Originally posted by Thupli

Originally posted by coretex666

I think it is quite possible that MoP sells around 4m copies.

I was kind of surprised when I saw that GW sold only 2m copies. I expected different numbers.

[mod edit]

      lol  do you really even understand what you are saying?? WoWs last expansion sold more in one day than GW2 has sold in a month.....One day not 8 years......

Originally posted by laserit

Originally posted by Azrile

I may be short on my prediction.   GW2 announced that they had sold 2M boxes so far, with another 10 days until MOP.  I had predicted that MOP would sell double, in it´s first day (and only in the west),  than GW2 sold in the month leading up to MOP.  While most of GW2 occurred the first week, you gotta figure they are still pulling in 100k per week... so give them 2.3M boxes when MOP launches.

I don´t think MOP gets 4.6M sales, even 4.2 will be pushing it.

One telling thing though is how many people are riding around on the collector´s edition Mounts.  Not only does that indicate that a ton of people have already bought MOP, but that they paid $60 for it.  Those mounts are so common now that I wouldn´t even use it if I had it.

2M for GW2 is a huge number... but in reality, MOP will sell almost double that in 1 day to people who will also have to pay $15 per month, and that is only in the West.

I like Blizzard´s business model much better.

Putting the two games aside

OP please explain to me: Why you like Blizzard's business model better.

$15 a month versus $0 per month and both games you have the option to purchase items in a cash shop.

I am looking at it from the business´s side of things, not from the players side of things.   But from the players side of things, I will say this.. a successful SUB game means you are sure that your effort in the past will be there next year.  You want to jump into a game like TSW that just laid off most of their dev team?  You want to pour time into a game that won´t get updates unless vanity clothing sells well in the cash shop.

There is a ´permanence´ about wow and it´s 10M subscribers.  It will be a long long LONG time before the servers get turned off. I still remember Earth n Beyond.  I spent a few hours one day mining..  finally ready to upgrade... the next day, they gave their lights out notice.

But my comment above was from Blizzards side of things.  Their business model is much more profitable and steady.  GW2 now must count on vanity items to fund further content patches.

Originally posted by Jackdog

Originally posted by halflife25

Originally posted by Jackdog
Henry Ford sold over 15 million  model T's which was a record for it's time. Wow was the Model T of MMO's, it made MMO history but it's business model and the raid end game is out dated just like turning a hand crank to start the engine in auto's is outdated. Not sure how many people will want to spend box price and 15 dollars a month just to play a panda character other than some pre teens. I could be surprised, time will tell

Yes MOP will sell out previous expansions and then you will come back again when next WOW expansion l is about to be released to say the same very thing. For someone who has been around these forums for so long i am afraid you didn't learn anything . WOW still has a lot of life left into it and i am sure they will release another couple of expansions before Titan.

you seem to think WoW has the same sub base it had in 2008 - 2009, it doesn't. Turbine started teh trend toward F2P with DDO and followed it with LoTRO. Now 15 dollars a month plus a box fee plus a cash shop makes no more sense than the old pay per minute  online services we had back in the 80's when the flat rate internet services came out in the 90's

Blizzard is just to vain/greedy to realize it

 

WOW is immensly more profitable than DDO and other free2play games.   Yes, Bliz may be greedy, but it is the purpose of every company (especially a publicly traded company) to make as much profit as possible.

And you are absolutely wrong about your ´subscription based is old school´..  You know how I know?  Because WOW has more ´players´ than DDO, LOTRO, EQ2, AOC  combined.   If what you were saying were  true, than those games would be flooded with players.   The fact that FREE games cannot keep the same number of players as a subscription game proves you are wrong.  You are also wrong from the business side of it.  Do you think those games are more profiable than WOW with thier cash shop model?

Free2play cashshops are a last gasp of breath for games that are dying, it is not the ´new´ business model moving forward.   Instead of pulling an Earth and Beyond, these dying games found a way to squeek out a little more money.  And DDO (the first) is the only one that seemed to have much success with it.  AOC has less servers and less players than when it charged a subscription fee.  

Originally posted by Aelious

 

I'm not sure what one has to do with the other.  If you have a pool of roughly 5 million paying subscribers (excluding asian countries because they have different models) who I would assume is waiting for new content would it not be surprising that they sold 3 mil+ copies the first day? This doesn't have anything to do with pricing models.

 

I'll throw my hat in and say that if MoP crosses 3.5mil sales in a month I'd be surprised.  By Christmas it may be about 5mil.  This is at original retail cost mind you, 59.99.

MOP is $40

Originally posted by Azrile

I am looking at it from the business´s side of things, not from the players side of things.   But from the players side of things, I will say this.. a successful SUB game means you are sure that your effort in the past will be there next year.  You want to jump into a game like TSW that just laid off most of their dev team?  You want to pour time into a game that won´t get updates unless vanity clothing sells well in the cash shop.

There is a ´permanence´ about wow and it´s 10M subscribers.  It will be a long long LONG time before the servers get turned off. I still remember Earth n Beyond.  I spent a few hours one day mining..  finally ready to upgrade... the next day, they gave their lights out notice.

But my comment above was from Blizzards side of things.  Their business model is much more profitable and steady.  GW2 now must count on vanity items to fund further content patches.

I'd say Guild Wars 1 contests that logic somewhat.

But given your other comments, I ain't about to budge your agenda.

Originally posted by laserit

Originally posted by Azrile

I may be short on my prediction.   GW2 announced that they had sold 2M boxes so far, with another 10 days until MOP.  I had predicted that MOP would sell double, in it´s first day (and only in the west),  than GW2 sold in the month leading up to MOP.  While most of GW2 occurred the first week, you gotta figure they are still pulling in 100k per week... so give them 2.3M boxes when MOP launches.

I don´t think MOP gets 4.6M sales, even 4.2 will be pushing it.

One telling thing though is how many people are riding around on the collector´s edition Mounts.  Not only does that indicate that a ton of people have already bought MOP, but that they paid $60 for it.  Those mounts are so common now that I wouldn´t even use it if I had it.

2M for GW2 is a huge number... but in reality, MOP will sell almost double that in 1 day to people who will also have to pay $15 per month, and that is only in the West.

I like Blizzard´s business model much better.

Putting the two games aside

OP please explain to me: Why you like Blizzard's business model better.

$15 a month versus $0 per month and both games you have the option to purchase items in a cash shop.

It's not a matter of one business model being better then the other.  If ANET used Blizzards model it would fail just as hard as all other AAA models that have tried it.  On the other hand if Blizzard went f2p they would not make as much as they do currently with their high sub numbers.  Each company has been smart enough to use the best business model in regards to money coming in.  Of course only one of these is really proven in Blizzard, as we really have no clue if f2p will be able to make major money yet but really it was ANETs only choice for success.

Really it's apples and oranges, you can't really compare a company like Nordstrom or Macy's to Walmart because while they are both going after people who buy clothes, they are completely different.  I like both models.  Oh and as far as subs dropping and MOP not going to do well.  Subs always drop before an expansion, they did so in WOTLK as well however there was a lot less going on at that time, Diable 3, SWTOR and GW2 has all caused people to move away from Wow, I do not believe that will be a perm move and I expect by end of the year Wow will be back over 10M easy, though maybe not back to the 12M high.

Originally posted by expresso

Originally posted by Aelious

 

I'm not sure what one has to do with the other.  If you have a pool of roughly 5 million paying subscribers (excluding asian countries because they have different models) who I would assume is waiting for new content would it not be surprising that they sold 3 mil+ copies the first day? This doesn't have anything to do with pricing models.

 

I'll throw my hat in and say that if MoP crosses 3.5mil sales in a month I'd be surprised.  By Christmas it may be about 5mil.  This is at original retail cost mind you, 59.99.

MOP is $40

Yes $40 dollars, also assuming noone returns for MOP Blizzard already has what 5M or close to western subs right now.  I'm sure pretty much all of those people will be buying MOP doesn't make much sense to keep on Subbing without it.  I bet when you include people coming back 4M will be hit pretty easily and pretty quick.

Originally posted by Azrile

 

I am looking at it from the business´s side of things, not from the players side of things.   But from the players side of things, I will say this.. a successful SUB game means you are sure that your effort in the past will be there next year.  You want to jump into a game like TSW that just laid off most of their dev team?  You want to pour time into a game that won´t get updates unless vanity clothing sells well in the cash shop.

There is a ´permanence´ about wow and it´s 10M subscribers.  It will be a long long LONG time before the servers get turned off. I still remember Earth n Beyond.  I spent a few hours one day mining..  finally ready to upgrade... the next day, they gave their lights out notice.

But my comment above was from Blizzards side of things.  Their business model is much more profitable and steady.  GW2 now must count on vanity items to fund further content patches.

To the part in red, it's to bad the fun factor of the game won't last. As each expansion has released many of the people I know have split sooner. I know I grow bored to tears of the game to the point that I try to find ways to make the leveling experience interesting except 2 hitting mobs really got old. I sadly have to agree that MOP will sell more than GW2 did probably on its first night if it hasn't already. It is Blizzard after all and I don't know of many companys that can let down their fanbase with a release like CATA and D3, only to have the fanbase come back for more of the same crap. Doesn't mean I think it is a superior product, only it has time on it's side as well as the fact that they market the game like no other MMO (Chuck Norris anyone).

I do however feel your last comments seem odd since I don't know how squeezing your fanbase for cash in the name of profit is a good thing when you look at what they have produced with the 6+ years of subs. Sure you can argue that sub base means funding for steadier development and longevity, but I haven't seen anything that tells me that all these millions of subscribers has led to better content since I personally feel I got more out of each FFXI expansion than anything I got out of Blizzards although that is merely my opinion. As far as the last comment on GW2, they seem to have done pretty well with revinues form their first game so I think it is too early to claim anything regarding updates and content.

Originally posted by Jackdog

Originally posted by halflife25

Originally posted by Jackdog
Henry Ford sold over 15 million  model T's which was a record for it's time. Wow was the Model T of MMO's, it made MMO history but it's business model and the raid end game is out dated just like turning a hand crank to start the engine in auto's is outdated. Not sure how many people will want to spend box price and 15 dollars a month just to play a panda character other than some pre teens. I could be surprised, time will tell

Yes MOP will sell out previous expansions and then you will come back again when next WOW expansion l is about to be released to say the same very thing. For someone who has been around these forums for so long i am afraid you didn't learn anything . WOW still has a lot of life left into it and i am sure they will release another couple of expansions before Titan.

you seem to think WoW has the same sub base it had in 2008 - 2009, it doesn't. Turbine started teh trend toward F2P with DDO and followed it with LoTRO. Now 15 dollars a month plus a box fee plus a cash shop makes no more sense than the old pay per minute  online services we had back in the 80's when the flat rate internet services came out in the 90's

Blizzard is just to vain/greedy to realize it

 

Yes that is exactly what i think and when MOP will release you will be proven wrong once again. Been there and done that.  Same old song and dance every time new WOW expansion is to be released.

And i like how you cut the rest of my post where i commented reagrding your absurd 'pre teens' generalisation.

Originally posted by laserit

Originally posted by Azrile

I may be short on my prediction.   GW2 announced that they had sold 2M boxes so far, with another 10 days until MOP.  I had predicted that MOP would sell double, in it´s first day (and only in the west),  than GW2 sold in the month leading up to MOP.  While most of GW2 occurred the first week, you gotta figure they are still pulling in 100k per week... so give them 2.3M boxes when MOP launches.

I don´t think MOP gets 4.6M sales, even 4.2 will be pushing it.

One telling thing though is how many people are riding around on the collector´s edition Mounts.  Not only does that indicate that a ton of people have already bought MOP, but that they paid $60 for it.  Those mounts are so common now that I wouldn´t even use it if I had it.

2M for GW2 is a huge number... but in reality, MOP will sell almost double that in 1 day to people who will also have to pay $15 per month, and that is only in the West.

I like Blizzard´s business model much better.

Putting the two games aside

OP please explain to me: Why you like Blizzard's business model better.

$15 a month versus $0 per month and both games you have the option to purchase items in a cash shop.

My guess is Blizzards business model is better because it will net them more money than GW2, but GW2 obviously has the momentum in the gaming industry atm.

If I where to blindly guess based only on Blizzards public financial trackrecord I would estimate

1st month MOP sales at best ~3.1 Million globaly, minus China. Simply said 1/3 less than with Cata.

Currently WoW earns about 1/3 less than it did !before! either Cata and WotLK.

WoW three quarter before WotLK ~ 275/275/275 M resulted into  + ~100% expansion sales revenue on top of regular sales

WoW three quarter before Cata ~ 300/300/300 M resulted into + ~100% expansion sales revenue on top of regular sales

WoW three quarter before MOP ~ 200/200/to be released

Reasons it could be lower than that:

The evident decline of their Eastern playerbase will have a much higher impact on Blizzards "sales" report, than they have on their financial sheet. A hundredthousand less Korean or Taiwanese player are simply 100.000 "sales" less they can claim for the expansion without actually "selling" a single client.  Blizzard would however hide that behind sales reports claiming "not including Korean and Taiwanese unit sales" and act like the numbers would have been much higher if they where included. They wouldn't even appear as a loss on their reports as they never generated extra revenue in first place due to their businessmodel. Opposite for the next subscriber drop. Blame it on "mostly Eastern losses" of course again.

It wouldnt consider the huge blow GW2 dealt on WoW recently. It just beat the low set expectations many WoW fans granted the game for its global success, in 2 weeks and just in the West. Now its 2 Million Western GW2 sales vs WoWs next global sales report.

With the ongoing content draught the situation could be worse. The last financial report was about the early half of the year. One whole quarter without any content likely has made the situation much worse.

Reasons it could be higher than that:

The recent low revenues where caused likely by massive contentdraught/lack of decent/any updates over almost a year and low replay quality. Not even Blizzards expensive marketing campaigns could deal with that.. The 30% drop in revenues compared to pre Cataclysm or pre WotLK quarters indicates their Western userbase was affected either. The Eastern didnt make as much in first place in total.  And if they had lost ALL Eastern player including their revenue, they could not have claimed even half of those 9 Million "subscriber".  Still against this negative current situation the outlook might be brighter. Many more than usual might come back for at least a few days with MOP promising new content they have waited for.

They are already rampant to advertise the game in TV. They could waste even more money on ads than usual, just to keep up the illusion many of their fans have about WoWs current state with a temporary spike and let the game generate fuzz with past success for a while longer.

Impact of marketing campaigns like offering discounts and combo-packs can only to be speculated about.  Just like the extreme discount Korean WoW player where offered, which was effectively a SC2 for free, but since SC2 was not as unpopular as WoW it effectively was WoW for free for SC2 player. And all those where considered additional Cataclysm "sales" before. They did it once, they might pull such moves again.

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Originally posted by laserit

Originally posted by Azrile

I may be short on my prediction.   GW2 announced that they had sold 2M boxes so far, with another 10 days until MOP.  I had predicted that MOP would sell double, in it´s first day (and only in the west),  than GW2 sold in the month leading up to MOP.  While most of GW2 occurred the first week, you gotta figure they are still pulling in 100k per week... so give them 2.3M boxes when MOP launches.

I don´t think MOP gets 4.6M sales, even 4.2 will be pushing it.

One telling thing though is how many people are riding around on the collector´s edition Mounts.  Not only does that indicate that a ton of people have already bought MOP, but that they paid $60 for it.  Those mounts are so common now that I wouldn´t even use it if I had it.

2M for GW2 is a huge number... but in reality, MOP will sell almost double that in 1 day to people who will also have to pay $15 per month, and that is only in the West.

I like Blizzard´s business model much better.

Putting the two games aside

OP please explain to me: Why you like Blizzard's business model better.

$15 a month versus $0 per month and both games you have the option to purchase items in a cash shop.

My guess is Blizzards business model is better because it will net them more money than GW2, but GW2 obviously has the momentum in the gaming industry atm.

Of course its more profitable and beneficial for the investor.

But is it better for the gamer if they invest even less back into the game than the one not asking for a subscription?

Whats you benefit of expensive TV ads, CGI trailer, popstars and ads on websites? Some casuals might drop into the game and leave it again only to be replaced by the next batch? Look what 150$ subscription got the average WoW player? Nothing!

Gw2 box sales have relatively no effect on MoP box sales. 

I'd say it will get more then that 2M, but I expect it to be the weakest expansion release for WoW in some time. Simply put, people are tired of WoW or just disliking the way in which its going that they don't want to play it. Wotlk had been quite a downhill slide for the game as it seemed to go quickly down after Ulduar. Even before that, there were to many flaws that the game was rather lack luster to many players. 

I know personally I have no plans to Play WoW again, specially considering Rift exists and fills that raiding gap far better then WoW had since Ulduar. Im just tired of the game and completely dislike the direction where its being taken and I'm not alone. 

Chuck Norris plays WoW, nuff said

Panda bears will bring back hardcore players to WoW

Panda bears will bring kids and teens to WoW

Pandas Bears will bring the Chinese & Koreans back to WoW from competitive Starcraft 2 play

Panda bears will bring Pandas to WoW

Panda bears will also bring that dude who made the fail hate Islam utube video to WoW

Panda bears bears will come get all this caffiene out of my system so I can focus

Panda bears will make me go write my paper instead of goofing on MMO forums >.>

Originally posted by Hrica

Chuck Norris plays WoW, nuff said

Panda bears will bring back hardcore players to WoW

Panda bears will bring kids and teens to WoW

Pandas Bears will bring the Chinese & Koreans back to WoW from competitive Starcraft 2 play

Panda bears will bring Pandas to WoW

Panda bears will also bring that dude who made the fail hate Islam utube video to WoW

Panda bears bears will come get all this caffiene out of my system so I can focus

Panda bears will make me go write my paper instead of goofing on MMO forums >.>

+1

Originally posted by expresso

Originally posted by Aelious

 

I'm not sure what one has to do with the other.  If you have a pool of roughly 5 million paying subscribers (excluding asian countries because they have different models) who I would assume is waiting for new content would it not be surprising that they sold 3 mil+ copies the first day? This doesn't have anything to do with pricing models.

 

I'll throw my hat in and say that if MoP crosses 3.5mil sales in a month I'd be surprised.  By Christmas it may be about 5mil.  This is at original retail cost mind you, 59.99.

MOP is $40

+ subscription fee

They do not have 10m subs.

They're lying.

China having 6m paying 5ct an hour does not count.

Given the mass influx of competition (Tera, TSW, GW2, Torchlight, PoE and a few other "major" titles) there's no way in hell MoP will sell even as well as Cataclysm did, especially given how burnout all ex-WOW players are and the sour taste Cataclysm & D3 itself left it most of our collective mouths.

I'm guessing 1.5 tops, peaking within two weeks of release, maybe 3m by the end of 13's first quarter. Subs will drop to 25% below current levels by the second quarter of 2013.