Official: Over 1.7 million active subs, 2 + mil sold

[Alkiii]

The attempts to discredit the information provided by a company to its stock holders is absolutely astounding.

 

I know some of you want the game to fail, but come on, you're just grabbing at straws now ... desperately.

 

/popcorn

/recliner

[GnatB]

For reference, 2 million sales and 1.7 million active subs is an 85% conversion rate.

 

*if* 100% of the sales activated their games prior to Jan 2nd, so are no longer on their 30 free days. The only "conversion" that matters is from nonpaying to paying subscriber. And that happens 30 days after activation.

 

As it currently stands, we have a bunch of numbers that *could* mean anything from 0% retention of nonpaying to paying, or 100% from nonpaying to paying.

 

You can come up with scenarios either way that make the "known numbers" fit.

[Selaik]

2 trillion dollars...really?! Yes it's the most expensive game so far but 2 trillion dollars...again really?! You could have came up with a better fake number.

 

hmm not sure how to react to this , have you ever heard of the words "sarcasm" "humor"?

[Kabjat]

I pew pew things and make them blow up when I'm playing SW:TOR and I'm having fun while doing it so therefore this thread is very very silly because of all of the posturing.

[CupieFoxtail]

[*]Unique logins 1 million per day, average playtime 4 hours per day.

 

http://cdn.overclock.net/5/5d/5d0a5eb4_mother-of-god-super-troopers.jpeg

[PjPablo]

Stock looking pretty good atm. Sitting at 19.10.

[Jamus_Divinus]

Opinion and experience are two seperate things. While I might have the opinion on whether or not the game is going to succeed or fail, Facts found in financial statements with commentary (like this financial statement) can be and are wordsmithed to paint the picture the author wants to. If you look at aggrigate data, its more difficult; however we don't have that here, so we are dependent on the subjective perspective of the author; which is Bioware. Thus, as a responsible company, they're not going to say things like, "sorry, we've got a net loss of subscribers." nothing illegal or immoral here- but they are being very particular in their wording

 

We're talking about 2 different things mate. I don't deny that some companies may lie/cheat/steal to put forth any result they need to.

 

My point was the person I quoted and that you're defending was implying that the 2mil/1.7mil numbers were lies. He didn't rationally state they could be lies. He was trying (and probably still is lol) to convince everyone here that this game didn't sell 2mil copies and that 1.7mil did not active their game. Opinion is not fact.

 

I saw that to be silly (we shouldn't take the word of an EA exec but we should take the word of an anonymous TOR critic?)

Edited February 1, 2012 by Jamus_Divinus

[whatthefett]

1.7 million and I can't find 4 people to do the Foundy with since release.

[Blotter]

Opinion and experience are two seperate things. While I might have the opinion on whether or not the game is going to succeed or fail, Facts found in financial statements with commentary (like this financial statement) can be and are wordsmithed to paint the picture the author wants to. If you look at aggrigate data, its more difficult; however we don't have that here, so we are dependent on the subjective perspective of the author; which is Bioware. Thus, as a responsible company, they're not going to say things like, "sorry, we've got a net loss of subscribers." nothing illegal or immoral here- but they are being very particular in their wording

 

I'm an attorney. I wordsmith all the time. Wordsmithing is not using the words "current" and "active" to provide a verifiable objective fact, like the number of "current, active subscribers," then using an actual number, not a vague range, in order to somehow make thigns sound rosier than they are AND refer to numbers from a month ago. People rationalizing this as referring back to December 31, 2011 or that the statements made were "salesman talk" designed to inflate the numbers and fluff the investors' hopes and satisfaction...you jsut don't know what you're talking about.

Edited February 1, 2012 by Blotter

[GnatB]

No you cant post if your sub isn't active. So, people posting now have already made at least one payment.

 

Only if they activated their game > 1 month ago. I'd assume not everybody on the boards started playing within 1 week or whatever of release.

[OkuKeelus]

Can you post on these forums if your sub is inactive?

Nobody can answer that. We all rage-quit according to the haters

 

But no, you can't post if you are not subscribed.

Edited February 1, 2012 by OkuKeelus

[Jett-Rinn]

Well is this the point where I say I told you so?

 

I remember all of the

"Just you wait there is a massive exodus!!! People are leaving in droves!!!!"

 

And the numbers grew from 1.5 mil to 1.7 mil in one month Post free month

 

Post free month

 

Oh and they say it's still growing

 

So much for the game is dying....

 

Edited February 1, 2012 by Jett-Rinn

[Failstar]

Clearing things up, as I love clicking different articles. From a different article.

 

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ea-beats-targets-on-sales-gain-forecast-off-2012-02-01?link=MW_story_featstor

 

The company launched “Star Wars” in late December, and reported it has sold through more than 2 million units of the game and now has about 1.7 million active subscribers playing the online multiplayer title, which Brown said represents a mix of users who already have signed up for a paid subscription and users who have given their credit cards over, but have not yet had their paid plans kick in.

 

So to clear up any confusion, this is a MIXTURE of both active paid subs and people who have "given their credit cards over"

 

Not saying this is good or bad, I still love those numbers. But that is the TRUTH about the 1.7mil number.

[Thaed]

Talking about BF3 right now...

I don't care about FIFA 12...

Here it comes.

 

"BioWare has delivered a game that millions will play for a long time"

 

My paraphrasing of what was said about SWTOR's launch on the conference call:

 

• Sold-through 2 million units since December.
  
• 1.7 million active subs. Rest have not started yet or have opted out.
  
• Metrics suggest players are loving game.
  
• Unique logins 1 million per day, average playtime 4 hours per day.
• Server performance allowed introduction of players faster than expected in pre-order.
  
• Server stability has been excellent.
  
• Lack of congestion was not sign of slow participtaion. Shortly after launch, server efficiency was doubled, allowing servers to handle far more players and lifting the limits previously experienced.
  
• Next phase- new content, frequent releases and aggressively courting new subs.
  
• Another major update in March, larger than most recent one.
  
• Adopting rates are trending favorably.
  
• Ambitious plan to reach broader market with new marketing buys, will be seeing that soon.
  

 

Before people try to spin it negatively, the yellow is no indication of a failing game. It's actually pretty good. Not every active subscriber is able to play the game every single day; 200k people that loged in on Sunday might not be able to log in on Monday, but a different group of 200k people might be able to.

[FAAK]

hmm not sure how to react to this , have you ever heard of the words "sarcasm" "humor"?

 

Fair enough I'll give you that.

[nomaar]

There's a difference between falsifying and reporting information with a positive spin and doing everything you can to make it look good. It's done all the time, especially when it comes to presenting quarterly results to shareholders. Business is business, nothing new here.

 

Also before the real conspiracy clowns, aka fanboys, cry out that I'm out to get the game, I have a 6 month subscription and I'm happily playing it regularly. That doesn't mean I can't look at information presented to me from financial management and be objective about it while using common sense about how corporate businesses are run.

 

Of course, companies fudge their books all the time. But explain to me how a company would fudge a subscription count? People are either subscribers or they are not. We're not dealing with any gray areas here -- not even the people still in their first free month. If they went as far as buying the game and signing up for a subscription, they are subscribers.

[Abriael]

This is hilarious. I can't stop laughing.

 

Anyone in business knows first hand how corporate suits manipulate numbers for reporting.

 

There are numbers you show your management team, the numbers you report and then the real numbers that, if you're responsible for, attempt generate bigger ones to match one of the other two numbers.

 

That's a fact. Call it Fuzzy Math. 1+1 = 3. Somehow.

 

Point is, there is NO way there are 1.7 million ACTIVE anything in this game.

 

Anyone that believes otherwise in for a rude awakening come end of Q2.

 

Then you'll see. Save this post.

 

Actually anyone in business knows that manipulating Fiscal financial result reports is a criminal offense.

 

Ergo. You're not in business. You may want to get used to the idea that this game is a success.

[GnatB]

Yeah, and im the CEO of Starbucks....

 

 

I doubt you work in management, if you did you would know that lying to investors, submitting false documents is illegal.

 

True. But you can say numbers that are nearly meaningless without actually lieing. Like these are. Every number given could be 100% accurate, and there could (theoretically) be a 0% conversion rate of non-paying to paying.

[Jamus_Divinus]

Well is this the point where I say I told you so?

 

I remember all of the

"Just you wait there is a massive exodus!!! People are leaving in droves!!!!"

 

And the numbers grew from 1.5 mil to 1.7 mil in one month Post free month

 

Post free month

 

Oh and they say it's still growing

 

So much for the game is dying....

 

 

No mate you missed the memo.

 

'People are leaving, you'll see a mass exodus once the 60 day subs run out'....is the new 'wait til after 30 days'.

 

Please keep up with the doomsayers!!!

[Ricktur]

ima settle this right now, the guy straight up said, "over two million units sold and 1.7mil active subscribers in JUST OVER A MONTH".

 

lets do the math, the game (officially) launched on 12/20/2011, so over a month would be, oh let's see, when the article was posted: FEB 1st 2012.

 

like no **** people. now drop it, the game is doing *********** amazing and its growing, i want the rager haters to please leave the room, kthxbye.

[ItchyThePenguin]

Those are some impressive numbers! ~1.7M subscribers and ~2M units sold! The numbers don't lie!

[Jimer_Lins]

Question asked about future of SWTOR. Now they're talking about future expansions, end-game PVP (actually said "PVP" on the earnings call!) and evolution of the service infrastructure. Now talking about operational efficiency gains (I assume making the servers and tooling better).

 

Strong marketing plan in Q4 (they've mentioned this multiple times now).

 

Ah, the question is asked- how many of the 1.7 million will convert.

 

They're definining "Active", they don't want to talk about conversion this early. Using industry standard- if it's on a paid sub or active prepaid timecard and those in trial sub period. I had a brief dropout and missed a critical bit there where they talked about trial subs.

[CupieFoxtail]

So to clear up any confusion, this is a MIXTURE of both active paid subs and people who have "given their credit cards over"

 

~1.8million people bought the game before the new year, they are not in their free month still (assuming they activated their game time when they bought the game)

~250k people bought the game between the new year and now, they are still in their free month

At least that's what VGchartz says, as rough of an estimate as that is

[Jett-Rinn]

Oh to the servers are all on light crowd.

 

Brown said EA was actually able to add a lot more users on a per-server basis, thanks to some technical improvements. He also noted that about 40% of the units of the game sold during the quarter went over the company’s Origin digital-distribution channel, which is not tracked by market researchers such as NPD.

 

“This has been the most rapid scaling of an MMO ever, based on our research,” Brown commented.

 

 

And that is exactly what I was trying to tell the hate machine.

[TheDevilHimself]

Only a complete idiot would believe that they actually have 1.7 active subs right now. What these number really say is that there are at least 300k worth of physical copies making their way through distribution channels that have not been converted into active accounts.