I havent bought anything retail for my pc since Burning Crusade :D

Originally posted by gt4980b

I always hear that UK games are cheaper if you buy them in stores vs digital.  So maybe digital isn't as big there.  They do have bandwidth caps so digital isn't as viable an option as in the US

Wrong on both accounts mate. In the majority, that is.

I don't understand how some people always think that because these numbers only show retail boxes, the numbers would be that much better for the digital sales.

Most other games in that list also have digital sales and it's not because it's an MMO that the % retail vs digital is that much different. If anything, who would really want to buy SW:ToR digital when everybody hates Origin (SW:ToR is not available on Steam) and want to avoid it at all cost...

Battlefield 3, aslo an EA game who's also available on Origin digital download is still peaking in that sales list and it's released 25 October (and it had massive pre-orders which broke records). That's almost 2 months before SW:ToR. It's been out for 5x longer than SW:ToR and it's on the 3rd spot as opposed to SW:ToR's 38th spot.

Skyrim for example, who was released 1,5 months ago is still on the 8th place in the same list and that game is even available on Steam. As we all know, Steam is a much more popular platform for digital download than Origin thus if it would really be digital downloads hurting the retail sales... then Skyrim would have a bigger loss in retail numbers than SW:ToR has.

In other words, the arguments that SW:ToR is low in retail sales list because of digital sales or because of preorders, are nothing more than myths.

What should alarm people is the trend which clearly shows form charts like this. The SW:ToR hype is dying very very fast if you ask me. Unlike Skyrim who created several meme's since it's release and where you still hear things like "omg if you havn't played this game already, you must check it out for sure".

I still play SW:ToR btw, I had 90 days of sub and I started playing the 20th december. I enjoy it and played it for about 45 hours in less than 2 weeks. I played Skyrim too, something like 55 hours. While I think I'll eventually spend more time on SW:ToR I do think it won't leave such a mark on the Game scene as Skyrim did. Every minute I played Skyrim felt special and I had plenty of awesome moments where I was really impressed by the game. I couldn't stop talking about it to my friends like... GO AND PLAY THIS F*ING GAME OR I WILL NEVER EVER LISTEN TO YOU AGAIN IF YOU TALK ABOUT ANY GAME TO ME WITHOUT HAVING EXPERIENCED SKYRIM I'm not having that with SW:ToR bc while I enjoy the entertainment it gives me for my money, it's not leaving that mark on me...

What might hurt SW:ToR long term sales is the word of mouth positive feedback... or the lack thereof...

- Skyrim intrigued me in it's first hour... other people felt the same = mouth to mouth promotion = good continued sales

- SW:ToR entertains me but doesn't stunn me with awesomeness = big hype dying fast after release = faster sale drop after preorder and initial sales

Ow yeah, by the way. I bought SW:ToR for 39 euro in retail store (Saturn, Media Markt). Online digital download costs 50 euro. Do you guys really think they sell so much digital versions of this game? That's being very delusional if you ask me...

Digital download being 11 euro's more expensive than having a boxed retail version...

Edit:

Either the list isn't correct (like the guy below me suggests), or those numbers show a very bad future for SW:ToR and everyone believing that it's bc of digital sales should open their fanboy-eyes and realised other games in those charts also have digital sales.

Out of everyone in my guild, only a single person bought a boxed copy.  All the rest were digital. 

My friend buys everything boxed and I buy my games from steam. He says one day in the far future steam will go bust and i wont have access to my games lol Is it possible for a big company like steam to go bust which would make me to loose access to all my games? :/

Weren't EU retail sales capped?

Originally posted by Gdemami

Weren't EU retail sales capped?

Seems I recall hearing that... and folks complaining about it.  Widget sales tend to plummet after you've run out of widgets.

Originally posted by Gdemami

Weren't EU retail sales capped?

I haven't seen any store in Belgium where since the 20th december, the game wasn't on display on like 1/4 th of the available space to put PC games on. There must have been like 50 copies on display when I bought SW:ToR at Saturn for 39 euro (game incl 30 days free).

Also, most retail charts show the amount of copies bought by retail shops. Not the amount of actual game copies sold to players woh have already left the retail shops.

Buying boxed copies are so last decade.

Originally posted by Marcelino

My friend buys everything boxed and I buy my games from steam. He says one day in the far future steam will go bust and i wont have access to my games lol Is it possible for a big company like steam to go bust which would make me to loose access to all my games? :/

A friend of mine got his Steam account hacked temporarily and for some reason all his games were inaccessable for a period of time, but he eventually got them back.  That's as far as worrying news about Steam went for me.

Anyway, I read on one forum that people in the UK don't have as easy access to credit cards that Americans do so many were forced to buy several months (via time cards) of a game they couldn't try first in order to play it, which makes EA's practices seem even more ridiculous, but I don't know how widespread that phenomenon is/was or if it affected sales to a large degree.

i always buy boxed copies, same with movies and music etc.  i just like actually having a physical thing not something that i can't hold lol, i know strange but if i spend cash i want an actual copy that i can hold in my hand :P

Originally posted by pharazonic

It's downhill from here ;)

 

that's exactly what i was thinking HA. so much for the WoW killer. People are already at level 50 and crying for more end game content of which the devs haven't even started yet. Not gonna have a good first six months without longevity.

Lol, is it just me who senses a growing desperation in hanging onto the "physical box sales" bit?

There is no reason whatsoever to assume that box sales and digital sales are not proportional lol. If anything, box sales should keep on longer because the word travels faster on the internet and the DL crowd tend to be more forum savvy than the box people who might lean more to getting their info from the mags.

To put it bluntly, a harassed dad is much more likely to buy a shiny box for his junior who likes those computer games  than some fiddly download thing on the internetz.

As for the mags vs vox pop:

metacritic

critic score: 87

user score: 6.1

Adittionally, box sales are dependent on physical stock being replenished, so many box buyers have to wait till new boxes arrive... while DL buyers don't have problems with supply. If anything, DL purchases should drop much faster than physical ones.

 

In my case my wife bought me a boxed copy of SWTOR for Christmas but I haven't broken the seal yet.  (She even purchased the Atlas to go along with which has some really cool maps in it.)

Now that the rush has died down a bit I'm thinking about setting up an account and logging in though.

Back on topic, makes sense, the Christmas sales are over, people who were interested in playing have all made their buys, and now its to see if they can draw in a steady influx of new players like WOW managed to do for so many years, literally replacing those who left the title and adding to the total.

I'm just surprised at the total lack of advertisement for SWTOR in the UK. It's no good copying the World of Warcraft strategy of waiting several years before having TV adverts, you need to hit the ground running now to make an impact and BioWare seem to be doing the opposite.

Originally posted by Kyleran

In my case my wife bought me a boxed copy of SWTOR for Christmas but I haven't broken the seal yet.  (She even purchased the Atlas to go along with which has some really cool maps in it.)

Now that the rush has died down a bit I'm thinking about setting up an account and logging in though.

Back on topic, makes sense, the Christmas sales are over, people who were interested in playing have all made their buys, and now its to see if they can draw in a steady influx of new players like WOW managed to do for so many years, literally replacing those who left the title and adding to the total.

 

That was my first thought too, but the article refers to relative sales (compared to other games) rather than absolute ones (the actual number of copies)...

It's normal that a game's sales decline after the release, but a good word-of-mouth can offset this to a large degree... especially if it's a game with a marked social component and which you can play with your friends. This is obviously not what is happening here.

Really, there is no way to sugarcoat this.

Originally posted by Eir_S

Originally posted by Marcelino

My friend buys everything boxed and I buy my games from steam. He says one day in the far future steam will go bust and i wont have access to my games lol Is it possible for a big company like steam to go bust which would make me to loose access to all my games? :/

A friend of mine got his Steam account hacked temporarily and for some reason all his games were inaccessable for a period of time, but he eventually got them back.  That's as far as worrying news about Steam went for me.

Anyway, I read on one forum that people in the UK don't have as easy access to credit cards that Americans do so many were forced to buy several months (via time cards) of a game they couldn't try first in order to play it, which makes EA's practices seem even more ridiculous, but I don't know how widespread that phenomenon is/was or if it affected sales to a large degree.

where did you hear that rubbish?

Originally posted by Qazaam
The answer is very simple. They had a shortage of boxes. Box sales fell due to a lack of boxes.

Just in order to pretend to be objective, I agree that this could be the case as well...