Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

I think both the fanboys and the haters will get somewhat satisfied. The game wont be a great success gaining more and more subscribers, but instead lose quite alot. But at the same time there will be maybe 200-300k players or so I'm guessing and that means the game is going strong which should satisfy those that wanna play it. :)

I'm somewhat of a hater myself. The disappointment of the game feeling broken for me means I got nothing to play now and I'm bored and blame that on Funcom, unfairly but still. :)

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

Look beyond just the decline and compare it to other recent releases and popular MMOs.

LOTRO (est. 150.000 subscriptions) has 10.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #14.

EVE online with 250.000 subscribers has 13.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #12.

AoC still has 50.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #4.

You base your statistics on people using Xfire?!? Makes we wonder how many other that are playing - not using this program. I have never used it, not sure what it does or what it is good for so this doesn't say jack...

Originally posted by hdnine

You base your statistics on people using Xfire?!? Makes we wonder how many other that are playing - not using this program. I have never used it, not sure what it does or what it is good for so this doesn't say jack...

When looking at several similar MMOs, estimated subscriber numbers to xfire user ratio come out quite close across the board.

I have waited for this game for years and years keeping track every single day and I have been a big supporter of the game but now I am becoming fairly negative.

Not because of the lack of content or the never ending bugs. I sort of expected that.

No its the completely unprofessional way funcom acts in regard to their customers. They keep stonewalling never ever engaging in meaningful communication. They never ever inform about what really happens and they keep the most basic game mechanics hidden which cause people to make choices that goes against what they really wanted.

Why does a company in 2008 think you can avoid talking to their customers? It makes them look like amateurs when they only come out with a controlled press release once in a while which is so far from the reality their players experience in the game that it just look like damage control, outright lies and untruthful hype.

If FunCom were honest about the state of the game and actually talked to their players about what works and what dont work and how things were intended to work in the game then they would probably have avoided loosing a very large percentage of those who quit these days.

People can easily forgive errors and problems. People will never forgive dishonesty.

Originally posted by bjornarg

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

 

Look beyond just the decline and compare it to other recent releases and popular MMOs.

LOTRO (est. 150.000 subscriptions) has 10.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #14.

EVE online with 250.000 subscribers has 13.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #12.

AoC still has 50.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #4.

The hype machine and the hopefulness that the next patch will solve its problems or the unwillingness of some to accept that they've been rooked out of, in some cases, $1000+ to even be able to play this game is what keeps it at the relatively high numbers. EVE I never even heard of before I found it by accident some years ago, and though LOTRO has years of lore, books, movies , single player games, the hype surrounding the mmo was not comparable, AoC made promises(lies) that AoC would be earth shattering, deep, dynamic and a new standard in AAA titles. What a crock. Anyway my point is, AoC's numbers are not a function of its quality or potential longevity, it is a function of a company taking advantage of a desperate  playerbase  by getting people to pay for extended beta by throwing who knows how much money into marketing, and using it to sell an inordinate number of pre-orders, collector's editions(which usually don't come out with a game's first run) and units in general. AoC is incomplete, poorly coded and poorly designed, you can't offer things you can't implement, have just enough content to make the first 20 levels (of 80) interesting and rely on good graphics to save you. Fact is though, that most mmos can survive at a low simmer almost ad infinitum, and funcom knows this, low standards have made more than 1 game company money in the long run, I'm sure AoC will be no different.

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Originally posted by afoaa
If FunCom were honest about the state of the game and actually talked to their players about what works and what dont work and how things were intended to work in the game then they would probably have avoided loosing a very large percentage of those who quit these days.
People can easily forgive errors and problems. People will never forgive dishonesty.

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As for the xfire thing: Funcom is not likely to release the real subscription numbers anytime soon, so we have to do with what we can find to estimate the numbers. Thanks for posting OP.

it was kindof expected, since this is the first month. many players simply stopped during their free time and never subscribed. that's why funcom suddenly has the idea to make this perk bullshit for those who subscribe (i.e. points for payed subtime).

now that the first month is over, we get to see how many really stay.

Xfire numbers are not a good stat to use for any game.  AoC has a lot of missing features, but the way some of you whine, you'd think it shipped with the CD ROM cracked in half.

If subs were low, they'd open up the buddy keys.

I am going to agree with what some here have said.  Lack of communication is hurting them.  I could be more understanding if I knew they were aware of the problem and working on it.  An update here and there saying what they were doing, and maybe an estimate of when a fix would be in would go a long ways.  Instead they are mostly silent on their tech forums.

Originally posted by bjornarg

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

 

Look beyond just the decline and compare it to other recent releases and popular MMOs.

LOTRO (est. 150.000 subscriptions) has 10.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #14.

EVE online with 250.000 subscribers has 13.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #12.

AoC still has 50.000+ hours played at peak. Its all time high was at #4.

Slightly OT, but the guy behind MMOGCHART has already pointed out he no longer believes the 150,000 figure he was given.  He now believes the previous figure of somewhere between 200,000 and 300,000 is more accurate, with the possibility it could even be a lot higher.

I don't play LOTRO, but it goes to show you have to be very careful when playing with stats. Even taking your one above comparing against EvE, it is pretty clear the xfire figures are skewed by some unknown factor. Back calculating it would make AoC have near on 1mil subscribers, which is clearly wrong.

At that point I would be tempted to ignore them as not saying anything of any worth, either way.

sadly from 200 members of my guild 50 is playing on regular basis...others didnt quit they dont just play as much as they did at start...few left thats true.

who would trust those numbers anyway....

Releasing a half assed game has helped and hindered them.

Help - People are bored there is nothing out there worth playing and the timing was perfect a few months before WAR and Aion.

Hindered - Its bug ridden garbage people are seeing that and no matter what enjoyment the game holds very few will stick around with lag and persistant crashes, these are the guys who leave now vowing to return in 6 months time but just never go back.

Come Jan next year after War, Aion and the  WOW expansion I seriousley think Conan will have a sub 50k subscription number.

I realy do hope the game slide's for the condition it was released in perhaps this will finally send a message to MMO producer's that Joe Public will no longer accept beta retail releases with empty promises and half the box features missing.

not sure if xfire is a good indicator, yes its popular in some parts of the mmo community. But thats the mainprobelm i see, cause its mainly used  in subcommunites you might not get a good statistical spread over all different types of players. So basically what i am saying with this is that it probably has not better statistical foundation as looking on the Forums on different MMO websites to see what people think about the game.

Interesting to think about whether xifre figures are a useful indicators. I guess Xfire it comes down to whether xfire provides a large and varied sample.

Though, that said,  I think the falling graph is probably inevitable in any MMO after first month release. For  AOC this is probably due to general displeasure, seen here and on the official forums. Hopefully devs  will realize the wisdom in releasing a *more* polished and complete product. Promising magical patches one month after release is just .. well... risky and annoying. "Polishy polish" and content is everything if you want subscriptions to carry on.

Personally I think AOC isn't going to be massive, it will probably get a long. I get the impression box sales are/were more important. Especially with the console release. In the end, its all about the money and most people are so desperate for a new MMO right now you could sell shit in a box and people buy it. Not saying AOC is total $&£", just pointing out a prevailing attitude...

I don't really think that xfire can show you much meaningful when comparing game sub numbers it is a rough view at best and could be skewed by one game community liking xfire a lot more then another community.  I do think however it is a good tool for showing a trend.  It isn't unreasonable to assume that x% of aoc subs are using xfire.  And it is reasonable to expect that X% would be a pretty static number unless of course some outside influence causes a bunch of people to suddenly stop using Xfire or conversely to start using xfire.   HAHA what is funny is this thread might be skewing the xfire numbers up as some poeple reading this will no doubt install xfire.

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

Whether I'd like or dislike a game I would certainly not draw any conclusions about increasing or decreasing subs taking Xfire as a valuable data source.

Perhaps it is a decline of subs to Xfire instead of the game in question? Can you prove either of these two statements?

Originally posted by Jupp

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

 

Whether I'd like or dislike a game I would certainly not draw any conclusions about increasing or decreasing subs taking Xfire as a valuable data source.

Perhaps it is a decline of subs to Xfire instead of the game in question? Can you prove either of these two statements?

Nope can't prove anything and like I said in the previous post it could be affected by outside influences.  That said it is a reasonable indicator of trends.  Common sense leads you to that conclusion.  It certainly showed AoC jumping to the top of the charts second to only Wow and it does show an accurate mmo usage rate where weekends spike up and week days drop down. 

For some games it also showed a drop off when AoC launched and is showing some rebounding as one can assume players that left for AoC are coming back.  So is Xfire an accurate comparison?  probably not.  Does Xfire show useful trending info?  I'd say it does.

Originally posted by Jupp

Originally posted by ethion

Kinda sad they might be topping the sales charts but it looks like they are sliding on keeping subs...  It will be interesting to see how th coming weeks shape up as accounts run out.

www.xfire.com/games/aoc/Age_of_Conan_Hyborian_Adventures/

 

Whether I'd like or dislike a game I would certainly not draw any conclusions about increasing or decreasing subs taking Xfire as a valuable data source.

Perhaps it is a decline of subs to Xfire instead of the game in question? Can you prove either of these two statements?

You don't sub to X-Fire its free.