Also, I should point out to people that EA and Bioware have always stated that the game would remain profitable and viable at 500k subscribers. Unfortunately, because of the reaction of idiots and trolls on the internet (many of whom have probably not laid a single finger on this game in the first place), the negative reputation being administered to the game is pushing them to look at the free-to-play option. EVEN THEN, it's not like free-to-play is a bad thing. DDO is an excellent MMO that has THRIVED because of the free-to-play model, as is LOTRO. It's already looking like Tera and Rift are considering that route as well, and a lot of it is because that's just where MMOs are heading.

When you see many free-to-play games being successful and pulling the numbers they pull, it's impossible for most games to even try to exist in the subscription model against WoW. If anything, the WoW killer that everyone has been talking about for ages...is free-to-play. We know that Blizzard's subs are bleeding, and we know that Mists of Pandaria is their reaction - to try and pull people back in with these promises of "oh, it's going to be like vanilla and BC, it's going to be what you want it to be". Ya know, the same promises they made about Cataclysm...and then went back on.

Just some food for thought.

I've decided to stay Mind Trick. It'll give me a chance to focus on my character instead of helping other players like I usually do.

@Ares42 said:

@Hamz said:

@connerthekewlkid said:

@Ravenlight: but WOW is dropping subs too

WoW has millions of subscribers, as in double figures worth of millions, they could afford to drop half their active subscriber base and still be a ridiculously profitable game and company.

No, it doesn't. It has somewhere around 4-6 million subscribers (might be less now actually), and then a large Asian userbase that pays per hour. It's sort of important to realize that distinction, as the average Asian user brings in way way less money than a "normal" subscriber. It's the unfair comparison most other MMO has to deal with, as they don't launch in Asia or even if they do they don't attract a large audience there.

Incorrect.

http://wow.joystiq.com/2012/02/09/world-of-warcraft-subscriber-numbers/

That article was posted in February this year as well.

Their stupid engine doesn't support it, duh. They are letting people migrate away from the servers so they can simply pull the plug on the servers later. 

@Jimbo: trolls certainly didnt help

@Hamz: I'll admit that I might be wrong, but I think you might wanna check up what they define as a subscriber. Pretty sure last time I checked what a subscriber meant was either someone who payed a monthly fee in EU/US or someone that had payed for any playtime during the same period on an Asian account.

MMOs are well known for fudging with numbers that way, and iirc the game hasn't even sold enough copies in EU/US to even up with 10+ mill monthly subscriptions. To pull a number from way way back:

"Yes, in a twist that surely suprises no-one, Blizzard announces that WoW now has over 8,000,000 subscribers worldwide. This includes 2 million in North America, 1.5 million in Europe, and 3.5 million in China." (dunno how those 7 mill turned into 8 though :P )

@Jimbo said:

@jakob187

Also, I should point out to people that EA and Bioware have always stated that the game would remain profitable and viable at 500k subscribers. Unfortunately, because of the reaction of idiots and trolls on the internet (many of whom have probably not laid a single finger on this game in the first place), the negative reputation being administered to the game is pushing them to look at the free-to-play option. EVEN THEN, it's not like free-to-play is a bad thing. DDO is an excellent MMO that has THRIVED because of the free-to-play model, as is LOTRO. It's already looking like Tera and Rift are considering that route as well, and a lot of it is because that's just where MMOs are heading.

When you see many free-to-play games being successful and pulling the numbers they pull, it's impossible for most games to even try to exist in the subscription model against WoW. If anything, the WoW killer that everyone has been talking about for ages...is free-to-play. We know that Blizzard's subs are bleeding, and we know that Mists of Pandaria is their reaction - to try and pull people back in with these promises of "oh, it's going to be like vanilla and BC, it's going to be what you want it to be". Ya know, the same promises they made about Cataclysm...and then went back on.

Just some food for thought.

Lol'd at 'negative reputation being administered to the game', good job. The bad word of mouth and nosediving subscription numbers couldn't possibly be a result of the game not being very good - it must be trolls. Yes a lot of failed subscription MMOs have become successful as "F2P", and it's only a matter of time before failing subscription MMO TOR is forced to go that route and take their chances. I think EA were hoping for a bit more than that from their massive flagship project though. It'll be an admission of defeat and another embarassing loss of face for them as a company when they do have to go F2P.

It was such a bad game that it was holding good numbers until the release of 1.2, to the point that Blizzard was rushing out game updates to try and combat against it, even going so far as to announce Pandaria in fears that they were going to bleed more subs than they wanted to. -_-

Moreover, the only thing that will be embarrassing is "we spent a lot of money to make the game and have to abandon the subscription model". The game itself isn't embarrassing beyond the lack of experience that the developers of the game (which happens to be the studio in Austin that was specifically opened for The Old Republic, and they handle all development on the title...so this is their FIRST game), thus causing the release of patches that break things for a day or two after their release. This is something that happens with virtually every MMO in existence.

If they go F2P, it will be a flagship way for developers to realize that paid subscription models as anything other than an option (much like how Dungeons & Dragons Online handles it) is a thing of the past. We are in a new era of gaming where people see the games that get released as free-to-play and say "why the fuck am I even paying for games under this archaic retail model anymore?".

Yeah, the problems that this game has had due to bad publicity has sucked for it, but the game is not deserving of it. It's an incredibly fun game. My SOLE reason for quitting was due to lack of server population, and again, that all happened LITERALLY the week that 1.2 was launched. I remember these same arguments of "the game isn't very good" coming along with Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons & Dragons Online, even Age of Conan. The thing is that the games ARE good and have been that way since launch. Some of them didn't have the necessary length of end-game content to carry the game until its next patch, but this massive level of MMO game design was something that WoW started and many people couldn't necessarily nail down. As the genre matured, that problem became alleviated more and more. Now all of those games generally thrive, and it's the one mistake I think that The Old Republic made: not launching as a free-to-play.

Had it launched under that model, it probably would've crippled WoW into oblivion. I'm not going to sit here and pretend I don't have aesthetic issues with some of The Old Republic's design (I don't like the Hero Engine for PvP gameplay, and I think that the custom UI stuff is still not as customizable as I'd like amongst a few other things), but the general gameplay was excellent. I had more fun playing a Juggernaut in TOR than I've had in any other MMO outside of DDO (and that's mainly due to my love for D&D in general).

So I understand that you feel the need to jump into every thread that involves TOR and say "BOY WHAT A FAILURE HURDY-HUR", but it literally just sounds like a troll spouting out of his ass when you type. Meanwhile, the people that HAVE played the game for any extended period of time beyond the first month know what the problems have been and where they need to be fixed. Luckily, the guys developing that game actually LISTEN to their community and WANT this game to be successful. It's a great license, they've got a great game, and all it needs is a little more finesse.

When they release the level cap increase, I'm going to be back on it, and I'm excited to see all the new content that I missed out on. Even if the game had been great, I would've still been unsubbing in order to give myself the ability to focus on other games that I probably wouldn't have played if I was subbed, like Diablo 3 and the Summer of Arcade releases. I'm also looking forward to Guild Wars 2, which I'll be dividing my time between TOR and GW2 when that comes out.

So...I don't know. I'm sorry you feel the need to shit on something you only see from outside of the box?

@jakob187: hes been posting tortanic pictures on every old republic thread there is so dont try to have a valid argument with him i really dont think there is any way to break through to him

Meh, SWTOR is another case where the developer had a solid product but probably spent way to much money in production to create it. These games got proposed, green-lighted and finance before the sub-prime mess imploded the world economy where I guarentee today no one would support spending $200 million just to launch.

I think SWTOR is in a uniquely bad position where just the beta WoW Mist beta already has shown improvements that put more shame on SWTOR let alone the almost radical departure Guild Wars 2 is taking. By the time we get to the end of fall where they will try to announce an expansion, those two games will be a step ahead in tech and design....again!

@EXTomar: so your saying SWTOR needs a kung fu panda expansion?

@Ares42 said:

@Hamz said:

@connerthekewlkid said:

@Ravenlight: but WOW is dropping subs too

WoW has millions of subscribers, as in double figures worth of millions, they could afford to drop half their active subscriber base and still be a ridiculously profitable game and company.

No, it doesn't. It has somewhere around 4-6 million subscribers (might be less now actually), and then a large Asian userbase that pays per hour. It's sort of important to realize that distinction, as the average Asian user brings in way way less money than a "normal" subscriber. It's the unfair comparison most other MMO has to deal with, as they don't launch in Asia or even if they do they don't attract a large audience there.

What?........ hahaha, oh lord jesus, love it when people talk our of their ass.

Took me all of 5 seconds to find this -clueless-

@Xeirus: and you do realize it dropped from may to june gosh so clueless

@connerthekewlkid: It dropped over 4 million subs in 1 month? Get out of here with your made-up bullshit man...

@Xeirus: that wasnt me that said that idiot that was another guy

@Xeirus: You might wanna read the full thread.

For more details check out this: http://www.sinletter.com/2010/03/blizzards-world-of-warcraft-the-china-growth-story/

"The Blizzard division of Activision Blizzard (ATVI) generated $1.2 billion in annual revenue last year" ... "If all 11.5 million subscribers were paying $15/month or $180 annually to play WoW, Blizzard’s revenue from just this one online source would be, $15 X 12 months X 11.5 million subscribers = $2.07 billion."

@Ares42: and? Think of how many people are buying chunks of time instead of 15/month, not everyone pays the full price every month. There are TONS of ways people don't pay the full $15, the company flat out said in it's financials the numbers. I'm not impressed, but nice attempt.

@CL60 said:

I don't see the point of these transfers when they could've just merged the servers. Sure, the transfers did fix the population issues and a lot of servers that you can transfer to now have upwards of 350+ people on the fleet, but now they're just spending money on shit loads of servers nobody will ever use.

Remember when I said the game had 6 months or so before it died? Remember how you said I was crazy and being judgemental?

Yeah.

@CL60 said:

I don't see the point of these transfers when they could've just merged the servers. Sure, the transfers did fix the population issues and a lot of servers that you can transfer to now have upwards of 350+ people on the fleet, but now they're just spending money on shit loads of servers nobody will ever use.

Remember when I said the game had 6 months or so before it died? Remember how you said I was crazy and being judgemental?

Yeah.

Has* can't edit on phone.

With the way the population have been changing in TOR it would be for the best to merge some of the servers, but merging servers is seen as a clear signal that your game is a failure and it is dying - so anyone who runs an MMO wants to avoid merging servers because it hits them financially - even though it might help stabilize the consumers.

They could circumvent this issue by doing something similar to World of Warcraft, where Blizzard in the upcoming Mists of Pandaria will be using a system that allows you to see and interact with people from other serves, the system will then control how many players from other servers are visible, depending on the number of players online in that specific zone from your server.

Presumably the implication is that they will use those servers some time. As others are speculating maybe this thing will be forced into going F2P and need that space.

@Xeirus said:

@Ares42: and? Think of how many people are buying chunks of time instead of 15/month, not everyone pays the full price every month. There are TONS of ways people don't pay the full $15, the company flat out said in it's financials the numbers. I'm not impressed, but nice attempt.

Was I trying to impress you ? All I was pointing out is that the good old "WoW has billions of subscribers" is factually wrong, and that they really only have a few million subscribers that pay for monthly fees bringing in most of the revenue for the game.

If they were suffering the same kind of losses in monthly subscriptions, it would actually be a big deal for them too.

@connerthekewlkid said:

@EXTomar: so your saying SWTOR needs a kung fu panda expansion?

Maybe? It isn't the pandas that are interesting in WoW Mists but the tech and activities:

- "Phased Cross Server Support" doesn't do away with "servers" entirely and is an important tech advancement. It actually does a lot to help keep "transit zones" populated where that tech would have helped out SWTOR a lot.

- Pet Battles are a surprisingly deep system.

- Scenarios can be run solo by any class in any spec for the same tier rewards as grouping.

- Deeper integration of phasing into everything including daily quests. This gives rise to things like building a farms and mines and workshops you can build and control.

There is a surprising amount of stuff crammed into WoW Mist that is more solo and casual oriented plus still supporting all of the old hard core stuff like rated pvp and raids. SWTOR needs an expansion just like this.

And to be clear, a MMO with the population of SWTOR can survive, thrive and be very profitable but they need to resize the game to fit it. Even in better days, the game had too much "space". It took to long to travel on foot or on vehicle. You had to traverse too many zones. When you got to "hubs" the space would be gigantic in volume but only 5 people would be standing around while the the rest where NPCs robotically going about their scripted routines. SWTOR is not going to fail because they have under 1 million active players peek but if they continue to run it like they have many millions more.

@EXTomar: i have no idea what any of that means i was just making a joke

@SeriouslyNow: come back after 6 months?

@CL60 said:

@SeriouslyNow

@CL60 said:

I don't see the point of these transfers when they could've just merged the servers. Sure, the transfers did fix the population issues and a lot of servers that you can transfer to now have upwards of 350+ people on the fleet, but now they're just spending money on shit loads of servers nobody will ever use.

Remember when I said the game had 6 months or so before it died? Remember how you said I was crazy and being judgemental?

Yeah.

Who says its dead? Still had 1 million + subs. There's just far too many servers..

Relevant

In short EA can't afford to keep it running and maybe even F2P won't save it because their investors want EA to kill it and a bunch of other games.

@Ares42 said:

@Xeirus said:

@Ares42: and? Think of how many people are buying chunks of time instead of 15/month, not everyone pays the full price every month. There are TONS of ways people don't pay the full $15, the company flat out said in it's financials the numbers. I'm not impressed, but nice attempt.

Was I trying to impress you ? All I was pointing out is that the good old "WoW has billions of subscribers" is factually wrong, and that they really only have a few million subscribers that pay for monthly fees bringing in most of the revenue for the game.

If they were suffering the same kind of losses in monthly subscriptions, it would actually be a big deal for them too.

What the hell are you even talking about. The whole point of the conversation was saying WoW had over 10million subs, which they do, the income means nothing, this conversation started based on their sub numbers.

@SeriouslyNow: Good read, thanks for that.

Just annoyed that I started playing this and the first server they put me in is one that they wish to close. Then I find that I can't transfer to a friends server. So I had to start again. Luckily I was only lvl 6...

@Ares42 said:

@Xeirus: You might wanna read the full thread.

For more details check out this: http://www.sinletter.com/2010/03/blizzards-world-of-warcraft-the-china-growth-story/

"The Blizzard division of Activision Blizzard (ATVI) generated $1.2 billion in annual revenue last year" ... "If all 11.5 million subscribers were paying $15/month or $180 annually to play WoW, Blizzard’s revenue from just this one online source would be, $15 X 12 months X 11.5 million subscribers = $2.07 billion."

They only got 1.2 billion?

LOLZ BLIZZARD WELCOME TO THE POOR HOUSE

BYE BYE ACTIVISION, WELCOME TO HOBO TOWN