Originally posted by Dahkot72

EA spin amuses me to no end ,

"In a conference call this afternoon, EA said the decrease was indeed due to "casual and trial players" cycling out of the game."

So I and all the other who have quit are "casual" or "trial" players.

I grew up with Star Wars in the 70's/80's , have played mmorpg's since EQ launch , and stilil prefer mmorpg's to any other game. I put in 20+ hours a week (late nights usually with wife/kids) and planned on playing TOR for quite a while.

I quit because the game is stale garbage , boring , and PVP is laughable at best. I play TERA now , likely TSW for a mix, and still toying with idea of GW2.

EA you lost many of those subs because you made a boring , "safe" , game that is not worth a sub fee , has an engine that chokes on large scale numbers , and couldn't make world PVP or even large BG's (Illum) work even after years of development.

I'm not "casual" ,

your game is crap.

 

There is absolutly nothing I can add to this. This post expresses what I feel about this game.

Originally posted by Burntvet

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 Cinium Financial. 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.

 

That's nice, but I also work in the industry.

All the release said was "STAR WARS®: The Old Republic™ active subscribers are 1.3 million."

Active subs =/= paying subs: it very likely means anyone who logged into TOR during the month of Mar 2012, a period during which they were offering multiple free trials, buddy trials, come back weekends (during which all canceled users had their accts reactivated) and all the rest.

And all of those could be counted as active, if someone logged in even one time.

So, no... TOR does not have 1.3 mil paying accts.

 

And even more, EA stock is down another 7% or so in after hours trading and is currently, this minute at a new 52 week low.

 

Active subs doesn't mean active players., but it does mean there is money on the books for services that might be demanded.  Even if the player has long since quit.   So what they really said was they have 1.3 million subscriptions on the books that are tolling and will expire.  (That is, they haven't been suspended or put on hiatus and will end in some future time certain.)   

The press release is deliberately designed to paint the most positive picture possible.  For example, they don't tell you that at least 100K of those subs are on 30-day trial still.   They don't tell you there could easily be another  150K subs that were 90-day trial (30-day trial + 2 month time card) and also might be inactive.

And fans can spin it like the want.  But the last sub-date you could activate and drop before March 31st was the 1st of March assuming they toll first day.   Which means, as I pointed out, 100K of those 1.3 million had no choice in the matter.   So, if we take our through March 1st sales (2.2 million) and subtract the population eligble to quit assuming it was 100% CC activation, we get 1 million subscription drops in 70 days of game play.   That's about 45%.

And remembering when the fanboys were crowing about WoW loosing 800K in a quarter...    They beat another WoW record.   Most sub losses in a quarter in MMO history.  And it wasn't even really a full quarter since they didn't start tolling until the 20th of December.

Originally posted by aSynchro
1.3M is for 3/31, two months ago.
They loose 25% subs from launch to end of march; given all the "my server is dead!" threads on their forum, i wouldn't be surprise if NOW, two months later, subs were down to 1M or less.

two months?  a month and a week more like it, but yes your overall sentiment is true, i'm sure they haven't really stopped the losses and there fewer than there were at the end of the quarter.  I will be honest though and say that I expected them to have fewer than the 1.3 million.  I was expecting closer to 900k or so.

Originally posted by Crackbone

I want to see the TOR fans spin this one. 

The fact that this includes the free 30 day "gift," really makes it scary. 

How many actual players are playing, that's what I'd love to know. 

But that isn't a "fact"  the 30 day gift didn't start until april, these subs were as of 3/31.

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by Greyhooff

The correct number as of 1st May is 400k.

The market isn't fooled by this doctored number.

Following the announcement, EA has now plunged 10% after hours and is at a new 52 week low.

Where did you get the 400k from?  

They were at 1.7 million subscribers at the end of the last quarter; they're at 1.3 for this one.

Edited for clarity.

Edit 2: Oh I see.

Yeah, I can see how his post is poorly worded.

Originally posted by pharazonic

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by Greyhooff

The correct number as of 1st May is 400k.

The market isn't fooled by this doctored number.

Following the announcement, EA has now plunged 10% after hours and is at a new 52 week low.

Where did you get the 400k from?  

They were at 1.7 million subscribers last quarter; they're at 1.3 for this one.

To me his post indicated that there were 400k players, not 400k lost.

Originally posted by Dahkot72

As other's have pointed out , DE tried to say they hadn't lost any subs last month , just that hours logged were less.

 

LUUCEEEEEE , you have some splainin to do ................

Of course they lied.   It's what BioWare does.   I clued into this a decade ago.   And this isn't EA.   BIoWare has been pulling this garbage since NWN (OC) and Jade Empire.   

If I weren't such a Star Wars Fanboy, I'd never bought this game.   They haven't made a truly excellent CRPG since NWN:HotU.   They have had bits and pieces.   Not all of KOTOR sucked.  But it was clearly padded with lots of unnecessary running-back-and-forth in artificially constrained areas to make a short game play longer.  

I think WoW really screwed up everyones expectations for MMO and sub numbers.  I dont deny the game has lost a lot of subs but it is also pulling in some cash.

2 mill copies sold ($50 mill assuming they averaged half the sales price)

3 months of 1.5 mill sub average ($67+ mill)

In the first quarter alone they almost broke even on the $150 development costs.  Even if they fall down to 1 mill subs thats still $15 million a month coming in.  At mid-summer the game will have paid for itself and then become a money printing machine compared to most other MMO's.

I agree everyone expected more from the game but if I were an investor, I would not be concerned just yet. 

Is it too late to turn it around? Probably. But, if it's not, the very first thing they should do is fire a couple people:

Georg Zoeller

Gabe Amantegelo

and the other two whose first names I can't remember, but Ohlen and Erickson.

They need to allow transfers/merge servers, they need to implement a FP/DungeonFinder and stop screwing up pvp.

Originally posted by cahenderson

Is it too late to turn it around? Probably. But, if it's not, the very first thing they should do is fire a couple people:

 

Georg Zoeller

Gabe Amantegelo

and the other two whose first names I can't remember, but [James] Ohlen and [Daniel] Erickson.

 

They need to allow transfers/merge servers, they need to implement a FP/DungeonFinder and stop screwing up pvp.

I could get on board with that....

Originally posted by Talonsin

I think WoW really screwed up everyones expectations for MMO and sub numbers.  I dont deny the game has lost a lot of subs but it is also pulling in some cash.

 

2 mill copies sold ($50 mill assuming they averaged half the sales price)

3 months of 1.5 mill sub average ($67+ mill)

In the first quarter alone they almost broke even on the $150 development costs.  Even if they fall down to 1 mill subs thats still $15 million a month coming in.  At mid-summer the game will have paid for itself and then become a money printing machine compared to most other MMO's.

 

I agree everyone expected more from the game but if I were an investor, I would not be concerned just yet. 

 

Really? Because considering the investment...

The marketing...

The ip...

The goodwill of the BW name...

I would be asking for the CEO's and management's  heads.

Is it a bust? Certainly not but considering what it could have been...I would be incredibly pissed.

...and considering most of those jokers usually expect to be the next WoW I would not be at all surprised if they are. Especially considering the 1.7 million bs spin they did for the last quarter and implying there would be some moderate growth. I would imagine some changes in management to be coming shortly.

Originally posted by RefMinor
My estimate for 31/3 was 800k to 1.2m so if anyone wants to laugh at me for being wrong feel free, the result is slightly better than my top end estimate.

 

However since 31/3 the 3 month subs fell for renewal, that sparked the great free game time giveaway so I imagine retention rates in that section of sub (one that offers a decent risk/cost balance and so is fairly popular) will have been not good.

 

This story still has legs, as someone pointed out active subs does not necessarily mean paying subs and certainly does not appear to mean playing subs if the tales of emptier servers is correct.

 

Kudos to Daniel Erikson for having the nerve to say subs had not dropped on the record, a brave man.

First, your esitmate was better than you thought.   There are a lot of subscription issues behind the scenes.   Some caused by people.  Others caused by the nature of subscription accounting.

FWIW, only 1.2 million of the 1.3 million subs were eligble for cancellation if 100% of them were all CC activated accounts.  Forgotten in your mea culpa was that there were 100K March subs that couldn't cancel to April .  Further, there could have been another 150K  (or more) Jan/Feb subs activated by Time Card that were automatically active, regardless of player commitment.

So you were closer and more accurate than you thought.   But, not having seen your math, I can't tell if you accounted for these accounting and reporting artifacts that tend to over-state actual, active subscriptions.

Originally posted by Talonsin

I think WoW really screwed up everyones expectations for MMO and sub numbers.  I dont deny the game has lost a lot of subs but it is also pulling in some cash.

 

2 mill copies sold ($50 mill assuming they averaged half the sales price)

3 months of 1.5 mill sub average ($67+ mill)

In the first quarter alone they almost broke even on the $150 development costs.  Even if they fall down to 1 mill subs thats still $15 million a month coming in.  At mid-summer the game will have paid for itself and then become a money printing machine compared to most other MMO's.

 

I agree everyone expected more from the game but if I were an investor, I would not be concerned just yet. 

 

You are probably right.  So many people bought the game that they may actually pay for their costs, which saddens me.  Bioware/EA set out ot make a WoW clone and deserved to fail hard so that the genre can prosper.  On a happier note, I am guessing paying customers are at around 500k.  This is based on how much SWTOR sucks.  Once the last 500k quit then SWTOR will be a truly embarrassing failure, and hopefully the box sales did not cover development and it will be a huge loss.  It may be harsh, but the industry and even EA/Bioware employees would be better off not having to work for a crappy company. 

Originally posted by Afrolas

Originally posted by cahenderson

Is it too late to turn it around? Probably. But, if it's not, the very first thing they should do is fire a couple people:

 

Georg Zoeller

Gabe Amantegelo

and the other two whose first names I can't remember, but [James] Ohlen and [Daniel] Erickson.

 

They need to allow transfers/merge servers, they need to implement a FP/DungeonFinder and stop screwing up pvp.

 

I could get on board with that....

Thank you for supplying the correct first names. I went to go look them up and you had posted them before I could edit my post.

The breaking point for me came when  fucking dumbass Georg Zoeller commented his bewilderment about huttball and not being out of combat for 8 seconds. Very clearly the man doesn't play his own 'creation' and has no fucking clue what he's doing. And James Ohlen and Daniel Erickson just keep spinning and lying and lying and spinning.

Originally posted by Talonsin

I think WoW really screwed up everyones expectations for MMO and sub numbers.  I dont deny the game has lost a lot of subs but it is also pulling in some cash.

 

2 mill copies sold ($50 mill assuming they averaged half the sales price)

3 months of 1.5 mill sub average ($67+ mill)

In the first quarter alone they almost broke even on the $150 development costs.  Even if they fall down to 1 mill subs thats still $15 million a month coming in.  At mid-summer the game will have paid for itself and then become a money printing machine compared to most other MMO's.

 

I agree everyone expected more from the game but if I were an investor, I would not be concerned just yet. 

 

First, only 33% were sold by Origin.  That means the other 2/3rds were retail.   That means they got about $25-to-$30 a box for those units, not $60.

Second, Lucas Arts  is the publisher.  They take 30% off the top.   Of everything.

Third, the marketing budget was between $35 and $50 million.   It was as large as BF3 (which hit $50 million), but quite a bit of it was post-Holiday and cheaper.

Fourth, you're about the only person I've heard who believes $150 million.  $200 million might be lowball.   Think about it.  BF3 which is just a shooter with a crap single-player add-on took $25 million to develop.   This is a HUGE, SEVEN YEAR undertaking and simply dwarfs BF3.  Heck, I've read that Aion cost $200 million and it doesn't have nearly as much voice acting.   Vanilla WoW cost $75 million.   And that, too, had far less VA, cinematics, etc., which are the major cost drivers in games that use them.    DDO cost $65 million.   THough it shared the engine with LOTRO.   But it had ONE town and 130 quests on release.

So, $150 million?   For this?    I don't think so.   $200 million is lowball.   And $150...  I'd say there is no way in hell as there is simply way too much production in the game. 

Fith, there are a lot of other cost-of-sales issues surrounding the game.      That could add anohter 35% to the captalized game development costs right there.

Just one quick glance at torstatus today and you realize 1.3m can make sense only if SW fans en masse are crazy enough to pay a monthly fee for a game they don't play at all. Just because the game happens to have SW in its title. Now I wouldn't know if that's the case, I never liked SW myself. But in my book paying for a service you don't care to use is pretty damn stupid.
 

Originally posted by wowfan1996

Just one quick glance at torstatus today and you realize 1.3m can make sense only if SW fans en masse are crazy enough to play a monthly fee for a game they don't play at all. Just because the game happens to have SW in its title. Now I wouldn't know if that's the case, I never liked SW myself. But in my book paying for a service you don't care to use is pretty damn stupid.

 

Funny you say that.    Twenty-three percent of WoW players that quit do not cancel their subscription for up to a year.    Poeple are just...    Well, I think you can fill in the blank...

Regardless of the some peoples estimates on cost and subscription numbers and whatnot...

The window to turn this COMPLETELY embarassing failure around and salvage something is rapidly closing. 1.2 was supposed to be the Messiah patch. We got race unlocks, no ranked WZ's and a beyond screwed up pvp system. They can't get 1.3 out the door fast enough at this point. Which means their already notoriously inadequate QA process is going to be circumvented or dispensed with completely which means what we DO get will be another turd in a punchbowl. Best case scenario, a polished turd in a punchbowl. 

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.

The 1.3 mill is actually at the end of April and not 3/31 which is after the 30 day account's reactiveated.They went into more detail on page 7 of the report.Looks even worse than first thought.

Let me provide you with an update on Star Wars:
Through the end of the quarter, approximately 2.4 million units have sold through. 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.