Just seven weeks after launch, Free Realms has hit three million players. To celebrate, the first three million players are being awarded a "3M Pet Party Pack" which includes items to be used with players' virtual pets.

The full press release is available below:

FREE REALMS™ CELEBRATES THREE MILLION
PLAYER MARK IN LESS THAN SEVEN WEEKS AFTER LAUNCH

"3M Pet Party Pack" Granted to All Three Million Players

SAN DIEGO, Calif. - June 12, 2009 - Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE) today announced that more than three million unique users have registered for Free Realms (www.FreeRealms.com), the free-to-play, family-friendly online video game that launched on April 28, 2009. Recently awarded recognition by Guinness World Records for conducting the first concert to take place simultaneously in the real world and a virtual space during E3 in Los Angeles last week, Free Realms continues to redefine the scope and pace of online games.

"SOE worked diligently over the past four years to ensure that Free Realms would take the online space by storm," said John Smedley, president of Sony Online Entertainment. "We are pleased to be able to provide such a vast, in-depth and, most importantly, fun world to an average of 500,000 new gamers per week."

To celebrate the rapidly growing community of players, SOE will grant its first three million Free Realms registrants the "3M Pet Party Pack," filled with goodies for use with their virtual pets, both cats and dogs. In Free Realms, players are free to do or be anything, including donning the job of pet trainer to raise a pet! From the in-game Marketplace, players can choose from more than 20 different types of playful dogs and cats to train, feed, groom and dress up. Players have until Friday June 19, 2009 (11:59 PM PDT) to redeem the "3M Pet Party Pack".

Free Realms also features 14 other fun jobs to master, as well as the Free Realms Trading Card Game: a full-featured trading card game, playable both digitally within the Free Realms online game and offline via physical card decks sold wherever you buy trading cards.

To support the initial release and launch of Free Realms, nearly one million Station Cash game cards were made available across five major retail chains. Free Realms players can pop into select retailers to purchase Station Cash cards, which are used to redeem Station Cash and buy virtual goodies or upgrade to a Membership status in the game.

Free Realms is rated E10+ for Everyone 10 and up with content descriptors of Crude Humor and Fantasy Violence. To play Free Realms, visit: http://www.FreeRealms.com.

 Woot! Grats Free Realms!

 Beau

Yes, grats! That is fast. Good for SOE as well for a change! No offence ofc, they just had some downers b4. This is good news.

World of Warcraft has 2 millions players from North America.

3 million accounts and yet there are still only the same 10 servers for a game with an entire world size that is similar to one zone in other mmos?

I don't really care anymore how they are counting "registered accounts", because you cannot fit that type of popluation into that tiny game. 

Free Realms has been live for 47 days

3 million UNIQUE players have joined up in that time.

Those 3 million players all joined on the same 10 servers and start in the same exact location in the game.

At that rate, an average of nearly 6,400 new players join each server every single day.  That is 2-3 times the total population of established mmos and that is just new players every single day?  You could combine the entire land mass of ever free realms server and it still wouldn't even compare to the landmass of 1 server of most fantasy mmos... even without expansion. 

6,400 new people each day on each server.  I don't think so. 

They might as well say 50 million registered accounts for all that is worth.   With a ratio of 300,000 unique registered users per server and such a tiny world, the game should be packed shouldn't it? 

And the SWG vets are still trying to find ways to lie about how SOE is making up the numbers...such sad pathethic people 

I guess with positive news you will always have someone negative to join in. Congratulations on the acheivement SOE, keep it coming. And Daff, brighten up man, it's not the end of the world.

Originally posted by Daffid011

3 million accounts and yet there are still only the same 10 servers for a game with an entire world size that is similar to one zone in other mmos?

 

I don't really care anymore how they are counting "registered accounts", because you cannot fit that type of popluation into that tiny game. 

Free Realms has been live for 47 days

3 million UNIQUE players have joined up in that time.

Those 3 million players all joined on the same 10 servers and start in the same exact location in the game.

---

At that rate, an average of nearly 6,400 new players join each server every single day.  That is 2-3 times the total population of established mmos and that is just new players every single day?  You could combine the entire land mass of ever free realms server and it still wouldn't even compare to the landmass of 1 server of most fantasy mmos... even without expansion. 

6,400 new people each day on each server.  I don't think so. 

 

They might as well say 50 million registered accounts for all that is worth.   With a ratio of 300,000 unique registered users per server and such a tiny world, the game should be packed shouldn't it? 

Do you think people spend 24/7 in a game, of course there are people that might do it that way, but don't think the majority of gamers playes 24/7. As thats the only way I could see your comment that you "MUST" asume people play 24/7, I mean do you use that same logic when you look at WOW, I mean doesn't the game have 11+ mil players yet I could spend a afternoon or evening without seeing anyone..With your logic WOW should also be packed, the reality is to understand most don't play 24/7 let alone every person that has a sub.
 

Anyway good job for SOE, as I always said that lessons learned will not really be seen with the game from the past the games that are either currently just released or soon to be released.

Oh and I am a SWG VET.

Originally posted by todeswulf

And the SWG vets are still trying to find ways to lie about how SOE is making up the numbers...such sad pathethic people 

Care to disprove anything I have said?   Please feel free to point out my lies instead of lumping me into a group.  

Like I said, I don't care how they get their numbers or if they are true or not.  Debating the validity of those claims might have made a interesting topic at the 1 million mark, because many companies use interesting methods or definitions of accounts, subscribers, players, etc.  However the disparity between soe claims and the game are so vastly different it isn't even funny. 

You tell me one game that uses a shard/server system that can accommodate 2 million additional unique users in under 30 days and not add one single new server.  I look forward to your explanation. 

Originally posted by Reklaw 

Do you think people spend 24/7 in a game, of course there are people that might do it that way, but don't think the majority of gamers playes 24/7. As thats the only way I could see your comment that you "MUST" asume people play 24/7, I mean do you use that same logic when you look at WOW, I mean doesn't the game have 11+ mil players yet I could spend a afternoon or evening without seeing anyone..With your logic WOW should also be packed, the reality is to understand most don't play 24/7 let alone every person that has a sub.
 

Don't be silly, I don't think anyone plays 24/7 and that isn't even close to what I am saying.    Just look at the raw data.  

an average of 6,400 new players join each server every single day since this game has released.  That is just new players joining.  6,400 players is about 2-3 times the total population of players currently logged into one wow server at prime time.  My only assumption is that if people register for an account, they actually log into the game.   For that to be true then the servers could not possibly handle this type of load. 

Consider that the free realms entire game world is roughly the size of hellfire penisula in warcraft and 2-3 times the active online population of a warcraft server is loggin into free realms every single day for 47 days?   That doesn't even take into account the 6,400 players from the day before that or the day before that and so on. 

Just put on your thinking hat for a moment, or if you think I am making things up based on flawed assumptions, then just log into the game.  Hang out at the spot where all new characters log in for 10 minutes and tell me if you think 6,400 people join each server every day. 

How about this way, lets assume only 1% of those 3 million unique players are logged in at any one time.   Each server would have 3,000 players online.  Now you tell me if you think 3,000 players are in that small gamespace. 

Several companies have stated that roughly 20% of their total subscriber base are logged in during prime time hours.  Either this game has the worst retention rate in the history of mmos, players only play for a few minutes at a time so the game world appears as empty as it is or there is a gaping difference in the definition of "registered user" and someone that actually plays the game.  

Originally posted by Martie

if this has 3 million registered users wow must have 50 million registered users.

wouldnt surprise me

Maple Story claims 92 million users

www.massively.com/2009/05/09/maplestory-announces-over-92-million-users-worldwide-4-year-ann/

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by todeswulf

And the SWG vets are still trying to find ways to lie about how SOE is making up the numbers...such sad pathethic people 

Care to disprove anything I have said?   Please feel free to point out my lies instead of lumping me into a group.  

 

Like I said, I don't care how they get their numbers or if they are true or not.  Debating the validity of those claims might have made a interesting topic at the 1 million mark, because many companies use interesting methods or definitions of accounts, subscribers, players, etc.  However the disparity between soe claims and the game are so vastly different it isn't even funny. 

You tell me one game that uses a shard/server system that can accommodate 2 million additional unique users in under 30 days and not add one single new server.  I look forward to your explanation. 

 

 

Well Mr. Hawking....what you don't seem to understand is the server system they are using expands as the server load increases...it is a bit like Guild Wars district system.  Example I logged in Monday Morning and 10 servers were up, the Saturday  before there were Fifteen servers.  The sever system expands an contracts as needed.....that is why the severs aren't static or have names only numbers.

I think it's also important to note that some of you are comparing apples and oranges. Registered users = people who have registered accounts. This is a COMPLETELY different concept from people who have SUBSCRIBED to a game. One is free, it takes about 10 minutes. One takes a credit card and a commitment.

I can't speak to the validity of the claims, but I tend to believe the claim. Even anecdotally, I have spoken to a number of people who have at least signed up for and played the game a little. Moreso than any game in recent memory, anyway.

Here's a handy translation for people who might find the marketing language of MMOs difficult to understand:

Registered Users / Players = people who have made accounts

Subscribers = could range from people who have ever subscribed to a game to current subscribers

Active Subscribers = people from whom companies are still raking in the cash

Active players = Active subscribers plus anyone who might be on a free trial OR average number of players currently active in a game.

Concurrent Users / Players = number of people online at the same time.

The bottom line is that yes, marketing departments often use strange words to obfuscate (see what I did there?) the truth of their numbers. That's to be expected. What I don't understand though are the people who don't take the time to sift through the language for a logical explanation and instead call foul.

It's marketing folks. Anything that ever comes out of a game company's mouth is marketing. Some is better disguised than others, but you will never see a press release where a company paints itself in a negative light when there's a positive spin to be put on it. It's all a matter of understanding the language.

However you want to disect it Free Realms is a huge success. Free Realms has also recieved glowing reviews from readers and websites including MMORPG.com.

SOE has a winner and some people just cant stand it.

Originally posted by todeswulf 

Well Mr. Hawking....what you don't seem to understand is the server system they are using expands as the server load increases...it is a bit like Guild Wars district system.  Example I logged in Monday Morning and 10 servers were up, the Saturday  before there were Fifteen servers.  The sever system expands an contracts as needed.....that is why the severs aren't static or have names only numbers.

Every single time I log in there are only 10 servers, no more no less.  If you have anything to back up your claim I am all ears, but I think you are mistaken, because the list is always 10 no matter what time of day I log in.    In fact you are the only one I have ever seen make this claim to have seen the list be anywhere from 8-15 servers.  Right on Jsmedlys twitter page you can clearly see where he talks about adding more servers to the game in the first two weeks to handle the load, but prior to 1 million not a single new server despite the game trippling in size?  Come on.

Even if the servers did scale all the way up to a whopping 15 would that somehow make 70,000 new players invading those servers most realistic?  The total land mass of 15 servers would struggle to fill up antonica on one servers in original everquest.

You can litter your post with all the insults you want, but that doesn't disprove anything I have said. 

Originally posted by todeswulf

SOE is making up the numbers...

I wouldn't say they're making them up but I will claim they are irrelevant in the manner being reported:
 

Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE) today announced that more than three million unique users have registered for Free Realms (www.FreeRealms.com), the free-to-play, family-friendly online video game that launched on April 28, 2009.

Understand this is the same as Sensationalism. 

Originally posted by Stradden

<<snip>>

I can't speak to the validity of the claims, but I tend to believe the claim. Even anecdotally, I have spoken to a number of people who have at least signed up for and played the game a little. Moreso than any game in recent memory, anyway.

<<snip>>

The bottom line is that yes, marketing departments often use strange words to obfuscate (see what I did there?) the truth of their numbers. That's to be expected. What I don't understand though are the people who don't take the time to sift through the language for a logical explanation and instead call foul.

It's marketing folks. Anything that ever comes out of a game company's mouth is marketing. Some is better disguised than others, but you will never see a press release where a company paints itself in a negative light when there's a positive spin to be put on it. It's all a matter of understanding the language.

I'm not debating the method in which soe makes their claim of registered accounts and I understand the marketing speak enough to eat salt while reading it.  I'm fine with a company putting a positive spin on marketing and word smithing their press releases, but what is being said here is impossible in any way to translate from account claims to people trying the game.  It might as well be 50 million as it is 3 million. 

My basic assumption is that if every person that signs up, the at least try the game and log into the game world.  The numbers that soe is post average out to 6,400 new players for each server each day.  It is simple math and I am not making it up.  Log into the game for 10 minutes and look at the spot where all new characters enter the world.  By soes claim, each server averages just under 50 new players every 10 minutes.   The starter area should be clogged with players. 

Put it to the test if you wish. 

Originally posted by mindspat

Originally posted by todeswulf

SOE is making up the numbers...

I wouldn't say they're making them up but I will claim they are irrelevant in the manner being reported:
 

Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE) today announced that more than three million unique users have registered for Free Realms (www.FreeRealms.com), the free-to-play, family-friendly online video game that launched on April 28, 2009.

Understand this is the same as Sensationalism. 

Umm I never said that you are quoting the wrong person dude.

Originally posted by Xiaoki

However you want to disect it Free Realms is a huge success. Free Realms has also recieved glowing reviews from readers and websites including MMORPG.com.

SOE has a winner and some people just cant stand it.

Bingo; there is so much animosity against SOE on this site due to the webmaster  harboring the lunitic fringe SWG Vet forum, FreeRealms will continue to be wildly sucsessful, the SOE haters will continue to deny and cry about it.

Originally posted by todeswulf

 SWG vets are still trying to find ways to lie about how SOE is making up the numbers...

I think thats what he was referring to