DS : Final Fantasy XIV is closing in on World of Warcraft's crown

[Tennis]

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/gaming/n...pmaQ2f4q3ELfbm

Final Fantasy 14: Heavensward is gaining ground on World of Warcraft, having reached more than 5 million registered accounts worldwide.

The latest figures suggest that Blizzard Entertainment's behemoth is down to 5.6 million active users following a 44% decline over the last six months.


Final Fantasy 14, on the other hand, is going through a purple patch, having increased its subscriber base by 1 million since February.

The multiplayer online game has been around for less than half the time of the market leader, originally launching around five years ago.

However, new life was injected into the title in 2012 when it was relaunched as Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn. Then Heavensward went live in June.

As the saying goes, no king rules forever

[bmjclark]

5 million registered accounts vs 5.6 million subs. WoW has over 100 million registered accounts. Final fantasy is likely no where close.

[Shuji V2]

Didn't world of warcraft have over 100 million registered accounts? Comparing two different numbers is just stupid.

[guzacon]

Are those accounts all paying at the moment? Because if you consider all created account on WoW, I believe you'd get more than 70 millions people across these 10 years and a half.

[Vynestra]

Inb4 in a few months "FF XIV Hits 5.6m registered accounts, TAKES CROWN FROM WOW!"...........

The ignorance is and will be real.

[Deleted]

I thought the same when I read the article last month.

They may have 5 million registered ACCOUNTS, but they only have about 1.6 million SUBSCRIBERS. I know two of them 5 million accounts are trial accounts I have made, so that leaves 4,999,998 left to account for!

[Gumboy]

Registered accounts. I have a FFXIV registered account but have literally never played the game...

[Echocho]

Yeah it's definitley not 5 million active.

When they had 4 million registered accounts (before heavensward) 2.5 million of them were active.
When they released the 5 million number 3.5 were active and now we're up to 4 million active.

[Gumboy]

And by the way? I would highly suggest not taking your "news" From the site you linked anymore, as they are sensationalist, lying, garbage.

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Yeah it's definitley not 5 million active.

When they had 4 million registered accounts (before heavensward) 2.5 million of them were active.
When they released the 5 million number 3.5 were active and now we're up to 4 million active.

And you know that...how? you realize that if wow went by the same extrapolation, they could say they had 30m active right now, right? People quit...and they don't just quit wow rofl.

"Registered accounts" will ALWAYS GO UP. It is impossible to do anything else. They do NOT effect "Active accounts", period, in any way....

[Echocho]

You should look at the registered accounts thing more as copies sold. It's people who have bought the game and pain at least one sub month. Not all of them stick around, most of them do but not all.

[Tennis]

I thought the same when I read the article last month.

They may have 5 million registered ACCOUNTS, but they only have about 1.6 million SUBSCRIBERS. I know two of them 5 million accounts are trial accounts I have made, so that leaves 4,999,998 left to account for!

The gap might seem big now but with the rate WoW has been losing subscribers..

[Lochton]

I have a registered account at FFXIV, it doesn't mean a subscription though, I don't play it ever since the did the first fuck up. World of Warcraft, as said before, has over 100 million registered accounts.

As well, you're posting in the wrong section.

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The gap might seem big now but with the rate WoW has been losing subscribers..

Until an expansion, then the gap might suddenly be big again.

[Budong]

This entire discussion is completely irrelevant compared to two inescapable truths. First, WoW is trending down. Two, FFXIV is trending up. It doesn't matter how many subs/accounts/monkeys banging on typewriters there are, these two games are going in two different directions and there's no amount of spin that can prove otherwise.

[Echocho]

This entire discussion is completely irrelevant compared to two inescapable truths. First, WoW is trending down. Two, FFXIV is trending up. It doesn't matter how many subs/accounts/monkeys banging on typewriters there are, these two games are going in two different directions and there's no amount of spin that can prove otherwise.

Yeah that's true. WoW used to be a good game and now it's not, FFXIV used to be a crap game and now it's not.

[Kathranis]

It's nowhere near close to that many active subscribers. Go through Square's earnings reports and you'll see statements they've got something like 2 million active subscribers between all three of their MMOs (FFXI, DQX, and FFXIV), so even if FFXIV has the lion's share of that, it's only a bit over a million active.

They have 5 million registered accounts, which translates more or less to "copies sold." Final Fantasy XIV is doing well since they relaunched it with A Realm Reborn, in fact it's really the first subscription-based MMO since WoW to actually maintain consistent growth after its first year, but it's still got a long way to go before it catches up to WoW.


As others have said, it's known that WoW has well over 100 million "registered accounts," but Blizzard doesn't report on that metric because it's not an accurate representation of the game's health.

Don't expect Square Enix to ever actually divulge the game's active playerbase, though. They've tied their PR wagon to the horse of "registered accounts" and it's going to stay that way, lest people realize they're not performing quit as well as advertised.

[Lochton]

This entire discussion is completely irrelevant compared to two inescapable truths. First, WoW is trending down. Two, FFXIV is trending up. It doesn't matter how many subs/accounts/monkeys banging on typewriters there are, these two games are going in two different directions and there's no amount of spin that can prove otherwise.

-snipped useless image-

FFXIV trending up? It is only trending up because it is in such a decline business wise. Just because I could, a while back, I bought 4 hard copies of the game, all four has a 1 month card inside as well, and I paid like, 5 dollars each. It is a discount game maybe why it is trending up.

One sub is like, 14.99, I just bought 4 months for 20 dollars, basically.

[Deleted]

This entire discussion is completely irrelevant compared to two inescapable truths. First, WoW is trending down. Two, FFXIV is trending up. It doesn't matter how many subs/accounts/monkeys banging on typewriters there are, these two games are going in two different directions and there's no amount of spin that can prove otherwise.

Thats true, but we need to also consider that FFXIV is on its new recently released expansion high and WoW is in the last patch slump.
I'm sure that if we compare numbers 2 months after the release of Legion we will get a different trend.

With that said, i am glad FFXIV is seeing sucess and an upward trend. I think it has a model to follow that WoW is completely missing atm. Also, the speed at wich they develop content is completely different. Western companies give us all these excuses that it takes soo much time to develop content and FF pumps out new updates every 3 months. Learn Blizzard, they are doing it right.

I agree with you at the end of the day. If things stay as they are, FF would deserve the top dog place.

[Lochton]

Thats true, but we need to also consider that FFXIV is on its new recently released expansion high and WoW is in the last patch slump.
I'm sure that if we compare numbers 2 months after the release of Legion we will get a different trend.

With that said, i am glad FFXIV is seeing sucess and an upward trend. I think it has a model to follow that WoW is completely missing atm. Also, the speed at wich they develop content is completely different. Western companies give us all these excuses that it takes soo much time to develop content and FF pumps out new updates every 3 months. Learn Blizzard, they are doing it right.

I agree with you at the end of the day. If things stay as they are, FF would deserve the top dog place.

Oh, of course, if they can hold their boat without sinking it again, they deserve their spot.

[Kathranis]

Also, the speed at wich they develop content is completely different. Western companies give us all these excuses that it takes soo much time to develop content and FF pumps out new updates every 3 months. Learn Blizzard, they are doing it right.

It's not really East vs West.

Square Enix is a much larger company than Blizzard Entertainment. They have more than ten internal production divisions and farm development out to various subsidiary and external studios. They also publish print media like magazines and novels, and produce various forms of merchandise including toys, figures, clothes, and jewelery. They're even responsible for localizing and publishing many major Western titles (including Activision titles like Call of Duty and Diablo III) for the Japanese market.

Look at how many games Square Enix is going to release this year. Over 20, I'm sure, for platforms ranging from phone to console to PC to arcade. Blizzard is releasing at most two expansions and one game this year.

[Deleted]

Going to close this, we don't allow game v game threads and the purpose of this one doesn't seem constructive.