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So 1 million STO sales. We really need to stop buying MMOs
gotha
Member UncommonPosts: 1,074
1 Million warhammer about crappy game
1 million AOC (at least they salvaged this one)
1 Million Aion
Now 1 Million STO
Is this really the new Business model for major MMO releases. Shove crap out the door and make your money off over hyped box sales.
If this really the way these companies wish to do business. As a smart consumer we really should let them drown themselves a few times so they stop rushing out crap. Games on this scale do not really deal with smart consumers though (its just a basic numbers thing). So unless the public gets really badly burned the next go around we will probably continue to see this in the future.
Comments
The problem is the over hyping, and yes, a lot of people have been getting burned lately. STO likely pulled in a lot of non-MMO gamers due to the franchise, so they've not 'learned' the hard way... yet.
Just wait a few months and the subscription numbers will fall to a realistic level... likely a quarter of the initial box sales, if not less.
I wonder how many charge-backs they have had from credit card companies though? I know how pissy most MMO players are, and if they dont get what they were sold then they get arsey about it.
Not to mention how many supernerds brought 3-4copies each just for the different abilities.
Im sure there are a million mugs on the planet, probably more than that, but why cant they do something productive with there money, I mean damn they could probably fund a decent games development team with that sort of cash.
Warhammer and Aion sold 800k at max i think.
I picked up STO (i'm a trek fan was gonna pick it up no matter what) and I have to say I'm actually pleasantly surprised. Of course, take that with a grain of salt, as I've really barely scratched the surface of the game. But the graphics are acceptable, the gameplay is smooth, no lag so far, no server crashes, a fairly well designed user interface, and lots of other non-tangibles. In short, the release appears to be very solid. I'm in no way qualified to say that STO is a good mmo (at least not yet), but the first impression is better than any of the mmos I've played in the past three years.
Anyway, my point is that this game is not all doom and gloom. Will it be my next mmo home for five years? Doubtful. But it does have promise (from what I've seen), and so far is worth the box price I paid. I guess i'm just another retard (at least per the OP).
I believe what was reported was 1M account set ups on their website, which did not require you to own the game to join.
I'm not sure any of the games you mentioned have 1M confirmed sales, at least not at launch.
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Sadly it is starting to look like that! Theres a huge market for MMO's nowadays and some companies are more than willing to exploit the chance
Luckily there are still some companies that are willing to make quality GAMES and revenue as a reward.
Id expect an IPO such as this to make the sales no matter what the game was.
Never the less, the OP is correct.
there seems to be about 1million players out there who will just try anything!
Source?
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
OP, can you actualy provide us with the source of your sale numbers for STO?
This is what P2P is all about. People seem to have forgotten this. The whole point is to get you to pay upfront, BEFORE you see the product. Next year, these games will be 'fixed' and be offering a free option, because then they will be looking to get your money based on actual performance... rather than marketing hype.
I buy a MMORPG when I am slightly intresting in it, reason I buy it is that I want first hand experiance, most MMORPG's come with 30 day's free before the sub kicks in. And thats the point where I feel is much more important to see how many will actually sub to a MMORPG, box sales say nothing as I am sure there are more gamers like me that want first hand experiance instead of going of on reviews or forum writters. Now if I already have beta experiance I can also judge a game if it will be worth it, but still like to get my hands on a released version to make the proper judgement.
But will admit that STO is one of the first MMORPG I aint going to buy, main reason is my view is very different then Cryptics view on MMORPG's which I have experiance in the MMO's they have released aswell have seen what the beta did for me, which wasn't the Star Trek experiance I would like from a IP like that, which doesn't mean I feel it's a bad game, it only means the game didn't suite the playstyle I want out of a MMORPG.
As said Box sales say NOTHING, it's the actually sub numbers that will speak to these company's and if sub numbers rise, maybe these games aint so bad as some like to pretend or hope they are. If subs go down and become allot lower then actuall box sales it will send a message to these gamecompany's, tho not many (gamecompany's) seem willing or able to learn from that.
Also keep in mind the majority of MMO players don't even visit forums, I bet even general gamers might if they see the box on the shelves in a game store of Star Trek Online they might pick it up, so hype isn't as big as some like to pretend it is.
As said retaining subscribers will be the message, box sales never will.
As a gamer it's something that just goes with being a gamer, got plenty of MMO boxes bought that or have gotten a little sub period or simply never subbed to it, same goes with plenty of other games in other genre's I bought hoping they would be cool but wern't, comes with being a gamer and would always advice if people are low on cash to not have a hobby of games.
They didn't actually sell 1 million, they're just bragging about having 1 million accounts registered on their forum.
[Mod Edit]
As already stated, its 1million registered accounts on their website, not 1million players or box sales. The way theyve spun it seems to have already convinced lots of people that its 1 million total players.
Highly Anticipated MMO for PC Releases with Over 1 Million Cryptic Accounts Created
New York, NY (February 2, 2010) – Atari, SA, one of the world’s most recognized videogame publishers, and acclaimed developer Cryptic Studios™, are proud to announce that the bold new PC MMO, Star Trek Online, is available today in North America and throughout the week in worldwide territories. Already, over 1 million Star Trek fans have created accounts at the official websites
Games:402 Guilds:2,109
Members:1,166,169 Online:304
Guests:1,549 Posts:3,244,676
I demand that MMORPG gets recognition for obtaining over 1,000,000 subscriptions first before Cryptic then. Because where Cryptic only has a few games... MMORPG has 402!!!!
We win, they lose. Let'em "spin" on that.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
I was wondering why marketing departments try to pass off crap such as website account creation numbers which mean nothing.
Now I see it's because apparently that trick still works in this day and people instantly think it correlates in any way to sales (which naturally it has nothing to do with).
Or maybe one million people who happen to like the game and decide to give it a chance.
Not everyone is religious about their games, especially the casual players. Sometimes it's just something to play for some fun for a little while.
I even considered buying it because it's at least worth a month of play to me.
It's ok for people to just play a game for a month or two and then move on. I realize that that is not what game companies (mmo game companies) want and their games are going to have to have some lasting appeal but again, for some people the play time for a month or two is enough to get their jollies on before they move on.
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do like me dont buy it and you have np if people still buy it they deserve it when its crap and lose 50 bucks lol.
Just wait for a while and buy it from budget shelve i bought lotr for 7 euro and i saw AoC today for 5 euro it seems nice way to try those games out at that cost hehe.
Games played:AC1-Darktide'99-2000-AC2-Darktide/dawnsong2003-2005,Lineage2-2005-2006 and now Darkfall-2009.....
In between WoW few months AoC few months and some f2p also all very short few weeks.
I have found that the intial numbers really dont mean a game will last long....its after those numbers reach end game.... and are still in the game enjoying it that really count.....give new games about 3-6 months before buying into them.....maybe then the devs will stop pushing out trash for that quick buck......
Wow I see they are using Funcom's tactic, tossing out press releases that mean absolutely nothing in the real world. Who the heck cares how many unique visitors a site has? Who cares how many free accounts were registered on the official website? Who cares how many boxes they shipped to the retailers (not boxes sold)?
This is overhype, something that came back to bite Funcom in the rear. I hope it does the same for Cryptic. Where are the days of worthy press releases where they actually proudly announce the number of retailboxes sold, and the number of paying subscribers?
EQ1-AC1-DAOC-FFXI-L2-EQ2-WoW-DDO-GW-LoTR-VG-WAR-GW2-ESO
Surely there's not people out there who like the genre of MMO's and want to see a different iteration of these game mechanics. Surely there's not people out there that may be fans of a particular IP and have always dreamed of filling the shoes of a starfleet captain, chaos warrior, or Barbarian King. Surely there aren't still people playing all the games you mentioned and loving them.
Surely you can't be wrong, right Shirley?
Originally posted by GTwander:
How are you an MMO? Or any of us for that matter?
I say we strike all users from the site for not being MMOs.
You need to learn not to make a big fuss out of these xxx account registered or yyy concurrent users online slogans.
They are all for advertisement purposes only. Clever players won't take these number as a big deal because we all know they don't represent UNIQUE players. Only mmo related sites reported them as "news".
Well part of the problem are people who are unwilling to wait for a trial.
if this is based of the article on this site then as said it wasn't 1 mil sales but 1 mil registers on the sto website
not sure if aoc ever got 1mil but the current 50k subs doesn't really count as a salvage against it's original sales does it?
and last i heard aion was closer to 1/2mil
but i agree on the business model front in companies making disposable mmos. Take the money and move on without ever really going for long term investment. I guess this is part of the 'curse of wow'. They make a half-arsed wow leech but with better graphics and never seem to figure out why it doesn't go multi-million. can't see it changing unless one someone manages to actually challenge wow's sub numbers
funny story
I was invited into the closed beta. I managed to get to character creation, and never went past it. I buy //EVERY// MMO that comes out usually. I figure 50 bux for the game, free month what the hell. this game, never once struck my interest. Im a huge sci-fi fan also, loved anarchy online and loved eve online. This game though? I dont know, maybe i thought a space drama wouldnt make a good MMO?
anyway, proud to say I didnt contribute to the 1mil
"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a robot foot stomping on a human face -- forever."
That's not going to stop people from latching onto that number and running with it.
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