PTR Build 13162, WoW reaches 12M Players, Authenticator Changes

next year and with cata release I bet will more then 13 mil

But 12 millions doing what? some servers are badly in need of merge and the reeason we got cross realm lfg was because numbers were at it worst. Beta servers are ghost towns, or at least is what a friend who also got beta invite told me. The last time blizzard spoke of a new milestone in terms of subscription was about 3 months before realasing WoTLK, so I don't buy it, not when what you read is not what you get in live serves, probably they meant 2 millions not 12.

Originally Posted by neatlynx

The only problem is Mark Twain said "The report of my death was an exaggeration"

So they were right with Rage Against, more's the pity

That's not how I remember it, but oh well. *shrug*

Originally Posted by Deathwee

You know with Blizzard making over 2 billion dollars a year just from player subscription fees you would think they could afford to forgoe only half a million dollars and just make the expac free.

Multiply your "half a million" figure by about 1000x (that makes half a billion, since you appear to be numerically challenged.) That's how much Cataclysm sales will actually be bringing in, unless I missed something and they're selling it for 4 cents per copy.

Let's see, 25% of your total annual revenue from services, all up front at once and on top of your regular revenue stream. Why would any business ever want that when they could instead make $0? Good point.

Originally Posted by Texar

I really wish people would read the entire article before they start posting nonsense.

Well done Blizzard 12 million players with more on the way come Cataclysm. 15 million subs inc in December, its gonna be a green coloured month for Blizzard.

We do all know why they reached 12 million right?

Asia plain and simple EU+NA have capped out for the most part right now.

Originally Posted by lios

Gah, can't you read or something? It says right there in the press release which accounts are counted. They only include accounts with an active sub (or gametime). Not banned accounts or expired trials. Ofcourse they will count people with 5 accounts as 5 players, but that's inevitable. Still, there aren't that many multiboxers.

Like a company has never "fudged" anything ever.

Didn't want to make a new thread of this, and I know its not related to this particular news post. But Blizzard has changed their guild member cap from 600 to 1000.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...26480920&sid=1

Originally Posted by smrund

Except that XboxLive service is a multi-purpose service. You can download games, music, movies, buy accessories, and play hundreds of thousands of different games. World of Warcraft is a single service, a single game. If all 20 million XboxLive subscrivers ONLY played Halo, then yeah, these numbers would be comparable. Otherwise it's like saying KFC sells more food than a school bake sale, the context is totally wrong.

Got curious about something and thought you would like to read this:
http://www.bungie.net/News/content.aspx?cid=28805

Even if you only limited say the xbox live (and this is not including the microsoft live games) a typical usage for gaming is enormous. The market for a crossover game is certainly there. There are "supposed" to be a few games working on it, but if that will ever happen? I doubt it to be honest. Maybe I could see it for the ps3. I think microsoft is way to into setting themselves up as the "COMPLETE" electronic entertainment center. WIth movies/music on demand etc.

You could say "well yeah, halo reach used in the above example is a fps. It has a much bigger audience than mmorpgs do and sure it will have a bigger player base." I agree, but then why would fable 1 and 2 still be so high on the xbox live activity charts per week.

For those that don't know why we are discussing this in a WoW thread about their subs, it's just a discussion really about the explosive growth of entertainment. Movies are falling a bit in income because more people would rather pay 15$ to play online with friends. If that is through the xbox/pc or through WoW. Which is pc, but it's not comparable to say microsoft live games.

Originally Posted by Leonora

It is a milestone, but the milestone comes much later than we once expected, and most likely also much later than Blizzard hoped. Is the game reaching its natural population maximum or is WotLK less appealing than Blizzard aimed it to be?

I am not unable to, I was too lazy. But I just typed in 'growth of wow'; take the link with 'Analyzing WoW's growth by the numbers' and note that we indeed have reached a plateau since 2008. If you do not share with me the interest in the observation that the attempt of Blizzard to make wow more casual-friendly actually seems to have lead to a plateau instead of the in that link projected further grow... then I cant help it . I find it enormously interesting, since it goes against the implications Blizzard made end BC that their new policies would work better than making a game that strongly caters to the hardcore raiders.

As others stated, most likely, trading authorities would be very strict with Blizzard if it ever appeared that they played with the actual numbers. So I would stop doubting the numbers. However, I find the discussion on the numbers logical since people wonder what the spin is Blizzard wants to give - and I think the spin may very well be what I referred to. Food for thought.

Well there are things you aren't taking into account either. Face it free mmo's, games like gw where you pay for the game and that's it, and microtransaction games are picking up speed.
1. current market, people may not like to admit it but the U.S. at least is in some serious financial trouble.
2. Length of time. If you started playing say in highschool in when wow launched there is a real chance you are in college now and might be too busy to play.
3. the numbers aren't calculating how many have been around since day 1, versus new players. MMOs just have a limited market, and they are all trying to get at that limited market.
4. people may not want to believe it, but WoW does have competition. It's a simple fact. There are other mmos, and there are single player games that mix some of that. (take fable 2 for example, but also look at the huge success of things like the halo franchise)
5. social stigma associated with wow. Let's face it, we've all heard about the idiot that left his wife and kids to play wow, or the guy who went crazy and never left his home etc. Some people do listen to those things when making a choice of what to buy.
6. There is also the change in blizzard as a company. They went from a company that really seemed to care about their players, to one that will make fun of them openly and tell them their feedback isn't wanted or needed.
7. WoW is an old game. Face it, by today's standards it is antique. The graphics alone compared to most games that are either out, or being produced will put people off.
8. The community has changed. When I first started reading the forums before wow launched things were different. People were nicer, but now things feel so elitist. If you don't do this on hard mode with less than 5 players in 25 you need to quit at life etc. When did the game devolve into a penis measuring contest? Yet that's what it has become. I told another user on these forums goto any other mmo forums where they discuss different games and not just wow. Read what they think about the community here. Even a mmo developer recently said they don't want the numbers of wow because that would bring in the elitist community of wow. (I will try to find a link)

Those are just 8,but my point is that you are trying to say "oh we don't have more numbers because of how blizz is trying to cater to casual players". You would be wrong, though that statement could fit into number 6. It's more likely a mixture of all of these, probably more number 1 than anything else. WoW has tons going for it, and it will continue to grow, but saying that it's slacked off because of things being easier is just more of number 8.

I assume this is the one you are referring to:
http://www.massively.com/2009/01/09/...y-the-numbers/

Scroll down that and read the first post. Also yours was a little misleading. If you look after the huge initial jump in growth you can see that from 06 to 07 growth slowed dramatically. It picked back up, but then slowed again, and this time kept slowing. They are talking in that article about wow reaching 13 million by the end of 09 but here we are near the end of 2010 and just now reaching 12 because of openings in the asian market.

Originally Posted by Alterno

But 12 millions doing what? some servers are badly in need of merge and the reeason we got cross realm lfg was because numbers were at it worst. Beta servers are ghost towns, or at least is what a friend who also got beta invite told me. The last time blizzard spoke of a new milestone in terms of subscription was about 3 months before realasing WoTLK, so I don't buy it, not when what you read is not what you get in live serves, probably they meant 2 millions not 12.

Beta servers are ghost towns because they aren't for playing they're for testing. And if you're not going to be testing then Blizz doesn't want you there. Sure, getting TONS of people in-game is a great stress test for the code, but that can be done on PTRs once the game itself is nearly finalized.

Also: server merges are death knells in MMOs, Blizz wouldn't do it even if a server had one player on it. Not to mention now is the worst time to take a pulse check of how many people are playing. Many people like myself have reached a point in the current content that with the upcoming release of Cata, we don't feel there's anything productive to be gained in playing high-end characters.

12 million ACTIVE accounts seems like a little much too me. I can't fight it because I'm not gonna count each one myself but I think a lot of those accounts must be fake, or placeholder accounts or something or possibly they are actually counting many frozen or deactivated accounts.

Although I guess the explanation of China makes sense.

I find it hard to believe that WoW account numbers are growing... In my personal experience I have found more people quitting the game rather than taking it up recently (myself included).

Counting American/Canadian accounts only I would expect falling numbers. people have put up with the same stale crap since ICC and many people don't want to fork out a subscription for the whole lot of crap they have been pissing out to tide us over. That and Blizzard seems to be more accessory-loving/money-grubbing/cheaper than ever with payed add-ons left and right (authenticator/mobile armory), needless money sucking only things like the pet store (at least the cards can stand on their own merit), and with small smay patches/useless 10 minute add-ons (RS-the new OS and the add nothing progressive Retaking of Echoisles/Gnomer) and brushing off promises like the Dance studio because they couldn't be bothered.

Although I obviously see a boost in accounts for Cataclysm (I myself will probably crawl back) I actually kinda hope WoW will pass it's hay-day after that because of the horrible motives the company has seemed to adopt with all its power.

Originally Posted by Ultimanium

This is what turns me off most from getting an authenticator.

It costs just shy of 20 bucks to get the damn thing to Canada. CANADA.

Dunno which part of Canada you live in but it cost me $6.50 and arrived in 2 days. I live in vancouver.

Originally Posted by Leonora

What you basically say is that you do think wow has reached its natural plateau. Maybe that is so - and there we both speculate since nobody knows - but for good order: I doubt it. But I bet Blizzard will not just accept that, so from their pov they still will try to get that ceiling up.

Yes, I think it has reached it's plateau, and I agree that nobody knows for sure why. I tend to think the first thing, economics, is a huge part of it. I have talked to so many that just say "it was either play wow or not eat for a few days a week". Now I don't think wow is overpriced for it's value, don't get me wrong. I think we are just in a bad state economically in the U.S.

I think they will try to get the ceiling up, I think a big part of that was the recent push into asia. They put lots of work into changing things just for their version of wow. So it's got to offer them something very hefty in return. Blizz isn't the kind of company to do something without a return, but then what money making company is?

I met a dude at the bar tonight who comment on my WoW hat. 2 minutes later, asian girls were sitting on me attempting to choke me with their tongue. I responded by getting their # and will continue monster pimping tomorrow night.

Discuss.

Originally Posted by Senaelanna

I met a dude at the bar tonight who comment on my WoW hat. 2 minutes later, asian girls were sitting on me attempting to choke me with their tongue. I responded by getting their # and will continue monster pimping tomorrow night.

Discuss.

I...must...resist.. GAH

Cool Story Bro!

I feel ashamed now

Originally Posted by lunaspike

I...must...resist.. GAH

Cool Story Bro!

I feel ashamed now

Don't be ashamed. Go out tomorrow. Make up for wasting your life playing wow. EZPZ!

Originally Posted by Senaelanna

I met a dude at the bar tonight who comment on my WoW hat. 2 minutes later, asian girls were sitting on me attempting to choke me with their tongue. I responded by getting their # and will continue monster pimping tomorrow night.

Discuss.

Fake stories are fun.

Originally Posted by Leonora

You misunderstand me. You speculate that they reached a plateau, I dont think they reached a plateau. I think they would do better if they made the game more challenging. But both of us speculate since none of us really knows.

Ah, sorry for the misunderstanding. I honestly don't know. From what I have seen cata will introduce more challenges, though I think the biggest one will be enormous queue times. I have to admit I get tired of certain instances being too easy. I like the level of difficulty in halls of reflection. What I am worried about is that they might go overboard and make stuff hard just for the sake of being hard, instead of trying to make it interesting and fun. I hope that makes sense.

Originally Posted by lunaspike

1. current market, people may not like to admit it but the U.S. at least is in some serious financial trouble.

You might want to replace US with global.

---------- Post added 2010-10-09 at 05:57 PM ----------

Originally Posted by lunaspike

I tend to think the first thing, economics, is a huge part of it. I have talked to so many that just say "it was either play wow or not eat for a few days a week".

Sorry but that example is terrible

Originally Posted by Falith

Uhm, why cant you just buy a normal authenticator?

Blizzard don't ship to some countries.

Originally Posted by Deathwee

You know with Blizzard making over 2 billion dollars a year just from player subscription fees you would think they could afford to forgoe only half a million dollars and just make the expac free.

Math fail.... it would be ~$480 million to make the expac "free." Half a billion dollars.

---------- Post added 2010-10-10 at 10:18 PM ----------

Originally Posted by lunaspike

Yes, I think it has reached it's plateau, and I agree that nobody knows for sure why. I tend to think the first thing, economics, is a huge part of it. I have talked to so many that just say "it was either play wow or not eat for a few days a week". Now I don't think wow is overpriced for it's value, don't get me wrong. I think we are just in a bad state economically in the U.S.

I think they will try to get the ceiling up, I think a big part of that was the recent push into asia. They put lots of work into changing things just for their version of wow. So it's got to offer them something very hefty in return. Blizz isn't the kind of company to do something without a return, but then what money making company is?

Um, a few days a week times ~4 weeks per month is 8-12 meals. Who the fuck can live off of literally $1-2 a day (in the US)? WoW costs $12 a month in bulk, $15 a month individually.

Your position is retarded. Entertainment spending goes up in a recession.