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World of Warcraft: Activision-Blizzard Stock Downgraded on Declining WoW Subs
MikeB
Community ManagerAdministrator RarePosts: 6,555
Lazard Capital Markets has downgraded Activision-Blizzard stock from "buy" to "neutral" in light of World of Warcraft's declining subscription numbers.
Lazard analyst Atul Bagga does not believe Activision-Blizzard can stop the hemorrhaging of World of Warcraft subscriber numbers due to age and increased competition in the space. The downgrade was mainly motivated by data coming out of a recent survery of 381 online gamers conducted by Lazard Capital Markets (along with Peanut Labs) . The survey results have Lazard Capital projecting a potential 900,000-1.6million player drop due to the the imminent launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic alone. 50% of those who were actively subscribed to World of Warcraft during the time of the survey stated they would be purchasing The Old Republic, while 38% said they may pick up the title.
Bagga wasn't entirely pessimistic, however, noting that half of former WoW subscribers polled during the survey stated they may return to World of Warcraft if Blizzard put on a special promotion, and that 33% of former subscribers would return to the game with the launch of Mists of Pandaria, the game's next expansion.
via GameSpot.
Comments
bla bla bla.
##Best SWTOR of 2011
Posted by I_Return - SWTOR - "Forget the UI the characters and all ofhe nitpicking bullshit" "Greatest MMO Ever Created"
##Fail Thread Title of 2011
Originally posted by daveospice
"this game looks like crap?"
I know this is 'news', but let it go. Are we going to have to hear every about every event that marks the decline of WOW. It was bound to happen eventually, let it go. People love this topic and I just don't get it. LET IT GO. The guy back in 1900 who predicted that WOW would decline is indeed nostrodamous. He predicted it, let him take all the credit in the world and move on.
I self identify as a monkey.
Why should anyone be surprised. With each expansion, they keep dumbing down the game. With the new talent tree, or whatever you want to call it thats coming, its just dumbing it down more. I dont know why Blizzard cant see this. Perhaps they want to kill this game so they can move on. Perhaps they are slowly transitioning into the F2P market.. I started WoW a few months after release and quit shortly after Cata when I realized the game is not challenging any longer. I think WoW had a good run, but its time to hang it up...or get back to the basics of mmorpgs, but I think its too late for that.
they're slowly changing wow to some vanilla-candy-sugar-game and then roll out their ominous titan mmo
i may be stupid or something but.... how is this news even important when they only surveyed 381 gamers? all i can say to this Bagga dude, go survey at least half of WoWs playerbase then post ur numbers... Of course the competition will get players from WoW to play their games, plus the road Blizz is taking WoW to is not the best one.... i for one will play swtor, and i will switch subs between It and WoW because i like both... only 10% of WoW playerbase left WoW, nobody knows how many of those 10% will come back later on...and how many wont... and i sure as hell know that only 381 surveyed gamers wont give the correct answer to that.
381 'online gamers' and not even all of them were WoW subscribers at the time of the survey? And they used these results to determine what literally millions of currently active WoW players are going to do? Thats really pretty pathetic surveying.
News peices like these are always an ecourangement for more flaming. Nothing good comes out of articles like these.
381 players our of 10 million and they came up with those kinds of statistics? People are always going to be leaving MMO's, but I think they would need more people to survey to get a better accuracy on their statistics.
Its kind of funny when I think about it. You know for example when I watch the news and they bring up a comparison. So and so has dropped 50% from 5 years ago. I dont wanna know that kind of comparison. The only year they should bring up is this year compared to last year. Anything beyond that is irrelevant. Its the same thing when you're making future predictions. I dont need to know what kind of increase it'll be in the next 50 years maybe in the next 5-10 years would give you a better idea.
once the players see the real quality of the old republic they'll be back to WoW in no time. though i'm sure the numbers will still be dropping regardless, after cataclysm and later pandaria
[ironic] ofc, SWOR will have 2 Millions playerbase, perhaps more, 5 million, amazing article.................[/ironic]
Someone mentioned the sample size, well, that's how polls are conducted. Next time you see a political poll and then run around yelling about how awesome the results are, remember that. Last political poll I remember seeing, it was run through a 1000 person sample.
Believe it or not many people that visit a website that deals specifically with mmorpgs do in fact give a shit (even if it's just a small eensy weensy shit) about what happens to the insanely dominant king of the genre. History is happening right in front of your face and you'd rather just have everyone just stick their heads in the sand.
Even if this news in particular upsets you, there are many people that would like to be informed of such things as they occur. Again, especially on a site dedicated to mmorpgs.
Get used to it, bud. This aint the last thread you're gonna to see on this topic
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
So, now we know who hasn't taken statistics. It's called a representative sample, you NEVER poll half of a demographic as large as a games subscribers, that's just a stupid waste of time and money. Besides, if you take just North American players of 2 to 3 million (just a guess of current subs) 381 should be plenty. You can't count the Asian "subs" that aren't subs. Blizzard has always inflated their numbers with those.
This was inevitable as nothing lasts forever. In fairness, Ultima Online was not doing anywhere near as well when it turned 7.
This makes you wonder, when will 'Titan' launch and will it see the second coming of mmorgs and a resurgance for Blizzard in the genre.
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
Oh, no. They are down to 10.3 million. Any day they will shut their doors...
What's curious to me is the fact that no other games seem to be getting these subs. 1) Its mostly Asian people finding new games, so we have no clue what they are playing now. 2) Mmorpgs are terrible.
surveying half of WoWs playerbase indeed would be a stupid waste of time... but surveying 381 people will never give an accurate answer for the decreasing population in the game.... since u said its a representative "sample" then the information given by Bragga is just way innacurate (making it false)... why they even bother posting false info...
http://kotaku.com/5857400/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-3-shatters-all-sales-records-surprises-no-one
I'm not putting much stock in this thread. WoW, albeit important income for the company, isn't it's only hand that feeds.
Grasping at straws are we? no it doesn't make me upset. I gave an opinion based on my past experince on these forums nothing more.
More wow hate on MMORPG.com, awesome...
Where are the "GW2 isn't what we are expecting..." articles that are based off of 200 people's opinions in a poll?
BLEH!
asking to poll half of the games subscribers might not be realistic but neither is playing with stats based on 'just a guess' ranging in the millions. And 381 still seems like a pretty weak group especially when they are just online gamers. They could be asking CoD players who don't even own a computer their opinion of WoW. I'm not doubting that WoW is in decline or will be, just that the quality of the survey justifies the conclusion they reached.
This is good as it will make them think outside their standardized operating practices.
This is bad because it sucks to see someones hard work start failing them
then again...maybe they just got lazy
To the caterpillar it is the end of the world, to the master, it is a butterfly.
How quickly will they change that rating upon announcment of their new title's release.
-----
The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
yeah, half naked walrusman is always more entertaining pixelated creature than panda will ever be but.
back to wow for quality, you mean back because its safe and easy and anyhting new is frightening.
I find it interesting and existing what analyst "Atul Bagga" has to say.
I almost read his whole statement but then a pencil dropped from my desk and i had to pick it up. Too bad.