I think it's time for Blizzard owns up to being "Responsible"

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

None of this has to do with "Responsibility" for anything?

Just say you want them to release sub numbers again because if it's low you'll quit, or already quit and just want to gloat.

No need to try wrapping yourself in some weird sense of righteousness about it.

[epigramx]

you want them to release sub numbers again because if it's low you'll quit

That's a bad argument if you generalize about it (unless you are talking specifically about the OP from a reply of his I do not know about).
A lot of people not only don't quit because of low popularity but they may keep playing precisely because of low popularity.
It's very common for many people to be contrarian and want to be into things that are not popular.

[Speedlance]

If it has 10mill subs or 100k, how does that affect you?

[Shadowferal]

Pretty sure if they had 10mil subs they'd be shouting that loud and proud everywhere.

[Chain Chungus]

The problem with MAUs is they don't measure engagement, just being logged in. Many people just log in the whole day long and sit there in the Covenant sanctum occasionally checking their mission table. It doesn't measure how much fun they are having at all. You might say, "Well, that's fine to them because they get your money either way!" But the truth is, it presents a false image of player satisfaction. They end up thinking everything is a-ok, don't invest effort to improve the game (or misallocate labor in the wrong places), and a big crash happens and they have to scramble.

Find some other way to measure player engagement, like how much content they are completing per week, how many alts are being created/leveled, how much active time vs idle time (like being afk) they have, etc. If any of those are too low, adjust development to cut problems off at the pass instead of waiting for them to fester.

[Mysterymask]

The problem with MAUs is they don't measure engagement, just being logged in. Many people just log in the whole day long and sit there in the Covenant sanctum occasionally checking their mission table. It doesn't measure how much fun they are having at all. You might say, "Well, that's fine to them because they get your money either way!" But the truth is, it presents a false image of player satisfaction.

Find some other way to measure player engagement, like how much content they are completing per week, how many alts are being created/leveled, how much active time vs idle time (like being afk) they have, etc. If any of those are too low, adjust development to cut problems off at the pass instead of waiting for them to fester.

I mean if someone cares enough to log in and just do the mission table there is an idea they have at least a bit of satisfaction doing it. How is that different from someone who just logs in,does some gathering for 12 hours and logs off or someone who logs in and runs a brothel in Silvermoon staffed entirely by Vulperia. It's a theme park MMO if someone is paying the admission then who cares

[MoanaLisa]

This would only make sense if the sub numbers were still in freefall when they stopped. They were not, the last sub number count which happened at the same time they announced they were no longer doing sub numbers had only a very minor drop of a few thousand.

Activision bought King Software, makers of Candy Crush and some other things. At that point ATVI changed their financial reporting so that the same metrics were used across all of their divisions (because that only made sense since it was all of ATVI that was of interest in those calls). Those metrics by the way, Monthly Active Users and the rest, are industry standards which allow stock analysts and investment advisors to compare across companies in this market space.

That’s not as sexy as other explanations but subscriptions became more or less meaningless for financial reporting at around that time. Blizzard’s revenue streams were spreading out with the token and subscriptions to WoW didn’t say anything at all about Overwatch, Diablo or Hearthstone. In addition, WoW's subscriptions had been falling for several years so if they were afraid of that sort of bad news I would think they would have halted that during Cataclysm (they didn't).

Yawn, but that’s how business works. Standard metrics are used and elimination of data that doesn’t convey anything truly meaningful to the market. Sure, it was a convenient time to stop reporting them. They had no real competition at the time and what there was didn’t report active subscriptions either. Apparently the only people who really cared about it were those who wanted a talking point to start forum fights.

- - - Updated - - -

The problem with MAUs is they don't measure engagement, just being logged in.

Nielsen ratings for television and Arbitron ratings for radio never measured whether people were watching or listening, just whether or not they were tuned in. For that matter subscriptions didn’t truly convey engagement either. Someone could play a lot or not so much or at all. I imagine that Activision/Blizzard has lots of other engagement metrics but keep them proprietary because they don’t provide any useful FINANCIAL information.

[Zantera]

They stopped giving out sub numbers because they ridiculed themselves. They spent years and years spamming their propaganda "we have 10 million subs!1" and when the numbers dropped like a rock after the big peak of TBC and WotLK they had to do something or their own marketing would hurt them.

I'm sure a lot of people will defend them because they believe the lies of marketing ("it's not only about the subs!") but it is clear that's why they did it because there's no other explanation about it and before they thought they had to do it they already sold other services anyway (e.g. expensive transfers).

Is this really any different than how any other company market themselves though? It's like you have that Pizza place that focus on "voted best pizza place in the city 2018" but they don't mention anything about being #7 in 2019 or #16 in 2020. When WoW was still fairly new and at the height of its popularity, I fully understand why they would push the 'look how many players we have' angle, but 10 years later down the line, no matter how good or bad the game is, you won't have that same number.

You can call it them hiding their numbers to be shady or whatever but I don't think there's many companies out there that would openly showcase average numbers. Everyone wants to look good.

[Michael Dark]

We deserve to know if a game we plan on investing time and money has an actual future. There are other games like Warcraft out there. MMO games are the most time consuming and expensive ones. We should make a choice based on facts. They have no reason to hide the numbers. If they are planning to ditch the game, we have to know. Subscription numbers say a lot.

[kranur]

Since I don't plan to invest in Blizzard, having that info has no relevancr to me.

If I enjoy the game and there are enough people to play with, I'll play. If not, I won't. Makes no difference if there are 1 million or 100 million players.

[lolmmofuture]

theyre too scared to do it lol its obvious

whether u like it or not, sub numbers does influence a players perception on the health of the game. No one wants to play a game thats declining, ESPCIALLY an mmo since those gams thrive on playerbases.

but alas here we are

[Cosmic Janitor]

Too bad there is no "IDGAF" option in the poll, that being said, If I hd to pick then I'd sure like to know the numbers so that the twits with their imaginary 8 million concurrent players right now get a big fat reality check. More info is always preferable.

[Dracullus]

Yeah, theh should show sub numbers just like competition!

Oh wait, no one does that.

[VinceVega]

Funny how the first assumption is that WoW is only losing subs and never showing an uptick for healthy changes or new content. Stakeholders are not only the investors, it also includes the player-base and employees.

Transparency would invite a healthy and sensible discussion backed up with numbers when it comes to the game. Honesty and transparency are the first steps to accountability.

I urge players to tally all the /played across their characters and add up how much they paid subs since they started playing WoW and see if they don't have a stake in the health and growth of this game.

There is no healthy discussion in internet forums... never seen one honestly.
Everyone just want their own opinion validated and that is that. Echo chambers everywhere. Good and bad.

Sure i am interested in sub numbers. But be real: Do you think Blizzard cares about that? They care about investment returned like every other MMO or game since the introduction of MTX. They are a next to useless metric for them. 1000 people leave? So what. We got that one guy who spends more money on the game than all of those combined.
Granted it is a bit more difficult in wow as there are not that many things you can buy and even gold is useless at some point.

But still. If they puplish them again we will all se that subs are down. What is the use of seeing that? Confirming what we know. Subs are down great. But there will be poeple who use this information to rile up people to quit the game because: "Look subs are down game si dead rip blizz *droolsonkeyboard*"

Blizz does not sit there it tries to look for ways to deliberatly make subs and earning less. They try. Some works. Soem doesn't. If it gets really bad they produce stuff like 9.1.5. And maybe when shit hits the fan really hard they think about hteir design and try to change. Which i honestly think is what is happening now. Not in SL anymore. That boat sailed. They lost nearly every big content creater they had left now. Publicity is worse than ever. And they know it.
Knowing the numbers won't do anyone any good. It is just pouring fuel into the fire.

[Mysterymask]

Too bad there is no "IDGAF" option in the poll, that being said, If I hd to pick then I'd sure like to know the numbers so that the twits with their imaginary 8 million concurrent players right now get a big fat reality check. More info is always preferable.

Yeah cause if it shows higher than expected it's either "Blizz is lying", "Flies are attracted to shit", "It's mostly China", or "Its all bots and multiboxers". However if it was lower then it's "SEE WOW IS DYING I AM VALIDATED BLIZZ WILL SHUT THIS DOWN ANY MOMENT YOU'LL SEE"

[MoanaLisa]

theyre too scared to do it lol its obvious

whether u like it or not, sub numbers does influence a players perception on the health of the game. No one wants to play a game thats declining, ESPCIALLY an mmo since those gams thrive on playerbases.

but alas here we are

OK. How do you know with other MMO's? I'm genuinely curious because none of them report anything but user accounts created which doesn't tell you anything at all. No one is publishing active subscribers so how do you personally decide?

[Osmeric]

I'd like them to release sub numbers, but I can't construct an argument to say that they should release sub numbers.

[Keristrasza]

I do not believe they should show their sub numbers at all. If someone's "informed" decisions are based solely on subscription numbers and not how a person is personally affected by the current state of the game (IE: They are bored, it is not up to their standards, or somehow they are the only living soul on their server.) Then they deserve to waste their time and money.

[lolmmofuture]

OK. How do you know with other MMO's? I'm genuinely curious because none of them report anything but user accounts created which doesn't tell you anything at all. No one is publishing active subscribers so how do you personally decide?

well i dont, but i know theyre not the number one mmo, thats for sure. numbers isnt solely what decides what mmo i play, but it does decide what mmo i stay with.

[MoanaLisa]

They stopped giving out sub numbers because they ridiculed themselves. They spent years and years spamming their propaganda "we have 10 million subs!1" and when the numbers dropped like a rock after the big peak of TBC and WotLK they had to do something or their own marketing would hurt them.

Well, one thing isn’t a lie: They didn’t drop subscriptions from their financial reporting until late in 2015. Legion had already been announced at that point. That’s a long time after Wrath. Five years in fact.