BFA subs, and someone's probably getting fired

[Super Dickmann]

weakauras has 45mill downloads. Now thats obviously not unique players, but 850k is very possible in my eyes.

Their October downloads are at 780k, which if we assume all are unique does make that more plausible. Blows my mind since most people I meet don't use addons in the first place.

[Deleted]

Yeah, no.. For when Blizzard makes it harder, a large group of people starts whining.

yea but today its easy beyond belief, to the point where its actually pointless.

[Mixxy]

weakauras has 45mill downloads. Now thats obviously not unique players, but 850k is very possible in my eyes.

Keep in mind that every WeakAuras update counts as a new download.

[Mardux]

Wasn't it "leaked" last month that there were around 3.5M subs? Then someone with an inkling of brainpower pointed out that the "leak" explicitly said that number was for western subs only...

[Gorsameth]

Funny didnt happen to TBC and WOTLK so how every expansion? Those spikes you talk about started with MoP. And if game have problem to retain players why Blizz do not target this issue? Sure there are drop offs. But why?

Because WoW is not 3 years old anymore. Its old and there is such a thing as product lifecycle.

Anyone that thinks WoW should be as popular as it was 8 years ago if only Blizzard did X or Y is an idiot.

[Lochton]

Would you care to cite some evidence to support your belief? No?

..I wonder why not?

To be honest. A Data leak through the API isn't much evidence either if we don't know the total anyways.

I mean, huge news to see the number so low but we don't know about factors. This is why Blizzard after all runs in quarter periods.

[Super Dickmann]

Wasn't it "leaked" last month that there were around 3.5M subs? Then someone with an inkling of brainpower pointed out that the "leak" explicitly said that number was for western subs only...

Did it have pictures attached? Because so far the only word we have that this happened is the WeakAuras tweet claiming that someone else showed that it did but it's now deleted.

[Kwaai]

From further down in the thread:

the original post with those findings has since been deleted, not sure if because Blizzard threatened to sue or because it was false data.

keep that in mind before spreading this as a fact. Just because something ended up being written on the internet, does not mean it's true.

[regarding type of sub] sadly not, as I said, the original post has since been deleted so we won't be able to tell if this was false data or made up.

[regarding whether or not china was included] yeah probably without China

lol

[Lochton]

yea but today its easy beyond belief, to the point where its actually pointless.

Yes, but look back to Legion, when Blizzard activated the scaling too early. Didn't take long for people to cry out bitching.

[Darknessvamp]

Pretty sure falsely reporting sales figures on earnings calls would land them in significant hot water once the bean counters started adding things up. Investors tend not to like being fibbed to about money matters.

They don't report active sub numbers anymore so how would that be lying? They use unique online activity or whatever the acronym is when they communicate player activity to their shareholders which don't actually care what that figure is and want to only know how much money is being made overall. Which is why they like to talk about the store sales both in and outside game a lot.

Also to everyone saying it's bs because of the WA users being 50% of the playerbase, I'm guessing he's basing that on the number of times that the WA Addon has been downloaded and presumably installed and is comparing it to the active sub numbers they gathered from the battle.net client. I don't think it was 100% serious.

[Raven]

Keep in mind that every WeakAuras update counts as a new download.

And those are numbers from the day it was added and it was added like back in 2013.

And even hardcoded api stuff that players can´t touch dont communicate betwen regions so no, no way that those are all the sub numbers.

[Lochton]

From further down in the thread:



lol

Thank you for including ^^

[unbound]

No? The same as every other expansion, a big spike at launch. a big drop shortly after and then roughly stable or slowly dropping until the next expansion. So if its 1.7mil now I would guess 1.5 mil in 6 months.

Yes and no.

Same as the past 4 expansions in overall trend, but the 50% drop this quick is new, and the starting number is much lower (so there wasn't as much excitement for BfA even at launch despite the PR Blizz tried pushing).

Also, from an overall trend, the OP is more accurate than you think. Subs were (supposedly) as high as 12.5 million back in Wrath / early Cata (supposedly because if you look at the financials at that time, revenue didn't match the concept of 12.5 million, closer to about 9 million at that time at best). If they really are down below 2 million subs, then Blizz may very well be looking to scrap WoW in the next few years (they may try one last hoorah expansion). They have other properties that likely make a lot more money for them than WoW if the subscriptions are heading to sub-1 million in a few more years (perhaps even before the end of this expansion).

[Laqweeta]

Literally impossible, because BFA's launch sales were 3.4 mil just on one day, so for the subscriptions at launch to be 3.2mil 200k people who bought the game would have to be sub-less and that's without preorders and so on.

You people are so stupid I can't.

3.4M was over a period of 6 months.

[stripesrus]

Because WoW is not 3 years old anymore. Its old and there is such a thing as product lifecycle.

Anyone that thinks WoW should be as popular as it was 8 years ago if only Blizzard did X or Y is an idiot.

Each expansion is essentially a different game. What you said is like saying "GTA was a 16 year old game so GTA5 should fail badly".

[Ariktu]

Likely a single region like the US, but it does explain the recent reactions to problems in the game and how fast they seem to be trying to fix them or at least tell us they are aware of them.

The free mount for 6 months of sub time was pretty strange promo as early as it was in the life cycle of the expansion so it makes the numbers real believable.

[tru]

Gold is still subscription, but it could be just Americans.

As a pure sub number maybe....but if I have gold and buy time they only made money from the person that purchased the token.

Which as low as the gold amount is I can't imagine they are selling a lot of tokens now. I sure wouldn't buy one for what 110k gold.

[Uncle]

Sounds fishy. And IF it is true, then, well, it is no surprising, the very idea of Bfa from the beginning was stupid.

[Super Dickmann]

From further down in the thread:



lol

So let me get this straight. What we're discussing is WeakAuras saying that someone else told them that a third someone said that there was a leak regarding the numbers, with no specificity and no picture that either the second or third party even exist?

You people are so stupid I can't.

3.4M was over a period of 6 months.

Okay, and? That doesn't dispute the point made about how many people bought it and were playing it and assumes no purchases happened after the fact. Mists sold 2.7mil but at its lowest it had 7 million, so clearly further people purchased it after the fact.

[Laqweeta]

Yes and no.

Same as the past 4 expansions in overall trend, but the 50% drop this quick is new, and the starting number is much lower (so there wasn't as much excitement for BfA even at launch despite the PR Blizz tried pushing).

Also, from an overall trend, the OP is more accurate than you think. Subs were (supposedly) as high as 12.5 million back in Wrath / early Cata (supposedly because if you look at the financials at that time, revenue didn't match the concept of 12.5 million, closer to about 9 million at that time at best). If they really are down below 2 million subs, then Blizz may very well be looking to scrap WoW in the next few years (they may try one last hoorah expansion). They have other properties that likely make a lot more money for them than WoW if the subscriptions are heading to sub-1 million in a few more years (perhaps even before the end of this expansion).

Perhaps it's time to start listening to the player base then