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World of Warcraft at 5.5 million subscribers, will no longer share numbers
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
Legion will help, but ultimately I think we'll end up right back here again in March/April or so when subscriptions get right back down to 5 million after spiking to 7 million after the Legion release.
I'd like to see a full blown reboot of the franchise given the completely convoluted mess the lore has become, but why screw with a proven formula?
I'd like to see a full blown reboot of the franchise given the completely convoluted mess the lore has become, but why screw with a proven formula?
Ultima Online is still being actively supported.
SolVanderlyn
Thanos acquires the fully powered Infinity Gauntlet in The Avengers: Infinity War, but loses when all the superheroes team up together to stop him.
The game is over ten years old, give it a rest already.
Its glory days were fantastic and will probably never be replicated, but even by the time Cataclysm came out, its appeal was waning. Everything beyond that has felt like botox on an aging celebrity.
Its glory days were fantastic and will probably never be replicated, but even by the time Cataclysm came out, its appeal was waning. Everything beyond that has felt like botox on an aging celebrity.
TatteredHat
Member
Hey man don't forget about that Age of Empires 2 tournament a couple of weeks ago.
That's true, and just to be clear, I'm not setting WoW at its prime numbers as the bar for the genre to be healthy, but nothing is even close.
Not surprised given that after over a decade they still haven't gotten the timing between last patch and expansion to be less than 6 months, let alone a year.
I'm wondering what kind of promo they'll announce at Blizzcon to get people back playing. I don't think they'll pull a Diablo 3 thing, but maybe Overwatch beta access with a Legion preorder or something.
I feel like they'll address it this weekend.
I'm wondering what kind of promo they'll announce at Blizzcon to get people back playing. I don't think they'll pull a Diablo 3 thing, but maybe Overwatch beta access with a Legion preorder or something.
I feel like they'll address it this weekend.
texhnolyze
Banned
What?
But that's not my point. The subscribers numbers are the lowest in a decade, and it's still declining as we speak, right? Isn't that showing that it's not looking good?
I didn't say it's going to die.
Digital-Hero
Member
How does a dead game still have subscribers? Dying yes, dead no.
According to the FF14 people on here, no content/content I already finished = ded game
GoldenEye 007
Member
11 years later with 5.5 million users seems quite accomplished.......
Subhuman Filth
Member
How the mighty hath fallen.
Lack of context in your post though. The fact that it only dropped 100k subs since last quarter is incredibly surprising to most of the WoW community because the last big content patch was in June and it wasn't very well received by most people (and it did nothing to keep subs up.)
Most people (myself included) were expecting a much bigger drop this quarter considering content-wise we have been in a dead game for months now. The fact they managed to stay this stable with no new content outside of a tiny patch that added some cosmetic items and an updated Halloween event is incredibly interesting/perplexing.
Sectorseven
Member
Any idea the split between north america and China?
Twilight Gap
Member
i remember the commercials when it was at 11 million subs.
No one actually thinks Warcraft is dead. But for subscribers to drop 7 million from the all-time high? The "Age of Warcraft" is well on its way out.
What is there to "LMAO" about?
The subscriber number has been in a steady decline since Cataclysm came out. The bumps were shortlived.
Mists of Pandaria never went below 7 million, WoD never went below 5 million, will you say "LMAO LOLSKI ROFLOS" when Legion does not go below 3-4 million?
The subscriber number has been in a steady decline since Cataclysm came out. The bumps were shortlived.
Mists of Pandaria never went below 7 million, WoD never went below 5 million, will you say "LMAO LOLSKI ROFLOS" when Legion does not go below 3-4 million?
The rise of Free Mobas like League and Dota killed any chance of that to happen.
I think mobas have no real effect on a different genre entirely.
nephilimdj
Member
Blizzard really need to do a good relaunch for the movie, atleast throw down a free mini expansion or something.
Like others have said, they suck so bad at content and value for money that rereleasing battlecheast will most likely be there lazy ass solution
Like others have said, they suck so bad at content and value for money that rereleasing battlecheast will most likely be there lazy ass solution
My exact thought all doom and gloom but yet no other publisher could dream of such a subscriber count.
It was at 10 mil subs less than 1 year ago. People like to rag on the numbers never reaching the peak they had during the start of Cata, but, every expansion has put them back up close to those numbers before falling off a few months into the expansion.
I know most of the people posting in this thread don't actually follow WoW news but one of the things blizz has been talking about over the past few years is them realizing that in a market with so much competition (tons of high quality F2P games) WoW is in a cyclical state now. Which is why they want to change their business strategy for content delivery to focus on expansions at a faster rate above all else. It's no coincidence that Warlords of Draenor is only going to have 1 major content patch when every other expansion has had 3 to 4. They are pushing for Legion to be out early next year.
PaleFolklore
Member
I resubbed earlier this year only to log on to the server I had been playing since vanilla(Illidan US) and realizing that it was apparently filled with Chinese players now. The chat was all in Chinese. None of the old guilds were around anymore either. I just can't see myself ever getting into the game like I did back in the day. My priorities have changed and I just wouldn't dedicate the amount of time I used to to the game. I felt nauseous when I saw I had almost 400 days played on my Mage.
Raid scene is on its deathbed. Warcraftlogs is like on the verge of shutting down because guilds are just dying.
God, I hate WoD, and I hate blizzard for always going back on their philosophies. Fuck garrisons. Man the fuck up, show some confidence, and fix the fucking retarded balance of some of these classes once and for all.
TBiddy
Member
I thoroughly miss the golden days of World of Warcraft. The 40 man raids in Molten Core, the 20 man afternoon raids in Zul'Gurub and the "hnnnnnggghh" feeling you got when you got a new epic.
And the sense of accomplishment, when you and your guild finally beat Arthas. Or Ragnaros. Or cleared Black Wing Lair. Or. Or. Or. So many good things.
In my mind WoW was partly ruined by "Raid Finder". Sure, it allowed everyone to try out the raiding instances, but it also killed many casual raiding guilds, since it was often easier to join a LFR-group and have them plow through the raid, than spending hours trying to beat it with your guilds.
It's a shame really.
And the sense of accomplishment, when you and your guild finally beat Arthas. Or Ragnaros. Or cleared Black Wing Lair. Or. Or. Or. So many good things.
In my mind WoW was partly ruined by "Raid Finder". Sure, it allowed everyone to try out the raiding instances, but it also killed many casual raiding guilds, since it was often easier to join a LFR-group and have them plow through the raid, than spending hours trying to beat it with your guilds.
It's a shame really.
kinoki
Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
That graph of subscribers pretty much aligns with my interest in the game. I'm always on the cusp of going back but I don't have the time to do so, nor the interest to play a game for the amount of time this game requires.
Problem is rather than making something new, everyone is trying to make the next WoW which doesn't work as WoW has had 11 years to tune itself.
It's why Eve is so popular. It's something newer and interesting and doesn't try to take the market share from WoW.
ShinMaruku
Member
The game was at it's best then. It was a great point to get in and get out. After Wrath WoW was dead to me. I had a great time though. Wrath was great.
Onion_Relish
Member
WoW will continue to be the game of choice until VRMMO's come into play. There simply isnt anything that can be done in the medium that will draw the players like they did in the old days content wise, so interface is the way to go.
Mister Wilhelm
Member
My last remaining WOW-playing friend was trying to explain to me why he was so excited for Legion and it just sounded like the most generic expansion yet.
Seems like they're doing literally nothing new or exciting for the game.
Seems like they're doing literally nothing new or exciting for the game.
ShinMaruku
Member
I'm sure they would love that, but that's probably half of the MMO market. Ideally Publishers want something bigger than that with less of a inside cost kinda of like a MOBA. But for that to happen it has to be emergent. So I would put any publisher who thinks they can do that with a MOBA or a MMO as delusional.
DiscoJer
Member
But Eve actually isn't all that popular, it's just internet cool. At its peak, it had 500,000 subscribers and they haven't released numbers since (2 years ago) which means it's probably lower and they don't want to admit it.
http://massivelyop.com/2015/04/19/eve-evolved-how-many-subscriptions-does-eve-have/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-Strike
Just grabbed the first example off top of head. Sure it's seen many titles, but the core tenets of the game have remained the same while shooters changed all around it (aiming down sight, regenerating health, etc)
I guess if that's cheating though, then stuff like DotA would similarly be cheating.
On topic though, the sentiment from half a decade ago that the only thing that could kill WoW is WoW itself, is correct. We've not seen any one MMO demonstrably snatch away a significant portion of its userbase.
Thing is though, unlike other games it's not died. It found it's niche and it's been going for ages.
Things like LOTRO, Warhammer and Age of Conan all appeared to try and "be the next WoW" and many of the people I played WoW with quit to go play them. After a few months they mostly all come back claiming in one of their own words "It's like WoW, but everything is broken and nnot as good". You just can't replace WoW. It at that point had had like 5-6 years worth of patching and anything trying to emulate WoW's success was basically screwed from the offset.
They needed to do something new and they just didn't. I think that's why Eve works so well.
Quite before WoD but the raiding being dead makes me so sad. Raiding was the only thing I cared about and if they do it well in Legion I legitimately might come back to play. Blizzard is sure to fuck it up though
witchedwiz
Member
imho, issue with wow is pretty much pacing of the content, not quality..
in terms of quality, content in wow is terrific..
in terms of pacing, content is terri..ble
if you're an "avid" player in a decent guild, 1//2 months after release of new content, you will have done EVERYTHING the game has to offer in terms of new content..
Issue is, that there is no actual goal in redoing stuff..
e.g. take guild wars 2.. sure doing drake is tedious and useless as poo, but you might as well do it and do other useless weekly event to gather gold and with gold buy yourself something..
in wow you are doing raid content ONLY to do raid content and get loot for yourself.. there is no secondary effect of obtaining some stuff that you can resell or similar.. arguably this is for the best, as blizz has proven themselves unable to balance drop rates and drop availability for sale (see diablo3.. even if you remove the concept of RMAH, AH in d3 was a clusterfuck).
But on the other hand, pushing content the same way of other games like ffxiv or gw2 would require blizzard to rework their approach..
when they release new content they release it along with ancilla content..
e.g. introduce hellfire citadel? ok they give you new daily, new factions, new rewards, new zone (tanaan)and on the top of that the new raid
the solution would have been to "unlock" all those stuff gradually say every 1 month..
this way it would seem less of a slog from the player perspective..
from the player perspective if you give me a lot of stuff to do on month 1 and then you don't give me anything new for 8-9 month you've given me nothing....
anyway i'll continue playing, make no mistake, till the game closes
After 10 years i've grown attached
in terms of quality, content in wow is terrific..
in terms of pacing, content is terri..ble
if you're an "avid" player in a decent guild, 1//2 months after release of new content, you will have done EVERYTHING the game has to offer in terms of new content..
Issue is, that there is no actual goal in redoing stuff..
e.g. take guild wars 2.. sure doing drake is tedious and useless as poo, but you might as well do it and do other useless weekly event to gather gold and with gold buy yourself something..
in wow you are doing raid content ONLY to do raid content and get loot for yourself.. there is no secondary effect of obtaining some stuff that you can resell or similar.. arguably this is for the best, as blizz has proven themselves unable to balance drop rates and drop availability for sale (see diablo3.. even if you remove the concept of RMAH, AH in d3 was a clusterfuck).
But on the other hand, pushing content the same way of other games like ffxiv or gw2 would require blizzard to rework their approach..
when they release new content they release it along with ancilla content..
e.g. introduce hellfire citadel? ok they give you new daily, new factions, new rewards, new zone (tanaan)and on the top of that the new raid
the solution would have been to "unlock" all those stuff gradually say every 1 month..
this way it would seem less of a slog from the player perspective..
from the player perspective if you give me a lot of stuff to do on month 1 and then you don't give me anything new for 8-9 month you've given me nothing....
anyway i'll continue playing, make no mistake, till the game closes
After 10 years i've grown attached
First, most MMOs wish they even had 100k to lose.
But secondly, really? Looking at the chart posted, WOD isn't getting a 2 year support window? Last content release was like just under a year? What's up with that?
TBiddy
Member
Considering they have an influx of new/old players each time a new expansion is released, I can't really blame them... from a business point of view.
The whole content delivery system is completely shit for WoW. It's outdated, and it doesn't work anymore. There's nothing in WoD.
It's pretty sad that FF14 gets more shit than WoW at this point.
Raiding is one of the only things they've gotten right in Warlords though. People aren't dropping out because the quality of raids, they are dropping out because raiding has been the only thing with substance to do at endgame during this expansion. Even if all you care about is raiding all of your non-raiding friends quitting the game is going to cause ripples through the raiding community.
I explained it in my last post, but, Blizzard has said multiple times over the past few years that they are more interested in pumping out new expansions than they are supporting an expansion. They want a new one every 12 months because expansions are currently what bring people back to the game, not patches.
Personally not a fan of it so I hope the whole thing crashes and burns, but, just have to wait it out for now.
LOL, 5.5 million paid subscribers in a single game means it's dead as opposed to what, the tons of other 'free games'? I bet world of warcraft is still generating a handsome profit.
SlickShoes
Member
Games like LOTRO are still going though and still making money, the advertising for a lot of games took aim at WoW but despite not doing any damage to it plenty MMOs are still running with "low" player numbers in comparison to WoW, still getting content, still have communities and still make a big enough profi for their owners.
MMO players go over the top when they are personally done with a game assuming it's done because they are done with it or didn't like it, WOW is going to be around for at least another decade, it won't have 5 million subs but it will still be a license to print money and some people somewhere will be enjoying playing it while everyone on Internet forums declares that it's dead.