WoW Down to 8.3 Million Subscribers

[AdamSavage]

Seems Blizzard is really losing large numbers of Subscribers. I wonder when it will stop nose diving.

Activision Blizzard's press release states that World of Warcraft is down to 8.3 million subscribers. This is a loss of 1.3 million, down from 9.6 million last quarter. Most of the loss came from the East once again.

Blizzard expects to have less subscribers at the end of the year than they do today.
Most of the decline in subscribers came from China.
There has been less engagement by casual players.
Blizzard is going to work on improving the experience for returning players.
Blizzard All Stars and Titan will not be released in 2013 according to the slide below.
Heart of the Swarm was the #1 PC game of the quarter, selling 1.1 million copies in two days.
Diablo III was the #2 PC game of the quarter
There has been increased competition with F2P games in Asia.
Players consume content faster and subscribe and unsubscribe as new content is added.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/324 ... ubscribers

[Novikova]

Honestly? For me? I think the high point was Wrath/Cata. I LOVED that in Wrath, I could bang out a few heroics with buddies in an evening while chatting, no matter what specs my alts were. That I could catch up my alts' gear. One raid fail? No problem, get the other lock out! Heck, I could freaking gear my alts without selling my soul to the VP and RNG deities.

Dailies were nice, but not like OMFG EVERY FACTION EVER WANTS YOU TO MOP FLOORS. And don't forget to fight 10 wombats and bring is 5 pizzas!

I mean, leveling is great. Though, it feels like I smack into a wall with Pandaria leveling. Pandaria's areas and crafting stuff ? Gorgeous. Not a fan of the huge number of '1 per day' dealyboppers, but that seems to be what they prefer. I liked that I could do all 7 bonus dungeons at once or one or two a go.

I think that devs and people got rose tinted nostalgia goggles for BC and forgot how grindy things were. Sure, back then I was a college kid with no job. Plenty 'o time. Not so much now.

CRZ makes leveling professions a PITA when my level 62 monk can't compete with a 90 DK from Stupidly Large RP Realm. Hunting rares? Yeah, good luck with that. Hope you didn't want Poseidus, Aoenaxx or TLPD.

Also, the game is about 10 years old. It's easy to get bored with it and I find I enjoy it more when I play on and off. Trouble is, with the 'WOO DAILIES' mode of play, that makes it tough to impossible for me to keep up.

[Kalliope]

It's always been a grind. The problem is that a good portion of the playerbase is painfully aware of it now, hence people quitting.

I don't think this is something that can necessarily be fixed. Not unless the focus moves to "gated storytelling" that doesn't require a grind, or at least meshes well with one. Patch 5.1 worked like that.

[Novikova]

It's always been a grind. The problem is that a good portion of the playerbase is painfully aware of it now, hence people quitting.

I don't think this is something that can necessarily be fixed. Not unless the focus moves to "gated storytelling" that doesn't require a grind, or at least meshes well with one. Patch 5.1 worked like that.

Yeah, I think the grind was a bit more subtle before in places. I don't know. I honestly liked the weekly limits vs. an itty bitty bit a day.

[Equeon]

It's always been a grind. The problem is that a good portion of the playerbase is painfully aware of it now, hence people quitting.

I don't think this is something that can necessarily be fixed. Not unless the focus moves to "gated storytelling" that doesn't require a grind, or at least meshes well with one. Patch 5.1 worked like that.

Yeah, I think the grind was a bit more subtle before in places. I don't know. I honestly liked the weekly limits vs. an itty bitty bit a day.

Blizzard's response before to that change was "before, it felt like a job. Now, we reward players whenever they have time to play, vs. making them feel forced into doing dungeons 7 times a week."

Now, I'm penalized (valor-point wise) if I don't do a dungeon every single day. >.> Versus, you know, doing two or three in a few days and catching up.
That part entirely made me not really care any more about getting valor points. What I have, I have from LFR reward queues and that's it.

Perhaps if Blizzard made a different kind of system...? but what could that be?

[cowmuflage]

I don't think you can truely get rid of the grind. I think that's just part of it being a MMO really. I've never seen a MMO with out a grind of some sort.

[Kalliope]

I don't think you can truely get rid of the grind. I think that's just part of it being a MMO really. I've never seen a MMO with out a grind of some sort.

Indeed - unless the pay-to-play system changes somehow...

[Novikova]

Well, like I said, a little grinding is fine. Why buy a game if I don't intend to play it? But the thing of it is, if I am not on every single day doing things, I really do fall behind, whereas, in Cata or Wrath, I could choose when to run my 7 dungeons.

[Ket Shi]

I'm no industry expert, so I can't exactly prescribe a magic bullet for this issue. I do hope that they figure out what to do with all of the struggling, low-population realms. When the economy fails, general population dwindles, major guilds fall apart, and friends quit, people frequently lose interest in staying. Yes, you do have the choice of trying another server, but that comes at either the price of having to start fresh, or paying $25 per character for a character transfer. CRZ is a good start, but it's not enough to buoy up all the failing realms and their disenfranchised population.

[AdamSavage]

Seems like this guy wants to kill the game.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/129 ... o-save-WoW

[Lupis]

I think people have just been playing for too long, honestly. The game's been out for years and years now, and many of the players started in vanilla. After this many years of playing, I can see people being burned out; after all, no matter how much the game is tweaked, it can't be fundamentally changed.

I can't say I've ever felt super pressed to do six thousand dailies/dungeons, though. The way WoW is set up currently works perfectly for me because I can do the dailies/dungeons/etc I want to do out of a long lineup. It gives me choices. I've never felt like I had to do anything, though.

[AdamSavage]

Wow made into Yahoo news:

http://ca.games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged ... 37952.html

[Ana]

To me its the rep grind.. same dailies over and over again and i have to do it for EVERY faction... boy im bored of it...
I could live with it if the rep was higher.. aka faster to grind and if the rep was SHARED with all my alts so i did not have to do it 12 times.. and yes i like alts

Else I really like MoP and that wow has become easier to play... im a casual player and it fits me with LFR. I LOOOVE that ppl who wanna raid hardcore can and those who won´t have an option too. This fit me

A good mmorpg has alot of options... and to me WoW should have more options

like

Click yes if you want to share the reputation/achivement of your main, click no if you want to grind them for you self

Shared mogsets .. like you can learn mounts and minipets .. let us learn mogging and use them BOA.. again it could be optional for those who doenst like it

Player made surnames.. you could make your own surname like Tårnfalk Sølvpil .. and you did not need to make one if u did not want too. When u whisper u just whisper the first name like u do now.

Player houses.. and not expensive ones... i want to decorate my own house

Easier moneymaking for us non chineese/casual players who only have a few hours a week to play... no idea how this would work.. but 12 alts.. who all is going to require 2x4k flying..atleast.. jeeeprs

[Danielfboone]

Seems like this guy wants to kill the game.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/129 ... o-save-WoW

Every single "solution" he proposes is something I would absolutely not want to see implemented.

I really don't care how many other people are playing. I'm enjoying being able to log in when I want and do dailies and an LFR or two without the pressure of regular scheduled raid times. My Guild leader hasn't even played for over 2 months now so we have become mostly solo players no longer dependent on other people to be able to play and still seeing all the content in some form. I'm actually enjoying that freedom. I have rediscovered other things and actually remembered what the big black box with the glass front sitting in the living room is for.

[AdamSavage]

I've told my friends, that if the new expansion is like MOP. Where the gear is gated behind faction rep, I would consider quitting the game atleast for that expansion, and alot of people I talk to said the same thing.

[Ana]

I've told my friends, that if the new expansion is like MOP. Where the gear is gated behind faction rep, I would consider quitting the game atleast for that expansion, and alot of people I talk to said the same thing.

Defo agree on that one.. i would look towards another game

[Danielfboone]

I've told my friends, that if the new expansion is like MOP. Where the gear is gated behind faction rep, I would consider quitting the game atleast for that expansion, and alot of people I talk to said the same thing.

I like the way they have done things in MoP myself. I enjoyed the rep gaining. It gave me something to do every day.

[Makoes]

I don't mind rep grinding for mounts or certain gear, what I do mind about this expansion is the rep requirements for JP/VP gear. I do not like being forced to grind rep...I loved the tabards that gave rep since it allowed me to not only play the way I found fun, but also to gain rep for factions I would have otherwise not enjoyed grinding for...The removal of those tabards for MoP factions and the rep requirements for JP/VP gear has made this expansion a pure grind fest.

On top of that, there has been a steady decrease in the feel of the world, I partially blame blizzard on that one for removing the old world bosses, rather then scaling them up to match the new player levels. The portals behind the dragons that never went anywhere, they could have done something with that. There is a distinct lack of world events, things to draw players together...That the current MoP world bosses are on short respawn timers, and loot can only be obtained from them once per week...means the groups for them are usually done a day or two after restart and it takes forever for them to form later in the week.

Guilds are a dime a dozen, and asides from some nice little perks, there really needs to be more added to prompt guild members to associate with each other more, get the feel of community and comradary going again. If players can't have individual houses, why not implement a guild hall, where players can play interactive games with each other to score point for their guild which can be used to purchase more guild hall stuff (more games, mog gear, guild buff items, potions, professional recipes, etc...what...I think I've gone off topic...what thread is this again? Oh look, more coffee!

[cowmuflage]

On top of that, there has been a steady decrease in the feel of the world

That really depends on the person.

Games always loose players and gain them it's just how it is with MMOs and the older they get the more it happens. It's a natural thing. Most MMO's don't live longer then a few years

[Vephriel]

I've found myself struggling to stay engaged this expansion, which is a first for me in the close to 8 straight years of playing. I've taken little breaks from the game here and there of course, but not usually while there's still so much content to do that I've yet to really touch. I suppose the length of time I've been playing could very well be a reason in and of itself, but there's just something about MoP that isn't holding my attention the way other expansions have.

It's not that I didn't enjoy it, and there certainly isn't a lack of things to do. I just haven't found myself logging in very often anymore. I don't feel pressured to do all of the dailies and reps, I usually only work on those types of things one at a time regardless, but I don't feel compelled to do any of them at the moment. Each new patch has given me a little boost of interest for a bit, but it lasts shorter each time. Isle of Thunder was amazing at first, along with the new raid and other content. I really loved the area, but then I became disinterested again.

I think I might just be in an extended lull period right now, I'll wait a bit and maybe try to get back into things once 5.3 drops. There's definitely a certain spark missing from the game right now for me though, and while I can't put my finger on what it is exactly, I'm suspecting it might just be catching up to me that I've been playing for so long and it's finally hitting the stale period, as much as I hate to admit it.

I didn't mean for any of that to sound negative, because I'm not feeling negatively towards the game in any way. I probably just need a break, haha.