1.3 million sub drop

[Deleted]

They lost subs during a quarter, with different reasons over the other. You can't sit there and say WoW is dying without any hard evidence. It didn't drop below 1mil subs overall, so it my eyes it looks like it's still pretty strong.

Lol.What evidence more do you need then 1.3m mil players lost in 3 months.
Dying and dead are 2 different things.Wow is not dead,but sure as hell is dying,at fast rate.

[Deleted]

WoW feels different than before. I think the game is in a better state than it has been in years, but yet I've never been so close to quitting. When my subscription ended last month, I started paying per month instead of per half year, just in case - even though I feel like Blizzard is doing a fantastic job right now. They're bringing out new content faster than ever before, I don't even mind doing all the dailies of the smaller patches for the first few weeks (and after that I'll just cap with dungeons or the occassional daily run) and I've never raided as actively as I'm doing now, and enjoying it. And yet I feel like I could unsub at any given moment. No idea if that's the same for anyone else, I just felt like writing down how I feel about all this, but maybe I'm not alone in this and it might actually be an explanation for this.

[hyphnos]

Morhaime just said next content update (i.e, 5.3) will be "later this month".

Which will probably get pushed to early June so that anyone coming back for 5.3 will be subbed at the end of q2.

[Jtbrig7390]

4th spec and vanilla player model upgrade will bring back players for the next expansion. Demon Hunters and a Burning Legion expansion will probably push the subs back over 12 million again.

Sorry but no its dam near a fact that wow will not reach 12 million subs again.

As I already stated blizzard themselves have said that the subs will be lower then they are now by the end of MOP.

[Deleted]

That's the attitude of a beaten housewife that stays with the husband.

This man speaks the truth.

Spot on.
+1

[Ragashii]

Just because wow has the highs sub count dose not mean they put out the best content.

that is like saying mcdonalds has the best food because they have served over 20 billion people.

Right, more content doesn't mean it's what people want. It's like serving someone a dish they can't stand. In that case it would be better to let them be hungry if that's all you have.

[Glorious Leader]

True, but things like electricity have gone up as well. Wonder what it takes to run all those servers, keep them cool and dry etc. Bet it's gone up with inflation :P

Probably actually less. The cost of running servers has gone down partially because of effeciencies by the technology in terms of power utilization.

[bionics]

Can we chalk this up to apathy towards the in-game storyline and what's going on or people simply becoming disenchanted with a nearly decade old game?

Does Blizzard have to reconsider some of the decisions they've been making and take a different approach?

[Glorious Leader]

Right, more content doesn't mean it's what people want. It's like serving someone a dish they can't stand. In that case it would be better to let them be hungry if that's all you have.

If it's shitty dailies that's the case. Or one massive over tuned bloated loot table raid tier every 6 months. Would love a raid half the size of tot and a few dungeons instead. I think that would probably be a better compromise as opposed to shoving everybody into lfr and saying NO MORE DUNGEONS SCREW YOU for the rest of the expansion.

[Deleted]

News flash the wow community is just as bad.

No, it isn't. Mobas have by a large margin the WORST communities in the history of games.

the 15$ a month dose not keep the trolls/asshats out of wow we just get a different set of them.

hell I have played many F2p/B2p mmo's that have a better community then wow. LOL's reason its shit is because of the style of the game itself with it being a PVP/MOBA game.

1. It does, we'd have way more of it was for free. Especially since people had less to lose.

2. You have played MMOs with a far smaller population. If 10% of the players are douchebags then you'd only have 10 in an environment where you meet 100 people and 1000 in an environment where you meet 10.000. And it's the negative experience that stay the most vivid and which we're going to remember.

That being said. Your advocation for F2P is disgusting. F2P MMOs are doing bad, very bad. Especially since they often run on a P2Win basis as there is no other viable option to make money with them. The same goes for many other F2P games. It's a game model that does not profit the players on the long run, it slows down new content, it shifts the focus to content they can squeeze money out of the players, it allows players with a bigger wallet to win simply buy bribing their way to victory and so on.

[nekobaka]

The higher-ups at Blizzard would do well to give that LOL presentation on toxic players a really thorough going over. Not all of it applies to World of Warcraft specifically but that presentation pointed up something that I've been saying for years. Community toxicity is a cancer that is eating away at what is supposed to be a social game. If the community gets better as the game gets smaller, it might be worth it speaking purely from a personal viewpoint.

Blizzard has always spoke of the idea that they like to educate their players where in practice they are on the negligent side with players having to be the active ones in finding out why their posts was moderated or what they did that got them banned. Blizzard tries to keep moderation very private which does nothing to educate other players as to what not to do and often times locks or deletes threads because of the actions of other posters and not that of the OP and a player would have to sent a ticket in which consumes human resources in order to get a reason for the moderation action. The moderation methods of Blizzard is mostly passive and effectively negligent from a company that likes to praise itself with good customer relations.

I am glad that other forums take an active roll in moderation where the members can learn from the mistakes of others and see trolls punished instead of seeing a thread or deletion that effectively censors the OP.

[Åmbulance]

Stop saying " they will come back, they always do" Newsflash WoW peaked around 11.5 million - 12 Million Subs, down to 8.3 million. Most aren't coming back, and there is an issue.

[Polygons]

If they'd merge all of the dying realms out there then maybe people would actually want to play.

My realm easily had 10-15 times the people back in Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King than it does now. It was amazing to play on. Now it's just dying a slow and painful death.

Killing 25 man didn't help either. Maybe they'll notice that the game's popularity actually decreased the longer that 10 mans were considered equal to 25 mans.

Pandas/Pokemon definitely didn't help kill it, that's stupid to say. Content is content.

I played on Blade's Edge in WotLK, those were some really good times until that server just kind of died. The time I played on there while it while it was still populated were the best times I've had on WoW. A lot of the fun I had there was due to 25 man raiding, so I agree that they need to bring back more incentive to do them over 10 mans.

It's really sad to see how dead it is today. I was in PAGAN and The Ethereal Walkers, good times.

[Fagatronics]

They pretty much have to do that because of inflation.
What cost $15 in 2004 would cost $18.04 in 2012.

Also, if you were to buy exactly the same products in 2012 and 2004,
they would cost you $15 and $12.33 respectively.
From the inflation calculator. In order to stay profitable because the sub fee has not kept up with inflation, they have to generate revenue in another way.

At the Q4 2005 they had 5.5 mil subs. The celestial steed was introduced as the first pay for mount in 2010 when subs were at an all time high of 12 mil. I think Blizz's logic was the game was so big that they tried to see what they could get away with by double dipping (making people pay for subs and vanity items) and it worked like a charm.

I remember people being outraged about this initially but now it's just the norm. I don't think they were as desperate for cash because of inflation. I think it's much simpler:

More money > Less money

[Jtbrig7390]

Does Blizzard have to reconsider some of the decisions they've been making and take a different approach?

There is one thing I feel is a must for blizzard to change

In my opinion: Blizzard needs to rework there sub system ether by lowering the cost to around 5$ or changing the f2p part of wow. make it work like how everquest1/2 run and I bet more people would start playing.

but right now there is more bang for peoples buck in other places some cost the same some is cheaper or just outright free.

so many f2p/b2p mmo's out there the point of paying for one each month just makes no sense unless your are so in love with the game you rather stay.

Like I said early'er there will not be a wow killer mmo all the mmo's are going it because the market has gotten so big over the past 4 years people have lots of choice's and as time go's on there will be even more choice's.

so now blizzard has to adept to this or close the doors and I highly dough they close the doors on there cash cow.

Also if people haven't notice this is the first time ever blizzard themselves stated that by the end of the xpac the sub count will be lower.

So I am kinda interested in what blizzard will do to fix this.

[Tharkkun]

I don't think GC (or the 'decision makers') have a goddamn clue about what's going on with their game. Look at GC's recent comments on twitter:
Anyone who can say that with a straight face, after the changes to talents and glyphs, is either delusional or incompetent.

I'm certain they know exactly what's going on. Competing against F2P games which are newer for roughly the same price is tough. Most of the US F2P games suck.

You know how I take that statement? The intent of letting you remake choices was never supposed to be "I can swap to anything at a moment's notice."

I read that as someone who had a great idea for the new talents, pitched it, designed it then someone above them made a decision that said "Give the players a way to change them easily and often." GC obviously doesn't agree 100% with how it was implemented as just like us he has a right to that opinion.

[Tomana]

From my point of view, Ghostcrawler should be replaced. He cares not about the players. I understand that nerfs and buffs have to be done, but have you ever seen his posts? "We feel that..." "We felt that..." "We're convinced..." "We do not..."... Where is the player's point of view?

What players? Players want everything and the opposite of it. Who are you gonna use as "point"?

[uopayroll]

And the other games wish they even had that many to lose...

[Vulcanasm]

If you're right - and I expect you are, given my own attempts at the revamped leveling content - how the hell does Blizz fix it? The amount of time and resources invested in the revamp arguable killed Cataclysm. They can't afford to do that again. Is Kotick's "we expect sub numbers to keep declining" an admission that they realize they've blown it with WoW and are just going to keep earning as much as they can with it while focusing on Titan? (Basically doing to WoW re: Titan what they did to late Cataclysm re: MoP?) Maybe they can introduce a way to skip the whole 1-60 (or 1-70?) leveling process for new players?

If it were me...(I realize I sound like Jerry Brown here)

I'd do two things.
* Make modernizing the graphics engine, and especially the character models, absolute 100% top developer priority. The graphics disparity, WoW vs. modern games, is a lethal wound in need of a tourniquet (then reconstructive surgery). This game compares to Skyrim like 80s TV cartoons vs. Hollywood CGI.
* Make the second priority a reversion to an open Azeroth. Two design principles: open quest flow and secrets to find. Pandaria did this marvelously. I'm still trying to do things like get the lobster claw. I feel Blizzard lost sight of the most fundamental design principle, here: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Specifically I'd revert, or re-design:
--The entire starting zones (lvl. 1-10) for Undead, Tauren, Night Elves, and Humans.
--Eastern Kingdoms: Arathi Highlands, Burning Steppes, Hillsbrad Foothills, Searing Gorge.
--Kalimdor: Feralas, Northern Barrens, Silithus, Tanaris, Thousand Needles, and Un'goro Crater.

[Aside: Thousand Needles is worst of the bunch, bar none.]

Other quest zones could use some quick redesign -- probably wouldn't take more than a couple weeks of review. Simply put, review all phasing and every quest chain. Change when each quest unlocks. Consider what's required before each quest appears. Ask "can this be done as a stand-alone and still make sense from a lore perspective?". Unless the answer is an emphatic "no", de-phase it and anything required to do it. [The problem with the old model wasn't phasing, it was "dead zone" levels with no appropriate quests! Phasing made that worse, not better!]

If that means people find themselves backtracking, so be it. One of the most immersive parts of Azeroth was its open world. I think the linearity and "closed world" feel of later MMOs is the main reason none produced the oft-vaunted WoW killer. If it's a rail-rider, people do a single play-through, then say "I win! All done! Heading back to Skyrim!"

Deciding what to keep vs. what to kill is no a place for egos or "artistes". If Cataclysm was your "vision", you took the wrong drugs. Full stop. End discussion.

[Aside: I take Kotick's statement as evidence for one thing. He's a simpering clod. "Bobby" is part of that self-appointed "CEO overcaste" in the United States whose sole contribution to Western civilization is running good companies into the ground, writing themselves "golden parachute" severance packages, and moving on to their next victims. They're basically a bunch of charismatic sociopaths. If they were D&D characters, they'd be Neutral Evil with 20 Cha and 6 Int. Furthermore, one of my real-life prejudices is that any male who still uses their name's diminutive ("Bobby","Billy", etc.) past age 25 is a fundamentally useless human being.]

[ThePlanckEnergy]

1) Raiding is harder than it has ever been. Far fewer people are raiding or having success with it (and perhaps those who stopped are not captivated by LFR... and who would be).

and much more important...

2) As well as I think the Pandaria storylines have played out and tied to the actual Raids and content... it has nothing really to do with past Warcraft games and established characters and lore from the books and RTS games. Once they go back to visit the Burning Legion and perhaps Azshara I think there will be a big upswing in subscriptions to see how that aspect of the story plays out.

Also, it is way way way way past time they completely segregated PvP and PvE and just balanced them entirely different. Make all the abilities due differing things or scale differently. Just make sure one has zero effect on the other. Only way to truly fix some of the broken classes (OP and UP).