New updated sub numbers (Official)

[iceperson]

I would guess the 7 day free trial is a result of dropping subs. They will never have more players than they do in the first month. Most games don't. Its all downhill from here.

 

lol.

[Science]

This game had 2 million subs on day one. Logic: 2 million in subs in one day means 2 million subs per day. We're three months in, what's that....180 million subs now? This has to be the most successful MMO, nay most successful business venture, of all time.

 

And all this without combat logs or lfd!

[MGriffith]

You seem like a slow poke.

If you didnt notice, the game came out right before christmas, it was brand new and no one had work or school.

 

People are casual and have real life responsibilities. Thats where your players went.

 

The 'missing' players went across the planets. It is the same reason why Bioware could increase the server load numbers without performance issues after a month.

 

Warning: following numbers are made up because I am not good at math and I am trying to illustrate the principle not to provide real numbers.

 

Suppose a server can handle 2500 simultaneous players. Roughly divided equally over republic and empire that makes 1250 for each side.

The first few weeks, even with the staggered pre-launch entries these 1250 pretty much all were concentrated in 4 planets, giving them a load of over 300 each. That would have cause performance issues so Bioware capped the servers at 1500 so as to have about 200 players on each of the low level planets.

 

As players moved on in the game they spread out more because players level at different speeds. This means that even with 2500 players on the server now each of the 15 planets each side has available would have about 80 players on it. And because many of the players are in flashpoints or warzones you will see even less players on average on each planet. The server probably could handle a theoretical 6000 simultaneous players without overloading any particular planet. As long as the players are fairly evenly spread over all the planets and instanced content.

 

Then as the game ages the number of high level players will begin to outnumber the low level ones and the population concentrates more in the highest level planets, increasing the population there again. And returning the bottleneck of the servers not being full, but some planets getting overloaded.

 

The point is that even without a drop in population the number of players in a planet, or fleet would drop significantly from the first few weeks to now simply because the same number of players spreads out over more planets and zones.

 

What this mostly shows is the essential weakness of a shard based server architecture. It leads to server bottlenecks and wastelands of unplayed content.

[WNxAbaddon]

Why cant people just play the game, stop QQ and enjoy it. Man really is it any wonder BW dont talk to people more when all you have are people going.

 

Waaaaaaaagh the game is fail everyone is quitting coz theres no fluffy kittens in SWTOR

 

Well here you go enjoy http://newfarmpersonaltraining.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Star-Wars-Cats1.jpg

[GalacticKegger]

Why cant people just play the game, stop QQ and enjoy it. Man really is it any wonder BW dont talk to people more when all you have are people going.

 

Waaaaaaaagh the game is fail everyone is quitting coz theres no fluffy kittens in SWTOR

 

Well here you go enjoy http://newfarmpersonaltraining.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Star-Wars-Cats1.jpg

+5

 

Brat: "Mommy - I want this NOW!!!"

Mom: "Go ask your father"

Dad: "No."

 

Guess what comes next? [Hint: earplugs and pacifier ftw...]

Edited March 11, 2012 by GalacticKegger

[Kthx]

When there subs hit 1 mill next month they will know they did something wrong

 

And if they are still close to 2 million next month, do you promise to stop making these sort of posts then?

[Nemmar]

God, some people just dont know when to admit they were WRONG!

 

This game is a sucess and its gonna keep going strong cause its fun and enjoyable.

 

Yes, you shouldnt listen at what the loudest troll is saying. May it be a lesson. Trolls dont know how to make accurate analysis of products. All they do is rage. Is that what you want to be? The dumb troll guy that everyone laughs at?

[Runeshard]

the reason playerbase has not fallen off is the expansion of the asian servers happening right about the time the hardcore gamers are quitting because they are "bored."

 

So, I think their numbers might start to reverse here shortly if 1.2 patch isn't a hit. I know a lot of people are just waiting on that. If they deliver just 50% of what is promised, I'll be happy to continue however. I really like the setting, and the entire concept of the game. Most of my complaints are technical in nature.

 

The numbers in the article seem to be from before the Australian/Asian servers launched, I base this on the the following

We also note that the company plans to launch Star Wars in the Asia-Pacific region later this month

[Ozzone]

God, some people just dont know when to admit they were WRONG!

 

You are so true.

 

This game is a sucess and its gonna keep going strong cause its fun and enjoyable.

 

Not yet. It will be a success when the huge number of players that subbed for 3 months renew their subs. We haven't hit that mark yet.

 

Without having the actual data, most people sign up for 3 months (to get the discount and figuring they will play at least 3 months). Some will do 6, some will go month-by-month, but the vast majority are 3 month subs.

[Vorphalack]

Why cant people just play the game, stop QQ and enjoy it.

 

Becasue there isnt any game to enjoy.

 

You can roll over both the Nightmare Ops in under 3 hours, the dailys couldnt be less imaginative if they tried, the pvp is riddled with problems from client / server sync issues to inexplicable frame rate drops, the space combat minigame stopped being fun in beta, crafting has the bare minimum of player interaction (i.e. click and wait), alt rolling forces you to repeat too much of the same content.....

 

I just cant sit down and play a game with so many issues that still has the balls to ask for a subscription fee. Even if patch 1.2 is the messiah the devs promised, there is no sense in subscribing now for a release date that could be over 2 months away.

[ZudetGambeous]

Well, some simple math (unless I overlook something) would say that you might be wrong about your assumptions.

 

1.7 million players (active subscriptions)

 

average 4 hours a day (24/4 = 8)

 

1700000/8 = 212500 (this would be the number of people who would be playing on average any hour of the day globally across all servers), although due to timezones and pek times the number would most probably be closer to 350k at peaks (more on weekends) and less than 100k at lowest.

 

there's currently 173 servers globally according to torstatus.net

212500/173 = 1228,32 (this would be the average number of people online at the same time on both factions per server).

 

1228,32/2 = 614,16 (this would be the average number of players online per faction per server online at the same time, on my primary server there's atleast double that number online for about 6 hours most evenings/nights and atleast triple on weekends)

 

Some servers will have a lower number of players online on average and some will have alot higher but on average I'd say that the numbers seems to hold (on average, not everyday but averaged over let's say a week over all the servers totalled).

 

Btw, even if a player would have an average playtime of less than 1 hour per day they'd still be active subscribers and playing, as long as their average playtime is above 0 hours they count, whether you think they do or not, you see there's this thing that's called real life (family/friends/works etc) that some people make more time for and only/mostly play in big "time chunks" during weekends/day offs.

 

24/4 = 6 not 8

 

I read through 10 pages of posts to see if anyone caught this... but nope they were all to busy pretending they knew statistics to figure out division.

 

Also I count 216 servers on the server page, not 173

 

so not only are your results meaningless, they are also completely wrong and just made-up to support your theory.

 

*Edit... turns out your 2 mistakes almost exactly canceled each other so your end number is still almost the same... mostly meaningless though, almost no one plays from like 2am-8am.

Edited March 11, 2012 by ZudetGambeous

[Tuscad]

Don't know why I bother since I know how some people will spin this and call it a conspiracy because obviously there isn't a third party agency that signs off on these to make sure they're accurate /sarcasm

 

But here you go:

 

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-03-08-star-wars-the-old-republic-sitting-at-nearly-1-7-million-paid-subscribers

 

As of March 1st the game is still at 1.7 million subs now with the vast majority beyond the first month.

 

By the end of June the game is estimated to have 2 million active subs if it continues expanding at this rate.

 

Really? John Recillo (forgive my spelling) is the source behind these numbers? That man has no clue of what SWTOR even is, he was probably looking at WoW's Sub numbers (ok not really but still...) This is the same man that thought that this game was set during the reign of the Galactic Empire pre release, I could see him putting a decimal in the wrong place.

 

 

 

The only reason that these numbers could be 1.7 million is because Bioware held off on releasing this in other regions of the world. For those of you saying that this game has excellent reviews, do you really think that reviewers played this game all the way through?

 

Hell no, if they were to they wouldn't be able to give any game reviews for a month, most reviewers probably never cleared Korriban, Tython, Ord Mantell, or Hutta and the game doesn't get stale until around Tatooine or Alderaan.

[RoyFokker]

Folks, that's the CEO of a public company talking to investors. If he lies to them, they'll sue, the company will lose a lot of money and the CEO could go to jail. If he says 1.7 mio subscribers, it's pretty close to the truth.

 

And yet that never stopped Enron and others.

[iceperson]

And yet that never stopped Enron and others.

 

wow

Edited March 11, 2012 by iceperson

[Norumaniac]

Yes this game doesn't go down because:

 

1) Casuals keep playing because they like the easy mode

2) People just want to play with glowsticks and that's all they care about in an MMO

 

The people who actually came to play a good MMO, have all left or are about to.

 

Agreed.

[Akirator]

Really? John Recillo (forgive my spelling) is the source behind these numbers? That man has no clue of what SWTOR even is, he was probably looking at WoW's Sub numbers (ok not really but still...) This is the same man that thought that this game was set during the reign of the Galactic Empire pre release, I could see him putting a decimal in the wrong place.

 

 

 

The only reason that these numbers could be 1.7 million is because Bioware held off on releasing this in other regions of the world. For those of you saying that this game has excellent reviews, do you really think that reviewers played this game all the way through?

 

Hell no, if they were to they wouldn't be able to give any game reviews for a month, most reviewers probably never cleared Korriban, Tython, Ord Mantell, or Hutta and the game doesn't get stale until around Tatooine or Alderaan.

 

Really? That's the comparison you want to make? Messing up on the story's timeline is a "oops, my bad" type thing, screwing up on numbers like that are a fineable offense and I can guarantee he had at least a dozen different people look over those number before releasing them.

 

 

As for only being 1.7(and it's actually over 1.7) because they didn't release everywhere at once? Maybe you'd have a point if those numbers included the delayed Asia/Pacific launch, but they don't.

[Adderdin]

You seem like a slow poke.

If you didnt notice, the game came out right before christmas, it was brand new and no one had work or school.

 

People are casual and have real life responsibilities. Thats where your players went.

 

Ah americans, the christmass last year were on saturday and sunday, normall weekend day.

So yes, nobody had work or school, but thats only because it was also a weekend, people still worked on friday and on monday, the world did not stop just to play the SWTOR and make servers heavy populated.

 

The game was populated because it was something new, now its not populated, because people lost interest.

 

If you have 200-300 people in the fleet and an hour queue during first 2 weeks, server mostly heavy populated and sometimes full and then after 80 days its standard or light with max of 70 people in the fleet (i hope by that time it had hit you that i am talking about the so called "prime time" any day) .

 

When the guild I am in goes from a ton of people online during evenings to barely 16 people during operation's day, and another guild that was made only for 8 man ops disbands because nobody comes online anymore you start to ask yourself this:

 

If the game has 2 milion subscribers, where are they?

Edited March 11, 2012 by Adderdin

[MGriffith]

Not yet. It will be a success when the huge number of players that subbed for 3 months renew their subs. We haven't hit that mark yet.

 

That is a bit of a 'no true Scotsman' argument. First the doomsayers predicted the subscription numbers to tank after the free month.

Now that did not materialise they predict doom and gloom for the game after three months. And when that does not happen no doubt the next 'end of the world' prediction will be 6 months and then a year.

 

We really have no idea how large percentage of the players has 1, 3 or 6 month subscriptions, and any post claiming that 'most' or 'few' do are really nothing but a WAP figure trying to appeal to authority, likely without even realising.

[MGriffith]

And yet that never stopped Enron and others.

 

Yes, and they got tossed into jail for that.

 

Remember, CEOs get to do jailtime when they defraud investors (the rest of the 1pct). They can plunder the bank account of ordinary people for as much as they can feel they can get away with (re: the banks)

 

If a company puts in writing, for investors, that the game sold 2 million copies and that they have 1.7 million paying subscribers to their service then those numbers are pretty much accurate. The first because the tax office will come knocking on their door for their share of those sales (and any company that keeps silent on sales so as to defraud the tax office finds itself in very deep water indeed. Remember, this is the office that goes after the mob when no other government agency has any success).

The second because those 18 million per month revenues directly affects stock share value and being found out to have willfully lied about it will lead to lawsuits for billions of dollars and jailtime.

 

Now I am fully aware that rational arguments will make no impression because you apparently have fully invested yourself in believing the game is doing worse than it is reported doing, for wharever reason, and your emotional well-being now depends on the game doing poorly.

[MGriffith]

Ah americans, the christmass last year were on saturday and sunday, normall weekend day.

So yes, nobody had work or school, but thats only because it was also a weekend, people still worked on friday and on monday, the world did not stop just to play the SWTOR and make servers heavy populated.

 

The game was populated because it was something new, now its not populated, because people lost interest.

 

Except, you know, the numbers clearly show that the subscriptions have not gone down so apparently people have NOT lost interest.

But I guess it is hard to grasp the fact that 1.7 million is the same as 1.7 million. I should know, my math-fu is not very strong either.

 

If you have 200-300 people in the fleet and an hour queue during first 2 weeks, server mostly heavy populated and sometimes full and then after 80 days its standard or light with max of 70 people in the fleet (i hope by that time it had hit you that i am talking about the so called "prime time" any day) .

 

Or, crazy idea I know, the first weeks just about every republic player was found on Ord Mantell, Tython, Fleet or Coruscant. Now 2 months later they are much more spread out over 14 planets, fleet, several flashpoints, warzones and operations. Even without a drop in players concentrating all players in 4 zones as opposed to about 20 would lead to a dilution of the numbers from, say, 300 per zone to 60 with the exact same number of players on the server. The math really is not that hard to grasp if even I can manage.

Edited March 11, 2012 by MGriffith

[CDanvers]

I can't honestly say that I know one way or the other. none of us can.

 

As far as number of subscriptions goes, they may not have lost much at all, they may even have gained a good number for all I know. It is almost impossible for anyone to get a good idea of total numbers then they are restricted to one server and one zone at a time.

 

One thing I would say is that while subs may be good how many ppl are playing regularly and for a good few hours when they do?

 

All we can have is a perception of our own server. My server happens to be pretty sparse most of the time. PvP is a mix of the same 8-15 ppl on each side again and again no matter what time of day etc.

 

So all I can say with any real knowledge is this:

 

There are less ppl PvPing

There are less ppl Looking for grps, Ops, etc

I rarely see another player while leveling or doing dailies.

 

Does any of that mean that numbers are down? Not for certain.

 

Maybe SWTOR has kept its initial numbers better then most but all I can say for certain is its getting harder and harder to find ppl to do any grp content on my server, and that is bad for my server.

[Dekkau]

This game is so deceiving in its structure cus it actually is very entertaining to start with, so much so that for me I gave them a three month sub...... But then the niggles start and you find yourself less likely to want to log. The game engine delivers the very same combat mechanic with all that you do and you do start to become very bored. For me I got so bored I just started standing in game for an age and not doing anything cus I couldn't muster the energy to want to trundle through dozens and dozens of the same old same old. And then about two weeks ago I stopped playing. I logged once and took my character into the wilderness to see how long it would take me to die from fatigue... I died and so did the game. And my character lies dead somewhere.... Shame I couldn't kill that bloody annoying moronic companion at the same time.

 

I don't think they can do anything to get me back. I'm playing something else now. And yes they have my sub... But this game unlike Rift and WoW will not be resubscribed. It really is very boring.

[Trenter]

And yet that never stopped Enron and others.

 

If you think you have case, why aren't you reporting them then? Go ahead.

[Wolfeisberg]

If you think you have case, why aren't you reporting them then? Go ahead.

 

Didn't you know? Every highly successful MMO publisher/developer are committing federal crimes. Look around the internet, and you'll see nearly 8 years worth of people stating that Blizzard has been committing the same federal crime.

[Pools]

Crosspost from Reddit, but still just as valid.

 

http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ERTS/1675578999x0x551670/86a5c9a0-1ee8-480f-887b-04bf50c8d268/ERTS_Wedbush_03082012_Transcript.pdf

 

"Star Wars, this is an area that I think has got a lot of people anxious. I've heard from investors today saying that we must have 800,000 subscribers. I heard 600,000 yesterday. So what I think a lot of people have misunderstood is we said we had 1.7 million subscribers on the last call, which was about a month ago. What that was about was the fact that only about – just about half that number had triggered through their 30-day point and become active subscribers, our definition of recurring subscribers."

 

Next time read the PDF. There is no solid paying subscriber number that has been stated.

 

Heh, I love this.

 

What that was about was the fact that only about – just about half that number had triggered through their 30-day point and become active subscribers, our definition of recurring subscribers.

 

(last month):

 

"Star Wars: The Old Republic is developing a committed community of players with more than 1.7 million active subscribers and growing." - John Riccitiello, EA's CEO

 

So the "naysayers" (I really hate that word) were right that the numbers EA was reporting last month for retention were ********. Half of those people counted as 'retained' hadn't even started their subscription. And now that investors called them on it, they're backpedaling despite clearly having stated "active subscribers".

 

Also,

 

We're two months into the launch, a lot more to go, but 1.7 million, vast majority now, are recurring subscribers.

 

How adorable - they claimed 1.7 million subscribers previously which turned out to only be half recurring subscribers and this month they've redefined what they meant in order to show growth in "recurring subscribers" which is just that previous set having aged 30 days and started payments. That explains the "fastest growing MMO" talk at the guild summit - they can claim almost 100% growth in February with their method without having to subscribe a single new player!

 

This is some really sketchy stuff. I wonder if the investors are going to let it slide.