Vault_News
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WoW Lost 800k Subscribers, down to 10.3M
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mmo champion posted:
Activision Blizzard latest earning call revealed that World of Warcraft lost another 800,000 subscribers last quarter, following the loss of 300k subscribers announced last quarter and 600k loss from the quarter before that. This brings us to 1.7 million subscribers lost in the last 3 quarters. Some things they made note of on the call:
Most of the subscriptions were lost in China.
There is normally an increase in subscriptions around December.
The decreased profit came from all of the games in development and no launches occurring.
There will be at least two major releases next year.
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And in more news Blizzard calls 'massive layoff rumor' just that. A rumor.
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/3559106190?page=12#228
Bashiok posted:
Hey guys, out of respect for their privacy, we don?t discuss individual employees, but the speculation circulating about ?massive layoffs at Blizzard? is just a rumor.
Posted from WoW Vault
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Elaok
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WoW Lost 800k Subscribers, down to 10.3M
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sooo 2 expansions next year?
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Rill_of_WE
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Diablo and Starcraft maybe? Possibly MoP?
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TruthyID
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Guess this puts an end to the "Cataclysm isn't a flop it just hasn't released in China yet" argument. Cataclysm seems to be getting a thumbs down everywhere.
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Spookysheep
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Where are the retard fanbois when you need them?????
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GutterSludge
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Bashiok posted: "Hey guys, out of respect for their privacy, we don?t discuss individual employees, but the speculation circulating about ?massive layoffs at Blizzard? is just a rumor."
But as you can see from the numbers, the speculation that Cata blows goats is spot on...
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Arunne
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What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
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TruthyID
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Arunne posted:
What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
So, you're saying that there were hundreds of thousands of accounts on CHINESE SERVERS that were used to farm gold for sale? And who exactly did they sell the gold to? Other people in China?
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Sprawl-zero1eye-
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TruthyID posted:
Arunne posted:
What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
So, you're saying that there were hundreds of thousands of accounts on CHINESE SERVERS that were used to farm gold for sale? And who exactly did they sell the gold to? Other people in China?
A viscous cycle of farmer eats farmer!! 
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Kriegprojekt
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Id really love to see what the change is next quarter - especially after the recent announcement of MOP.
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Auenwing
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I'd be interested as well.
Been a flood of WoW players into the Rift newbie zones the last couple of weeks. Granted, a lot of them are trial accounts. 
When are the "amazingly awesome" new games coming out?
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Sociop
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TruthyID posted:
Guess this puts an end to the "Cataclysm isn't a flop it just hasn't released in China yet" argument. Cataclysm seems to be getting a thumbs down everywhere.
But I thought China an the rest of Asia for that matter is the target audience for MOP in fact I thought they were getting some heat for the Kung Fu Pandas being stereotypical thus offensive to many there.
If Asias numbers are down MOP could have something to do with it.
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Arunne
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TruthyID posted:
Arunne posted:
What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
So, you're saying that there were hundreds of thousands of accounts on CHINESE SERVERS that were used to farm gold for sale? And who exactly did they sell the gold to? Other people in China?
I thought the statement was rediculous enough that you would catch the sarcasm there. I forget that the internets doesnt get /sarcasm sometimes. Tho I think Sprawl got it!
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Turumbar-HG
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I can see a few announcements coming up from Blizzard.
1. Ghostcrawler has been 'promoted' to a different product development team.
2. MoP pushed back to give new lead designer time to fix stuff that started going wrong with 4.0
3. WoW to go F2P and the D3 AH will be implemented, with the Blizz store items and other certain items being sold directly by Blizz for rl $$.
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Ugh_Lancelot
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TruthyID posted:
Arunne posted:
What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
So, you're saying that there were hundreds of thousands of accounts on CHINESE SERVERS that were used to farm gold for sale? And who exactly did they sell the gold to? Other people in China?
Taking your comments at face value for a moment just for the sake of argument, I think we already know what most of those accounts are used for: 1) advertisement bots (which get banned regularly after people report them) and 2) gold "laundering" accounts that get banned fairly quickly but only after the money has already moved on to other accounts for eventual sale. If Blizzard tends to scrutinize money transfers of >5000g, you make 2 or more accounts and transfer the gold in smaller "below-the-radar" amounts via multiple accounts. If you're hacking accounts or paying minimal fees for them and your gold-muling process is mostly automated anyway, what do you care how many accounts you use?
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Tai-Daishar_MT
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Turumbar-HG posted:
3. WoW to go F2P and the D3 AH will be implemented, with the Blizz store items and other certain items being sold directly by Blizz for rl $$.
Seriously? Cata has been a flop, only Ghostcrawler disputes that, but F2P is a long way off in the future. Incredible that anyone can come to this conclusion while they are still north of 10 mil subscribers.
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Turumbar-HG
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You don't think Blizzard is discussing different ways to recoup the revenue lost from these subscriptions?
Box sales from MoP are probably 9 months away. 4.3 and the DW raid might bring some people back, but it might not with SW:ToR releasing not long after. I'm wondering how many subscriptions will be gone by the next announcement.
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JaconKin
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TOR will see another 800k-1 mill in lost subs, if not more, then the eventual release of GW 2 will see another high loss of subs, I will not be surprised to see WoW by the the time MOP release only have 6-8 mill subs.
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-MrBean-
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JaconKin posted:
TOR will see another 800k-1 mill in lost subs, if not more, then the eventual release of GW 2 will see another high loss of subs, I will not be surprised to see WoW by the the time MOP release only have 6-8 mill subs.
Oh no, only $77,490,000 to $127, 920, 000 per month. How will they ever survive?
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Turumbar-HG
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-MrBean- posted:
JaconKin posted:
TOR will see another 800k-1 mill in lost subs, if not more, then the eventual release of GW 2 will see another high loss of subs, I will not be surprised to see WoW by the the time MOP release only have 6-8 mill subs.
Oh no, only $77,490,000 to $127, 920, 000 per month. How will they ever survive?
Oh, there's no doubt that they will survive. But any company that loses 10%-40% (if MrBean's projections of continued loss of subscriptions is correct) of its revenue stream in a little over 1yr needs to make changes. What those changes are or will be remain to be seen.
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TruthyID
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Arunne posted:
TruthyID posted:
Arunne posted:
What they are saying is that the economic downturn is affecting the chinese gold farming business, so they had to lay off some workers. Which accounts for most of those account closures.
So, you're saying that there were hundreds of thousands of accounts on CHINESE SERVERS that were used to farm gold for sale? And who exactly did they sell the gold to? Other people in China?
I thought the statement was rediculous enough that you would catch the sarcasm there. I forget that the internets doesnt get /sarcasm sometimes. Tho I think Sprawl got it!
I came here after doing some reading on MMO-Champion where people were actually claiming that the loss in subs was due to gold farmers quitting. Apparently some people saw the word China in a message from Blizzard and believe that the only Chinese people that play are gold farmers.
The fact is that Cataclysm just released in China in July and they, just like the US/EU, saw a huge drop in subs shortly after its release because they didn't like it either. The numbers don't lie, people don't like Cataclysm.
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Liquid741
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wonder if anyone ever has called for the firing of Ghostcrawler at a convention or a stern letter from the community?
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Arunne
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TruthyID posted:
I came here after doing some reading on MMO-Champion where people were actually claiming that the loss in subs was due to gold farmers quitting. Apparently some people saw the word China in a message from Blizzard and believe that the only Chinese people that play are gold farmers.
The fact is that Cataclysm just released in China in July and they, just like the US/EU, saw a huge drop in subs shortly after its release because they didn't like it either. The numbers don't lie, people don't like Cataclysm.
Yeah I get what you're saying. I basically was trying to poke fun at the people who would obviously jump on the China thing. Yeah I would say you're right lots of people dont like it. It's never a good idea to release a exansion that is disliked this much this late in the lifecycle of a game.
People will adjust to you making big changes in your game for so long till they get to the breaking poin where the changes just kill it for the players. Cat was that for me.
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-Peo-
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Maybe someone will realize that GC is a freaking moron and needs to be FIRED. Or reassigned to Candyland Online. Jut please, someone keep him away from WoW.
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tantallous
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oh damn. only 10 million subs, how will they ever stay out of the red now!!!
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Ugh_Lancelot
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tantallous posted:
oh damn. only 10 million subs, how will they ever stay out of the red now!!!
Your point is intriguing and novel. Would you please expound on your line of thought so that we mere mortals might benefit from your wisdom?
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tantallous
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sure..
they are still taking in 155 mil/month in subs. is it 165 mil like it was before? no. is that 10 or 12 mil significant? maybe. i dont see them going out of business over it though. as to if cata was the cause.. well... maybe. but also consider, the game has been out for a long time now.. i cant think of anything i was doing in 2004 that i am still doing right now. priorities change, commitments change.. i have a lot of stuff to do now that doesnt involve sitting around playing pc games. i didnt have near as much back when i first started. anyway.. it doesnt matter to me what happens to the game or the company, but i think all this doom talk is silly.
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Deionnara
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tantallous posted:
sure..
they are still taking in 155 mil/month in subs. is it 165 mil like it was before? no. is that 10 or 12 mil significant? maybe. i dont see them going out of business over it though. as to if cata was the cause.. well... maybe. but also consider, the game has been out for a long time now.. i cant think of anything i was doing in 2004 that i am still doing right now. priorities change, commitments change.. i have a lot of stuff to do now that doesnt involve sitting around playing pc games. i didnt have near as much back when i first started. anyway.. it doesnt matter to me what happens to the game or the company, but i think all this doom talk is silly.
Uhm, you do realize that China -- where the majority of the much touted 10M figure is coming from -- is not paying anywhere near $15 per month?
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tantallous
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what are they paying?
k, then with a bit of google-fu.. so the impact is even less than i had originally thought? or am i missing something...
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JaconKin
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-MrBean- posted:
JaconKin posted:
TOR will see another 800k-1 mill in lost subs, if not more, then the eventual release of GW 2 will see another high loss of subs, I will not be surprised to see WoW by the the time MOP release only have 6-8 mill subs.
Oh no, only $77,490,000 to $127, 920, 000 per month. How will they ever survive?
Funny, I don't think I ever stated anything about them not being able to survive? 
Besides, I called certain aspects of Cataclysm's failure while various features were being axed, Path of the Titans, the talent system overhaul, and the fact that it was more of the same with out innovating and adding new matters for players to do with their time, like they are now trying to do with MOP.
tantallous posted:
sure..
they are still taking in 155 mil/month in subs. is it 165 mil like it was before? no. is that 10 or 12 mil significant? maybe. i dont see them going out of business over it though. as to if cata was the cause.. well... maybe. but also consider, the game has been out for a long time now.. i cant think of anything i was doing in 2004 that i am still doing right now. priorities change, commitments change.. i have a lot of stuff to do now that doesnt involve sitting around playing pc games. i didnt have near as much back when i first started. anyway.. it doesnt matter to me what happens to the game or the company, but i think all this doom talk is silly.
Umm, Blizzard isn't just WoW you know right? See above, I don't think anybody is actually stating the end of Blizzard or WoW because of a decrease in subs, just that such a decrease isn't a good sign and perhaps a sign that the heyday of WoW is over.
Also the defense argument about the game getting old and stale has been used many times. Why did the game get old and stale? See above about lack of options and more innovative game play measures, lack of any serious competition is one of the reasons it did get old and stale. Why did Cata begin seeing a decrease in Subs while Wrath saw a huge increase? See above about lack of options while increasing the difficulty and grind needed to get anything actually done at end game. Wrath equaled fun because the game was treated like a game. Cata equaled not fun because it was all of a sudden treated like actual work to get anything done at end game.
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