Thought provoking facts

[Deleted]

If you c.b.a. to read this just skip to the big bold part at the end.
square brackets with a number in them, like [5], I use to point to a source. Just look for the number at the end of the post if you want to check my sources.

So, anyway.

I recently quit WoW some time ago and I was thinking the other day.

I paid them loads of money.

About $1000 (calculated over 6 years, $13 / month + some char transfers and stuff).
And thats just the monthly cost (+extra). Add to that $200 to buy the games/expansions.

This got me thinking about how much money they actually make.

For the sake of easy calculations I'm going to calculate from 10 million [1] subscribers (and thats low)

Did you know that if ~1/10th of all the subscribers bought Celestial steed that thing only made them $25 millon [2].
It probably took one guy about a week or two to actually make the mount (considering the animations is more or less a copy from hippogriffs afaik)
Same thing can be said about the rest of the things in the store, mostly downscaled models with old animations.

ICC was released 8 Dec 2009 [3]. Cataclysm was released (the shattering) 23 Nov 2010 [3]. Thats 11 month and 15 days (11.5 month).
During the almost the same timespan back in vanilla they did manage to release 3 major, 2 minor raids and 4 world bosses. (And they made much less money)

• Blackwing lair, 12 July 2005.
• Zul'gurub (also Arathi Basin), 13 September 2005
• 4 dragons of nightmare, 10 October 2005
• Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj + Temple of Ahn'Qiraj, 3 January 2006
• Naxxramas, 20 June 2006

And for some reference, TBC was released just over 6 month later, 5 December 2006
[3]
Assuming the avarage person pays $13 / month (cheapest subscription) they make $130,000,000 or $130 million evey month.

This is $1,495,000,000 ($1,495 Million or $1.495 Billion) between the release of ICC and Cataclysm where they released
virtually no new content (I'm going to assume that Ruby Sanctum was more or less finished by the time ICC came)

In the last 12 month, blizzard has had a revenue of $4,768 Million [4]. They have 7600 Employees [4]. Thats $627400 per employee. [4]

Thay've had a net income (pure profit) of $656 million [4] during that period (about 13.7% or total revenue).

Thats just about $21 per second.

This is ofcourse revenue from all their games (SC2, WoW, WC3, ect) but if we apply those 13.7% on the subscription revenue ($1,495 million) we get about $205 million.

Thats about 2/3rds of what it cost to make Star Wars: The Old Republic[5]. Thats a whole new game!

So..

Do you think that Cataclysm was a $205+ million expansion? :)

I reserve myself from any spelling/grammatical errors as english is not my first language. I also want to point out that number without citation is estimated
I have cited my sources and nothing I say is made up. Thus i will ignore all trolls and flameposts :)

Sources:
[1] Wow subscribers

[2] Celestial steed cost $25

[3] Patch dates

[4] Blizzard budget data

[5] SW:TOR delevoping costs

[Aydinx2]

We all know Blizzard has more money then some 3rd world countries.

[Deleted]

You are comparing a long time developing game with a new game. I don't get it. Besides vanity pets/mounts are for people who want/can buy them...it's vanity, not a necessity.

[Deleted]

No, I compared how much money blizzard made last 12 month from subscriptions with how much it cost to make SW:TOR

[Deleted]

No, I compared how much money blizzard made last 12 month from subscriptions with how much it cost to make SW:TOR

I don't get your point.

[Narveid]

So what you mean to say is ... "Go study video game developing kids!"?

[Deleted]

I don't get your point.

They make a truckload of money.

[Twoflower]

I'd like to see proper numbers about subscription fees in asia.

...

[SufferingPlanet]

Additional things to consider: Apparently running a game server is free. There are no costs for storage of said servers as well as maintenance on the servers. The buildings the employees work in are completely free as is the electricity, heating, water, and any other luxury we, lesser people, have to pay for.
The Blizzard websites cost Blizzard nothing, and all the money is simply pooled in a huge room so the employees may dive in and swim like Scrooge McDuck, as none of it is used to develop existing or future projects [StarCraft 2 was made by little fairies, and Diablo 3 is made from the souls of children who lose ladder matches in Korea].

[Sym]

I don't get your point.

He's basically asking if Blizzard are being tight. With the money they got, another company could almost develop an entire new game, whereas Blizzard gives us a few content patches.

[Niter]

The numbers the OP provided are not exactly right, since payment varies greatly by region, and Asian markets do not pay the same amount as Europe and North America, for instance. It is very hard to make assumptions like that. Even though the numbers are definitely off, they are still big no matter how we look at them.

Having said that, yes, Blizzard is monetising WoW, and has been for a long time now. Cataclysm was mostly a rip-off, in my opinion, since what we got for the amount we paid pales in comparison to the previous expansions. It is the most over-priced Blizzard title ever created, I would say. I do believe Cataclysm could have costed a lot less than 10 millions in development.

So no, Cataclysm was not worth the money.

[Kisho]

It's always fun when people twist the numbers to support their misguided point. I'm not going to bother getting into any sort of argument, but there is one thing I'd like to mention: Blizzcon. Blizzard run this convention at a loss. They actively lose money every year they do it. But do they stop? Hell no! They know the players love Blizzcon, and they love doing it.

So some of that 'pure profit' isn't quite as cut and dry as you may think.

[Dethknell68]

It's a pretty crazy amount, but they also make amazing games and try to keep Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo all up to date as well as all their hardware. I think it'd be awesome to at least donate a little bit more of that profit to charity though ><

[Pull My Finger]

Do you think that Cataclysm was a $205+ million expansion?

What do you mean by that?

[Deleted]

They make a truckload of money.

isn't that like....a good thing?

[Niter]

It's always fun when people twist the numbers to support their misguided point. I'm not going to bother getting into any sort of argument, but there is one thing I'd like to mention: Blizzcon. Blizzard run this convention at a loss. They actively lose money every year they do it. But do they stop? Hell no! They know the players love Blizzcon, and they love doing it.

So some of that 'pure profit' isn't quite as cut and dry as you may think.

I am sorry, but this is laughable.

Even if they did not even break even considering tickets, merchandise and stuff like that (and I think it is actually profitable for Blizz), it is a very powerful marketing strategy. Even if they did not make money directly, the exposure, the attention and all that is very significant.

Make no mistake, friend, they might not skin people for money, but Blizzard still are a company focused on profits. No company would do such a thing to lose money.

[Kisho]

It's a pretty crazy amount, but they also make amazing games and try to keep Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo all up to date as well as all their hardware. I think it'd be awesome to at least donate a little bit more of that profit to charity though ><

They've already done way more than most companies do for charities. Cenarion Hippogryph and the Pandaren Monk in particular were brilliant ways of getting players to donate thousands, even millions. Of course that money didn't come directly from Blizzard, but they don't really need to shout about what they do for charity. They do more than enough already, they don't need the good PR from saying 'LOOK AT US DONATING ALL THIS MONIES AREN'T WE SO AWESOME'.

[palladish]

I've thought about this a few times myself never actually bothered to calculate anything but yeah, what really ticks me is the fact any time someone brings this up on the forums they always say how they have the employees to pay blah blah they don't get as much extra as you think or something a long those lines and then /threadlock

[phyrix]

It's a pretty crazy amount, but they also make amazing games and try to keep Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo all up to date as well as all their hardware. I think it'd be awesome to at least donate a little bit more of that profit to charity though ><

How about their most recent action of selling the old WoW bladeservers?

If I'm not mistaken they're selling 2000 blades. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they gathered at least a million dollars with that, possibly even more.

I think that's pretty impressive.

[Thunderball]

They've already done way more than most companies do for charities. Cenarion Hippogryph and the Pandaren Monk in particular were brilliant ways of getting players to donate thousands, even millions. Of course that money didn't come directly from Blizzard, but they don't really need to shout about what they do for charity. They do more than enough already, they don't need the good PR from saying 'LOOK AT US DONATING ALL THIS MONIES AREN'T WE SO AWESOME'.

Do you actually believe that? You are pathetic if you do.

Infracted. Play nice.