Do we really need a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square, within a square?

As to the topic, played for two months then quit because it is very boring and repetative.   WoW kept me paying a subscription on and off for years.  I don't pay anything monthly for this and uninstalled it after only a couple months.  Very shallow game.

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by boxsnd
It amazes me how little about statistics the GW2 fans in this thread know.

Unless my Stat 101 book is suddenly out of date, XFire meets the criteria of a 'random sample' for decline / incline of games.

No selection bias and a sufficient sample size.

Whether the ANALYSIS of the sample is statistically sound or not is another issue.

No, I think the question is whether it provides a statistiacally biased sample.  

Last I checked, Xfire doesn't report one game more favorably over the other.

There is no 'bias' when installing Xfire amongst gamers cause any gamer can install the program.

Unless we go down the 'But you have to DO STUFF' argument again (thus voiding every survey / poll done ever), it is statisitically a sound sample.

 

The problem with all survey's is that they ignore the apathetic masses.  The installation of XFire connotes an above average interest imo.  

It is not a problem when the non-apathetic part of the population think more or less the same as the apathetic part of the population, which has been shown to be true at least in case of political voting polls.

citation please? 

Do you have an example of any major polling institute that was extremely wrong when it came to the Obama re-election voting percentages?

I live in the UK, and I have seen parties come into power against polls due to voter apathy, repeatedly.  

I see. To what extent were the polls wrong? Did they get  over twice as many votes as the polls had indicated?

Splitting hairs now. The point stands.  

I do not know how the UK election works. If for example, a system requires 5% of the votes for a party to enter the government, then a poll showing that a party has 4.5% of the votes would not be inaccurate if the party gained 5.1% of the votes in the real election. If, however, that party gained 9% of the votes despite polls showing 4.5%, then I would consider that to be an inaccurate poll. 

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by Nadia

i Blizzard reacts to Xfire - Blizzard also validates Xfire

why should Blizzard give Xfire any press?

So you are saying that proving someone wrong, validates the results of what was proven wrong?

when i say validate

i mean it shows that Blizzard cares about Xfire and takes it seriously (which they dont)

 

when DFC claimed LOL was the #1 online PC game in the world

http://www.prweb.com/releases/dfc/xfire/prweb9684487.htm

i dont recall Blizzard reacting at all - they ignored it

 

Blizzard has never discussed Xfire to the public, why should they start now?

Were DFC wrong though? I wouldn't see the point in reacting to the statement unless they could prove them wrong. Given the upswing of social media and community, I wouldn't see it as a wrong path for them to have a form of PR staff to get engaged in such situations. Even if it is to just simply congratulate the competitors. 

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by Nadia

i Blizzard reacts to Xfire - Blizzard also validates Xfire

why should Blizzard give Xfire any press?

So you are saying that proving someone wrong, validates the results of what was proven wrong?

when i say validate

i mean it shows that Blizzard cares about Xfire and takes it seriously (which they dont)

 

when DFC claimed LOL was the #1 online PC game in the world

http://www.prweb.com/releases/dfc/xfire/prweb9684487.htm

i dont recall Blizzard reacting at all - they ignored it

 

Blizzard has never discussed Xfire to the public, why should they start now?

Were DFC wrong though? I wouldn't see the point in reacting to the statement unless they could prove them wrong. Given the upswing of social media and community, I wouldn't see it as a wrong path for them to have a form of PR staff to get engaged in such situations. Even if it is to just simply congratuate the competitors. 

WOW used to the #1 game on Xfire until  LOL overtook it

from your reasoning, Blizzard should have cared when that happened - and downplay why it happened

personally, I saw the whole DFC / Xfire announcment as nothing more than self promotion for both their services

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by Nadia

i Blizzard reacts to Xfire - Blizzard also validates Xfire

why should Blizzard give Xfire any press?

So you are saying that proving someone wrong, validates the results of what was proven wrong?

when i say validate

i mean it shows that Blizzard cares about Xfire and takes it seriously (which they dont)

 

when DFC claimed LOL was the #1 online PC game in the world

http://www.prweb.com/releases/dfc/xfire/prweb9684487.htm

i dont recall Blizzard reacting at all - they ignored it

 

Blizzard has never discussed Xfire to the public, why should they start now?

Were DFC wrong though? I wouldn't see the point in reacting to the statement unless they could prove them wrong. Given the upswing of social media and community, I wouldn't see it as a wrong path for them to have a form of PR staff to get engaged in such situations. Even if it is to just simply congratuate the competitors. 

WOW used to the #1 game on Xfire until  LOL overtook it

from your reasoning, Blizzard should have cared when that happened - and downplay why it happened

 

personally, I saw the whole DFC / Xfire announcment as nothing more than self promotion for both their services

If LoL's actual activity is indeed lower than Blizzards activity, then yeah Blizzard could have stepped in and shown them to be wrong. Given that it takes max 30 minutes for a PR person to do a such statement: why not? However, if LoL has indeed higher activity, then Blizzard has no good reason to downplay it. 

from that report link:

The new report is part of an ongoing initiative between DFC Intelligence and Xfire to better understand the products that core PC gamers interact with.

sorry everyone about going way offtopic but thats how all Xfire discussions go  ;)

Originally posted by Nadia

from that report link:

The new report is part of an ongoing initiative between DFC Intelligence and Xfire to better understand the products that core PC gamers interact with.

 

sorry everyone about going way offtopic but thats how all Xfire discussions go  ;)

It is very much on topic since the opening topic post stated following: "So now that the game has sold 3 million, what are peoples opinions on it's relative success or dissapointments in comparison to recent themepark mmo's and people, still playing there views on the state of the game."

The relative success of GW2 is dependant on WOW's success. WOW's success, is in my opinion to an extent dependant on how its PR staff works. So yeah, it is on topic.

threads in the past were often closed when Xfire was brought up

theres a current sticked thread in the pub for discussion of Xfire

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/373008/XFire-As-MMO-population-estimation-tool.html

I think Gaihunters post is good example of the flaws of Xfire

WOW Jan 2013 showing a huge drop since Jan 2012

- yet Blizzard has approx the same amount subs around 10m  (as seen from Nov 2012)

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/120552-World-of-Warcraft-Subscriptions-Rise-to-10-Million

I reposted this discrepancy to the Xfire discussion link

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by TwoThreeFour

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by boxsnd
It amazes me how little about statistics the GW2 fans in this thread know.

Unless my Stat 101 book is suddenly out of date, XFire meets the criteria of a 'random sample' for decline / incline of games.

No selection bias and a sufficient sample size.

Whether the ANALYSIS of the sample is statistically sound or not is another issue.

No, I think the question is whether it provides a statistiacally biased sample.  

Last I checked, Xfire doesn't report one game more favorably over the other.

There is no 'bias' when installing Xfire amongst gamers cause any gamer can install the program.

Unless we go down the 'But you have to DO STUFF' argument again (thus voiding every survey / poll done ever), it is statisitically a sound sample.

 

The problem with all survey's is that they ignore the apathetic masses.  The installation of XFire connotes an above average interest imo.  

It is not a problem when the non-apathetic part of the population think more or less the same as the apathetic part of the population, which has been shown to be true at least in case of political voting polls.

citation please? 

Do you have an example of any major polling institute that was extremely wrong when it came to the Obama re-election voting percentages?

I live in the UK, and I have seen parties come into power against polls due to voter apathy, repeatedly.  

I see. To what extent were the polls wrong? Did they get  over twice as many votes as the polls had indicated?

Splitting hairs now. The point stands.  

I do not know how the UK election works. If for example, a system requires 5% of the votes for a party to enter the government, then a poll showing that a party has 4.5% of the votes would not be inaccurate if the party gained 5.1% of the votes in the real election. If, however, that party gained 9% of the votes despite polls showing 4.5%, then I would consider that to be an inaccurate poll. 

It is first past the post.  Like the US there are swing states (counties).  The conservatives generally appeal to the more affluent regular voters (although they have a smaller share of the overall vote) and Labour appeal to the less affluent more apathetic majority.   Gross generalisation but true.  Similar to Republicans and Democrats.  

But I see your point.  

Originally posted by eyelolled
I remember posting in a thread about how many accounts we estimated that GW2 would have after a few months. Did that thread ever get dug up and the results compared?

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/4634697#4634697

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by eyelolled
I remember posting in a thread about how many accounts we estimated that GW2 would have after a few months. Did that thread ever get dug up and the results compared?

 http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/4634697#4634697

Good joke, Loktofeit! :)

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by waynejr2

Originally posted by Warband

Guild Wars 2 has sold over 3 million copies since its August, according to an update on the MMO’s website from director Colin Johanson, who also outlined the team’s 2013 plans for the title starting with expanding and leveraging the achievement system.

 

http://www.vg247.com/2013/01/15/guild-wars-2-has-sold-over-3-million-copies-since-august-2013-content-plans-outlined/

 

So now that the game has sold 3 million, what are peoples opinions on it's relative success or dissapointments in comparison to recent themepark mmo's and people, still playing there views on the state of the game.

 Well, it's only 3million.  In a pre-wow universe it would be amazing.  In a post-wow universe, well, not so much.

Still no other western MMORPG was able to gather that many in the west.

 Still, if that is good enough for you.

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by ScaryMonk

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by boxsnd
It amazes me how little about statistics the GW2 fans in this thread know.

Unless my Stat 101 book is suddenly out of date, XFire meets the criteria of a 'random sample' for decline / incline of games.

No selection bias and a sufficient sample size.

Whether the ANALYSIS of the sample is statistically sound or not is another issue.

No, I think the question is whether it provides a statistiacally biased sample.  

Last I checked, Xfire doesn't report one game more favorably over the other.

There is no 'bias' when installing Xfire amongst gamers cause any gamer can install the program.

Unless we go down the 'But you have to DO STUFF' argument again (thus voiding every survey / poll done ever), it is statisitically a sound sample.

 

You keep confusing the subject.

No one is saying GW2 should be number 1  or number 10 in XFire.

People are (I am) saying XFire isn't a random sample of GW2 population.

You are saying XFire is random sample of XFire users across games.

For each individual gaming population it doesn't matter that XFire has the same chance of being installed by hardcores in every game.

An example:

You go to party A internal elections.

And you are asked 2 questions:

1) Who is going to win the general elections, Party A or Party B?

2) Who is going to win Party A nomination, candidate X or candidate y?

You can claim the population answering question number 2 is a random population.

You can't claim that the same population answering question number 1 is a random population.

And basically XFire is a random population when answering the question "Which online PC game is most popular" but it isn't a random population when answering the "What has been the evolution of playing habits and the population size of X game population".

The proper and valid tools depends of what we are trying to do, it isn't one size fits all.

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

You keep confusing the subject.

No one is saying GW2 should be number 1  or number 10 in XFire.

People are (I am) saying XFire isn't a random sample of GW2 population.

You are saying XFire is random sample of XFire users across games.

For each individual gaming population it doesn't matter that XFire has the same chance of being installed by hardcores in every game.

 

An example:

You go to party A internal elections.

And you are asked 2 questions:

1) Who is going to win the general elections, Party A or Party B?

2) Who is going to win Party A nomination, candidate X or candidate y?

You can claim the population answering question number 2 is a random population.

You can't claim that the same population answering question number 1 is a random population.

And basically XFire is a random population when answering the question "Which online PC game is most popular" but it isn't a random population when answering the "What has been the evolution of playing habits and the population size of X game population".

The proper and valid tools depends of what we are trying to do, it isn't one size fits all.

 

Uh, not really.

People dont join XFire to only play GW2. Anyone that has XFire can play any game.

To prove its not random you would have to prove that people that play GW2 joined XFire and play exlusively GW2.

And it has been proven that numbers cannot be correlated among different games, that means your A question cannot be aswered through XFire anyway (meaning if game A has x XFire users and known total number of players is known you cannot correlate total number of players game B has based on y XFire users).

What you can do with XFire is look at individual trend of number of users for a single game individually as its nicely represented by spikes when certain major events occur (expansion, content patch, "free weekend" etc), and ONLY by number of different users, NOT hours played.

Originally posted by Catibrie
Servers are still heavy or full. No low population on any server. I am still loving the game and dont see me leaving any time soon. Lots to do end game and by far one of the best MMOs ever to come out. Its in my top 4, EQ1, WoW, DAoC and GW2. 

It has already been established that server status is based on number of active accounts, not people actually playing at any given moment.

Therefore, full servers mean nothing other than john gamer logs in once a week to see if the game has magically become more interesting.  The game has promise, but it is a long ways off from being fixed.

Originally posted by azurrei

Originally posted by Catibrie
Servers are still heavy or full. No low population on any server. I am still loving the game and dont see me leaving any time soon. Lots to do end game and by far one of the best MMOs ever to come out. Its in my top 4, EQ1, WoW, DAoC and GW2. 

It has already been established that server status is based on number of active accounts, not people actually playing at any given moment.

Therefore, full servers mean nothing other than john gamer logs in once a week to see if the game has magically become more interesting.  The game has promise, but it is a long ways off from being fixed.

No - if that is the case then the server populations would not go up and down during the day and they do. If they were only based on the accounts - they WOULD NEVER BOUNCE UP AND DOWN!!