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Will SWTOR be the largest MMO launch ever?
dubyahite
Member UncommonPosts: 2,483
Through the 12th of Nov. VGchartz has SWTOR at 865,669 preorders in NA only counting box sales. This is only a percentage of the actual pre-order numbers and those numbers are from 6 weeks before launch.
http://www.vgchartz.com/preorders.php
Remember, this is just box sales in North America. It doesn't take into account all the people that ordered digitally (me) and people that aren't in NA. There has got to be at least a couple million pre-orders by now.
Also looking at VGchartz first week sales for all games world-wide, the highest sales on the list for an MMO were WoW Cataclysm at around 2.2 million. Granted, that's an expansion, but it's a similar launch of an expansion vs launching a new game, although possibly much simpler.
http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly_records.php (This shows the top sales in one week, all of the games on the top show the numbers for week 1)
I also realize there are plenty of games that have been launched with mainly digital sales and wouldn't be tracked on VGchartz.
If we accept cataclysm as a launch, and assume it's the biggest launch ever, then I would say SWTOR is well on course to being the biggest mmo launch ever.
Does anyone know of anything that launched with more sales than Cataclysm? I honestly don't really know if there is or not.
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Cata sold around 4 million when in launched according to Bliz. but get ready for the people that are going to come in here and say that pre-order numbers don't mean jack.
Taken from the WoWWiki for those that need sources:
Sales
Cataclysm sold more than 3.3 million copies in the first 24 hours of its release including digital presales, and 4.7 million copies in its first month of release.[26][27][28] It holds the distinction as the fastest selling PC game, overtaking the former holder World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King which sold 2.8 million copies in its first 24 hours.[27] It also holds the record for the most number of copies sold for a PC game in the first month.[28] In the UK, the game placed 3rd on the "Top 10 Entertainment Software (All Prices); Week Ending December 11, 2010" behind Call of Duty: Black Ops (Activision) and FIFA 11 (EA Games).[29]
Yeah, VGchartz can't track digital so that's just box sales. It's not even really the same thing since it's just an expansion. That is however a world wide number compared to the NA only number for SWTOR.
If you compare Cataclysm's week 1 box sales to SWTOR's current box preorders you'll see that CATA sold 796,544 boxes in week one. Tor is right behind that, and will possibly hit it in one or two weeks.
Again, that's only box sales in NA, but at least it's a more accurate comparison. There is the problem that WoW is in more countries probably now then TOR will be in at launch, but I'd say it's a safe bet that TOR passes that number easily by launch.
If that's true and the same kind of ratio holds true with TOR that it did with CATA this could ALREADY be at 3 - 4 million pre-orders. It could be less, no way to know, but damn thats a lot. And theres still a month to go with the biggest stress test beta weekend ever coming up.
Next weeks numbers should be really interesting.
As far as preorders not mattering, I'd say that matters quite a bit. Even with 50% retention it's still the second biggest MMO in the world probably at launch right?
EDIT: ok i see you added source now. I think TOR totally has a shot at doing that. amazing.
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I am thinking TOR pre-orders would be well over 900k maybe more after the 11-11-11 beta weekend as of now if I were to fathom a guess with VGchartz, they haven't updated their website yet. But yeah we don't have numbers for online retailers or retailers outside the U.S. and I think that online retailers see more sales than a brick and mortar retailer.
Cataclysm is not an MMO launch, its an expansion launch. You would have to compare SWTOR's launch to WoW vanilla launch.
The numbers on there are from 6 weeks out from launch. They gained 62k preorders that week. If you assume there won't be an increase in preorders as we get closer and that rate stays steady, we're looking at around 370,000 more preorders before launch.
That puts them well over a million box NA sales by launch, but they would still need a couple million sales in digital and non NA retailers to surpass Cataclysm. It's very doable I think, but it will probably be very close.
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Although TOR is only launchong in NA/EU there are people in the non launch zones that plan on buying the game also, and just playing on the NA/EU servers since there is no region locks on the servers. So that will add to TOR's launch numbers as well.
Yeah I realize it's not the same thign at all. The only reason I compare it to that is that it's the biggest sales I could find. It is different.
In some ways it's the same though, the level cap increase is kind of like everyone starting out in the same place. There are new zones that get launched as well as new endgame. I'm sure it's less challenging for Blizzard to launch an expansion then it is for most to launch an entire game, plus they have a captive audience in a sense with all their customers.
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I would say that it will be the biggest "Launch". There are alot of Star wars fans, Bioware fans, and just people looking for a new mmo that it will be a successful launch. But those numbers i don't believe really matter. I think the numbers that will matter is when the smoke clears how many will still be Subbed in 6-8-12 months.
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Yeah I am waiting for them to put up the 11-19-11 numbers, TOR's growth rate sames to hover around 50k to 60k a week, and I am thinking they might go even higher after this mass beta weekend.
Yeah yeah, thats not really the purpose of this thread though.
Just curious about discussing the launch numbers here.
Since you bring it up though
If they launch with 3-5 million people, that's an insane amount. They have a better chance out of the gate with subscriber numbers down the road than any game I've seen launch. If they hold on to half of those people and pick up new ones throughout the year, that's still millions of people. I think they'll hold on to more than half though to be honest.
Even if people do start dropping off, they have more than covered the development costs with box sales I assume, and the rest of us will all be left playing a game we love for a very long time.
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CATA was not an MMO release but an expansion release, as you also need to orriginal game to play cata.
When you look bcak to first month sales of all true MMO releases in the past (and not expansions) SW:TOR will undoubtfully be the most selling game.
When you look to the number of subs after 2 months, i also think SW:TOR will be on top. It took WoW almost a year to get 1M subs.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
It means I really hope this game is the best thing since sliced bread because if it sucks it tells MMO developers to buy a high profile IP and make a shit ton of money on a crappy game in preorders then let it tank on purpose to save infrastructure costs.
They need to sell atleast 4 Milion copies to make a dime out of it. But i guess that selling 6Million at release will cover all the costs they made.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
Oh don't get me wrong. I do think this game will be very successful even past launch. And I do believe that they will have a very large retention rate.
But to get back to the topic. I would like to add that "TO DATE" this will be the biggest launch. Ever? I mean unless its the last MMO ever created. (With the end of the world next year it might be) I think Ever might be a bit of a stretch.
Also I voted yes.
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I personally prefer the game over sliced bread. I mean you can always rip bread apart with your bare hands, slicing is more of a convenience feature.
Your conspiracy theory is completely unfounded though. I don't think any company would want to tank their game on purpose to save on infrastructure. lol the infrastructure is paid for with subs or cash shops you know? You think WoW is really hurting on infrastructure costs or are they making a boatload of profit.
Who would choose tanking their game intentionally over millions of subscribers? That makes no sense.
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Free to play in a year, a cash shop, no appreciable expansions. Yea, thats a conspiracy. They wouldn't do that. Its unheard of. What was I thinking?
Well, by saying ever I mean to date. I'm not accounting for future games (although I think it will beat next years games hands down).
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The largest MMO launch ever? Yes.
I don't count 'expansion releases' as 'launches'. Blizzard has had amazing success with their expansions, but the launch of the actual base-game is what we're talking about here.
I think RIFT had a pretty solid launch, honestly. But I think SW:TOR will destroy the numbers.
Will SW:TOR have 12 million subs after month one? No.
And i certainly don't think it should in any way reflect as a 'failure'. I think that's the overall number everyone is somewhat expecting still though. It's not realistic... but that is somewhat of a 'line in the sand' that people are using as a 'mark of success'. They want to see that 'passing of the torch' from WoW to (insert the name of the new MMO here). It's not going to happen at launch, and I we should all be careful to remember that.
Yeah I agree, I don't think no MMO is going to launch with 12 million subs out of the gate. It took WoW serveral years to hit those numbers. A million is doable since the MMO market has grown considerable since 2004 at that time EQ's 400-500k was the bench mark. Not to mention that half those subs come from the Asian markets with the other half split between the EU and NA.
Man are you really that far fetch when it comes to identifying a market, targeting a market? Yes you are.
The platfom on which the OP compares does not matter. You have to look at how the market has evolved over the years. When WoW was released and a year after announced 1 million subs, that’s as amazing as if a game announce 5-7 millions today. If you compare TOR release to wow’s, well then there are already loads mmo doing better than wow did on boxsales. You have to look at how the market is today, you cannot compare a 6 year old release to one today. Think before talking? would do good sometime.
The best way to compare is like the OP says, to cataclysm, due to the change in market and how many people are now accessing the MMO market.
Think about the market, not the product. that would make sense.
Well thanks for supporting my idea but no need to attack him. This is a thread of reason and speculative math!
Even though I chose CATA to compare it to, I do sort of agree with the posters that said it should be compared to an actual launch of a game. I mean a wow expansion and another mmo launch are two entirely different beasts.
But like you said if we're looking at the market for mmos Cataclysm is a good place to start.
To be honest with you the only reason I chose Cataclysm numbers to post here was because that 1 week records chart has no filters so it counts all platforms. I found cataclysm week one on the first page and went through a few more pages before I found the next mmo release record and it was Cataclysm again for week 2. HAHA. I gave up at that point and just went with that after sifting through all of the Call of Duty, Sims, and other non mmo games that are on there.
Speaking of...Call of Duty has set a crapload of 1 week records. I'm not a fan of the series but damn if that's not impressive.
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Same goes for you. No we should not be talking about wow actual launch since it so old and the market grew more than 300% since then.
You always look at the market, the target group. basic of marketing and statistices..
Your right, i shouldnt. Dunno why i always have to be so arrogant when i post. Sorry about it. But working with marketing all day for several years. Its just like.. how can't you see the size of the market matter? and the change in a much bigger target group deffently change how many you can exspect to get..? so on
But yes, no need to be a cocky idiot about it. Sorry
Nope pretty sure WoW and Rift both opened up with higher numbers but I could be wrong.
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You are wrong. Wow only launched with a few hundred thousand. TOR already has that almost in North America box pre-orders. It also took about a month before Rift announced that they had sold 1 million.
TOR will smash both of those.
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