandatory features. Also sub gain or loss - is always difference between new players coming and old players going away. New players still come. For them Wow is still new and fresh - not 12 years old game. They quit too fast due to wrong direction of development - that is the reason of Wow's fail.

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If you need to know subscription numbers about an MMO to figure out whether or not it's a game you enjoy then you are very far beyond anything reasonable. Especially given that Blizzard, up until recently, was the only game studio providing any data on actual active subscriptions.

- Rift: Never has.
- Final Fantasy XIV: Never has.
- SW-TOR: Never has that I know of.
- WildStar: Never did.

It's an empty argument. And a moronic way to decide whether or not you enjoy a game. Your entire argument smacks of the notion that you can't tell yourself if a game is any good unless you know how it's doing financially.

May be that's because they have never been successive? I guess, if they would have at least 1M subs - they would report them. Yeah. It's pointless to report amount of players, when your game is F2P.

Also. Financial success - can't be used as measure of game success. There are games, that are essentially P2W, where game developers charge 500$ for one single exclusive model and there are "whales" who buy them, but developers invest close to 0$ into improving the game itself. May be you've never played such a games? I've played and I know, what I'm talking about. Yeah, such games are financially successive. But are they successive as games? I guess, no.

[Hexxidecimal]

This may be true in a long term. But short term sub number changes are surely affected by current direction of development. When WotLK had 12M subs and all of a sudden Cata started to lose 1 player every 15 seconds - it surely wasn't due to Wow suddenly becoming old and obsoleted. When WOD had 10M at launch and 5M after 3 months - it wasn't due to Wow suddenly becoming 12 years old or due to half of players suddenly becoming "cyclical". Also Wow isn't so obsoleted - many MMOs still sacrifice graphics to provide better gameplay and scale of the world. Many games has some better features, but they don't have them all - only Wow has almost all modern mandatory features. Also sub gain or loss - is always difference between new players coming and old players going away. New players still come. For them Wow is still new and fresh - not 12 years old game. They quit too fast due to wrong direction of development - that is the reason of Wow's fail.

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Actually YOU have no idea what causes the sub loss. Absolutely none. All you have is conjecture, period. You are still playing in the realm of confirmation Bias. Just because new players still come to the game doesn't mean the game is "new". It's quite obviously 12 years old, even with the fresh coat of paint. This is something that is objectively true. It's systems and combat are rather archaic, even in the world of MMO RPGs. Your graphical argument is also unfounded. There are a lot of games out there that succeed far better in their own art style and graphic that WoW currently does in it's. This isn't because WoW devs suck at models or anything like that, the revamps and the new models look great all things considered. But they don't come close to games like FFIVX or Black Desert. Even games that are close to the same level as WoW currently is graphically still push ahead in game play, like Blade and Soul, Tera and Wildstar. I am not saying these games are better, don't get me wrong. That is subjective at best.

The short term matters very very little because it's the long run that is important to a games longevity. WoW has seen a fairly steady decline over the years, with sharp drops here and there as well as increases (usually at the start of an expansion) but they have stayed a sub based game and have succeeded in a model where almost everyone else has failed for 12 years.

But since we are guessing at things here, here is my take on why the subs have dropped substantially more lately and it has little to do with direction of the game. Well I should be specific and say it has little to do with the mechanics of the game, but the content, or lack there of. The content droughts hurt this game far worse than any design decision has, at least in my opinion. I could be wrong and I have little else other than anecdotal evidence to give it any support. But hey, I can admit when my idea is just a thought or conjecture.

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I like WoW or what it was, before Blizz wrecked it. Right now, bashing Blizz for that is a better thing to do with one's life than playing WoD.

This isn't a binary choice ya know. There are literally thousands of other things you could other than just those two things lol. But hey, in my opinion bash away. It's what forums are for.

Also @Vichan people come here not to just bash Blizz (though some do certainly) some want to play WoW again but simply can't stand whats going on. Fair enough, going to community forums, expressing opinions and discussing (although not always constructively) is how Blizz becomes aware of changes, from going discussions. Will they see Caolela's post? Maybe, probably not, but the over all discussion will draw their attention.

[Eats Compost]

I don't think they will. The simple reality is that even if Blizzard starts to knock it out of the park with every expansion, the numbers will probably continue to go down over time. They just can't make that number look nice, not when they've got a legacy of 10 million+ subscribers.

It's a shame. Contrary to what some people say, it's an extremely useful metric. It's just not one that's advantageous for them to share anymore.

[Elfezen]

No, when they stop they stop for good, same with Microsoft and Xbox sales reports

[mhdoe]

No they said they would never show subs again just the profit/loss margins.

[Deleted]

The last time this was discussed, the general consensus was that most people don't give a shit about sub numbers and the value of the data is lessened due to the WoW token skewing information.

I don't think much has changed since then. :^)

Quite part from their refusal to break the figures down geopgrahically (esp China).

[hrugner]

I don't think they will ever report the quarterly numbers again. I do think they will report the game sales when/if they hit a number worth reporting.

[Deleted]

I don't think they will. The simple reality is that even if Blizzard starts to knock it out of the park with every expansion, the numbers will probably continue to go down over time. They just can't make that number look nice, not when they've got a legacy of 10 million+ subscribers.

It's a shame. Contrary to what some people say, it's an extremely useful metric. It's just not one that's advantageous for them to share anymore.

The most interesting metric is http://www.warcraftrealms.com/weeklyfactionactivity.php, although it would be nice if they provided long term access to the underlying data - a plot of rolling average of the combined faction activity would be nice.

[Baine]

I like WoW or what it was, before Blizz wrecked it. Right now, bashing Blizz for that is a better thing to do with one's life than playing WoD.

And did your bashing had any influence on the game development? So why keeping bashing it? Why not formulating intelligent and pertinent complaints in a nuanced and rational way?

[Auxora]

They aren't going to report numbers again. The investor analysts are incredibly sharp folks, and they don't really care about sub numbers. They care about revenue, and they care about future expected revenue projections. Sub numbers became meaningless after tokens also. And it would look very shady for Blizzard to only report sub numbers during high periods or good times, that would make Blizzard look very bad and actually do a lot more harm than good.

Also, as much as we're wow fans...the truth is that investors are also mainly looking at Activision-Blizzard as a whole. Investors have largely closed the book on wow to be completely honest, and are *far far* more interested in the newer IPs like Overwatch and Hearthstone from Blizzard, along with Destiny/CoD from Activision. Those are actually where the money is from their standpoint. If you read their last few press releases and earnings calls, wow actually barely gets mentioned or asked about. It's more of an, oh yeah and an expansion is coming, but what about your Overwatch plans? What wow did 5-10 years ago couldn't matter less to them, since growth is king in the market and they don't see wow growing anymore They know well that the curve peaked in 2009-2011 and that the expansion bursts are just that and have thus far quickly dropped after a few months each time. It's viewed more just as an IP property and their interest there is what they do with it in the future that would really generate a lot of revenue (more than just expansions and the typical short-lived playerbase boost), like a WoW 2 or Warcraft 4.

Again, just listen in on or read the transcription from their next earnings call and you'll see what I mean.

[xero93]

I think they will report the numbers when Legion first comes out. But I highly doubt they will report when/if people start to leave again.

[Relapses]

And did your bashing had any influence on the game development? So why keeping bashing it? Why not formulating intelligent and pertinent complaints in a nuanced and rational way?

Why bother having a new and original idea or criticism when you can just circlejerk each other into the stratosphere about how much Blizzard hates their customers?

[ReleaseDay]

One thing is for certain; as long as they refuse to publish the sub numbers, we know they're really, really bad.

[Dormie]

Honestly it's probably best that they don't report numbers. Not because the numbers are bad or good, but just the way people try to use them in arguments.

[MoanaLisa]

They aren't going to report numbers again. The investor analysts are incredibly sharp folks, and they don't really care about sub numbers. They care about revenue, and they care about future expected revenue projections. Sub numbers became meaningless after tokens also. And it would look very shady for Blizzard to only report sub numbers during high periods or good times, that would make Blizzard look very bad and actually do a lot more harm than good.

Also, as much as we're wow fans...the truth is that investors are also mainly looking at Activision-Blizzard as a whole. Investors have largely closed the book on wow to be completely honest, and are *far far* more interested in the newer IPs like Overwatch and Hearthstone from Blizzard, along with Destiny/CoD from Activision. Those are actually where the money is from their standpoint. If you read their last few press releases and earnings calls, wow actually barely gets mentioned or asked about. It's more of an, oh yeah and an expansion is coming, but what about your Overwatch plans? What wow did 5-10 years ago couldn't matter less to them, since growth is king in the market and they don't see wow growing anymore They know well that the curve peaked in 2009-2011 and that the expansion bursts are just that and have thus far quickly dropped after a few months each time. It's viewed more just as an IP property and their interest there is what they do with it in the future that would really generate a lot of revenue (more than just expansions and the typical short-lived playerbase boost), like a WoW 2 or Warcraft 4.

Again, just listen in on or read the transcription from their next earnings call and you'll see what I mean.

This is a really good post. The assumption that Activision's quarterly revenue calls are somehow all about WoW and that investors are hanging on by their fingernails waiting for the subscription news has always been a bit precious. It's all about revenues for Activision as a whole. Blizzard is important and WoW was very important during the years when it was the primary revenue driver for the company. WoW is one of several revenue streams now for Blizzard. It may or not be one of the largest but the main point is that these calls are first about the health of Activision generally (CoD, Skylanders and all of the rest) and only secondarily about Blizzard. And WoW is just a piece of that. Since no other subscription based MMO--the few that are left--report subscriber numbers there's not been any real point in giving them out for several years now. And I don't believe they ever will again. WoW's numbers will fluctuate up and down depending on the expansion, patch and any number of other factors but generally it's a safe assumption that in the future they will flatten around some point and will coast along as other MMO's coast along on their B2P/F2P revenues.

The main thing it does is remove a starting point for pointless arguments and that's not a bad thing. There are plenty of reasons for those any way.

[Aeriedk]

I doubt they will start reporting again. They stopped for a reason. It would be great to report subs over 10 million again when legion releases, but it would be far worse to report them dropping back to vanilla levels again a few months in.