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Population Drop!
Felconian
Member Posts: 103
[Mod Edit]
Just take a look at the amount of people who have been going back to view the engereering reports.
3 March 2010 = 104 556 views
2 April 2010 = 24 385 views
http://forums.startrekonline.com/forumdisplay.php?f=158
Yes i know we not at the end of the month but take a look at the consistant drop between the other threads?
Speculation People?
Comments
Someone on the forums did the math with the Captain DB on max total accounts at 190k-ish. CDF members think means current accounts, which is just LOL delusional. I cancelled in Feb and still show up in the DB FFS. Jack said on March 23rd-ish they had over 100k subs, which was of course before the 2nd billing cycle started Apr 4th, so they are probably under 100k now and will continue to drop.
That being said, even I, as a founding member of the STO hate club, don't believe they are down to 25k-ish subs. I'd buy 60-70k after the miracle 45 day patch was to no one's surprise a bust.
I agree Darth.. Just from a glance looking at "inactivity", I'm guessing from 50K - 75K active subs. This from a newly released mmo from one of the largetst IP's in the world.. If Atari wishes to save their ship from sinking due to Cryptic's anchor, they need to fire Roper, Emmert and Zinkievich.. I would also give Needham notice that his position isn't safe either..
Well everyone knows only .1% of players post on the forums so the the actual number of subs are around 2.5 million.
hum i really wander why?
oh wait i know why. it's because the game sucks. come on guys you can just watch the youtube clips of this game and see that it's very shalow and just....... crappy.
Absolutely.
What? Is Emmert's ego "too big to fail"?
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
Fired? Not gonna happen. Moved to a new project most likely. Games are not made for gamers anymore. They are made for the publishing comapnies to hype as far as possible to make the most they can off box sales and then move on.
And cryptic has a formula that makes the most sense right now. Make them quick hype them to the stars and start next projecct. Sounds like a publishing companies wet dream, no?
Atari is a pretty small publisher, have you looked at their top 5 selling games this month:
1. Star Trek Online Digital Deluxe Edition
2. Champions Online
3. Rollercoaster Tycoon® 3: Platinum
4. Neverwinter Nights™ 2: Mysteries of Westgate
5. Puzzler World
Entries 3-5 don't really put anybody in a position to do any firing, they make entries 1 and 2 look good by any standard.
Cryptic is trying a Customer Development approach to MMO creation.
Dont forget that STO and CO rank 2 and 6 on my top 10 of crapfests
WAIT!! The MMORPG with a 'Pause Button' is losing subscriptions? Goodness me, that is just shocking....
I don't know if I'd go with those numbers as that kind of indication. I mean, it could be representative of that the things in the last report were so uninspiring that people felt no need to go back and look at the following month's report because they figured it would be equally flat.
I do agree that the game most likely does not have as many subscriptions at the end of April as it had at the end of March, though. as more and more folks start capping out and finding less new content to do and as they start boring of doing repeatable content they may start finding less reason to stay signed on. I know that happened for me.
"Many nights, my friend... Many nights I've put a blade to your throat while you were sleeping. Glad I never killed you, Steve. You're alright..."
Chavez y Chavez
haha. World of Warcraft has a Trillion Players, then.
It is an interesting observation and I'd reckon it was indicative of the declining trend.
While I think it's never too late to install some intergrity and ethics and to look at a game and say "We've done a bad job here, let's shake things up and reverse the situation" I've seen no sign that it'll ever happen at Cryptic. Atari will never take action to fix what is wrong either because they're just like Cryptic - the two companies make good bed fellows.
Any company that loses customers and doesn't give a damn, they are a problem to themselves in the end.
Wall of text but this guy predicted what would happen back in November. Most of it is just like he predicted. Good read.
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=32964
Such a business model won't work in the long term though. Soon Cryptic will have to do nothing but pander to all the LTS (LifeTime Suckers) because that's all that will be left. They'll have to try to sell C-Store items to the dwindling LTSers to stay in business. They know this and that is why over half of all the upcoming STO updates are C-Store items.
Holy crap. Apart from a few things he got wrong, this guy was prophetic!
Man it's like he had a crystal ball. Now cryptic is doing sales on the c store? Box sales and LT subs weren't enough I guess. I just have a hard time figuring out what cryptics vision is for STO and from what I can tell, so do they.
The heck with giving Needham notice, fire him as well! Needham worked for SOE, and therefore should know how a MMO company should not operate. The fact that he was heading Cryptic for both CO and STO means thathe should share in the blame.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Awesome!
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
WOOWWW!!!.. Is this guy an insider under an alias? lmaoo Great prediction, I"m surprised STO didn't see the truth there and delete the post.. TY for the read
Exactly. the firt number is from the first time they introduced it. Likely anyone with an interest even those like myself (thought about buying but didn't) would go and have a look. If people were underwhelmed they are not likely to check it out again.
I get that the game is not doing well but this is using statistics when other variables are not the same. Did you know that last July near my home almost 1000 times the people got sunburned that in December?!!?!?! The sun is going ti kill us! Did you know that "christians" are massivly over represented in the US prison system. . this means that statisticly people who believe in God are more likely to be criminals! (nothing to do with the fact that they might get released early or they need something to hold onto in prison and most picked up the "faith" after they entered prison).
My point is that numbers can't be looked at alone. . sorry . . I got a little off there.
Wa min God! Se æx on min heafod is!
I also wouldn't be surprised that many "inactive" but yet PAYING subs are kids that don't care, because they are floating on their parents money.. They won't press the cancel button, until another game comes out or grabs their interest and forces them to cancel it, because mom and dad will only allow 1 subscription at a time..
which means, as soon as another MMO becomes a viable option, there goes another wave of customers out the door..
I wonder how many people in that thread that ripped the OP are still playing, or if they got in beta and even bought the game at all.
There were plenty of threads before launch where people pronounced the game would fail. It was actually fairly obvious once people lost their Star Trek fanboi glasses.
I think many of the people still playing are lifers. Though it's pretty hard to say anything about population, since numbers can be tweaked. But I sure hope they fall flat on their face with their next game, if that MMO is just as shallow as STO.
As Cryptic was only 'claiming' "100K+" as far back as a month ago it is safe to assume that they are probably already struggling to be over 100k now. Believe me, if they had 160k they would have said back when 'over 150k' - there is no way they made that comment without wording it as absolutely rosey as possible so the truth is probably near the low end of the range they invented trying to make it seem better than it was.
So the starting point of this obvious tailspin is likely barely over 100K (if even that) and that is most certainly referencing prior to the first 30 days ending, now past the second and approaching the third renewel period they are most certainly under 100k. Hard to say how much under but it would not surprise me to learn that they are down to 50k or lower. I logged on a friends account after the 45 day patch and it was a ghost town (considering there is one server) with nowhere having more than an instance or two of a handful of people. STO is tanking, big time - no two ways about it.
And before the fanboys chime in just consider this, 3 weeks from launch they had to lower the price 20% and extend the included time by 300% to make salse. Subs and flames and defenders aside succesful products do not do a firesale days after launch. Moreover, in considering Jack's 'over 100k' claim how many of those are people who took advantage of the $10 off and extra 60 days but will not be re-upping. Plain and simple, anyway you slice it - Cryptic/Atari did everything they could to hype this game early and get its numbers up, so the fact that they are acknowledging such poor numbers very early, by the statement and the firesale, tells you everything you need to know about this most epic of epic fails. Crytpic deserves this and we can only hope Atari cleans house and puts these jagoffs out of the MMO (psuedo or otherwise) business.
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