Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Will SWTOR ever recover?
This discussion has been closed.
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Comments
The reply was in response to "its made a profit" - despite the statements of e.g. EA's previous CFO. And the topic has been covered so I didn't want to go over old ground. However enough info has been released to make a reasonable guess.
1. Bioware announced 2M accounts post F2P. With their results EA announced (just under) 500k subs and 1.7M F2P accounts. Implication: prior to going F2P SWTOR had roughly 200k subs. There was a few weeks between the 2M announcement and EA's results but more people signing up would mean less subs prior to F2P so less revenue.
2. At $15/month 200k subs would bring in $3M / month at $15 per month. (Some will have been on 90 and 180 day plans).
3. With their results EA said that SWTOR's average revenue had doubled. So if it was bringing in $3M a month prior to going F2P that's $6M a month or $24M to the time of the announcement.
4. (just under) 500k subs were announced in March - so that's $7.5M.
5. Assume all subscribers bought Makeb at the discounted price of $10 and that's another $5M. (And forget anybody who bought it for $20.)
6. The other $11.5M comes from subs in Dec, Jan and Feb and the cash shop for 4 months.
Now more subs = less cash shop revenue; higher cash shop revenue = lower subs. Big question: average subs for Dec/Jan/Feb. And you can plug different numbers in: 200k subs would be $9M in subs and $2.5M cash shop; 100k subs would be $4.5M subs and $7M cash shop etc.
7. EA announced in their results at the start of the year (shortly after SWTOR had gone F2P) that subs and cash shop were about the same. This would suggest about 120k subs in Dec/Jan/Feb (for $5.4M) and $5.6M from the cash shop over 4 months or $1.4M a month.
Now SWTOR had only just gone F2P when EA talked about subs and cash shop being about the same and cash shop revenue tends to be higher when a game launches. So I would be inclined to go with a higher average sub number for Dec/Jan/Feb and a lower average cash shop figure.
Quick rider: trying to allow for the $13.99 90 day subscription and $12.99 180day subscription plans reduces pre-F2P revenue possibly as low as $2.5M/month. So EA would only need to hit $20M revenue to double that. So in bullet point 6 the $11.5M could be $7.5M - reducing subs and/or cash shop revenue by as much as a third.
Anyway: this type of stuff was discussed so I didn't feel the need to repeat it. At the end of the day the then CEO and then CFO both said that SWTOR did not perform so "made a profit" ....
"The problem is that the hardcore folks always want the same thing: 'We want exactly what you gave us before, but it has to be completely different.'
-Jesse Schell
"Online gamers are the most ludicrously entitled beings since Caligula made his horse a senator, and at least the horse never said anything stupid."
-Luke McKinney
....Being Banned from MMORPG's forums since 2010, for Trolling the Trolls!!!
i dont know how the game is doing right now, last time i played was about one or two months ago and it was definitely not as populated as during the F2P transition, but there was still plenty of people at that time.
I have to say that the game would certainly recover if they remove some of the limitations that are still in place (im specifically talking about being locked away from competitive gear unless you subscribe, money cap, and any other feature that prevents character progression without the cash shop). Cash shop is supposed to be 1) optional and 2) eye-catching to entice people to buy.
If you make your cash shop mandatory for progression unless you subscribe (even for people who bought the game) then ill keep sending my money to a different game. I cant play a game that tries to force its hands into my pocket. You want my money, earn it.
I didn't think swtor had any defenders list and yet they still surprise me. Trying to spin "a slight down trend" isn't going to work here.
That is such great point. It's more than a little shocking a company would dump 200+ million into a project in such a helter-skelter way. Frankly it's a little damaging to gaming as a whole, when a major company is that reckless.
http://wyrdblogging.blogspot.com/
Only 3 full instances of the Fleet? There was at least 5 on the previous double xp weekends, so it is going down. The decline will not show until there is only one instance left, as even if there was 10 times more population than WOW at its peak you will still not see more people in game around you due to the instances.
Star Trek Online - Best Free MMORPG of 2012
^- Well written tripe.
He doesn't need to back anything up with anything. He's a poster stating he's observed things. Not the press.
May I suggest you stop role playing the perfect one.
Anyhow the guy is write to an extent. Ebon and Berg are down dramatically. How do I know?
I still play nightly!
I've seen a huge drop off. I am sure there are subs here and there being made. But really? At the point they designed tor? Any subs even 5 is better than what was happening.
By all means hack and chop the hell out of this, as I know I am right. I've subbed this game since release. I still like it!
I just know the population on the servers I play on have radically declined.
I'll see me a 120 people x1 here and there on the newbie planters but once you get to say..Nar? 1-20 people.
Yes ! That's super successful! That's clearly showing progress.
He's right on another fact. The fandom for this game is crazy. I know. I used to be a member of the fandom.
You guys are seriously going to tell me as a long time player of TOR it's doing better?!
Really?
OP you are correct things have reduced way more than expected. It's not OMG mode but damn some of you need to take your noses from the ole TOR brown eye and start smelling the stink. There is something terribly wrong with the game at this time. If you deny that. Once again. Get your noses out of assholes.
If SWTOR was still a sub based mmo then I would be inclined to agree based on the servers it has.
Different rules apply for F2P games however. EA have just closed several F2P games including The Sims Online - when announced its "Daily Average Users" count had dropped from 10M to 6M. OK the game was "in decline" but it underlines the significance of money spent in the cash shop.
What will be will be however I'm certainly not waiting for anything.
It was good enough for me.
I played at launch and in the beta, my personal view being the game is not good or in other words: SWTOR does not meet my expectations as a customer? (is that okay to write)
I have to be careful now as words deemed too strong may get me into trouble, so I will simply say:
No I do not think this game will ever recover, they have too few resources left after a few hundred staff members lost their jobs at EA/Bioware (fact). Less human resources = less chance of an investment recovery.
Very nice pictures -- they make me want to put down a small Naboo house and hunt for resources.
http://wyrdblogging.blogspot.com/
Yep, very cool pics. SWG's graphics were underrated. There was an attention to detail. Considering that the game was built 10 years ago (give or take) when computer specs and internet connections weren't tweaked to the current day standards, I'd say the graphics were amazing. These pictures support that claim.
The restricted exploration will prevent me from ever going back.
I would much rather have SWG graphics...
Having dropped the $$ on the CE, you have NO idea how much I want this game to make a comeback, but nothing I've seen so far has given me the slightest indication that there's a light at the end of the tunnel; that significant changes or improvements are coming.
Really, the only redeeming quality it has is the story, which, when content updates are few and far in between, kind of defeats the whole purpose of playing an mmo.
They also need to stop thinking linearly and give us more to do. Turn Coruscant into something more than a quest hub. Put in player housing, player-owned businesses, arcades, a friggen gladiatorial arena - whatever it takes to fill the streets with players and then we can get some real targets for bounty hunters to chase, real trade orders from dedicated crafters and buyers to be carried out by actual player-operated smugglers trying to avoid playable enforcers/troopers.
Let players' decisions affect the game world. Give us a vote and the ability to become politicians, hiring player assassins to kill your rivals. Have the empire send in regular assaults on major landmarks so you get massive battles and siege opportunities, you could even allow imperial agents to act as spies or paint targets for artillery volleys. Allow us to command fleets of merchant corvettes, patrol craft, pirate marauders. If they even brought in a fraction of the features they toted in beta, this game could beat anything on the market.
As it is, it looks like we'll have to be satisfied with their current attempts to keep afloat. They don't appear to have the clout or the resources to make any of these things a reality.
People keep cutting on SWG, but at least SWG had a fluid frame rate when roleplaying.
In SWTOR, if you have 10 people near you, expect about 5 fps .. 80 fps solo ... just 5 fps when you try to do multiplayer anything.
JOY.
I think SWG needs more praise, in light of this competition.
No doubt! Was great times.
Survivor of the great MMORPG Famine of 2011
it looks as good as swtor,,surprising, when you consider its age
but good ,,or bad Graphics, isnt the most important thing,,pandaland is proof of that
gameplay is important, and immersion
and that is, where swtor fails miserabelly
Is your point of view.
In my opinion, it will never be as big as they intended it to be, but it will survive since every game out their is F2P these days.
To recover to the million of players that jumped into the game on opening, I doubt it highly unless we see a movie release sometime soon, which probably wont happen for a couple / few years.
yes,,,shared by 3/4 of the people, who bought this game at launch
its okay to have a niche game,,,but star wars deserves more
and now that EA have the rights to all star wars games,,expect them to suck the life out of it
and if that fails,,they simply block it ,,as a certain other mmo