SWTOR $1 million decrease in subscription

[Tsillah]

I think you missed her sarcasm there. The "quarterly game is dead thread" thing really sounds like a silly jab at the OP and people who think a slight loss in revenue means the game is dying again.

 

the sarcasm was obvious but since nobody claimed the game was dying, it didn't make sense to me to make that comment.

[DarthDymond]

From the 2016 figures Q3 FY16 Earnings release in that report:

Q3, STAR WARS™: The Old Republic grew to its highest subscriber level in nearly

three years.

That is pretty encouraging for the game and shows they are doing something right if they can relay in increase in subscriber figures to their investors (and investors/shareholders are all that matter). The game caters for casuals and solo players (like me) rather than raiders and group PvPers and I suspect that's where the reflected sub increase comes from.

A quote from "Electronic Arts Reports Q3 FY16 Financial Results":

 

"In Q3, STAR WARS™: The Old Republic grew to its highest subscriber level in nearly three years."

Just so these quotes don't confuse people who are thinking in terms of the calendar year instead of the fiscal year, the "$1 million decrease in subscription" line that OP is talking about comes from the latest release: Quarter 2 of Fiscal Year 2017 (Q2 FY17). The "highest subscriber level in three years" quote Sarova and Quaker referenced is from a year ago: Q3 FY16 was October 2015 - December 2015.

 

That being said, the "highest subscriber level" quotes are pretty relevant to this discussion because the "$1 million decrease in subscription net revenue" was a year-over-year change. In July 2016 - September 2016 EA's subscription services brought in $83 million, while in July 2015 - September 2015, they had brought in $84 million.

 

What's significant is that July 2015 - September 2015 (Q2 FY16) had a large spike in subscriptions: SWTOR had a 31% increase in subscriptions from the lead-up to KotFE (and it then grew even more in Q3 FY 16). So the "$1 million decrease" is a dip relative to that large increase - seems like the subscriber numbers settled back down a bit after spiking.

Edited November 13, 2016 by DarthDymond

[Tsillah]

We get this every single time EA announce their quarterly report. Armchair financial pundits scouring the report for any signs that the game is finally "dying" and they can turn round and say "I told you so." No-one specifically said the game was dying but it's heavily implied in the OP -

 

Maybe I misread the OPs intention, but I read that as "Subs are down, game is dying". Don't think he opened this thread to celebrate the game doing well. Would be totally out of character for a forum thread.

 

Well, since he only posted what he thought he saw without any commentary I prefer not making such assumptions. I got what you were trying to do, just didn't feel it was warranted in this case.

 

In the end SWTOR didn't lose 1 million but is the primary contributor to this total so it's not even factual what he said. But assuming he saw it as factual and him not giving any judgments with it, I guess he wasn't leading people in a specific direction.

 

You'll have to forgive me. I am a bit more literal than most people and try not to read too much into things, but I do understand I am different in that and that makes me the odd one out. So sorry for ruining your joke I guess.

[TalonVII]

All I'm gonna say on this one, stuff happens, ebb and flow. 1 million on the overalls scheme of things isn't too bad right before a major release is coming out in Dec.

 

Now if it was a 10 million drop, I'd be concerned. 1 mil, that's ebb and flow.

[CrazyCT]

Nobody comes to the forums just to make a statement without any agenda behind it. Especially when it refers to EA and their money.

[AllisonLightning]

Nobody comes to the forums just to make a statement without any agenda behind it. Especially when it refers to EA and their money.

 

My agenda is to procrastinate with my writing. People are a little quick to blame EA for anything and everything that happens in game.

[CrazyCT]

My agenda is to procrastinate with my writing. People are a little quick to blame EA for anything and everything that happens in game.

 

I was going to join Procrastinators Anonymous, but I just keep putting it off.

Edited November 13, 2016 by CrazyCT

[Keta]

If it gets called out in the quarterly as a loss, it is a bfd.

 

No, not really. It's also not a loss. as has been pointed out it's a decrease in revenue. 100 to 99. 667 to 666. etc. They're not the same thing.

[Alssaran]

No, not really. It's also not a loss. as has been pointed out it's a decrease in revenue. 100 to 99. 667 to 666. etc. They're not the same thing.

 

People confuse those two things. A decrease in revenue is not the same as a loss. Not per se. A decrease of 1 million in SWTOR's revenue means that compared to the subscriber high during the late stages of 2015 and early stages of 2016, the game is slightly down. Instead of making 46 million a quarter now (a hypothetical number), the game only made 45 million $ during the last quarter.

 

The overall revenue has slightly decreased, but that doesn't mean that the game caused EA to downright lose money in terms of return on their investment. Such changes in subscriber revenue and overall revenue per quarter are completely normal.

[Transcendent]

We get this every single time EA announce their quarterly report. Armchair financial pundits scouring the report for any signs that the game is finally "dying" and they can turn round and say "I told you so." No-one specifically said the game was dying but it's heavily implied in the OP -

 

Well at least I tried to pull a positive out of it. Glass half full and all that

[ekwalizer]

How did you arrive at 22000?

 

1M / $15 = 66600 (which also gives us an idea of the range of actual subscribers (~6M) if that is a 1% loss in subscription revenue).

 

Now divide by 3 for 3 months in a quarter.

[Rolodome]

It's kind of meaningless, cause even if there is a slight decrease, it's completely unsurprising given the content drought. It'll probably see a slight uptick with the quarter where KOTET is released and then it's anyone's guess what'll happen after that.

[CrazyCT]

Now divide by 3 for 3 months in a quarter.

 

Still ~2.2 million subs going by those figures. That's a heck of a lot more than anyone thought.

 

Possible it's a 1% drop in year to date? That'd give about a million subs, which I think is a bit closer to the truth.

Edited November 13, 2016 by CrazyCT

[xkcurtisx]

Still ~2million subs going by those figures. That's a heck of a lot more than anyone thought.

 

i would go as far as to say its below 10k

[CrazyCT]

i would go as far as to say its below 10k

 

{You totally get how maths works. Gold star for participation.}

[xkcurtisx]

{You totally get how maths works. Gold star for participation.}

 

i did not do any math or even looked at the figures, my comment was unrelated to any of that. I merely made an assumption , using my personal observation of the past month.

 

Edit: it made sense when i first wrote it down didn't make sense after so i rephrased it.

Edited November 13, 2016 by Xcurtx

[Tsillah]

Still ~2.2 million subs going by those figures. That's a heck of a lot more than anyone thought.

 

Possible it's a 1% drop in year to date? That'd give about a million subs, which I think is a bit closer to the truth.

 

As I already said, that's on the assumption that the 1 million in revenue loss is solely referring to SWTOR, which it's not. That is a false assumption. The text says that it's primarily from SWTOR, which depending on how many games contribute to this total of 1 million could for example mean that the contribution from SWTOR might only be 20 or 30% and because the other sources may only contribute 10% or less each it then makes SWTOR the primary contributor even with 20 or 30% of the total. In which case we're talking 500-700k subs at best. Not that bad, but not anywhere near the 2 million people keep throwing around because they assume "primarily" means 90% or more, which it doesn't have to at all.

[Darknestknight]

Remain subbed for KotET, leave after completing it to your satisfaction. Wait for group content if that's what you're after, sub on release, do content, leave. Buy nothing from the CM.

 

Eventually the developers have 2 choices, either they change what they are doing and it brings back players or they double down and have players for 3 months who then leave and don't come back, that cycle continues for new people and the game dies.

 

Reality is, they don't need to change gearing, they don't need to change the classes particularly drastically, they don't need to make it level 70, they don't need expansions with health sponge waves of trash.

 

Bioware needs to go to his roots, strong story telling, make the choices mean something, make a couple of new operations a year that are part of a story arc. The dread master arc to this day remains one of the best things about the game for me. Lastly, bring back the dailies with reputation items on those planets! Section x and Oricon were awesome!

 

Please don't let greed ruin what could be a great game! Oh and make HM flashpoints relevant, they serve no purpose currently.

[CrazyCT]

As I already said, that's on the assumption that the 1 million in revenue loss is solely referring to SWTOR, which it's not. That is a false assumption. The text says that it's primarily from SWTOR, which depending on how many games contribute to this total of 1 million could for example mean that the contribution from SWTOR might only be 20 or 30% and because the other sources may only contribute 10% or less each it then makes SWTOR the primary contributor even with 20 or 30% of the total. In which case we're talking 500-700k subs at best. Not that bad, but not anywhere near the 2 million people keep throwing around because they assume "primarily" means 90% or more, which it doesn't have to at all.

 

Yup, have to make too many assumptions to do any calculations. Which makes these reports all the more useless (to us), and not worth discussing, really.

[Alssaran]

Yup, have to make too many assumptions to do any calculations. Which makes these reports all the more useless (to us), and not worth discussing, really.

 

This entire report is useless to us anyway. We don't know the revenue distribution between subscriber money and the Cartel Market. We don't know current numbers. We don't know the impact of the cinematic trailer and subscriber rewards, seeing that the whole promotion didn't take off until a week after the fiscal period ended.

 

It's a report saying Bioware made a million less in subscriber money than previously, but that money is distributed between SWTOR and other games.

 

We might just have lost 20k of 500k subscribers to Legion. That could be it. There might be a content drought until KotET and that caused a few people to leave until later this year. That report is completely inconsequential for most of us.

[FourPawnBenoni]

Couple things; the data on the loss of subs is going to be primarily before the announcement of RNG. They made that announcement in October, the loss of subs (I believe) is as of end of September.

 

This is not news to any player; as all servers have been losing players; as pointed out on NA servers JM, POT5, Bastion are all ghost towns, JC has decreased significantly and even Harb isn't what it was a year ago.

 

What's sad is that management has probably known about this and yet the things they focused on in 5.0 doesn't address a single issue as to why they have been losing subs. Not a single one LOL...in fact, they make it even worse with RNG.

 

So Q4, in my opinion, could really be an eye opener to upper management and clue them in to the fact these devs don't know what they are doing in this game. I'm sure they are expecting exciting for "new content" and the revival of subs, which is why they timed it for December release (to make Q4 numbers look good). However, when they are releasing content AND have a drop in subs it should hopefully cause some heads to roll.

 

This is probably why they are putting XP boosters on the cartel market, they know they screwed up with getting subs and they're hoping to make up revenue by making the game pay to win.

Edited November 13, 2016 by FourPawnBenoni

[Alssaran]

This is probably why they are putting XP boosters on the cartel market, they know they screwed up with getting subs and they're hoping to make up revenue by making the game pay to win.

 

Only that it's not pay to win. It's pay to accelerate, just like many other mobile games out there. But that's a discussion for another post.

 

There were many studies that suggest that RNG actually has a positive factor on player behaviour. Rare but extreme cases of accomplishing something, or gaining that rare drop, are better for our brain's chemical response. The rewarding potion is much more effective when it comes in small, RNG-based doses rather than a constant accomplishment in form of equiping a character in a day.

 

That sounds utterly strange to people looking at it from an outsider's perspective, but it does make sense from a psychological point of view.

 

This new RNG system might not be all that negative. The next few weeks will be crucial to see how it pans out.

[Aeneas_Falco]

Now we know why all companions aren't being returned, despite initial promises that they would.

 

KOTFE did not retain subscriptions, so plans changed.

[Kyuuu]

majority of profits do NOT come from # of subcriptions they have... Majority comes from the people spending 100$'s a MONTH on cartel shop packs and what not.

 

Why you think Packs drop even less now then when they were original introduced or they removed platinum just to put it back in, cause they know people that spends 100$'s a MONTH on Cartel shop stuff will continue to do.

 

For same reason CS bugs and issue are the only thing really fixed these days. it no longer about the gameplay it all about the CS and how much they can push.

 

Single player content and long *** CGI movies are easier to do and "balance" then actual game content and gameplay balancing.

 

5.0 might be final straw for alot subs

Edited November 13, 2016 by Kyuuu

[dr_mike]

Now we know why all companions aren't being returned, despite initial promises that they would.

 

KOTFE did not retain subscriptions, so plans changed.

 

In their defense, one voice actress went on record that she refused to come back to swtor. I forget who.