Activision Blizzard Q3 2021 Investor Call, Jen Oneal Leaving Blizzard

[Nize]

no you cant guarantee it... you can think it, and you might be right but you definitely cant guarantee it
still, if blizz lost massive amounts of players due to ass-grabbers the amount of people brought in by D2:R would have to be MASSIVELY larger than TBCC, is it possible? sure, is there any evidence? no, so at best its guess... i mean it might be right, but we simply cant tell, we can just assume

You're also forgetting the point that the more games that are out, the more MAUs there should be. A MAU last quarter could not count Diablo 2's MAUs. A MAU THIS quarter does also count TBCC's. More products should be driving up the MAUs by nature.

[RoKPaNda]

i'm curious how you came to the conclusion that *money earned* equates to *no players leaving*, if the remaining whales who are steadfast in their addiction to WoW keep spending, then very obviously the game will report the same or better figures for income over the period, i just can't wrap my head around how you equate ANY correlation between income to player numbers, it boggles my mind.

Did you just skim or what? Did you miss this part?

World of Warcraft is on track to deliver its strongest engagement and net bookings outside of a Modern expansion year in a decade.

That's player engagement, not money earned.

At this point it's painfully obvious that the whole mass exodus to FFXIV from WoW never happened.

[crusadernero]

"World of Warcraft is on track to deliver its strongest engagement and net bookings outside of a Modern expansion year in a decade."

And yet...during PEAK hours, legit no ones playing, LFG is one scroll to bottom, lmao seems like padded numbers to me.

nah. they are making money from wow, they dont say alot of people play it daily. Theres a difference. Its 2021 now, alot of player engagement in a MMORPG is not first priority anymore. They need enough players buying the stuff they have to sell, thats it.

[exochaft]

We're talking about WoW. According to this investor call WoW is performing VERY well. We were promised that a mass exodus is happening in WoW and that was obviously a lie.

That's not what the call said, as the phrasing and verbiage used is very important. If you go over everything, there is zero affirmation that things are going well. It's like the difference between saying "We have an increase in X" versus "We are seeing trends towards X increasing"... the former is an affirmation of an increase; the later is ambiguity that could be taken either way but expressed in a way that gives off the impression that something good is happening. Yes, you cannot lie during these calls, but you can absolutely play word games and twist definitions and verbiage to leave things ambiguous enough that even if you are having a bad time, it may sound like a good time. You can even notice the different in phrasing that they use between properties like COD and Blizz, it's night and day.

If anything, having MAU's stagnate despite the release of D2:R, the Hearthstone expansion, and all the cross-promotional play is extremely telling that Blizz has lost MAU's somewhere. It's not hard to see why Blizz was pressing cross-promotional play, as it boosts MAU's even if the actual engagement is not consistent or just disappears. Overall, breaking even is very bad, which is why the language used for the Blizz properties (especially WoW) is insanely evasive and non-committal. If everything was point towards a good direction, ActiBlizz would absolutely be parading such success exactly because of everything else going on within their company.

[Armael]

Hey, look. All the people that quit WoW, but still post here about dead game, etc. couldn't have been more wrong! LMAO

[Saltysquidoon]

We're talking about WoW. According to this investor call WoW is performing VERY well. We were promised that a mass exodus is happening in WoW and that was obviously a lie.

So Wow is not one (well it's technically two now when it looks good for blizzards metrics to define it as two) of blizzards games?
Further, 'reach' and 'engagement are inhouse soft-defined marketing buzzwords that mean whatever the firm blizzard hires to gussy up investor calls needs them too.
The only unambiguously positive thing they said about wow is net bookings are up, which is in of itself intentionally ambiguous so as to (intentionally and knowingly) obfuscate the player to whale ratio.

Now let me stop you before you start skwarking about the 'mass exodus' like that was ever my point or I ever even contested it. It's immaterial to me if wow has 10 players or 10 million players. The only reason I see edgy doomers as preferable to your position is at least they aren't lapping post-truth corporate propaganda from a company that made $493M like anything about that sentance I just typed contains positive information.

[MoanaLisa]

At this point it's painfully obvious that the whole mass exodus to FFXIV from WoW never happened.

I thought that was overblown. Of course a lot of people are going to take a lull in WoW content to go explore something else when their 'trial' is expanded to F2P for everything except the current expansion. Unless you buy into the theory that everyone only plays one MMO at a time—I don't, especially in this case—lots of people likely went over for a look. Some liked it, some didn't, others are still dinking around in it because it's relatively free (with a giant store for both F2P trials AND subscribers). It doesn't necessarily mean they cancelled their subscription to WoW. Some did, some didn't.

[crusadernero]

Did you just skim or what? Did you miss this part?

That's player engagement, not money earned.

At this point it's painfully obvious that the whole mass exodus to FFXIV from WoW never happened.

Im sure less people play the game now than in say february, but its certainly not die.

It might be a clear sign that we who hang out on fansites(like mmochamp) sometimes live in a echochamber. We read & hear about negative wow stuff everyday, after a while you start thinking "yes, yes. The game is actually dead".

Fact is - most people dont give a shit. They just play games they enjoy. I would bet ALOT of people have no idea whats been going on at Blizzard in 2021.

Theres lots of games I play every week and wow is the only game I actually follow beyond playing it. I have no idea whatsoever whats going on at the company that made AC: Vikings, Metro 2033 and more(cant even remeber company names of other games). I invested a little time into NW beyond playing, but im done with the whole game lol.

Point is - the masses of peopled dont jump unto forums and all. They just play videogames and move on

[RoKPaNda]

That's not what the call said, as the phrasing and verbiage used is very important. If you go over everything, there is zero affirmation that things are going well. It's like the difference between saying "We have an increase in X" versus "We are seeing trends towards X increasing"... the former is an affirmation of an increase; the later is ambiguity that could be taken either way but expressed in a way that gives off the impression that something good is happening. Yes, you cannot lie during these calls, but you can absolutely play word games and twist definitions and verbiage to leave things ambiguous enough that even if you are having a bad time, it may sound like a good time. You can even notice the different in phrasing that they use between properties like COD and Blizz, it's night and day.

If anything, having MAU's stagnate despite the release of D2:R, the Hearthstone expansion, and all the cross-promotional play is extremely telling that Blizz has lost MAU's somewhere. It's not hard to see why Blizz was pressing cross-promotional play, as it boosts MAU's even if the actual engagement is not consistent or just disappears. Overall, breaking even is very bad, which is why the language used for the Blizz properties (especially WoW) is insanely evasive and non-committal. If everything was point towards a good direction, ActiBlizz would absolutely be parading such success exactly because of everything else going on within their company.

Actually you're wrong, let me direct you to this quote:

World of Warcraft is on track to deliver its strongest engagement and net bookings outside of a Modern expansion year in a decade.

What that quote means is that everything else Blizzard related aside WoW's engagement metrics are very good. Mass exodus from WoW never happened, sorry to disappoint the doomsayers.

[Lolites]

You're also forgetting the point that the more games that are out, the more MAUs there should be. A MAU last quarter could not count Diablo 2's MAUs. A MAU THIS quarter does also count TBCC's. More products should be driving up the MAUs by nature.

sure, but the MAUs were in steady decline for some time (despite wow releases), so they should most likely be lower even without the scandal, so diablo might remove the decline that would happen "naturaly"...
truth is, without knowing how much MAUs there are without D2 we have no clue how much the scandal affected it

[Biggles Worth]

"World of Warcraft is on track to deliver its strongest engagement and net bookings outside of a Modern expansion year in a decade."
Scuse me?

[Alphard]

Diablo II: Resurrected first week sales were the highest recorded for a remaster from the company.

When you first read this it sounds great, but when you break it down it just means it did better than Warcraft III: Reforged? Did they release any other remaster?

[Gangresnake]

Generally I think this is right although it doesn't explain why WoW's net bookings for the year are so strong. TBC is perhaps a big part of that. The call strongly implies though the normal drop-off after expansion launch is less than expected. In any case, there's no signal whatsoever that Blizzard or WoW is in any trouble or even close to 'dying'. Blizzard revenue is going to be well north of one billion dollars for the year (perhaps closer to two billion) and WoW is apparently Blizzard's largest franchise (it says so in a slide).

That's not evidence that the doomsayers are in any way correct.

Calling wow net booking "strong" might be a bit of an overstatement. They said it's "on-track to deliver their best modern non-expansion year"
"On track to" is non-commiting communication, it mean that they havent reached that target in the last 9 months and may never reach it. Basically no promises.
"Modern non-expansion year" is a bit of an eye-roller, when Shadowland was released in end 2020 and TBC in june 2021. It SHOULD logically be a strong year, but they dont show a single solid metric to back that up. Which mean they have none.

It doesnt vindicate the doomsayers but it's not exactly good news.

[Biomega]

Diablo II: Resurrected first week sales were the highest recorded for a remaster from the company.

When you first read this it sounds great, but when you break it down it just means it did better than Warcraft III: Reforged? Did they release any other remaster?

SC1 remaster as well.

But you're absolutely right - the phrasing is undoubtedly deliberate fluff.

[baseballfan]

well so much for the mass wow exodus.

how much copium do you have to be on to actually believe that the extreme amount of players leaving the game for good and posting on the forums are all lying to you about a massive amount of players leaving WoW. It's okay you will just say "it's always been doom and gloom" and not see what is in front of your face. This game is dying so quickly. I don't give a crap about what the weasels say about MAUs.

[terminaltrip421]

"World of Warcraft is on track to deliver its strongest engagement and net bookings outside of a Modern expansion year in a decade."
Scuse me?

as in more people are *potentially* still playing post-expansion release than in the previous ten years. but given they don't actually say players playing maybe it's hours played per player and net bookings I assume is money spent. the language used is obviously purposefully vague.

[Armael]

It's all anecdotal. Vocal minority amount of folks go to the forum to tell everyone how horrible their Ex was and still continues to be, and will rehash it and keep bringing it up when a new topic pops up.

[Phagelives]

the next quarterly will be neat to read , it will all the shit show drama falling from right after the ending of the 2nd quarter.

[baseballfan]

One of the saddest things to see are the people that actually still defend Blizzard and their god awful games. They will ignore everything and be good little consumers. You have to be on serious copium if you think all the content creators are just lying about an exodus from the game. Keep buying your store mounts and paying your sub for 1 patch a year because the game is "as good as ever". Praise the MAUs. That's all you are to them and it is so obvious to everyone, but y'all.

[Self Inflicted Wounds]

the next quarterly will be neat to read , it will all the shit show drama falling from right after the ending of the 2nd quarter.

Somehow I am sure they will still spin it as positive no matter what.