+/- 100k.
/10
PEPE SILVA, PEPE SILVA
subs down under 8 million because of one reason:
5 years of doing the exact same thing.
dailies
purples
same crappy models
dailies
purples
same crappy models
dailies
purples
same crappy models
If bots were removed from the totals, sorry I meant "compromised accounts", they'd probably be under 8 million.
Otherwise, I don't expect a big decline.
As usual we will learn the mass exodus some whiny players have been continually promising for years still isn't happening and that they never expected it to happen until NEXT quarter as per their usual propaganda.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 12:06 PM ----------
What the fuck? This again? Why on earth would people quit the game because the expansion wasn't released during Christmas? That is more idiotic than claiming people would only buy the expansion if it was released around Christmas.
And here we go with the spin doctoring already. Listen the reason the numbers weren't announced during the last shareholders meeting was because they had already announced them a few days prior to that as part of their usual press release that they put out shortly after each and every expansion release. There was no need to discuss the numbers because that information was already out.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 12:13 PM ----------
While they aren't obligated to report actual subscription numbers they are still obligated to be accurate about any and all information they do release to investors.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 12:16 PM ----------
Well seeing as how there were only 1.2 million annual pass holders I'm not too terribly concerned. Most people who got the annual pass weren't planning to quit the game anyway.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 12:21 PM ----------
D3 isn't an mmo and as such the shareholders aren't terribly concerned who is and isn't still playing it. They made their profit at release so that is over and done with as far as investors are concerned. RMAH or not they still made a significant amount of profit and certainly made more than what was originally spent on developing D3.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 12:25 PM ----------
And yet subscriptions went up by 1 million despite all the screaming and crying over cross realm zones which had been implemented a month before and we were promised a mass exodus like no other which never came to pass. If it didn't happen then what makes you think it is going to happen now?
Considering WoW got an expansion in the same quarter that GW2 released, the first point can still be fairly accurate, there is just no mention on what he thinks happens when an expansion is released.
So, I'm not entirely sure how these things are measured, but it's from the highest point of the quarter, right? If so, then the sub numbers will stay more or less same, since MoP was released, what, a week before Q4 started? And I assume Q3 numbers are from MoP release too.
Now I don't wanna be the guy who makes excuses as to why WoW actually has less subs than what they say it does, but if the numbers are almost exactly the same as Q3, I'd assume that the numbers are from early October and the numbers from December are actually lower. (Since they couldn't be higher.) Obviously just my assumptions on how things'll go.
At least for the west. I can't say anything for the east, I don't really know at what point they got MoP. So if there are bigger changes in the numbers, (drops or rises.) I'd guess they'd be from the east.
Ah good point, didn't occurred to me.
So I guess you're right it'll probably be "over 10 millions" like in the previous conference call.
---------- Post added 2013-01-19 at 08:39 PM ----------
I'm not so sure. Given how little content there was during Cata, I would not be surprised if some of these people felt screwed over by Blizzard.
In fact I've seen several of them pretty angry about the annual pass.
Though that doesn't mean it'll have any significant impact on the sub numbers.
I'm aware it's only some guessing and anecdotal evidence.
Well, it seems that mist is a wee bit more well received than cata at this stage of the game. I dont know the difference between raid participation now and then? Or well, now there's LFR that opens up raiding for everyone and their moms... in cata noone pugged raids at start, or perhaps some on big servers but I was on a medium one back then when I played and there was nothing. So guess people should be pleased with that?
Otherwise, I dont know how gamebreaking forced dailys are in order to keep players interested in the game. It's the way of wow and they said mist would be many patches with updates in daily quests and then some with raids... shouldnt come as a surprise if dailys are the dominating part of the game. And I guess noone would buy the xpac knowing this if they didnt like taking part of it :P
Overall, daily quests and broken pvp seems to be only complaints. And pvp was always broken in wow so it shouldnt have any effect on people leaving or not, the sane ones left wow pvp long ago =) Leaves us to dailys and I dont think that should be making people quit, especially since it was the marketed content of the game. The ganking on pvp servers shouldnt be any problem either, not many people leveled up in the world in the past and I find it hard to believe the numbers have reached such a major increase. I dont think many people start playing wow now, most people are ol players and they already got mains on max. So I dont think it would be anything really gamebreaking.
To sum up, I think that there is some smaller decrease in subs, mostly because of people who bought the xpac and tried level up and then it was back to same ol and they got tired and split to something else. But sure, I would hope to see other numbers =) However considering there isnt that much complaits overall from what I see when I check this part of mmo champion once or twice a month, I think most people still are rather pleased with current state of the game. But its always interesting follow this conference calls, to see how things goes.
Another reason I believe the subs are down in Q4: If they were up, they would've already announced it like they did a week after Q3 ended with Pandaria's release.
"There is a pervasive myth that making content hard will induce players to rise to the occasion. We find the opposite. " -- Ghostcrawler
"The bit about hardcore players not always caring about the long term interests of the game is spot on." -- Ghostcrawler
"Do you want a game with no casuals so about 500 players?"