Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor

This just in... SWTOR is no longer a top 5 game for Arts of Electronica:

 

http://www.shacknews.com/article/73691/star-wars-the-old-republic-not-a-top-5-game

 

They did say however that it is in the top ten and that SWTOR is more important than Tiger Woods.

LOL. And I didn't think it could actually get any more hilariously sad.

Board Members: "So, we just announced a dramatic loss in our subscriber base. Our already damaged public perception is taking even more hits. Anyone have any ideas?"

CEO: "Hey, how about I swallow both my wingtips?"

Board Members: "That just might work, John....."

Originally posted by Berikai

Looks even worse than first thought.

 

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Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor
This just in... SWTOR is no longer a top 5 game for Arts of Electronica:
 
http://www.shacknews.com/article/73691/star-wars-the-old-republic-not-a-top-5-game

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Originally posted by wowfan1996

 

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Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor
This just in... SWTOR is no longer a top 5 game for Arts of Electronica:
 
http://www.shacknews.com/article/73691/star-wars-the-old-republic-not-a-top-5-game

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Yeah, that's more like it. Damage control mode is on.

 

I don't know if I'd call that "Damage Control". I think the guy could take some spin lessons from the Romney campaign.

I can't believe so many get so heated about this topic, I really can't. What does it matter how many subs TOR has and why has this argument continued for so long? It's been months of this back and forth, for what?

Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor

"Frank Gibeau, another top executive at EA, said that no one is directly competing with EA’s Star Wars title in the massively multi-player online space, and no one else has the Star Wars brand behind it."

Well, this isn't completely unexpected. Need to sweeten the pill, you know. Still I can't help wondering how LA is going to react to that Riccitiello's bit about SWTOR not being even a top 5 priority for EA. I can almost hear echo of angry phone calls...

One new tidbit found here, note he took some important cliff notes from the streamed conference call:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=4289269

1. Wanting incorporate microtransactions to all EA titles, with shifting importance to making many of them Free to Play.

2. SWTOR profits for EA is in the top 10 but not top 5.

3. More Free to Play weekends coming.

4. When discussing the importance of TOR, put upcoming SimCity title ahead in importance.

5. Casual players have unsubscribed.

Originally posted by wowfan1996

Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor

"Frank Gibeau, another top executive at EA, said that no one is directly competing with EA’s Star Wars title in the massively multi-player online space, and no one else has the Star Wars brand behind it."

Well, this isn't completely unexpected. Need to sweetent the pill, you know. Still I can't help wondering how LA is going to react to that Riccitiello's bit about SWTOR not being even a top 5 priority for EA. I can almost hear echo of angry phone calls...

 

Why would LA care? They get paid either way.

Anyone that read this or any other mmorpg forum knew that it was going to happen

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

Originally posted by Nevulus

"But “Star Wars: The Old Republic” showed signs of weakening. EA said active subscribers totaled 1.3 million at the end of the quarter — down 24% from the 1.7 million reported at the end of the December period, when the game first launched"

I work as a stock analyst for [edit]. I specialize in the tech sector, lately I have been assigned to online games.I wish I could publish our results from our analyst group so you can see the impact SWTOR had on EA, or lack of, and the truth behind the numbers. But alas I am not allowed so I will only say that as much as I would like to see EA crumble and burn, They are holding well over a million paid subs as of March.

 

Edit: Not allowed to post my firm's name.

There are only two acceptable reasons for you to have a half naked man as your forum portrait.  One your a girl or two its you.

Originally posted by hh33

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

 

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

OK, I'm quick to bash the game, but let's quit with the 'it'll be F2P by XXX' crap. It's almost as pathetic as EA/BW subscription claims.

Originally posted by cahenderson

Originally posted by hh33

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

 

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

OK, I'm quick to bash the game, but let's quit with the 'it'll be F2P by XXX' crap. It's almost as pathetic as EA/BW subscription claims.

Free week 

Free weekend

Free month

Come on... It's practically F2P already...

Originally posted by Blackwater56

Originally posted by cahenderson

Originally posted by hh33

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

 

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

OK, I'm quick to bash the game, but let's quit with the 'it'll be F2P by XXX' crap. It's almost as pathetic as EA/BW subscription claims.

Free week 

Free weekend

Free month

 

Come on... It's practically F2P already...

Yea but we also gotta look at the other MMOs EA have...they still are not F2P. I think the closest would be B2P.

The 1.3 mm subscriber count is actually as of April 30, not March 31, and it is all subscribers, not just paying subscribers, ie it includes those on bonus time who will not renew

From the presentation:

In our last call we indicated that we had 1.7 million active subscribers, and as of the end of April we now have 1.3 million, with a substantial portion of the decrease due to casual and trial players cycling out of the subscriber base, driving up the overall percentage of paying subscribers.

The quote is from the following link on page 7

http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ERTS/1855720613x0x566984/c10f605c-3487-488e-ad86-b5bb74fe2408/Q4_FY12_Script.pdf

Hope this helps.

Originally posted by hh33

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

 

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

LOL discontinued by the end of this year?  Please.  I'll admit that SWTOR is a flop, but a game of this magnitude will take years to die.

Originally posted by hh33

Toss in all the manufactured subs that EA/Bioware created with their 30 day giveaway and the number of subs lost since Dec 2011  is probably in excess of 55%. Either way it does not bode well for EA/Bioware considering they launched the game in 30+ countries recently.

 

SWTOR will be F2P by Q4 2012 if it is not discontinued altogether by then.

According to the article the subs were as of the end of Q1 which was 3/31.  However, the 30 days free didn't come until April.

Bioware/EA viral marketing department is in panic mode.

Check out the sheer number of EA paid shills on this thread in the SWTOR official forum. It is mind-boggling.

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=447469&page=19

They banned all the constructive critics and anyone who said anything negative, now their threads are just pages of shills discussing back and forth with fanboys, backed up by their corrupt fascist moderators who are "editing" threads to make them look better, all desperately trying to make the game look as if it's not completely dead already.

Their new story: it was the bad community that killed SWTOR.

That's right, they're blaming the players for SWTOR's problems, in order to deflect the blame from their **** devs who made a **** game!

Nice spin, blame the community that tried to fix the game by providing feedback and solutions - and got banned for it, and don't blame the terrible clueless lead developers who destroyed the game with terrible decisions, 1.2 class balance, no merges because "it would look bad" etc etc etc.

Originally posted by PyrateLV

“Star Wars: The Old Republic” showed signs of weakening. EA said active subscribers totaled 1.3 million at the end of the quarter — down 24% from the 1.7 million reported at the end of the December period, when the game first launched.

 

ROFL!

 

What happened to - "subscriber numbers haven’t dropped, but concurrent users at peak times have" - Daniel Erickson

That statement came less than a month ago

 

 

Eh, in this case, it was just a lagging indicator.  i'm sure he knew what was coming next, but he wasn't technically lying.  He was just speaking with so much legalese that anyone who understood MMO's couldn't stop laughing as he talked.

But the money shot here is that basically within 4 months of release, TOR has lost at least 25% of its subcriber base.  No real way to spin that.