Originally posted by Hyanmen Considering the kind of tantrum people get over having to pay a sub fee, and then same people turn around to say a free game vs. a game that costs money is "pretty much the same thing", is rather hilarious but not unlike what you'd expect on this forum.
850 000 people didnt find FFARR sub worthy. After only 1 month.
Originally posted by Hyanmen Considering the kind of tantrum people get over having to pay a sub fee, and then same people turn around to say a free game vs. a game that costs money is "pretty much the same thing", is rather hilarious but not unlike what you'd expect on this forum.
850 000 people didnt find FFARR sub worthy. After only 1 month.
76% of statistics are made up on the spot.
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
Originally posted by Hyanmen Considering the kind of tantrum people get over having to pay a sub fee, and then same people turn around to say a free game vs. a game that costs money is "pretty much the same thing", is rather hilarious but not unlike what you'd expect on this forum.
850 000 people didnt find FFARR sub worthy. After only 1 month.
76% of statistics are made up on the spot.
Poor Yoshi, you calling him out liek that!
And you now dispute their own official numbers?
And his "35%" is also pretty random. He didnt back up HIS claim with anything so his number is just as good as any other random number.
BTW his number was shot down with official numbers from another MMO. You colors show.
And his "35%" is also pretty random. He didnt back up HIS claim with anything so his number is just as good as any other random number.
BTW his number was shot down with official numbers from another MMO. You colors show.
Nope, I'm calling you out. Unless you want to claim that Yoshi-P's post as the director and producer of FFXIV:ARR is the same thing as a post by didjerama as the didjerama.
It's hilarious though. First we wait that the devs post good news, and then act as if the devs are lying if the news are actually good. Completely in-line with anyone's expectations of how a certain demographic reacts to the game's success.
No game director ever has "back up" his claims in any sort of way because he doesn't have to. They are taken for granted, because posting incorrect data or news as a game director on behalf of your company is slightly different matter than doing so as a random person on the interwebs.
BTW that "another MMO" (funny you dont even mention which) is just not another exception to the rule as far as initial retention rate goes? Nothing was shot down until you manage to prove that.
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
850k quit within the first month (no word how many have quit to this date as they only gave peak subscriber numbers which could be from any point since release).
600k peak subscribers (this is not current subscribers as I said, it just states the peak amount as of now)
Again, a comparison to SWTOR player loss for first month.
First month sales were 2 million for NA/EU alone, of that 2 million customers 1.7 million subscribed which is pretty great retention numbers given FFXIV ARR had 1.45 million sales and well over half quit... at best within the first 4 weeks (850k quit). So far, more have quit the game in the first 4-5 weeks than subscribed and these aren't even current numbers just highest point. Which says there is a huge flaw with this game.
850k quit within the first month (no word how many have quit to this date as they only gave peak subscriber numbers which could be from any point since release).
600k peak subscribers (this is not current subscribers as I said, it just states the peak amount as of now)
That's a 41.4% retention rate (based solely on those numbers), which seems to line up with what Yoshi said about FF:ARR beating the 35% retention rate of other sub mmo's in their first month since 2008 by a good margin.
When all is said and done, I don't think it really matters that much. The mmo community at large is very fickle now days, and as long as FF can hold onto a core audience it should do fine.
FFXI was highly profitable (the most profitable in the FF series) with less subscribers than ARR has according to these numbers, and if SE is willing to put the kind of commitment into ARR that they did with XI, then I think ARR has a long prosperous future ahead of it.
Besides, if you like theme parks, ARR is arguably the best on the market right now (disclaimer: I do like theme parks). If you don't like theme parks, well then why are you even reading this?
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
I'm ignoring the part where you said Yoshi made up the figures, because that is impossible for you to know.
I then skipped the part about SWTOR, cause I could care less about that game.
You're right that XI held the numbers for many years and so that is why it was profitable, but since the future hasn't happened yet we don't know if ARR will sink or swim (could go either way frankly).
Since you don't like ARR, just stop bothering this forum. Please return to your own games. Feel free to pick apart my post if you would like since I have directly addressed you, but I won't respond to you again I can promise that.
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
The 1.7 million number from SWTOR INCLUDED those still in their first free month. The article says "most of the 1.7 million were paying subs, which puts it at around 850k.
850k out of 2.4 million sales = ~35-36%
YoshiP seems to be correct on his statement. FFXIV retained 42%, hence the statement exceeding other mmo's by a "wide margin."
Here's another instructive article by YoshiP discussing why Star Wars failed and why it HAD to go F2P and what FFXIV has to do in order to prevent going down the same road.
My personal opinion on why SWTOR failed was poorly optimized engine that affected both pve and pvp (more pvp), no end game content, no world pvp as promisd for Ilium, etc etc.
The best part of SWTOR was the story, and people finished the story in 1 to 2 months, hence the huge drop in numbers after the first few months. SWTOR went F2P in 9 months. FFXIV is a deeper game in terms of crafting, better dungeons, better engine, looks better, etc. All this is my opinion but I think it's going to serve FFXIV well in the next few months.
I think FFXIV will settle on 500k subs and never dip below that. How high they can go remains to be seen.
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
The 1.7 million number from SWTOR INCLUDED those still in their first free month. The article says "most of the 1.7 million were paying subs, which puts it at around 850k.
850k out of 2.4 million sales = ~35-36%
YoshiP seems to be correct on his statement. FFXIV retained 42%, hence the statement exceeding other mmo's by a "wide margin."
Here's another instructive article by YoshiP discussing why Star Wars failed and why it HAD to go F2P and what FFXIV has to do in order to prevent going down the same road.
My personal opinion on why SWTOR failed was poorly optimized engine that affected both pve and pvp (more pvp), no end game content, no world pvp as promisd for Ilium, etc etc.
The best part of SWTOR was the story, and people finished the story in 1 to 2 months, hence the huge drop in numbers after the first few months. SWTOR went F2P in 9 months. FFXIV is a deeper game in terms of crafting, better dungeons, better engine, looks better, etc. All this is my opinion but I think it's going to serve FFXIV well in the next few months.
I think FFXIV will settle on 500k subs and never dip below that. How high they can go remains to be seen.
That's quite interesting and indeed pushes the fact that Square would of done the same exact thing, I forgot that FFXIV launched with 30 days subscription free...and as such are also subscribers from day 1. So that means that the 1.45 million sales have somehow been heavily padded, maybe they are adding on V1 sales?..which would make a lot of sense and show that the game hasn't sold as well as they are saying afterall. Very strange. That would imply that 1.45 million people bought the game and 840k decided to not even register to play at all, maybe they all wanted teacosters. Your 850k figure in relation to SWTOR is nonsense of course so I'll let that slide.
The comments on why SWTOR failed are kind of silly, given the lag and optimisation problems of this game he isn't really in any posaition to critique, even more odd he would mention pvp... It failed because the market has changed and this game is running in that market, he of course couldn't say that.
I really don't see how you can honestly think this game will sit at 500k subscribers? It peaked at 600k and you think it will simply lose 100k over time when even he says that modern mmos lose vast numbers once they complete the story? FFXIV v1 had around 40-50k subscribers, I'd guesstimate this will even out around the 80-90k point with good content updates. Which I hasten to add is still pretty decent.
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
The 1.7 million number from SWTOR INCLUDED those still in their first free month. The article says "most of the 1.7 million were paying subs, which puts it at around 850k.
850k out of 2.4 million sales = ~35-36%
YoshiP seems to be correct on his statement. FFXIV retained 42%, hence the statement exceeding other mmo's by a "wide margin."
Here's another instructive article by YoshiP discussing why Star Wars failed and why it HAD to go F2P and what FFXIV has to do in order to prevent going down the same road.
My personal opinion on why SWTOR failed was poorly optimized engine that affected both pve and pvp (more pvp), no end game content, no world pvp as promisd for Ilium, etc etc.
The best part of SWTOR was the story, and people finished the story in 1 to 2 months, hence the huge drop in numbers after the first few months. SWTOR went F2P in 9 months. FFXIV is a deeper game in terms of crafting, better dungeons, better engine, looks better, etc. All this is my opinion but I think it's going to serve FFXIV well in the next few months.
I think FFXIV will settle on 500k subs and never dip below that. How high they can go remains to be seen.
That's quite interesting and indeed pushes the fact that Square would of done the same exact thing, I forgot that FFXIV launched with 30 days subscription free...and as such are also subscribers from day 1. So that means that the 1.45 million sales have somehow been heavily padded, maybe they are adding on V1 sales?..which would make a lot of sense and show that the game hasn't sold as well as they are saying afterall. Very strange. That would imply that 1.45 million people bought the game and 840k decided to not even register to play at all, maybe they all wanted teacosters. Your 850k figure in relation to SWTOR is nonsense of course so I'll let that slide.
The comments on why SWTOR failed are kind of silly, given the lag and optimisation problems of this game he isn't really in any posaition to critique, even more odd he would mention pvp... It failed because the market has changed and this game is running in that market, he of course couldn't say that.
I really don't see how you can honestly think this game will sit at 500k subscribers? It peaked at 600k and you think it will simply lose 100k over time when even he says that modern mmos lose vast numbers once they complete the story? FFXIV v1 had around 40-50k subscribers, I'd guesstimate this will even out around the 80-90k point with good content updates. Which I hasten to add is still pretty decent.
Read thepress releases again. SE said FFXIV has already "surpassed" the highest number of users by FFXI (600k). We don't know how many subscribers FFXIV has. We only know that it's MORE THAN 600k.
The 1.45 million sold number DOES NOT include 1.0. That's a good or a bad thing. It means that even after FFXIV 1.0 failed, 1.5 million people still decided to give it a try by word of mouth alone. I barely saw a single advertisement for this game. Compare that to the publicity machine that was SWTOR.
The foundation for SWTOR was doomed to fail. The game touted PvP but had a horrible engine (both ilium and battlegrounds) that couldn't support the long animations. People would be locked on abilities and did not have the responsiveness they expected from other games (Wow/Rift).
The minimum 600k number is people who ARE currently subscribing and OUT of the free month period. Remember, this game stopped sales for THREE WEEKS, so you may have hundreds fo thousands of people still on the free period who are not party of the 600+K.
You also have the confirmed release of the game in CHINA and PS4 release. So do I think that my estimation of 500k subscribers, minimum is realistic, you bet I do.
PS: My guesstimation is that if you include 1.0 players and ARR players, you probably have 2+ million people who have a copy of the game. Why is that significant in a positive direction instead of just saying "Looking at how many players they lost!!!!!!!" Simple, before every big patch, you will have people to resuscribe for a month or two at a time to check it out. Some will stay, some will leave, but that factors into the calculations by YoshiP and SE. You may have 600k subscribers for 6 months before and after each content patch and only 400k subscribers when there is a lul, regardless, the calculation of steady income to support more expansions and content patches holds true.
I guarentee you that you'll see 800k+ subsribers try out patch 2.1. I have friends who stopped subscribing last month who will Definetely be back for 2.1. The 600k number is lower than it actually suggests because people consumed much of the content, that won't be the case with 2.1.
All that matters is that SE is super happy with FFXIV right now. That means the fans of the game should be happy as well.
I really don't see how you can honestly think this game will sit at 500k subscribers? It peaked at 600k and you think it will simply lose 100k over time when even he says that modern mmos lose vast numbers once they complete the story? FFXIV v1 had around 40-50k subscribers, I'd guesstimate this will even out around the 80-90k point with good content updates. Which I hasten to add is still pretty decent.
This entire paragraph is hilariously trite conjecture designed to incite other posters to negative post.
Please refrain from obvious baiting.
Thank you.
(In other words your logic is so heavily flawed that even addressing it is clearly unacceptable)
FF14: ARR was expected to make around $600 million but made $626 million.
ARR has undeniably been a big success.
Glad for people that actually play ARR and enjoy it. I'm however not among them. in this ammount earned is also aprox my 30€. But they did not get single euro from me for sub.
Since SWTOR i don't believe in company PR when it comes to numbers for P2P MMOS.
It is still too soon to brag about numbers because past has shown us that for sub based games first 6 months / one year period is very crucial.
But since flaunting numbers is all about PR and to get players attention especially who aren't playing, i take such news with grain of salt.
"The problem is that the hardcore folks always want the same thing: 'We want exactly what you gave us before, but it has to be completely different.' -Jesse Schell
"Online gamers are the most ludicrously entitled beings since Caligula made his horse a senator, and at least the horse never said anything stupid." -Luke McKinney
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
The 1.7 million number from SWTOR INCLUDED those still in their first free month. The article says "most of the 1.7 million were paying subs, which puts it at around 850k.
850k out of 2.4 million sales = ~35-36%
YoshiP seems to be correct on his statement. FFXIV retained 42%, hence the statement exceeding other mmo's by a "wide margin."
Here's another instructive article by YoshiP discussing why Star Wars failed and why it HAD to go F2P and what FFXIV has to do in order to prevent going down the same road.
My personal opinion on why SWTOR failed was poorly optimized engine that affected both pve and pvp (more pvp), no end game content, no world pvp as promisd for Ilium, etc etc.
The best part of SWTOR was the story, and people finished the story in 1 to 2 months, hence the huge drop in numbers after the first few months. SWTOR went F2P in 9 months. FFXIV is a deeper game in terms of crafting, better dungeons, better engine, looks better, etc. All this is my opinion but I think it's going to serve FFXIV well in the next few months.
I think FFXIV will settle on 500k subs and never dip below that. How high they can go remains to be seen.
That's quite interesting and indeed pushes the fact that Square would of done the same exact thing, I forgot that FFXIV launched with 30 days subscription free...and as such are also subscribers from day 1. So that means that the 1.45 million sales have somehow been heavily padded, maybe they are adding on V1 sales?..which would make a lot of sense and show that the game hasn't sold as well as they are saying afterall. Very strange. That would imply that 1.45 million people bought the game and 840k decided to not even register to play at all, maybe they all wanted teacosters. Your 850k figure in relation to SWTOR is nonsense of course so I'll let that slide.
The comments on why SWTOR failed are kind of silly, given the lag and optimisation problems of this game he isn't really in any posaition to critique, even more odd he would mention pvp... It failed because the market has changed and this game is running in that market, he of course couldn't say that.
I really don't see how you can honestly think this game will sit at 500k subscribers? It peaked at 600k and you think it will simply lose 100k over time when even he says that modern mmos lose vast numbers once they complete the story? FFXIV v1 had around 40-50k subscribers, I'd guesstimate this will even out around the 80-90k point with good content updates. Which I hasten to add is still pretty decent.
Read thepress releases again. SE said FFXIV has already "surpassed" the highest number of users by FFXI (600k). We don't know how many subscribers FFXIV has. We only know that it's MORE THAN 600k.
The 1.45 million sold number DOES NOT include 1.0. That's a good or a bad thing. It means that even after FFXIV 1.0 failed, 1.5 million people still decided to give it a try by word of mouth alone. I barely saw a single advertisement for this game. Compare that to the publicity machine that was SWTOR.
The foundation for SWTOR was doomed to fail. The game touted PvP but had a horrible engine (both ilium and battlegrounds) that couldn't support the long animations. People would be locked on abilities and did not have the responsiveness they expected from other games (Wow/Rift).
The minimum 600k number is people who ARE currently subscribing and OUT of the free month period. Remember, this game stopped sales for THREE WEEKS, so you may have hundreds fo thousands of people still on the free period who are not party of the 600+K.
You also have the confirmed release of the game in CHINA and PS4 release. So do I think that my estimation of 500k subscribers, minimum is realistic, you bet I do.
PS: My guesstimation is that if you include 1.0 players and ARR players, you probably have 2+ million people who have a copy of the game. Why is that significant in a positive direction instead of just saying "Looking at how many players they lost!!!!!!!" Simple, before every big patch, you will have people to resuscribe for a month or two at a time to check it out. Some will stay, some will leave, but that factors into the calculations by YoshiP and SE. You may have 600k subscribers for 6 months before and after each content patch and only 400k subscribers when there is a lul, regardless, the calculation of steady income to support more expansions and content patches holds true.
I guarentee you that you'll see 800k+ subsribers try out patch 2.1. I have friends who stopped subscribing last month who will Definetely be back for 2.1. The 600k number is lower than it actually suggests because people consumed much of the content, that won't be the case with 2.1.
All that matters is that SE is super happy with FFXIV right now. That means the fans of the game should be happy as well.
I read it just fine, seems you didn't. FFXIV surpassed FFXIs peak numbers (which was 500k) and has managed a highest point of 600k. Since 600k is more than 500k that sentence makes sense as it is and doesn't need what you're doing to it, so if they state that this game peaked at 600k (that peak might of been for just 1 day, nobody knows) that is almost spot on the number. If it was 650k they would of said that, so if it is more it's marginally more (a few k at best).
You state the 1.45 million number does not include v1 sales but then how to you explain 850k bought the game and didn't ever register it within the first month? Since everyone that buys this game gets 30 days sub free and as you shown is technically subscribed from day 1. You can't make a point and then say the company of the game you like doesn't do that, you proved something so now have to accept it as common practice.
As for no advertising...please, they actually did run many TV advertisments (which is more than most other mmos ever have). There has been advertising in every place you would normally see it and much more, including mmo websites. They spent a lot of money on advertising, more than most. It's also a huge IP so it's not like most mmo players simply don't know about this game...
SWTOR problems are no worse than the problems this game has, which is why stating them is silly. This game has worse problems than SWTOR had, it has no PVP at all (and what they are adding doesn't look all that impressive either), it has a totally unsecure database, it has incredibly fast leveling which leads to "nothing to do, I'm bored", it has almost no proper endgame and will forever be limited to ps3 limitations (since devs program to the lowest platform). They can't make content that can't be done on the ps3, you won't see any kind of UI systems if they won't run on ps3, you won't ever see huge raids or massive bosses if they can't work on ps3 because that would stop ps3 players from doing FFXIV content or put them at a massive disadvantage (look at ffxi to see how it held that game back), and no most of them will never buy a $400 ps4 when it launches anymore than they upgraded on FFXI from ps2s to Xbox.
The minimum thing you mentioned showed that you don't understand the word peak, peak means highest ever numbers. That is the MAXIMUM they ever achieved at the point the game was most popular (launch month), also the numbers do include boxed sales with 30 days free, your own post proves that. Which as I stated shows massive padding with the sales figures or an incredible quit rate, no way they sold 1.45 million boxes and 850k just didn't ever register. No way they didn't count brand new players as subbed since they technically are, as you have shown.
Since the game has capped at the very higest poiint at 600k you're 800k guarantee is meaningless. No modern mmo has ever exceeded peak first-second (sales throttling) month figures with a patch, ever. Neither will this. Modern mmos do not grow, they start out big and decline, that is a fact. The only difference is how steep that decline is.
The game shipped about 1.1 million copies at retail, and moved another 350,000 units via digital download up to September the 30th. It’s also mentioned that the number of paying subscibers “broke through” 600,000, surpassing the peak amount attained by its predecessor, Final Fantasy XI.
The wording here is a bit cloudy, because it doesn’t really say by how much the 600,000 mark has been surpassed, but considering that the game has been launched just recently, it’s pretty much understandable.
Quoted from duel shocker so no its not 600k peak we don't know what the peak is so your 850k that quit the game is your own made up number. Not to mention they said nothing of peak numbers of XIV but only that it surpassed XI's peak number.
FFXI peaked at 500k users for a short time, not 600k. FFXI has never peaked at 600k in the 11 years it's been running. Want to know why? FFXI had a staggered launch (JP released a year before NA etc). So it was impossible for it to peak so high, a worldwide release will always peak higher but that doesn't mean it's doing better in real terms.
FFXIV:
1100k box sales.
350k digital sales.
1450 total sales.
FFXIV subscibers (includes 30 day free sub with box players since they are all technically subbed) pushed through 600k (if it was significantly higher they would of said 650k or whatever). If I run 10.1 miles I pushed though 10 miles, doesn't mean I ran 20 miles or 15 and if I did I would of said that.
1450 - 600k = 850k that bought the game and never played it even once, which means they are padding the sales numbers. Probably from v1 sales.
Don't look at some website, look at the official PDF that Square Enix put out to their investors.
"Number of payment users broke through 600,000, already exceeded the peak of FFXI."
Notice the comma? Number of payment users (subscribers) broke though 600k, which exceeded the peak of FFXI (FFXI peak was 500k subscribers). It's not saying FFXI got 600k subscribers and we beat it by some massive amount! it's saying FFXIV beat the PEAK of FFXI and has managed 600k subscribers at its highest point.
Originally posted by drivendawn Originally posted by amber-rNumber of payment users broke through 600,000. (APPLIES TO FFXIV)FFXI never broke 500k subscribers.
OK, so they broke through 600k subs where does it say that is XIV'S peak number?
You would assume that they were talking about the peak in this statement or they would have stated a higher number. The peak is over 600k at this point. Given the industry it is unlikely to go up until an expansion is released since almost none of these games go up after the 1st month.
Originally posted by amber-rNumber of payment users broke through 600,000. (APPLIES TO FFXIV)FFXI never broke 500k subscribers.
OK, so they broke through 600k subs where does it say that is XIV'S peak number?
You would assume that they were talking about the peak in this statement or they would have stated a higher number. The peak is over 600k at this point. Given the industry it is unlikely to go up until an expansion is released since almost none of these games go up after the 1st month.
1) PS4+DX11 release
2) China release
Both are to come pre-expansion, both have a high chance of raising the peak number considerably. I don't see 2.1 or 2.2 doing that however.
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
Originally posted by thecapitaine Desire to see games fail is apparently endemic to many posters on MMORPG.com, which is one of the ugliest facets of visiting here. I powered through the early difficulties of FFXIV's re-release but ultimately found it not worth my sub money. I hope it does well since it is one of the better polished and well-made games I've played this year.
You are so correct. I used to be an avid user of this site but started going elsewhere because all you get on here is demands for all games to fail so they can somehow satisfy themselves by posting later that they called it. I want real feedback not that a game is a wow clone or that it failed because it doesn't have 11 million subscribers. What I want to know is the mechanics and gameplay, is it fun or not. Simple. Now on about this game. I reluctantly played it and now I am hooked. Its a fun game. I am personally glad this game exceeded expectations and can relate because it definitely exceeded mine.
Ah, someone got an unpleasant surprise on moderation apparently.
The trick is, very hard to define what excessive negativity is, and a discussion forum such as these, any point put up as a positive will have someone else counter-pointing with negatives.
Usually the opposite would counter this one out. Such as what happens in the official forums.
MMORPG.com, though, is a different beast. Here you can get people saying that "fanboys" are what makes others (them) post excessively negative things about the game, but I say bullshit. This forum has 1:10 ratio of fanboys to haters because this forum is where people come to hate on the genre and its games. Fanboys hardly come here, they have official forums and other forums designated for their game to post on.
I dare anyone here to show me a thread where the ratio of fanboys to haters isn't 1:10. "Fanboys started it" is the excuse around here but it's based on delusion - just like the whole general mmorpg discussion forum where people circle-jerk about how "they get it" and the devs don't. Over and over again.
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
Originally posted by amber-rNumber of payment users broke through 600,000. (APPLIES TO FFXIV)FFXI never broke 500k subscribers.
OK, so they broke through 600k subs where does it say that is XIV'S peak number?
You would assume that they were talking about the peak in this statement or they would have stated a higher number. The peak is over 600k at this point. Given the industry it is unlikely to go up until an expansion is released since almost none of these games go up after the 1st month.
1) PS4+DX11 release
2) China release
Both are to come pre-expansion, both have a high chance of raising the peak number considerably. I don't see 2.1 or 2.2 doing that however.
1) It remains to be seen what PS4 will do for FFXIV sub numbers (Xbox had minimal inpact on FFXI for instance), keep in mind that DC universe will also be releasing on PS4 and so will ESO (PC/MAC/XBOX1/PS4).
What are you expecting from DX11 exactly? You know that Aion and LOTRO both upgraded to DX11 and offered very little improvement right? If you're expecting massive changes to the graphics I think you're going to be pretty dissapointed. Some people have way too high expectations of what DX11 would bring, if they even do actually do it (they promised a dx update on xi and never did it).
2) Again, how is this major? many MMOS have released in China...and failed horribly. Rift for example bombed in China and Korea and closed down in both regions. Keep in mind that China and Japan are not exactly best of friends either, China boycotts many JP products.
The current subscriber numbers are not in a vacume, they are going to decline so whatever increases 1) and 2) have will have to be in excess of player loss to improve the peak.
Originally posted by amber-rNumber of payment users broke through 600,000. (APPLIES TO FFXIV)FFXI never broke 500k subscribers.
OK, so they broke through 600k subs where does it say that is XIV'S peak number?
You would assume that they were talking about the peak in this statement or they would have stated a higher number. The peak is over 600k at this point. Given the industry it is unlikely to go up until an expansion is released since almost none of these games go up after the 1st month.
1) PS4+DX11 release
2) China release
Both are to come pre-expansion, both have a high chance of raising the peak number considerably. I don't see 2.1 or 2.2 doing that however.
1) It remains to be seen what PS4 will do for FFXIV sub numbers (Xbox had minimal inpact on FFXI for instance), keep in mind that DC universe will also be releasing on PS4 and so will ESO (PC/MAC/XBOX1/PS4).
What are you expecting from DX11 exactly? You know that Aion and LOTRO both upgraded to DX11 and offered very little improvement right? If you're expecting massive changes to the graphics I think you're going to be pretty dissapointed. Some people have way too high expectations of what DX11 would bring, if they even do actually do it (they promised a dx update on xi and never did it).
2) Again, how is this major? many MMOS have released in China...and failed horribly. Rift for example bombed in China and Korea and closed down in both regions. Keep in mind that China and Japan are not exactly best of friends either, China boycotts many JP products.
The current subscriber numbers are not in a vacume, they are going to decline so whatever increases 1) and 2) have will have to be in excess of player loss to improve the peak.
I wonder what SE did to this person, sounds so bitter lol
1) It remains to be seen what PS4 will do for FFXIV sub numbers (Xbox had minimal inpact on FFXI for instance), keep in mind that DC universe will also be releasing on PS4 and so will ESO (PC/MAC/XBOX1/PS4).
What are you expecting from DX11 exactly? You know that Aion and LOTRO both upgraded to DX11 and offered very little improvement right? If you're expecting massive changes to the graphics I think you're going to be pretty dissapointed. Some people have way too high expectations of what DX11 would bring, if they even do actually do it (they promised a dx update on xi and never did it).
2) Again, how is this major? many MMOS have released in China...and failed horribly. Rift for example bombed in China and Korea and closed down in both regions. Keep in mind that China and Japan are not exactly best of friends either, China boycotts many JP products.
The current subscriber numbers are not in a vacume, they are going to decline so whatever increases 1) and 2) have will have to be in excess of player loss to improve the peak.
1) Do I have to spell out the giant differences between XI on X360 and XIV on PS4? You're really struggling here so I'll just let it slide. I did list DX11 with PS4 and not separately for a reason.
2) S-E is far more familiar with China and South Korea than any Western company, and FFXIV is far more Asian-style than Rift could ever dare hope to be. Many of S-E's most profitable products are on the Chinese market that the common folk haven't even heard about. I don't see how S-E will struggle in that region in any scenario, the facts speak for themselves.
While I said 2.1 and 2.2 won't raise the peak numbers, what they do is keep the playerbase stable. It's not going to decline because new massive content updates are being pumped out at a rate that completely destroys the competition. Especially in the long-term.
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
Originally posted by Kayo45 Give it up haters, they went from an expected loss to an even larger profit, and they credited FFXIV and arcade sales for it. They even reported 1.5 million in sales well into their second month ... an increase of 500k since their first report near release. Hell, they recently promoted Yoshi for such a job well done. I mean it doesnt get much clearer that the game is succeeding.
Yet again you got haters going out of their way to come to the games specific forum, to whine about it and spread negativity. Its like im reading Fox News commentators trying so hard to convince everyone that its really doing bad despite multiple reports of success. Reality is its crystal clear theyre only desperately trying to convince themselves.
It's people putting it in the proper context. The OP took data intended to reflect on SE's revenue as a whole (across all games) and spun it to make it sound like it was for ARR alone. And other fans rushed right in here to defend it as though it were gospel, calling anyone dissenting a "hater".
The problem is, you people are only interested in one thing: Validating your choice of game by finding any reason, however untenable or inaccurate, to boast its success. Apparently, not even blatantly wrong information being posted by the OP stops that; you just find a different way to spin it.
What the OP is doing is called "spreading misinformation". Period. They are attributing data pertaining to SE's overall performance to a single game (ARR). They should be called out on it to adjust and correct it, so it's more accurate. This should be done by fans and detractors alike. Someone with even a modicum of honesty or integrity should be demanding accurate information over "information that makes the game look better". Instead, what I see are people attempting to take the misinformation and make it somehow still seem legitimate.
What you people are demonstrating is that how successful the game looks is more important to you than the accuracy or honesty of information being spread about it. That's sad. Very sad.
Then many of you get all indignant when referred to as "fanboys". Well, if the shoe fits...
Comments
850 000 people didnt find FFARR sub worthy. After only 1 month.
76% of statistics are made up on the spot.
Poor Yoshi, you calling him out liek that!
And you now dispute their own official numbers?
And his "35%" is also pretty random. He didnt back up HIS claim with anything so his number is just as good as any other random number.
BTW his number was shot down with official numbers from another MMO. You colors show.
Oh and youre switching to rant mode again.
Nope, I'm calling you out. Unless you want to claim that Yoshi-P's post as the director and producer of FFXIV:ARR is the same thing as a post by didjerama as the didjerama.
It's hilarious though. First we wait that the devs post good news, and then act as if the devs are lying if the news are actually good. Completely in-line with anyone's expectations of how a certain demographic reacts to the game's success.
No game director ever has "back up" his claims in any sort of way because he doesn't have to. They are taken for granted, because posting incorrect data or news as a game director on behalf of your company is slightly different matter than doing so as a random person on the interwebs.
BTW that "another MMO" (funny you dont even mention which) is just not another exception to the rule as far as initial retention rate goes? Nothing was shot down until you manage to prove that.
1.45 million sales.
850k quit within the first month (no word how many have quit to this date as they only gave peak subscriber numbers which could be from any point since release).
600k peak subscribers (this is not current subscribers as I said, it just states the peak amount as of now)
Square enix financial report.
http://www.hd.square-enix.com/eng/news/pdf/14q2slides.pdf
Again, a comparison to SWTOR player loss for first month.
First month sales were 2 million for NA/EU alone, of that 2 million customers 1.7 million subscribed which is pretty great retention numbers given FFXIV ARR had 1.45 million sales and well over half quit... at best within the first 4 weeks (850k quit). So far, more have quit the game in the first 4-5 weeks than subscribed and these aren't even current numbers just highest point. Which says there is a huge flaw with this game.
That's a 41.4% retention rate (based solely on those numbers), which seems to line up with what Yoshi said about FF:ARR beating the 35% retention rate of other sub mmo's in their first month since 2008 by a good margin.
When all is said and done, I don't think it really matters that much. The mmo community at large is very fickle now days, and as long as FF can hold onto a core audience it should do fine.
FFXI was highly profitable (the most profitable in the FF series) with less subscribers than ARR has according to these numbers, and if SE is willing to put the kind of commitment into ARR that they did with XI, then I think ARR has a long prosperous future ahead of it.
Besides, if you like theme parks, ARR is arguably the best on the market right now (disclaimer: I do like theme parks). If you don't like theme parks, well then why are you even reading this?
As I said before though that 35% figure was nonsense because how would he know the retention numbers of every mmo released since 2008, did he ring them all individually and ask? No he made it up, some gave out this information but they all didn't.
Anyway as I showed from EAs financial report, SWTOR had had a very high player retention rate. 2 million sales 1.7m subscibers at begining of month 2.
As for FFXI, it was profitable not because of these numbers but because it kept high numbers for 10 long years. Something that is unheard of in modern mmos. This is NOT FFXI and has very little in common with that game or the reasons it has such a long term playerbase, infact ARR has the exact opposite game design which encourages fast quitting.
I'm ignoring the part where you said Yoshi made up the figures, because that is impossible for you to know.
I then skipped the part about SWTOR, cause I could care less about that game.
You're right that XI held the numbers for many years and so that is why it was profitable, but since the future hasn't happened yet we don't know if ARR will sink or swim (could go either way frankly).
Since you don't like ARR, just stop bothering this forum. Please return to your own games. Feel free to pick apart my post if you would like since I have directly addressed you, but I won't respond to you again I can promise that.
http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02/01/ea-reveals-swtor-subscription-and-sales-numbers-beats-financial/
The 1.7 million number from SWTOR INCLUDED those still in their first free month. The article says "most of the 1.7 million were paying subs, which puts it at around 850k.
850k out of 2.4 million sales = ~35-36%
YoshiP seems to be correct on his statement. FFXIV retained 42%, hence the statement exceeding other mmo's by a "wide margin."
Here's another instructive article by YoshiP discussing why Star Wars failed and why it HAD to go F2P and what FFXIV has to do in order to prevent going down the same road.
http://venturebeat.com/2013/06/17/final-fantasy-online-director-defends-monthly-subscriptions-in-the-golden-age-of-free-to-play-exclusive/
My personal opinion on why SWTOR failed was poorly optimized engine that affected both pve and pvp (more pvp), no end game content, no world pvp as promisd for Ilium, etc etc.
The best part of SWTOR was the story, and people finished the story in 1 to 2 months, hence the huge drop in numbers after the first few months. SWTOR went F2P in 9 months. FFXIV is a deeper game in terms of crafting, better dungeons, better engine, looks better, etc. All this is my opinion but I think it's going to serve FFXIV well in the next few months.
I think FFXIV will settle on 500k subs and never dip below that. How high they can go remains to be seen.
That's quite interesting and indeed pushes the fact that Square would of done the same exact thing, I forgot that FFXIV launched with 30 days subscription free...and as such are also subscribers from day 1. So that means that the 1.45 million sales have somehow been heavily padded, maybe they are adding on V1 sales?..which would make a lot of sense and show that the game hasn't sold as well as they are saying afterall. Very strange. That would imply that 1.45 million people bought the game and 840k decided to not even register to play at all, maybe they all wanted teacosters. Your 850k figure in relation to SWTOR is nonsense of course so I'll let that slide.
The comments on why SWTOR failed are kind of silly, given the lag and optimisation problems of this game he isn't really in any posaition to critique, even more odd he would mention pvp... It failed because the market has changed and this game is running in that market, he of course couldn't say that.
I really don't see how you can honestly think this game will sit at 500k subscribers? It peaked at 600k and you think it will simply lose 100k over time when even he says that modern mmos lose vast numbers once they complete the story? FFXIV v1 had around 40-50k subscribers, I'd guesstimate this will even out around the 80-90k point with good content updates. Which I hasten to add is still pretty decent.
Read thepress releases again. SE said FFXIV has already "surpassed" the highest number of users by FFXI (600k). We don't know how many subscribers FFXIV has. We only know that it's MORE THAN 600k.
The 1.45 million sold number DOES NOT include 1.0. That's a good or a bad thing. It means that even after FFXIV 1.0 failed, 1.5 million people still decided to give it a try by word of mouth alone. I barely saw a single advertisement for this game. Compare that to the publicity machine that was SWTOR.
The foundation for SWTOR was doomed to fail. The game touted PvP but had a horrible engine (both ilium and battlegrounds) that couldn't support the long animations. People would be locked on abilities and did not have the responsiveness they expected from other games (Wow/Rift).
The minimum 600k number is people who ARE currently subscribing and OUT of the free month period. Remember, this game stopped sales for THREE WEEKS, so you may have hundreds fo thousands of people still on the free period who are not party of the 600+K.
You also have the confirmed release of the game in CHINA and PS4 release. So do I think that my estimation of 500k subscribers, minimum is realistic, you bet I do.
PS: My guesstimation is that if you include 1.0 players and ARR players, you probably have 2+ million people who have a copy of the game. Why is that significant in a positive direction instead of just saying "Looking at how many players they lost!!!!!!!" Simple, before every big patch, you will have people to resuscribe for a month or two at a time to check it out. Some will stay, some will leave, but that factors into the calculations by YoshiP and SE. You may have 600k subscribers for 6 months before and after each content patch and only 400k subscribers when there is a lul, regardless, the calculation of steady income to support more expansions and content patches holds true.
I guarentee you that you'll see 800k+ subsribers try out patch 2.1. I have friends who stopped subscribing last month who will Definetely be back for 2.1. The 600k number is lower than it actually suggests because people consumed much of the content, that won't be the case with 2.1.
All that matters is that SE is super happy with FFXIV right now. That means the fans of the game should be happy as well.
This entire paragraph is hilariously trite conjecture designed to incite other posters to negative post.
Please refrain from obvious baiting.
Thank you.
(In other words your logic is so heavily flawed that even addressing it is clearly unacceptable)
Glad for people that actually play ARR and enjoy it. I'm however not among them. in this ammount earned is also aprox my 30€. But they did not get single euro from me for sub.
Since SWTOR i don't believe in company PR when it comes to numbers for P2P MMOS.
It is still too soon to brag about numbers because past has shown us that for sub based games first 6 months / one year period is very crucial.
But since flaunting numbers is all about PR and to get players attention especially who aren't playing, i take such news with grain of salt.
"The problem is that the hardcore folks always want the same thing: 'We want exactly what you gave us before, but it has to be completely different.'
-Jesse Schell
"Online gamers are the most ludicrously entitled beings since Caligula made his horse a senator, and at least the horse never said anything stupid."
-Luke McKinney
I read it just fine, seems you didn't. FFXIV surpassed FFXIs peak numbers (which was 500k) and has managed a highest point of 600k. Since 600k is more than 500k that sentence makes sense as it is and doesn't need what you're doing to it, so if they state that this game peaked at 600k (that peak might of been for just 1 day, nobody knows) that is almost spot on the number. If it was 650k they would of said that, so if it is more it's marginally more (a few k at best).
You state the 1.45 million number does not include v1 sales but then how to you explain 850k bought the game and didn't ever register it within the first month? Since everyone that buys this game gets 30 days sub free and as you shown is technically subscribed from day 1. You can't make a point and then say the company of the game you like doesn't do that, you proved something so now have to accept it as common practice.
As for no advertising...please, they actually did run many TV advertisments (which is more than most other mmos ever have). There has been advertising in every place you would normally see it and much more, including mmo websites. They spent a lot of money on advertising, more than most. It's also a huge IP so it's not like most mmo players simply don't know about this game...
SWTOR problems are no worse than the problems this game has, which is why stating them is silly. This game has worse problems than SWTOR had, it has no PVP at all (and what they are adding doesn't look all that impressive either), it has a totally unsecure database, it has incredibly fast leveling which leads to "nothing to do, I'm bored", it has almost no proper endgame and will forever be limited to ps3 limitations (since devs program to the lowest platform). They can't make content that can't be done on the ps3, you won't see any kind of UI systems if they won't run on ps3, you won't ever see huge raids or massive bosses if they can't work on ps3 because that would stop ps3 players from doing FFXIV content or put them at a massive disadvantage (look at ffxi to see how it held that game back), and no most of them will never buy a $400 ps4 when it launches anymore than they upgraded on FFXI from ps2s to Xbox.
The minimum thing you mentioned showed that you don't understand the word peak, peak means highest ever numbers. That is the MAXIMUM they ever achieved at the point the game was most popular (launch month), also the numbers do include boxed sales with 30 days free, your own post proves that. Which as I stated shows massive padding with the sales figures or an incredible quit rate, no way they sold 1.45 million boxes and 850k just didn't ever register. No way they didn't count brand new players as subbed since they technically are, as you have shown.
Since the game has capped at the very higest poiint at 600k you're 800k guarantee is meaningless. No modern mmo has ever exceeded peak first-second (sales throttling) month figures with a patch, ever. Neither will this. Modern mmos do not grow, they start out big and decline, that is a fact. The only difference is how steep that decline is.
FFXI peaked at 500k users for a short time, not 600k. FFXI has never peaked at 600k in the 11 years it's been running. Want to know why? FFXI had a staggered launch (JP released a year before NA etc). So it was impossible for it to peak so high, a worldwide release will always peak higher but that doesn't mean it's doing better in real terms.
FFXIV:
1100k box sales.
350k digital sales.
1450 total sales.
FFXIV subscibers (includes 30 day free sub with box players since they are all technically subbed) pushed through 600k (if it was significantly higher they would of said 650k or whatever). If I run 10.1 miles I pushed though 10 miles, doesn't mean I ran 20 miles or 15 and if I did I would of said that.
1450 - 600k = 850k that bought the game and never played it even once, which means they are padding the sales numbers. Probably from v1 sales.
Don't look at some website, look at the official PDF that Square Enix put out to their investors.
"Number of payment users broke through 600,000, already exceeded the peak of FFXI."
Notice the comma? Number of payment users (subscribers) broke though 600k, which exceeded the peak of FFXI (FFXI peak was 500k subscribers). It's not saying FFXI got 600k subscribers and we beat it by some massive amount! it's saying FFXIV beat the PEAK of FFXI and has managed 600k subscribers at its highest point.
Number of payment users broke through 600,000. (APPLIES TO FFXIV)
FFXI never went above 500k subscribers.
You would assume that they were talking about the peak in this statement or they would have stated a higher number. The peak is over 600k at this point. Given the industry it is unlikely to go up until an expansion is released since almost none of these games go up after the 1st month.
1) PS4+DX11 release
2) China release
Both are to come pre-expansion, both have a high chance of raising the peak number considerably. I don't see 2.1 or 2.2 doing that however.
You are so correct. I used to be an avid user of this site but started going elsewhere because all you get on here is demands for all games to fail so they can somehow satisfy themselves by posting later that they called it. I want real feedback not that a game is a wow clone or that it failed because it doesn't have 11 million subscribers. What I want to know is the mechanics and gameplay, is it fun or not. Simple. Now on about this game. I reluctantly played it and now I am hooked. Its a fun game. I am personally glad this game exceeded expectations and can relate because it definitely exceeded mine.
Usually the opposite would counter this one out. Such as what happens in the official forums.
MMORPG.com, though, is a different beast. Here you can get people saying that "fanboys" are what makes others (them) post excessively negative things about the game, but I say bullshit. This forum has 1:10 ratio of fanboys to haters because this forum is where people come to hate on the genre and its games. Fanboys hardly come here, they have official forums and other forums designated for their game to post on.
I dare anyone here to show me a thread where the ratio of fanboys to haters isn't 1:10. "Fanboys started it" is the excuse around here but it's based on delusion - just like the whole general mmorpg discussion forum where people circle-jerk about how "they get it" and the devs don't. Over and over again.
1) It remains to be seen what PS4 will do for FFXIV sub numbers (Xbox had minimal inpact on FFXI for instance), keep in mind that DC universe will also be releasing on PS4 and so will ESO (PC/MAC/XBOX1/PS4).
What are you expecting from DX11 exactly? You know that Aion and LOTRO both upgraded to DX11 and offered very little improvement right? If you're expecting massive changes to the graphics I think you're going to be pretty dissapointed. Some people have way too high expectations of what DX11 would bring, if they even do actually do it (they promised a dx update on xi and never did it).
2) Again, how is this major? many MMOS have released in China...and failed horribly. Rift for example bombed in China and Korea and closed down in both regions. Keep in mind that China and Japan are not exactly best of friends either, China boycotts many JP products.
The current subscriber numbers are not in a vacume, they are going to decline so whatever increases 1) and 2) have will have to be in excess of player loss to improve the peak.
I wonder what SE did to this person, sounds so bitter lol
1) Do I have to spell out the giant differences between XI on X360 and XIV on PS4? You're really struggling here so I'll just let it slide. I did list DX11 with PS4 and not separately for a reason.
2) S-E is far more familiar with China and South Korea than any Western company, and FFXIV is far more Asian-style than Rift could ever dare hope to be. Many of S-E's most profitable products are on the Chinese market that the common folk haven't even heard about. I don't see how S-E will struggle in that region in any scenario, the facts speak for themselves.
While I said 2.1 and 2.2 won't raise the peak numbers, what they do is keep the playerbase stable. It's not going to decline because new massive content updates are being pumped out at a rate that completely destroys the competition. Especially in the long-term.
It's people putting it in the proper context. The OP took data intended to reflect on SE's revenue as a whole (across all games) and spun it to make it sound like it was for ARR alone. And other fans rushed right in here to defend it as though it were gospel, calling anyone dissenting a "hater".
The problem is, you people are only interested in one thing: Validating your choice of game by finding any reason, however untenable or inaccurate, to boast its success. Apparently, not even blatantly wrong information being posted by the OP stops that; you just find a different way to spin it.
What the OP is doing is called "spreading misinformation". Period. They are attributing data pertaining to SE's overall performance to a single game (ARR). They should be called out on it to adjust and correct it, so it's more accurate. This should be done by fans and detractors alike. Someone with even a modicum of honesty or integrity should be demanding accurate information over "information that makes the game look better". Instead, what I see are people attempting to take the misinformation and make it somehow still seem legitimate.
What you people are demonstrating is that how successful the game looks is more important to you than the accuracy or honesty of information being spread about it. That's sad. Very sad.
Then many of you get all indignant when referred to as "fanboys". Well, if the shoe fits...