Well, I for one would not consider Gold-Farmers "players" After all, they don't play the game for amusement and fun, do they?
The problem with that logic is that you then have to adjust every game's numbers by the number of gold-farmers in the game and there's absolutely no way of doing that. And actually, if the reports that you see on Gold Farmers are true, many of them have become gold farmers because they get to play a game rather than work in some factory or something, so technically you can't say no they are not playing for fun. The fact they are getting paid to do it is a bonus. Even grinding mobs is better than working on an assembly line....maybe
That's a very dangerous statement right there, considering the gold-farming industry and their...reputation, but yes, I agree. It's impossible to accurately tell how many -PEOPLE- are actually playing a MMO.
That doesn't change that in all likelihood, it's not nearly 9 Million players for WoW.
As for 1 out of 8 owning a second account not being likely...why? I know more than a few people who have second accounts for themselves. Most because they want to play with friends in America, others because they help themselves grinding with two characters (Buffbots ftw). *shrug*
Anyway, I think this discussion is more or less moot. WoW -is- the biggest game out there but that doesn't change my personal feelings towards the game.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period.
Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million.
Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games.
Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion.
If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions.
I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
You do realize that they have to pay people, right? I mean...those 1.2 Billions you are talking about...you do realize that there's things Vivendi and Blizzard have to pay for, right? -.-
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
WOW is the best game ever made... only because it was made to appease the masses of carebear gamers that wanted easy leveling, easy gear, and zero learning curve. I think getting out of bed is the hardest part to playing this game.
That said... grats WoW on all those subscribers....and grats all you subscribers on a game that fits your needs.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too! You also have tech support expenses that includes us, european, and asian Of course the9 have to give a portion of asian profit back to blizzard USA for the license agreement.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too!
Accountant? no, running my own business for over 20 years? yes. The numbers shown in the quarterly stock report are total revenue generated during the time, deductions anad expenses are listed elsewhere.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
That's just it, you need to subtract the money earned from the expansion sales, then subtract whatever amount the other divisions earned(no idea about that) from the 716 million then you end up with money earned from subs then divide by 9 then divide by 15.
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too!
Accountant? no, running my own business for over 20 years? yes. The numbers shown in the quarterly stock report are total revenue generated during the time, deductions anad expenses are listed elsewhere.
None of what you say matters because you left out the most important fact! Anywhere from 4-7 million of those subscribers do not pay 15 dollars per month. So you can't take the 9.3 million and multiply it by 15 and expect to get the correct income. Because in ASIA they do not charge a monthly fee of 15 dollars to play!
Is that difficult to understand?
Currently playing: LOTRO & WoW (not much WoW though because Mines of Moria rocks!!!!)
Looking Foward too: Bioware games (Dragon Age & Star Wars The Old Republic)
I was gonna write something about McDonalds not being the best restaurant in the world despite being the most popular and quality and quantity being rarely linked, and never underestimating the ability of the paying public to demand so little in the lazy lack of looking for anything better...
lmao... what a gormless thread... I was gonna write something about McDonalds not being the best restaurant in the world despite being the most popular and quality and quantity being rarely linked, and never underestimating the ability of the paying public to demand so little in the lazy lack of looking for anything better... But I can't be bothered really.
I don't think the point of the "9.3 millions... in your FACE" threads is to claim World of Warcraft is the best game. It's rather a (rightful) slap those claiming WoW and/or Blizzard are going down / already dead / plain mistaken in how to make an MMO. ;-)
Look, i'm not saying it's not the most popular, i'm just saying it's not as popular as is advertised.
Once again you fail to respond to the fact that more then 50% of their playing base does not pay 15 dollars per month. So when Vivendi shows their income it will not be greater then 9.3 million times $15 because that isn't how much people pay to play the game.
It will in fact be a whole lot less since the expansion was given away for free in China and they play for around 2 cents per hour there.
So maybe you should actually do a bit of research before you slander a company?
Currently playing: LOTRO & WoW (not much WoW though because Mines of Moria rocks!!!!)
Looking Foward too: Bioware games (Dragon Age & Star Wars The Old Republic)
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period. Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million. Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games. Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion. If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions. I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
That's just it, you need to subtract the money earned from the expansion sales, then subtract whatever amount the other divisions earned(no idea about that) from the 716 million then you end up with money earned from subs then divide by 9 then divide by 15.
Ok, I'll bite. What are those numbers?
In other words, you don't know how much money was earned from the expansion, you don't know how much the other divisions earned, you don't know how much The9 pays Blizzard for the subs in China, you don't know how many subs are in China and how many outside of China and yet despite all that, you know the fact that Vivendi reported only 716 in income for the first 9 months of 2007 proves that Blizzard doesn't have 9.3 million subscribers. Did I get that right?
If you would like to change your statement to WoW doesn't have 9 million subs in EU and the US, then I agree with you. And you're absolutely right, it's probably closer to 3 or 3.5 million in EU and the US.
WoW is the biggest and most succesfull game around.
McDonalds (tbh Subway might have surpassed them by now, but that doesn't change my point) is the largest damn fast food franchise in the world. Succesfull beyond anyones dreams. No one says that McDonalds serves anything but junk, but it works for them.
Why should anyone care (from a gaming perspective), just how much WoW is bigger than anyone else?
I can name 5 different restaurants within a 10 minute walk from where I live that have better food than McDonalds, will that make those damn McDonalds junkplaces go away? No. Still plenty of idiots that eat there.
Don't hate WoW or Blizzard. Hate those <people> that think WoW is a quality game...
I can name 5 different restaurants within a 10 minute walk from where I live that have better food than McDonalds, will that make those damn McDonalds junkplaces go away? No. Still plenty of idiots that eat there. Don't hate WoW or Blizzard. Hate those <people> that think WoW is a quality game... <modedit>
Or perhaps we could all just allow others to have their opinion and accept that our own may be wrong?
lmao... what a gormless thread... I was gonna write something about McDonalds not being the best restaurant in the world despite being the most popular and quality and quantity being rarely linked, and never underestimating the ability of the paying public to demand so little in the lazy lack of looking for anything better... But I can't be bothered really.
I've actually read through that pdf file someone listed and done my own research.
First, remeber that Vivendi is a French company, and everything in that pdf is Euro's.
Right now, the Euro is valued 1.4633 times the US dollar...
You have to take their earnings statements, and realize that their gaming division which includes Blizzard is only a portion of the multitude of companies Vivendi owns.
Then you have to look at 2007 and remember that their profits (WoW/Blizzard) will be much lower because they had to spend a LOT of money on advertising and packaging and merchandise production and everything else + their normal operating expenses to get The Burning Crusade out the door. You have to spend money to make money.
PLUS Vivendi has bought major shares of different companies, and now spent billions to aquire Activision...
And then realize that revenue is end-of-the-day how much money they made.
Pretty much, what I'm trying to say it... Because Blizzard is a privately held company, we'll NEVER get 100% accurate information on their sales figures or subscription numbers.
AND - trying to look at Vivendi for clues as to how well Blizzard is performing is just a futile because Blizzard is only a part of the massive conglomerate that is Vivendi, and while Vivendi is publically traded and thus HAS to report their earnings, they don't have to get specific about anything Blizzard related unless they are being audited.
Point is?
WoW is the biggest game out there. Why fuss over the symantics?
Yeah, Blizzard makes a large amount of money. They also spend a TON of money on things like maintenance and support, marketing, advertising, employee payment and benefits, and of couse not to mention the costs associated with developing Wrath of the Lich King and Starcraft 2 simultaneously.
Now back to the McDonalds arguement...
Is McDonald's that much cheaper then Wendy's or Burgerking or White Castle etc. etc. etc. ???
It's not because it's the cheapest. It's because for the price range, you get the best bang for your buck. Is it the best food ever? No, of course not, but for the price range, it's the best bang for you buck!
In the MMO world, WoW is the best bang for your buck. Because there are not Tiers of MMORPG payment (yet) their competition is with every other MMORPG that costs around 50 bucks at the store + around 14.99 a month subscription.
Because obviously a vast majority of MMO gamers would rather play WoW for 14.99 a month instead of paying the same price to play anything else. It's simple fact.
December 2, 2007 (Santa Monica, Calif. and Paris, France) – Activision, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) and Vivendi (Euronext Paris: VIV) today announced that they have signed a definitive agreement to combine Vivendi Games, Vivendi's interactive entertainment business -- which includes Blizzard Entertainment's®World Of Warcraft®, the world's #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise -- with Activision
Activision Blizzard, is expected to have approximately $3.8 billion in pro forma combined calendar 2007 revenues and the highest operating margins of any major third-party video game publisher
Blizzard Entertainment, a division of Vivendi Games, has projected calendar 2007 revenues of $1.1 billion, operating margins of over 40% and approximately $520 million of operating profit. Blizzard owns the #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise, World Of Warcraft, which currently has over 9.3 million subscribers worldwide
December 2, 2007 (Santa Monica, Calif. and Paris, France) – Activision, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) and Vivendi (Euronext Paris: VIV) today announced that they have signed a definitive agreement to combine Vivendi Games, Vivendi's interactive entertainment business -- which includes Blizzard Entertainment's®World Of Warcraft®, the world's #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise -- with Activision Activision Blizzard, is expected to have approximately $3.8 billion in pro forma combined calendar 2007 revenues and the highest operating margins of any major third-party video game publisher Blizzard Entertainment, a division of Vivendi Games, has projected calendar 2007 revenues of $1.1 billion, operating margins of over 40% and approximately $520 million of operating profit. Blizzard owns the #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise, World Of Warcraft, which currently has over 9.3 million subscribers worldwide
Comments
That's a very dangerous statement right there, considering the gold-farming industry and their...reputation, but yes, I agree. It's impossible to accurately tell how many -PEOPLE- are actually playing a MMO.The problem with that logic is that you then have to adjust every game's numbers by the number of gold-farmers in the game and there's absolutely no way of doing that. And actually, if the reports that you see on Gold Farmers are true, many of them have become gold farmers because they get to play a game rather than work in some factory or something, so technically you can't say no they are not playing for fun. The fact they are getting paid to do it is a bonus. Even grinding mobs is better than working on an assembly line....maybe
That doesn't change that in all likelihood, it's not nearly 9 Million players for WoW.
As for 1 out of 8 owning a second account not being likely...why? I know more than a few people who have second accounts for themselves. Most because they want to play with friends in America, others because they help themselves grinding with two characters (Buffbots ftw). *shrug*
Anyway, I think this discussion is more or less moot. WoW -is- the biggest game out there but that doesn't change my personal feelings towards the game.
Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?
Final Fantasy 7
WoW does not have 9 million subscriptions, period.
Vivendi's 3rd quarter stock reports shows Vivendi Games having earned a total income of 716 million.
Vivendi Games incorporates not only Blizzard but also Sierra, Sierra Online and Vivendi Mobile Games.
Add the fact that a good portion of that 716 million is from the expansion.
If Blizzard averaged around 9 million subs through the first 9 months of this year Vivendi games would show revenue generated at over 1.2 BILLION plus sales from the expansion, plus sales from the other divisions.
I do not know what the actual paying number of subscriptions are but my guess is around 3-3.5 millions subscribers.
I love it when people start down this road.
Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?
Final Fantasy 7
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
WOW is the best game ever made... only because it was made to appease the masses of carebear gamers that wanted easy leveling, easy gear, and zero learning curve. I think getting out of bed is the hardest part to playing this game.
That said... grats WoW on all those subscribers....and grats all you subscribers on a game that fits your needs.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too! You also have tech support expenses that includes us, european, and asian
Of course the9 have to give a portion of asian profit back to blizzard USA for the license agreement.
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too!
Accountant? no, running my own business for over 20 years? yes. The numbers shown in the quarterly stock report are total revenue generated during the time, deductions anad expenses are listed elsewhere.
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
That's just it, you need to subtract the money earned from the expansion sales, then subtract whatever amount the other divisions earned(no idea about that) from the 716 million then you end up with money earned from subs then divide by 9 then divide by 15.
I am sorry, but your wrong. VIvendi has published their financial report that stated " their wow subscription of november 2007 has reached 9.3 million subscriptions and that 80% of their quarterly earning is from wow, other 20% is from their other game division to SEC.
9.3 millions total subscribers since launch. Also remember that over 5 million are asian players who subscribe to a company called The9 which offers multiple games similar to Sony's Station Pass but they pay per minute to play not a monthly fee.
The numbers don't lie, averaging around 9 mill subs for 9 months=1.2 billion $ and yet, according to Vivendi's own 3rd quarter stock report Vivendi Games has only earned 716 million $. Regarless of the they "say" is truth, you do the math.
Are you an accoutant or finance major student? if not then you dont know how expenses works. They make that much money its true 9 million subs. But in your fianance statement you have depreciation expense, employee expense, license, royalty expenses, servers expense ( by the way i believe blizzard employes the best server hardware that could cost alot per servers.... then you have over 400+ servers and more servers employed in asia.) Since Vivendi is the publisher if blizzard, blizzard owns vivendi a portion of royalty fees to their publishers or should i say owners. I am sure blizzard is very rich in its own right, then they pay salaies of gm's and customer services department on top of devs salaries.) Your forgetting expenses and royalty fees blizzard needs to pay to vivendi. Oh by the way phone support cost money too!.
thats an expense. Then they have to pay a portion for the9 to keep asian wow contract too!
Accountant? no, running my own business for over 20 years? yes. The numbers shown in the quarterly stock report are total revenue generated during the time, deductions anad expenses are listed elsewhere.
None of what you say matters because you left out the most important fact! Anywhere from 4-7 million of those subscribers do not pay 15 dollars per month. So you can't take the 9.3 million and multiply it by 15 and expect to get the correct income. Because in ASIA they do not charge a monthly fee of 15 dollars to play!Is that difficult to understand?
Currently playing:
LOTRO & WoW (not much WoW though because Mines of Moria rocks!!!!)
Looking Foward too:
Bioware games (Dragon Age & Star Wars The Old Republic)
lmao...
what a gormless thread...
I was gonna write something about McDonalds not being the best restaurant in the world despite being the most popular and quality and quantity being rarely linked, and never underestimating the ability of the paying public to demand so little in the lazy lack of looking for anything better...
But I can't be bothered really.
Link to reports or it didn't happen.
I don't think the point of the "9.3 millions... in your FACE" threads is to claim World of Warcraft is the best game. It's rather a (rightful) slap those claiming WoW and/or Blizzard are going down / already dead / plain mistaken in how to make an MMO. ;-)
you have to dl a pdf file.
Look, i'm not saying it's not the most popular, i'm just saying it's not as popular as is advertised.
you have to dl a pdf file.
Look, i'm not saying it's not the most popular, i'm just saying it's not as popular as is advertised.
Once again you fail to respond to the fact that more then 50% of their playing base does not pay 15 dollars per month. So when Vivendi shows their income it will not be greater then 9.3 million times $15 because that isn't how much people pay to play the game.
It will in fact be a whole lot less since the expansion was given away for free in China and they play for around 2 cents per hour there.
So maybe you should actually do a bit of research before you slander a company?
Currently playing:
LOTRO & WoW (not much WoW though because Mines of Moria rocks!!!!)
Looking Foward too:
Bioware games (Dragon Age & Star Wars The Old Republic)
Sorry, but that logic doesn't quite work because Blizzard doesn't get paid a set amount per subscription. The rights to the game are sold to The9 in China and the details of that agreement are sketchy at best so no one but Blizzard really knows how much they get from the China subscriptions.
But lets explore your logic a bit further. Let's say Blizzard has 3 million subs in EU and US and let's assume they get on average $15 per subscription like you were assuming. Over 9 months that works out to 405 million. Let's say Blizzard gets 300 million from China from The9. Now we're getting a lot closer to that 716 million number aren't we?
You really think if Blizzard was just making it all up that they wouldn't be smart enough to actually do the numbers themself? LOL
That's just it, you need to subtract the money earned from the expansion sales, then subtract whatever amount the other divisions earned(no idea about that) from the 716 million then you end up with money earned from subs then divide by 9 then divide by 15.
Ok, I'll bite. What are those numbers?
In other words, you don't know how much money was earned from the expansion, you don't know how much the other divisions earned, you don't know how much The9 pays Blizzard for the subs in China, you don't know how many subs are in China and how many outside of China and yet despite all that, you know the fact that Vivendi reported only 716 in income for the first 9 months of 2007 proves that Blizzard doesn't have 9.3 million subscribers. Did I get that right?
If you would like to change your statement to WoW doesn't have 9 million subs in EU and the US, then I agree with you. And you're absolutely right, it's probably closer to 3 or 3.5 million in EU and the US.
Damn Vesavius, you beat me to it.
WoW is the biggest and most succesfull game around.
McDonalds (tbh Subway might have surpassed them by now, but that doesn't change my point) is the largest damn fast food franchise in the world. Succesfull beyond anyones dreams. No one says that McDonalds serves anything but junk, but it works for them.
Why should anyone care (from a gaming perspective), just how much WoW is bigger than anyone else?
I can name 5 different restaurants within a 10 minute walk from where I live that have better food than McDonalds, will that make those damn McDonalds junkplaces go away? No. Still plenty of idiots that eat there.
Don't hate WoW or Blizzard. Hate those <people> that think WoW is a quality game...
<modedit>
Or perhaps we could all just allow others to have their opinion and accept that our own may be wrong?
That's just my opinion, I could be wrong.
Like a huge company like Blizzard can get away with lying about something like that..
You are right Gameloading, But they can stretch the truth to their likeing, and I have a feeling that they do.
I've actually read through that pdf file someone listed and done my own research.
First, remeber that Vivendi is a French company, and everything in that pdf is Euro's.
Right now, the Euro is valued 1.4633 times the US dollar...
You have to take their earnings statements, and realize that their gaming division which includes Blizzard is only a portion of the multitude of companies Vivendi owns.
Then you have to look at 2007 and remember that their profits (WoW/Blizzard) will be much lower because they had to spend a LOT of money on advertising and packaging and merchandise production and everything else + their normal operating expenses to get The Burning Crusade out the door. You have to spend money to make money.
PLUS Vivendi has bought major shares of different companies, and now spent billions to aquire Activision...
And then realize that revenue is end-of-the-day how much money they made.
Pretty much, what I'm trying to say it... Because Blizzard is a privately held company, we'll NEVER get 100% accurate information on their sales figures or subscription numbers.
AND - trying to look at Vivendi for clues as to how well Blizzard is performing is just a futile because Blizzard is only a part of the massive conglomerate that is Vivendi, and while Vivendi is publically traded and thus HAS to report their earnings, they don't have to get specific about anything Blizzard related unless they are being audited.
Point is?
WoW is the biggest game out there. Why fuss over the symantics?
Yeah, Blizzard makes a large amount of money. They also spend a TON of money on things like maintenance and support, marketing, advertising, employee payment and benefits, and of couse not to mention the costs associated with developing Wrath of the Lich King and Starcraft 2 simultaneously.
Now back to the McDonalds arguement...
Is McDonald's that much cheaper then Wendy's or Burgerking or White Castle etc. etc. etc. ???
No, but it's still #1. Why?
It's not because it's the cheapest. It's because for the price range, you get the best bang for your buck. Is it the best food ever? No, of course not, but for the price range, it's the best bang for you buck!
In the MMO world, WoW is the best bang for your buck. Because there are not Tiers of MMORPG payment (yet) their competition is with every other MMORPG that costs around 50 bucks at the store + around 14.99 a month subscription.
Why are they still #1
Because obviously a vast majority of MMO gamers would rather play WoW for 14.99 a month instead of paying the same price to play anything else. It's simple fact.
December 2, 2007 (Santa Monica, Calif. and Paris, France) – Activision, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) and Vivendi (Euronext Paris: VIV) today announced that they have signed a definitive agreement to combine Vivendi Games, Vivendi's interactive entertainment business -- which includes Blizzard Entertainment's® World Of Warcraft®, the world's #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise -- with Activision
Activision Blizzard, is expected to have approximately $3.8 billion in pro forma combined calendar 2007 revenues and the highest operating margins of any major third-party video game publisher
Blizzard Entertainment, a division of Vivendi Games, has projected calendar 2007 revenues of $1.1 billion, operating margins of over 40% and approximately $520 million of operating profit. Blizzard owns the #1 multi-player online role-playing game franchise, World Of Warcraft, which currently has over 9.3 million subscribers worldwide
Damn you beat me to it.Very nicely done. Thank you.
Still, as I said, not 100% accurate. But it doesn't have to be.
Press releases are just that, for the press.
Basic figures you can use in a story.
520 million dollar projected 2007 profit. Considering everything, that's huge.