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Is Blizzard lying about WoW Sub #s ?
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Lol, no kidding. I stopped playing WoW years ago because it got hella boring, but threads like this are popcorn-worthy
.
Where's the any key?
No. That is only one definition of a sub. They define a sub as anyone with an account that has paid something in the last 30 days, excluding free trials and first months.
Whether you agree or not is irrelevant. 10 million people have payed something in the last 30 days, whether they loggin in or not, they paid something.
I have a WoW account. I did not buy MoP. I have no need to buy it. I"m not anywhere near max level, have no interest in fighting with the pets and am not interested in the monks. I'm sure there are millions like me.
To answer the question in the topic sentance.
No.
Take off your tin foil hat.
Please do us all a favor. Thanks.
you may be surprised to know how many of us actually play WoW, we just don't tell you.
They do. They can easily track the account registration and billing for every single account. Blizzard has defined what they mean by subscriber many many many times. The percentage of MoP sold is less than previous but still holds that only a small percentage of the playerbase bought the expansion within the first 6 months.
You are making a claim that blizzard is lying, the burden of proof is on you to prove this. The financial reports show that blizzard is making a butt load of money and have about 10 million active accounts. Anything else?
That's a crap article.
More than half of their numbers come from Asia. All a chinese player has to do is play one hour during that period, they pay by the hour, and be counted as a full subscriber. They also don't buy the game itself.
So NO, I don't believe Blizzard is lying about their numbers. What matters is the games income and profit per month, which I doubt they release.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
It is inferred in your post with statements like:
It just yells "I am a foool!"
whenever we got yet for the hundredst time over the point that the game does not have "10 Million player" but 10 Million so called "active accounts" all over the world.
btw it has always been 10 million active accounts, not players.
We do not know how many western players blizz has now, however they have stated the number in the past.
I don't think you know what the word fanboy means. The evidence that has been posted would not be counted as evidence in any research class.
This is probably the best post in this whole thread. The person who wrote the article, who also may or may not be the OP, are both clueless as to how to analyze anything. The only thing the article showed was some very sketchy numbers for NA/EU. Doesn't count any of the asian market or the Latin American market.
Ironically, I thought we got past the point of the blinding hate filled posts about WoW, since the game is too old to care about :P
I do not think Blizzard is lying either, I do however have an issue with what they classify as a subscription. With entertainment products a subscription has typically meant that you are making a recurring time commitment to a product or service.
I can understand why they would want to do this, what I find strange is how fans seem to be in denial and simply lap up whatever the hell they put out there. If they have 3 million subscribers, that's amazing. The fact that they bring in so much additional revenue with alternative Eastern payment plans is also amazing. But to call them subscribers is beyond a stretch. Like I said though, it's understandble from their perspective.
Speaking of recurring though, there seems to be theme on this site with members that have an odd struggle with basic definitions. Quite a few people seem to just want to create their own meanings for a surprising number of words and terms. It can get exhausting in some threads and this affliction has a major effect on discussions actually progressing in anything that even resembles intelligent. It reminds me a bit of the lovely X-fire threads that are no longer tolerated on the forums. No one can agree and the thread just goes in a perpetual circle.
This really is a strange community we have here.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Of course Blizzard is lieing about their numbers, is this even a question? How much they are misleading their investors on is the question, is it in the millions or simply in the 100's of thousands. If they claim 10mil active subscribers does a factor of a few hundred thousand matter? The numbers game is rampant in every mmo, and most businesses for that matter. It's always a word play on whats an active subscriber, which markets, and for which durations of time. Anyone that believes WoW has 10 million unique, active subs is gullible. I'd speculate that number is much more likely to be around the 3 million mark.
Remember WoW began the game hopping mentality, their customers are exactly the sort of players who burn threw content and then leave.
I wouldnt be surprised. I know of 20 or so people that quit WoW in the last few months. None of them have come back or plan to come back. Many dislike the daily quest grind just to get people in the world. If you are looking for an MMO that is good I would recommend Rift. Most people that complain about it complain about it and say how WoW is so great and anything else is just a knock off. /sigh WoW is a knockoff of other MMOs but lets not go there. I brought 8 friends over to Rift and we are staying here. Still trying to get others to come over and try it out because after people have tried it they enjoyed what it has to offer.
After reading that article, I think the author didn't do much research beyond a few cursory numbers. The warcraftrealms.com thing struck me as particularly odd, since not only does that site have very low player participation (many servers have no numbers), it wasn't even setup to register or acknowledge players above level 80 until 2 days ago. The site is OK for figuring out things like faction and class balance, but not for absolute numbers.
Also the whole 50% of people who resubbed didn't buy the expansion is roughly in line with my personal experience so far. Unless you want to play a monk, or have a level 80 ready to go explore Pandaria, you don't need the expansion right away.
You make me like charity
They are pretty specific about their definition and state it publicly and in their quarterly reports. While some rounding is reasonable (no one really cares whether it is 10,000,001 or 10,000,100) a few hundred thousands is not. They are subject to legal and punitive measures for lying.
While those measures do not stop all companies, assuming that all companies are lying because some have is just as rediculous.
Right now here is the choice. Reading the financial reports and believing what is said about a company in a legal document where punitive measures are taken if they are fraudulent or believing some nobody on the web with extremely specious data.
Hmm?