Bioware numbers spin, and is SWTOR really a success, a dissection.

Lobotomist · February 2012

I dont know guys.

But comming from SWTOR hater. Even I predicted around 4 million sold.

I mean couple the strongest IP on the planet + one of most popular developers Bioware + huge marketing investment.

Than make barely 2 million sales...

Well thats just pathetic all considering.

Bioware and EA might be all big to the press now. Talking about big sucess.

But I am sure heads roll there ... not that it will help now.

RelGn · February 2012

The only quality company out there is Blizzard.All others are just trying to take some glory from them.

pmaura · February 2012

OP what do you mean by demanding more from SWTOR. THis game gives you a lot to do.

Do you know how much I paid for Kindquest 1 in the 80's $55. thats what I paid for Swtor you realize these games if you tie in inflation should be higher.

This game is great, also there should be a log in drop off becuase its not the holidays anymore.

Gagelish · February 2012

[mod edit]

I'm sorry, I must not have been clear. I meant meaningfully respond. The fact that you live in a weird little bubble where everyone who buys a videogame is a 14 year old with no commitments or life that they need to attend to and can find time every single day to play makes the entire basis of your argument false.

korent1991 · February 2012

Well if you ask me it's possible to have so many players at launch, and you could say they lyed a bit and instead of telling us it has 1.7 million players which created an active account they removed the created an account and said active

But 1.7 million players for me is possible, for the 1st month servers were full, it was hard to find a server which didn't have a waiting queue. But as soon as the free month passed the numbers dropped, drastically... The servers are now "heavy" at it's peak, only 3-4 servers are "full" with waiting queue at best.

Game isn't a success, I was expecting so much of this game and then I was dissapointed. SWG was better than this crap. It is cool to be a part of the story with the voiceovers, but when doing sidequests it's being rather boring and I was pressing space most of the time because the story of the side quess are boring. Even the main quest story line is sometimes trivial and boring. So now this voice overs come more as a pain in the ass than a fun and good implementation. This game misses a lot to be a success. End game content is really really a must, and this game doesn't offer much of it. PVP is unbalanced and isn't interesting enough to keep you playing. Small maps, fast pace, unbalanced classes, alot of bugs, slow support on fixing them. Customer support is awful comparing to other mmorpgs I've played.

It is fun to loose your self in mostly good and interesting main storyline which BW created for player, but that alone is not enough to keep you interested in the game for long. With everything the game has to offer now, 1.5 - 3 months MAX if you ask me.

1.7 million at launch - probably was true

success - big fat NO

PS. The game now probably has 1/3 of what it had on launch, judging by the server statuses.

jpnz · February 2012

I must be the reason why SWTOR is failing, due to work/personal appointments I was not able to login today.

ZOMG! It all makes sense!

/sarcasm

slickbizzle · February 2012

Originally posted by Hrimnir
Its not a matter of "making up the numbers", we're not saying they just grabbed a number and threw it on paper, we're saying they spin the numbers. Even at the time that was posted a healthy portion of the player base was still in their free month (or included gametime with purchase of game).

You're saying a major corporation spins numbers to make their product more desireable? Nice try.

Next, you'll be telling people that Warcraft only has 2-3 million subs in NA/EU and Blizzard uses some far away country like China to trick people into thinking their game is more popular than it really is.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by Loke666
I don´t log in to whaever game I play every day. Maybe 2 days out of 3 unless I am sick or a new expansion just came out.

I actually do other stuff as well as gaming, 1 million out of 1,7 does not seem that strange to me.

Not that I play TOR or have any special feelings about it one way or another but the reasoning sounds odd to me.

I don´t think we can see if TOR is a success or not for months yet.

The problem is more likely that those 1,7 million active subscribers just do not add up!

As I simply do not see anywhere near that kind of activity on the servers, even during primetime!

I have toons on both a US and an EU server, both where queueing and FULL during the first 2 weeks and both are now down to Standard / Heavy during primetime (Heavy only in weekends).

Not a single zone has more than one instance running anymore and at most not more than 40 to 50 people in it, except for Republic Fleet.

Groups are a total pain in the butt to get going most of the time.

Those 1,7 million are more likely the amount of people that created an account at launch, but in no way reflect the same numbers after 20th of January when the 30 days freetime were up! As activity on servers dropped significantly directly after that.

So it really just doesn't add up. So we just have to wait and see what the next Quarterly report will bring, as that one will contain the actually data after January 20th and gives a more truthful picture.

Omnifish · February 2012

Originally posted by Axehilt
A. Speaking of numbers spin, the OP cited a source (VGChartz) which indicates ToR sold 2.11m boxes while RIFT sold 0.50m boxes.

B. I have no clue if VGChartz is at all reliable, but I assume that if "1 million sold" numbers have been released for RIFT that gives VGChartz a +/-100% accuracy.

C. Who the hell cares? Do you like RIFT? Then play it. Do you like ToR? Then play it.

D. See any other MMORPGs with 2 million players? Just WOW? Well gosh, I guess that means only WOW is a success in this market if that's the measure of success.

E. If you factor out players who have cancelled their subscription, and think that 100% of the remaining players play every single day, then you have no clue how players play games. 40% of your users playing every day sounds entirely realistic, having worked on games where we track that stuff.

F. With 2.11m box sales, and assuming 10% of box sales were Deluxe Edition and 0% were Collector's Edition, it works out to $131m (minus the profit margin of retailers). This is an extremely conservative value as CE is probably more like 1-2% of sales and the DE ratio is likely higher too (possibly much higher.)

A similarly conservative, highly-bleeding estimate of subscription income would start at 1m subs and bleed 30% of those subs each month meaning they start with $15m profit and it bleeds down to $3.6m four months later resulting in $41m total.

A less conservative, highly-bleeding estimate starting at 1.7m subs and bleeding 30%/month gives them $70.6m after five months, allowing them to break even against dev costs (this ignores the cost of running the live team, but in the long run I can easily see it paying for itself.)

And of course it comes out dramatically more favorable if they bleed slower than that (and my model doesn't include the additional box sales and subscribers made during those five months.)

Couldn't agree more.

I was wondering how long it would take for the haters to find a new angle after the active accounts were announced, (many seem to have slinked off). So I guess it's now, 'It's EA...they LIE!!!!!'.

The next time IMO to judge this will be after the 3 months mark, lets see how many subs there are then. Overall I think the simple fact is some people on here just can't understand why others enjoy the game for what it is, thus they think somehow through the power of MMORPG.com it'll be destroyed. Sad really.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by zymurgeist

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by Loke666

I don´t log in to whaever game I play every day. Maybe 2 days out of 3 unless I am sick or a new expansion just came out.

I actually do other stuff as well as gaming, 1 million out of 1,7 does not seem that strange to me.

Not that I play TOR or have any special feelings about it one way or another but the reasoning sounds odd to me.

I don´t think we can see if TOR is a success or not for months yet.

The problem is more likely that those 1,7 million active subscribers just do not add up!

As I simply do not see anywhere near that kind of activity on the servers, even during primetime!

I have toons on both a US and an EU server, both where queueing and FULL during the first 2 weeks and both are now down to Standard / Heavy during primetime (Heavy only in weekends).

Not a single zone has more than one instance running anymore and at most not more than 40 to 50 people in it, except for Republic Fleet.

Groups are a total pain in the butt to get going most of the time.

Those 1,7 million are more likely the amount of people that created an account at launch, but in no way reflect the same numbers after 20th of January when the 30 days freetime were up! As activity on servers dropped significantly directly after that.

So it really just doesn't add up. So we just have to wait and see what the next Quarterly report will bring, as that one will contain the actually data after January 20th and gives a more truthful picture.

Presenting anecdotes as fact to draw erroneous conclusions is a common mistake. The 1.7 million is current subscribers as of the end of January. It has nothing to do with cancellations or free months. It simply means at the given time 1.7 million customers had the ability to play. You can't spin that. It's a hard number and lying about it would be a violation of SEC regulations.

Nowhere was End of January cited! The report talks about End of Dec. 2011! As that's the end of the Quarter of that report! Not end of january! Those numbers will come up in the next report.

Various journalists already jumped on that little detail and were wavered off with standard corporate spin, about how they use the standard way of reporting numbers commonly used in MMO's and that they could not provide anymore details. yadayadayada.

Take it for what you will. But there it is.

the next report is the one that will be interesting, as it will actually contain financial data from January! Specifically after January 20th!

TheLizardbones · February 2012

The report is as of Feb. 1.

Why is it so hard to accept that SWToR has had a really good month?

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by lizardbones
The report is as of Feb. 1.

Why is it so hard to accept that SWToR has had a really good month?

Read the report again! That they released it on February 1st, doesn't mean the report contains data till end of january.

Creating a financial report doesn't take a couple hours, it takes quite some time, hence the 1 month delay. Very common, as they have to be very careful, especially when you are reporting to shareholders.

The report is from the Quarter that ran till Dec. 31st 2011.

BadSpock · February 2012

To answer the question, is SWTOR *really* a success?

Too soon to tell, and we'll never really know exactly how much profit the game makes and what EA/Bioware consider to be a "successful" ROI.

(Return on Investment)

From a purely subjective stand point, lots of people are playing and having fun, the game has received mostly positive press reviews...

If this were any other genre there wouldn't even be a doubt in anyone's mind that this was a success.

But us MMORPG'ers are a crazy bunch.

Many of us don't seem to understand that as long as the servers remain up and people log in and enjoy the game, a game is a success.

Think on that for a while...

Gagelish · February 2012

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by lizardbones

The report is as of Feb. 1.

Why is it so hard to accept that SWToR has had a really good month?

Read the report again! That they released it on February 1st, doesn't mean the report contains data till end of january.

Creating a financial report doesn't take a couple hours, it takes quite some time, hence the 1 month delay. Very common, as they have to be very careful, especially when you are reporting to shareholders.

The report is from the Quarter that ran till Dec. 31st 2011.

The subscription numbers are current to February 1st. The active accounts information was from the prepared comments released along with the Earnings Report. The Report was current to December 31st. The prepared comments, a related but separate document was current as of February 1st.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by Gagelish

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by lizardbones

The report is as of Feb. 1.

Why is it so hard to accept that SWToR has had a really good month?

Read the report again! That they released it on February 1st, doesn't mean the report contains data till end of january.

Creating a financial report doesn't take a couple hours, it takes quite some time, hence the 1 month delay. Very common, as they have to be very careful, especially when you are reporting to shareholders.

The report is from the Quarter that ran till Dec. 31st 2011.

The subscription numbers are current to February 1st. The active accounts information was from the prepared comments released along with the Earnings Report. The Report was current to December 31st. The prepared comments, a related but separate document was current as of February 1st.

Nope. It's a very clever and carefully crafted.

The hard 1,7 million numbers were on Dec. 31st 2011. Then they say that the majority of those actively subscribed after the first month. So they went from hard numbers on End of dec. to a rough estimate after that.

Really simple, because they were only legaly bound to report til Dec. 31st 2011. Everything after that is for the next quarterly report.

EA knows EXACTLY what they are doing.

Why do you think they desperately tried to launch the game on Dec. 20th? Because they know the number would be good for that Quarterly report. Just before the end of the year.

They know there will be a major drop after the first month, as it has been the general trend in MMO's for the last 5-6 years.

But here EA's cleverness kicks in... the next quarterly report will be dominated by impressive sales numbers of Mass Effect 3! So if SW:TOR shows decline is sub numbers in that report (which it will), it will be snowed under by Mass Efffect 3 numbers.

So this is actually all very carefully orchestrated by EA. If they are good in something, then it's actually this.

marion242 · February 2012

I will have to read the report you guys are talking about but business years typically do not end Dec. 31. They run through the end of January. So the quarter would not end Dec. 31 but more like Jan. 28th.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by zymurgeist

I won't bother to repeat the dozens of refutations you've ignored. You would only ignore them again. The 1.7 million number is as of the end of January.

Q3 Non-GAAP Revenue and EPS Ahead of Expectations

Highest Operating Cash Flow in 31 Quarters

More Than $1 Billion in Non-GAAP Digital Revenue in Calendar Year 2011

Battlefield 3 and FIFA 12 Each Sells-Through Over 10 Million Units

Origin Generates $100 Million in Calendar Year 2011

Star Wars: The Old Republic Has More Than 1.7 Million Active Subscribers

REDWOOD CITY, CA

– February 1, 2012 – Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: EA) today announced

preliminary financial results for its third fiscal quarter ended December 31, 2011.

Business Outlook as of February 1, 2012

The following forward-looking statements, as well as those made above, reflect expectations as of

February 1, 2012. Electronic Arts assumes no obligation to update these statements. Results may

be materially different and are affected by many factors, including: product development delays;

competition in the industry; the health of the economy in the U.S. and abroad and the related

impact on discretionary consumer spending; changes in anticipated costs; the financial impact of

acquisitions by EA; the popular appeal of EA’s products; EA’s effective tax rate; and other factors

detailed

in this release and in EA’s annual and quarterly SEC filings.

Fourth Quarter Fiscal Year 2012 Expectations

– Ending March 31, 2012

hikaru77 · February 2012

Originally posted by BilboDoggins
You people (haters/fanboys) can believe whatever you want but looking at my guild roster gives a pretty good indication of how things in this game are going subscriber wise.

90ish unqiue members of which only about 20ish are still active. Thats a HUGE drop in active memberships. Much more than I saw in Rift after 1 month.

My guild keep growing every single day, i didnt notice a drop in the server popultaion at all, and looks like is growing. You know? http://www.torstatus.net/ have some info about the server population, you´ll notice that the ¨population¨ is actually, growing and not droping.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by hikaru77

Originally posted by BilboDoggins

You people (haters/fanboys) can believe whatever you want but looking at my guild roster gives a pretty good indication of how things in this game are going subscriber wise.

90ish unqiue members of which only about 20ish are still active. Thats a HUGE drop in active memberships. Much more than I saw in Rift after 1 month.

My guild keep growing every single day, i didnt notice a drop in the server popultaion at all, and looks like is growing. You know? http://www.torstatus.net/ have some info about the server population, you´ll notice that the ¨population¨ is actually, growing and not droping.

LMAO! Funny you bring exactly that up, as that one is actually playing against you.

Before you just blindly posted that link, did you actually check the Overal population index for both EU and US servers?

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/us

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/eu

You would have seen that the trend is downwards, not upwards. /sigh

FrostWyrm · February 2012

I have no doubt EA has spun the numbers in their favor to make SWTOR look more successful than it is.

But do you really think they're the only ones to do this?

Every MMO out there, WoW included, takes every legal means neccessary to present their game in as positive a light as possible. Even in this sense, STWOR does nothing new.

dougmysticey · February 2012

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by hikaru77

Originally posted by BilboDoggins

You people (haters/fanboys) can believe whatever you want but looking at my guild roster gives a pretty good indication of how things in this game are going subscriber wise.

90ish unqiue members of which only about 20ish are still active. Thats a HUGE drop in active memberships. Much more than I saw in Rift after 1 month.

My guild keep growing every single day, i didnt notice a drop in the server popultaion at all, and looks like is growing. You know? http://www.torstatus.net/ have some info about the server population, you´ll notice that the ¨population¨ is actually, growing and not droping.

LMAO! Funny you bring exactly that up, as that one is actually playing against you.

Before you just blindly posted that link, did you actually check the Overal population index for both EU and US servers?

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/us

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/eu

You would have seen that the trend is downwards, not upwards. /sigh

Concurrent users definately went down after the holiday as many of us were off and had to got back to work/ school, etc so I don't see that as an indicator for or against the actually subscribing population.

I am on The Shadowlands Server which is always heavy load at peak times. I used to see 20-30 people in the mid level planets like Taris & Tattooine and now see well over 100. Could just be people catching up, who knows.

There are always at least over 100 of my guild members on at peak time, sometimes a lot more.

Maybe I am just lucky in the server my guild was assigned too at launch but my server "seems" much, much busier than it was at launch. I never have problems finding someone to run with or groups for Flashpoints, etc.

I think it is still way to early to tell how TOR will do but I don't understand why the OP is itching for TOR to fail. Don't like it, don't play it but I don't want games I don't like to fail. I simply don't want to play them AND don't bother posting in the forums for those games. I am busy with other stuff.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by FrostWyrm
I have no doubt EA has spun the numbers in their favor to make SWTOR look more successful than it is.

But do you really think they're the only ones to do this?

Every MMO out there, WoW included, takes every legal means neccessary to present their game in as positive a light as possible. Even in this sense, STWOR does nothing new.

We for sure know Blizzard is doing it with WoW. Hence why they plain refuse to merge all those nearly empty and low populated realms.

They can easily merge over 30% of their current servers, but they won't, as it means bad press for them! Because then their boasted numbers suddenly do not add up anymore.

It's common practice in MMO's to include trial and newly created accounts in their Active subscriber numbers.

SkillCosby · February 2012

I had a 4.0 in college... the first day of class.

JeroKane · February 2012

Originally posted by dougmysticey

Originally posted by JeroKane

Originally posted by hikaru77

Originally posted by BilboDoggins

You people (haters/fanboys) can believe whatever you want but looking at my guild roster gives a pretty good indication of how things in this game are going subscriber wise.

90ish unqiue members of which only about 20ish are still active. Thats a HUGE drop in active memberships. Much more than I saw in Rift after 1 month.

My guild keep growing every single day, i didnt notice a drop in the server popultaion at all, and looks like is growing. You know? http://www.torstatus.net/ have some info about the server population, you´ll notice that the ¨population¨ is actually, growing and not droping.

LMAO! Funny you bring exactly that up, as that one is actually playing against you.

Before you just blindly posted that link, did you actually check the Overal population index for both EU and US servers?

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/us

http://www.torstatus.net/shards/eu

You would have seen that the trend is downwards, not upwards. /sigh

Concurrent users definately went down after the holiday as many of us were off and had to got back to work/ school, etc so I don't see that as an indicator for or against the actually subscribing population.

I am on The Shadowlands Server which is always heavy load at peak times. I used to see 20-30 people in the mid level planets like Taris & Tattooine and now see well over 100. Could just be people catching up, who knows.

There are always at least over 100 of my guild members on at peak time, sometimes a lot more.

Maybe I am just lucky in the server my guild was assigned too at launch but my server "seems" much, much busier than it was at launch. I never have problems finding someone to run with or groups for Flashpoints, etc.

I think it is still way to early to tell how TOR will do but I don't understand why the OP is itching for TOR to fail. Don't like it, don't play it but I don't want games I don't like to fail. I simply don't want to play them AND don't bother posting in the forums for those games. I am busy with other stuff.

If you play on Empire, it might be that a lot of people have been rerolling Empire, tired of being facerolled due to being outnumbered. So that might explain that some Empire guilds might experience some growth with new guild members.

I however play Republic on both an EU and US server and have seen quite a steep decline in overal activity in the past couple weeks. :-(

InFaVilla · February 2012

[mod edit]

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Bioware numbers spin, and is SWTOR really a success, a dissection.

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Bioware numbers spin, and is SWTOR *really* a success, a dissection.

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Bioware numbers spin, and is SWTOR really a success, a dissection.