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Why I believe SWTOR is Below 200k Subs
Warley
Member UncommonPosts: 508
First, I'll be honest. I don't play this game nor do I have intentions. But, I don't necessarily want to see it fail either. I do question the fact that this game has over 200k 'active' subscriptions. Here's why:
The game relies heavily on VO and story as its selling point. From what I've heard, it's pretty good in that area. However, in other areas (areas that retain and build subscribers), I've heard nothing but bad and negative things. It seems that many feel that this area is a poor man's version of WoW.
Considering that, and considering some of the things EA has said; 500k subscriptions to be profitable. Then, combine that with their latest announcements (laying off staff -twice- and going F2P), you know that they are -at least- below the 500k subscription mark. Then, active paying subscriptions are different than subscriptions. Ultimately, I think around 200k active paying subscriptions is a fairly accurate number.
Here is the biggest concern I think that SWTOR supporters should have: If that the subscription numbers were stable at even 200k subscriptions I don't think we'd be hearing about F2P from EA. I really do believe that subscription numbers are falling fast, and EA is predicting that that number will fall even further.
This is the only explanation for F2P. 200k active paying subscriptions equals $3 million a month or $36 million a year, minus operational costs of course. Even still, that's a substantially high number that any business person would be foolish to mess with. Especially considering that SWTOR has failed to meet expectations.
Again, I'd be surprised if EA has over 200k active paying subscriptions for SWTOR at this point.
Comments
Eve and SWTOR are completely different types of MMO's. They're as close to comparing apples and oranges in the MMO genre as you can get. Again, all of the above is speculative, but it's based upon past experience with MMO trends.
I could be wrong, but I doubt I am on this. If SWTOR wasn't going F2P I'd peg their number anywhere between 200k - 400k.
Xfire is a questionable tool as a linear "success" gauge, however, it can give you good trend analysis, and is certainly better than using nothing but pure speculation, as the OP has.
It's fair to say that their sub numbers are probably a good bit lower than where they projected them to be, but 200k is just silly.
Then why are you posting random baseless theories about a game you neither play nor intend to play?
As for your "theory"....well....i can pull numbers out of my arse as well, but that doesn't mean they'll taste like strawberries.
Expresso gave me a Hearthstone beta key.....I'm so happy
Why are those numbers silly?
I wouldnt put too much stock into Xfire either for your numbers, WoW had 10k players on xfire, yet they have 10million subs, that 1353 would then mean SWTOR has well over 1 million subs, so how can we use Xfire when it's not exactly reliable.
I'd say SWTOR still has 500k subs, the server I've been on has been very populated and had multiple instances up at the same time, I'm actually in Coruscant at the moment and it has 198 players plus another duplicate instance, thats just 1 world, 1 server.
Now I'm back to my companion and hopefully he didnt fail in his archealogy mission.
Sure, and any number used by anyone is just speculation; even 500k+. In fact, MMO history and trends support the 200k number more so than the 500k number.
WOW has 10,967 Xfire members - so if SWTOR has 200k with 1353 members - WOW must have 8.1 x 200k = 1.6 millions subs
Rift has 191 xfire members - Rift must have 0.14 x 200k = 28k subs
Xfire numbers are telling NOTHING about subs
Sith Warrior - Story of Hate and Love http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxKrlwXt7Ao
Imperial Agent - Rise of Cipher Nine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBBj3eJWBvU&feature=youtu.be
Imperial Agent - Hunt for the Eagle Part 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQqjYYU128E
X-fire is only measuring the active player base. Whatever SWTOR's subs are, the active playerbase seems to have stabalized.
As far as subs go, EA has stated that as of July 31st, the sub number is between 500k-1 milion. What is it exactly? Only EA knows and whatever that number was, in EA's opinion it wasn't enough and thus the FTP conversion. You could spin it that EA is being proactive and staying ahead of the curve and recognizing a trend and converting the game's payment model while the game can pay for that conversion (unlike Warhammer) but the bottom line the sub number is not enough.
If you want to see SWTOR's sub number in a more of a glass half empty manner; one would guess the sub # was about 500k on July 31st. Going further, if 10% of the initial 2.4 million box sales were 6 month subs who will not be renewing on August 20th, there sub # becomes around 270 thousand overnight.
If you want to say the sky is falling, the guesstimate rule of thumb is that only 5% of FTP players spend money in the cash shop. Since EA is expecting half its revenue in SWTOR to come from the FTP players, they sure are going to need a lot of them. If that 5% spends on average $5 a month in the cash shop, you would need 16,200,000 new FTP players to equal the revenue of 270,000 subscribers. You also don't benefit from box sales from those new 16 million+ FTP players. Scary stuff.
200k players is probably about right give or take 50k players. Subs might be a bit higher with people that paid long term butdo not play.
With 16 servers left or 7% of the amount of servers at release 150-250 is probably the right figure. Given BWs previous deciet and already fishy numbers its safe to say their claims are not true or relying on some very liberal defenition of subs that simply counts people that are not paying them.
The good news for Tor is that their 16 servers left are fairly healthy. They have been losing people slowly for a month now but the rate of decline is not what it was previously. Thier merger seems to be a great success for them and not only stopped the massive blleeding but helped stabilize the population.
The factor to watch here is what happens to these 16 servers when GW2 and the WoW expaionions get released. Will the massive bleeding start again. Will the 16 servers quickly drop to 4 active servers? They have done an adireable job of hanging on the last two months but this next month could be very ugly for ToR. The questions to be asked is how bad will it be? How fast will they respond? They lost a huge amount of subs becayse they took to long to merge servers before will they respond faster this time? Will there be anything left to save? Its quite possible that GW2 could drop their servers so low that pretty much all become light or empty leading to a mass exodus. I would not be shocked to see them below 50k subs with 2-4 viable servers by the end of September. Putting aside ones feelings of like or dislike iof a game seeing a game and the communities doe is a very sad thing to see. I am not a ToR fan but I don't want to see it die either.. I have played to many dying games ever to wish that to happen anyone elses game.
Now that summer vacation is over player college or under are now returning to school and will play more at peak times. Threw the weeks all games will take a massive blow in 24/7 playtimes in the US. Which is a smart thing for ANET and WoW. It will be easier for them to tell thier load times on a 24/7 basis with school in.
EA already stated that the game needed 500k active subscribers to stay afloat. EA has already shown us they are willing to pull the cord on any project. I doubt the number of active subscribers are under half of what they needed or it wouldn't go f2p it would just go SWG route and shut the servers down all together.
^^^ This.
And I think this in particular "if 10% of the initial 2.4 million box sales were 6 month subs who will not be renewing on August 20th," hits the nail on the head:
EA, when giving out their results, have a duty not to mislead investors. If the percentage of 6 month subs is closer to 20% that could be as many as 480k coming up for renewal from c. 20th August. Subs might drop from just under 1M as at 31st July to just over 500k late August / early September. Not warning people about a potential huge drop could be construed as financial misrepresentation. Probably explains the big 500k-1 million range.
And in response to the comment about EA simply closing the game that may not be an option without having to pay LA damages for damage to the SW brand. Life support however - sure. And as EA will already paid / will have to pay LA regardless there is probably little lost in trying F2P. If only to get more people to sign up to Origins.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
Why do people who will never buy GW2 go into the GW2 forums and post nonsense about that game. Because freedom of speech. Gotta take the good with the bad. Everyone can and will have their say about anything.
We've been through this many times before.
No one is disputing that there is some number that adds up to over 500k made up of:
* Active paying subscribers
* 6 month subscription plans that have yet to run out
* Free months and other promotions
* People who have recently bought the game and have the first free month which they count as an 'active subscription'
This thread is about how many active and paying subscribers the game has right now. 150-200k is a fair estimate given the number of servers and reasonable estimates of the number of people playing on those servers.
...and again. For the second time. His reference to subs are the same as any other company mentioning fucking subs. Stop reaching not like you need to. It is not a fair estimate. You got the number from him yourself. Pretty easy for anyone to assume it is between 500 to 600k. Which is abysmal considering the initial sales and the ip plus goodwill.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
LOL, ok whatever you want to believe.
What a great comeback and dispute. Are you deluded in thinking I'm defending this game? Can't say that I am. Just prone to calling out bullshit regardless the avenue it is coming from.
Anyone that has followed this genre for a bit can figure this out on their own and realize many of the points you gave is exactly why they made the 500k to less than a million remark. Doesn't take a genius to figure it out, Feel free to call the SEC though if you think he is lying about his 500k benchmark.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
For real? Your first sentence makes this entire post moot...
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
I would say it makes him differ from many of the other "pros or cons" posters. But I don't see why not playing the game would have any impact of his ability to read and interpret what's written and what's said about TOR subscription numbers, because that's what he comment in his post. Not if the game sucks or are great. Sometimes it's an advantage to read the actual post before throwing in one-liners.
I wholeheartedly agree. However, in this case you pretty much can sum it up from that and not waste your time. Pretty bunk really. Topic should be locked to be honest.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
While al that is most likely true, you have to understand the irrationality of the player base you are trying to communitcate with.
http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=522253
That one Topic in the SWTOR official forums should tell you all yo need to know about any negative remark made about this game. Even when its desperately grasping at a 500k number while in rapid decline it is still somehow better than WOW.
At this point, the actual sub count doesn't really matter anylonger. With dropping down to 26 servers, EA calling it a "miss", and F2P announced, the number is certainly not what EA/BioWare expected. In the recent call, they said over 500K but under 1 mil. EA has full knowledge of all the recurring subs and how many of those that have canceled and waiting on their time to run out. I have heard that magical 500K drop-dead number used again in an interview here recently so I would imagine that we can assume they have reached under that drop-dead number or they know they are heading in that direction.
What amazes me is that they were given boat-loads of good feedback on what was actualy wrong with their game. By people who continue to sub and a very long thread, on their forums, of people who listed the top 5 reasons why they were leaving. Instead of trying to "fix" their game, they chose F2P, and leave the game as-is. 6 weeks also for a "full team" to just do 1 PVP instanced map, or an instanced flashpoint, or even an Ops with 4 bosses?
It takes about 6 months to develope the F2P model they have posted about? Basicly, the game stays as-is, some restrictions are developed into it, add a store and some items to sell, and it takes 6 months to just do that? I seen more development and consistancy in new content from SWG's 2 remaining developers in it's last 2 years. These guys at BioWare seem to not be able to do anything fast except watch a playerbase bleed down to nothing.
EA got it right, TOR was indeed a "miss". By internal initial design from the NGE devs, ongoing design criteria, communication from developers to it's playerbase, and the speed in which they can actualy do anything.