They met their revenue target and at the upper end of it, but didn't exceed it. So there was less subscribers from Jan-March than at the end of last year but not by much.
They have said subscriber levels have remained constant throughout 2009 so the huge gain people talked about clearly did not happen but the length of time people keep their subscription and the ammount of time current subscriber plays has increased..
They have 120 people working on age of conan (not including customer service) so the game will continue to improve.
Doesn't sound like the free trial is doing particually well, encourageing ammounts of people subscribe after the trial but the ammount of people trying it isn't great.
bad news on expected revenue from next quarter, expecting it to be a fair bit lower down to 5-7mill revenue. So they still think they are going to continue losing people. This alone pretty much disproves any populations are rising opinions.
Overall they made a small profit and have a decent number of people continueing to work on the game which is the most important thing. It does show it's time for people to stop the aoc is growing thing though, it clearly is not and at best is remaining stable though the predicted revenue says they are still losing a significant number of people. It seems to suggest a touch over 100k subs currently.
Yeah not bad numbers and it looks like the change of game director and recent big patches and updates have helped to stabilize the player levels, mostly.
Lower forecast for next quarter does not necessarily mean lower subscription numbers either - it could just be adjusted for a lower box sale expectation (not many boxes are gonna sell now, a year after launch and boxes that do sell will be considerably cheaper). So subscription levels could remain steady for the current quarter.
Funcom needs to hold on to the current subscribers though. WIth the expansion due to release in November, it'll be a long stretch without any major content update (a few dungeons and instances don't really count in such a long period). If Funcom can hold on to the majority of current subscribers until the expansion launches they should be fine.
Nice results, and in the far upper end of the last Q's projection. The stock went up 10-12% when the report was presented this morning. From reading the report, I don't think they project lower revenues due to subscriber loss, but rather through lower box sales as mentioned above. The report also noted that revenues from Funcoms other MMO Anarchy online is decreasing.
I don't agree with the lower box sales arguement for lower predicted revenue. If anything the free trial will increase box sales (well digital boxes) this quarter compared to last. They were already selling very few boxes and at a low charge for each box, it was already the case that box sales were a very small part of revenue.
That's of course possible. In that case the reduced revenue forecast would be based on Funcom's expectation that subscription numbers would drop again slightly in the next Quarter. Which, combined with their statement of increased Marketing, does not make them sound too positive.
That's of course possible. In that case the reduced revenue forecast would be based on Funcom's expectation that subscription numbers would drop again slightly in the next Quarter. Which, combined with their statement of increased Marketing, does not make them sound too positive.
Thats how I see it, though the fact they have significantly lowered expences its clear there is no short term worry for aoc at all, they have a decent sized team working on it, so while the situation isn't good it's ok.
The company as a whole though are in a much worse position compared to this time last year and that doesn't bode so well for the their new mmo. I'm sure it will be released but don't hold much hope for them really doing it properly this time.
At this point last year they had assets of 102 mill with 7 mill in short term liabilities. Now they are down to 75 mill with 14 mill in short term liabilities. So they have lost about a 1/3rd of their assets over the year that should have been their best ever.
AoC looks like it has been doing pretty much exactly what I thought it was doing. Maybe a bit worse than I thought. It looks like it may still have a slightly declining population which is better than the mass exodus. I had really thought it was pretty much flat. I don't think 1.05 will be out in time to really affect Q2 that much but by Q3 the die should be cast.
I am not much on interpreting financial reports but to me it does not look extremely bad but neither is it exactly setting the world on fire. Overall I would guess that the population is still between 75K and 100K and is probably closer to the bottom of that range than the top.
If someone likes a game why is someone else asking them to explain the revenue of the company?
Quite honestly subjects like this just make the OP look like an ass... end of story.
First off anyone who is a game player and enjoys game would want all games to succeed. Every game that fails just convinces more investor to not invest in games. Why would any game player gloat about destruction of their supposed hobby? That to me would be the question.
Talking about system or games and what you like or don't like is one thing. Its a way to express ideas .. exchange points of view.. who knows maybe even get a point across to a developer so that things improve.
Yet asking anyone to explain financial loss on this forum does what exactly? Contributes what exactly?
If I like a game yes I want the company to do well.. so that game continues to run. Yet if they make more or less money I hae no idea why... that's not my "job". I'm not a share holder etc...
I have an idea let's make a thread in every forum except say.. EvE and WoW .. and ask the supporters of all those games why they are losing subscribers... because that will be a good positive conversation...
I'm a Business Consultant/Financial Advisor for a living and i'm telling you, 10-20 million dollars isn't a "Big loss". Look at Sony who lost over $3 billion last year, most of which was to do with loses made on the PS3. I find it funny how people are calling this a "big loss" hehe. AoC did make some bad decisions, like most MMO's (Wish people would learn that turning a profit on a game 5-6 months before it's ready instead of spending the time polishing it off isn't a good idea). The funny thing is, most of it pays for itself.. you can reduce staffing numbers in no time, as while bugs are still in-game, less content needs to be added to make the game playable.
Question is, would people complain after that new content isn't coming fast enough? .
I'm a Business Consultant/Financial Advisor for a living and i'm telling you, 10-20 million dollars isn't a "Big loss". Look at Sony who lost over $3 billion last year, most of which was to do with loses made on the PS3. I find it funny how people are calling this a "big loss" hehe. AoC did make some bad decisions, like most MMO's (Wish people would learn that turning a profit on a game 5-6 months before it's ready instead of spending the time polishing it off isn't a good idea). The funny thing is, most of it pays for itself.. you can reduce staffing numbers in no time, as while bugs are still in-game, less content needs to be added to make the game playable. Question is, would people complain after that new content isn't coming fast enough? . Auto
I'm sorry but I struggle to believe you are a Business Consultant/Financial Advisor. Weather a loss is big or not is completely dependant on the size of the company. If you lose a 1/3rd of the total value of the company assets the loss is a big loss. Weather that is a 1 man shop losing 75 grand, or a multi-billion dollar company losing 2 billion isn't that relevent. Sony's loss last year was also not over $3 billion, it was $1.04billion. Funcoms loss while way smaller in dollar ammounts was a much bigger loss in practice. If funcom had 2 or 3 more years like this one they would be long bankrupt. Sony would still be doing fine.
Believe what you want to believe about my occupation (though I see no reason why I would lie.. wouldn't have spent 3 years studying Accounting and Financial Advisory in England to claim otherwise). I know it's relative, but the beauty of game-developers stock is that it fluxuates. The Secret World will push Funcom stock up again. There's a reason people try to get inside knowledge on the Stock market so they can buy/sell before big announcements are made public hehe.
"By pricing the PS3 below its production cost, Sony has lost over USD 3 billion during the past two years according to information revealed in the company's fiscal 2008 annual report.
According to a Kotaku report, Sony lost USD 2.16 billion in 2007 and USD 1.16 billion in 2008 on the PS3. The console allegedly cost over USD 800 to manufacture but which was sold in the USD 500-600 range when it was launched in 2006."
Sony announced last year they had lost 3 billion on PS3's. Credit to www.gamesindustry.biz (Article written last June).
Believe what you want to believe about my occupation (though I see no reason why I would lie.. wouldn't have spent 3 years studying Accounting and Financial Advisory in England to claim otherwise). I know it's relative, but the beauty of game-developers stock is that it fluxuates. The Secret World will push Funcom stock up again. There's a reason people try to get inside knowledge on the Stock market so they can buy/sell before big announcements are made public hehe.
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It was more polite to belive you wern't being truthful than to belive you were worse at your job and less knowledgeable than someone with no financial training who just reads the news.
What does fluctuateing stock have to do with the fact you were deriding people for saying 20 mill isn't a big loss, losing one 3rd of the assets of your company is a massive loss, you now say you know it's relative so why did you write your previous post? you surely accept that if you have assets worth 100 mill and you drop to 65 mill in assets and your liabilities increase too that you have not just suffered a big loss but a massive loss. your post was just wrong and you even used out of date and incorrect information to back up your point, something I instantly knew was wrong dispite not following financial markets and not being a buisness or financial advisor I knew sony had lost around a bill last year. Admitadly I looked up the exact ammount but I knew without checking you were off massivly. So again the more polite thing was to assume you wern't a financial advisor/buisness consultant because the alternative is worse.
I've seen on the main boards (the boards where only active subscribers can post) that AoC subscriptions (in their view) are up above 200,000, and might even be around 280,000. Now I have a question about this: 200,000 subscribers would mean, at $15 a pop, 9 million dollars in revenue for a quarter. Yet Funcom's revenue for Q1 isn't going to be anywhere near that. And that would assume that Funcom doesn't earn a SINGLE dollar from Anarchy Online or for any box sales. Lol. Of course with average subscriptions being more than $15, and because Funcom has other sources of revenue, subscription are far below this. If Funcom comes in above guidance you might convince me they have 150,000 subscriptions. Instead, don't be surprised when the number is closer to 6.5 million dollars US. And if that is the current population (instead of the retroactive population Jan-March) , when Funcom gives its guidance, how will supporters explain the guidance coming in a few million dollars short? This is simple math folks. Lit
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
If someone had came up to me in 1980 when I was on my Atari 2600 and said we will be playing games with thousands of people at the same time.I guess my response would have been,"but I only have 2 joysticks"
Oh, and for the Sony comment "By pricing the PS3 below its production cost, Sony has lost over USD 3 billion during the past two years according to information revealed in the company's fiscal 2008 annual report. According to a Kotaku report, Sony lost USD 2.16 billion in 2007 and USD 1.16 billion in 2008 on the PS3. The console allegedly cost over USD 800 to manufacture but which was sold in the USD 500-600 range when it was launched in 2006."
Sony announced last year they had lost 3 billion on PS3's. Credit to www.gamesindustry.biz (Article written last June). Auto
Wow, again you are showing you surely can't be a fiancial advisor. you said Sony lost 3 billion last year. firstly that shows a loss of 1.16billion last year not 3 billion. Secondly and even more importantly that is talking about Sony's loss on one product by selling it below cost and not talking about the company losing money.
Sony made a profit in 2007/8 and in 2008/9 they made a loss of $1.04 billion there first yearly loss in 14 years
I've seen on the main boards (the boards where only active subscribers can post) that AoC subscriptions (in their view) are up above 200,000, and might even be around 280,000. Now I have a question about this: 200,000 subscribers would mean, at $15 a pop, 9 million dollars in revenue for a quarter. Yet Funcom's revenue for Q1 isn't going to be anywhere near that. And that would assume that Funcom doesn't earn a SINGLE dollar from Anarchy Online or for any box sales. Lol. Of course with average subscriptions being more than $15, and because Funcom has other sources of revenue, subscription are far below this. If Funcom comes in above guidance you might convince me they have 150,000 subscriptions. Instead, don't be surprised when the number is closer to 6.5 million dollars US. And if that is the current population (instead of the retroactive population Jan-March) , when Funcom gives its guidance, how will supporters explain the guidance coming in a few million dollars short? This is simple math folks. Lit
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
And you're also forgetting Funcoms stock spiked up after the launch of AoC. Even with the loss, they are no worse off now than before AoC was launched. Funcom stock was at $25.. then spiked to $54.. now it's dropped to $24.. So really, there hasn't been a significant lost from where they started out before release.
I'm not going to go on and on about this heh. Was just pointing out the fact that, it's not as bad as people think. Maybe I should have posted this part in there to explain it a bit more though.
And you're also forgetting Funcoms stock spiked up after the launch of AoC. Even with the loss, they are no worse off now than before AoC was launched. Funcom stock was at $25.. then spiked to $54.. now it's dropped to $24.. So really, there hasn't been a significant lost from where they started out before release. I'm not going to go on and on about this heh. Was just pointing out the fact that, it's not as bad as people think. Maybe I should have posted this part in there to explain it a bit more though. Auto
I'm not forgeting anything, we arn't and wern't discussing funcoms stock so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up. If you insist on it though we can discuss it but it will prove even further than you arn't a financial advisor as funcoms stock is not currently at anything like $24. It's about 4 times lower than that. We wern't talking about losing stock value we were talking about losing actual assets.
You made a silly comment, got called out on it and instead of accepting it you continue to dig yourself deeper and deeper by posting more and more innaccurate information.
I've seen on the main boards (the boards where only active subscribers can post) that AoC subscriptions (in their view) are up above 200,000, and might even be around 280,000. Now I have a question about this: 200,000 subscribers would mean, at $15 a pop, 9 million dollars in revenue for a quarter. Yet Funcom's revenue for Q1 isn't going to be anywhere near that. And that would assume that Funcom doesn't earn a SINGLE dollar from Anarchy Online or for any box sales. Lol. Of course with average subscriptions being more than $15, and because Funcom has other sources of revenue, subscription are far below this. If Funcom comes in above guidance you might convince me they have 150,000 subscriptions. Instead, don't be surprised when the number is closer to 6.5 million dollars US. And if that is the current population (instead of the retroactive population Jan-March) , when Funcom gives its guidance, how will supporters explain the guidance coming in a few million dollars short? This is simple math folks. Lit
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
Ahh ok thanks...like I said I am no wizard with these things,I would maybe take more of an interest if the money was comming back to me
If someone had came up to me in 1980 when I was on my Atari 2600 and said we will be playing games with thousands of people at the same time.I guess my response would have been,"but I only have 2 joysticks"
I've seen on the main boards (the boards where only active subscribers can post) that AoC subscriptions (in their view) are up above 200,000, and might even be around 280,000. Now I have a question about this: 200,000 subscribers would mean, at $15 a pop, 9 million dollars in revenue for a quarter. Yet Funcom's revenue for Q1 isn't going to be anywhere near that. And that would assume that Funcom doesn't earn a SINGLE dollar from Anarchy Online or for any box sales. Lol. Of course with average subscriptions being more than $15, and because Funcom has other sources of revenue, subscription are far below this. If Funcom comes in above guidance you might convince me they have 150,000 subscriptions. Instead, don't be surprised when the number is closer to 6.5 million dollars US. And if that is the current population (instead of the retroactive population Jan-March) , when Funcom gives its guidance, how will supporters explain the guidance coming in a few million dollars short? This is simple math folks. Lit
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
Ahh ok thanks...like I said I am no wizard with these things,I would maybe take more of an interest if the money was comming back to me
Me too, I only came here for 10 mins while I was waiting for something to download and got myself pulled into a debate, I'm far to argumentative for my own good.
That is assuming the subscriber base has plateaued and isn't decreasing at massive rates. I.E. 700k subscribers early summer to less than a seventh of that now.
As for the question of the player base growing or not, I saw a norwegian article today that said this:
"We have significantly more customers in the first quarter than we had in the fourth quarter of 2008. Activity among the players is significantly higher and longer subscription times. I can disprove speculation in the press that we lose customers"
As for the question of the player base growing or not, I saw a norwegian article today that said this: "We have significantly more customers in the first quarter than we had in the fourth quarter of 2008. Activity among the players is significantly higher and longer subscription times. I can disprove speculation in the press that we lose customers" (Google translate) Article Make of it what you want.
Thanks for this. So many people were really making it sound worse than it is, and this report is actually quite positive.
One comment of note is that they will be making major changes until the summer (if the translation is correct). So, the focus will still be AoC, but I bet if they do not see major growth, they will slow down after the summer, and push all the focus onto Secret World then.
They also stated a campaign to bring back old players, so all in all, not bad news at all.
I am still subscribed, thanks to support making an effort to resolve some issues for me, and I am still having fun. So many of the other MMO's suck now, and have gotten old. So now I know thanks to this report, I do not need to worry about the game closing shop!!
As for the question of the player base growing or not, I saw a norwegian article today that said this: "We have significantly more customers in the first quarter than we had in the fourth quarter of 2008. Activity among the players is significantly higher and longer subscription times. I can disprove speculation in the press that we lose customers" (Google translate) Article Make of it what you want.
Thanks for this. So many people were really making it sound worse than it is, and this report is actually quite positive.
One comment of note is that they will be making major changes until the summer (if the translation is correct). So, the focus will still be AoC, but I bet if they do not see major growth, they will slow down after the summer, and push all the focus onto Secret World then.
They also stated a campaign to bring back old players, so all in all, not bad news at all.
I am still subscribed, thanks to support making an effort to resolve some issues for me, and I am still having fun. So many of the other MMO's suck now, and have gotten old. So now I know thanks to this report, I do not need to worry about the game closing shop!!
Cheers
The things I said were from the report, the report states that population has remained constant throughout 2009. The fact that revenue was significantly higher in Q4 2008 than Q1 2009 and the fact they expect it to be significantly lower next time suggests his comment is at best misleading.
These people know the actual numbers, if they won't give them out and the numbers we can see don't tally with what you are saying then people are going to concider you very dubious. Especially if this were true it would be in the report. Strange then not to use it in the area where the things you are saying have to be factual.
Edit here is what the report says -
"Improved subscriber retention for Age of Conan and
a significant increase in new customers in Q1
compared to Q4 has led to a stable and solid
subscriber base during the first 4 and a half months
of 2009. The average player also spends more time
in the game."
So they have more "new customers" joining each month than they used to, but the fact that doesn't mean populations are rising means that they are losing a similar ammount of people. His comment has either been mistranslated or it is deliberatly misleading because it is not the case that they have more subs in q1 than in q4.
Every quarter the ammount of money they are bringing in from subs gets less and less and less yet they still manage to spin it so it looks like population is healthy.
But yeah things actualy look decent, not good just ok, but the future of aoc for a significant time is assured and thats all that matters really and encouraging old people to come back will be a very important step.
The things I said were from the report, the report states that population has remained constant throughout 2009. The fact that revenue was significantly higher in Q4 2008 than Q1 2009 and the fact they expect it to be significantly lower next time suggests his comment is at best misleading.
I went back to the report and cannot find this wording you present here. Can you show me exactly where this was worded?
Is it this?
"This combined with an increase in new customers in Q1 2009 has led to a stable and solid subscriber base for the Game."
or
"Solid, stable customer base in Age of Conan in Jan-May 2009"
Which are both just stating "We are not losing" but does not come off as "constant" either.
Can you point me to where you saw the "Constant" statement?
Comments
Results are out and they are ok.
They met their revenue target and at the upper end of it, but didn't exceed it. So there was less subscribers from Jan-March than at the end of last year but not by much.
They have said subscriber levels have remained constant throughout 2009 so the huge gain people talked about clearly did not happen but the length of time people keep their subscription and the ammount of time current subscriber plays has increased..
They have 120 people working on age of conan (not including customer service) so the game will continue to improve.
Doesn't sound like the free trial is doing particually well, encourageing ammounts of people subscribe after the trial but the ammount of people trying it isn't great.
bad news on expected revenue from next quarter, expecting it to be a fair bit lower down to 5-7mill revenue. So they still think they are going to continue losing people. This alone pretty much disproves any populations are rising opinions.
Overall they made a small profit and have a decent number of people continueing to work on the game which is the most important thing. It does show it's time for people to stop the aoc is growing thing though, it clearly is not and at best is remaining stable though the predicted revenue says they are still losing a significant number of people. It seems to suggest a touch over 100k subs currently.
Yeah not bad numbers and it looks like the change of game director and recent big patches and updates have helped to stabilize the player levels, mostly.
Lower forecast for next quarter does not necessarily mean lower subscription numbers either - it could just be adjusted for a lower box sale expectation (not many boxes are gonna sell now, a year after launch and boxes that do sell will be considerably cheaper). So subscription levels could remain steady for the current quarter.
Funcom needs to hold on to the current subscribers though. WIth the expansion due to release in November, it'll be a long stretch without any major content update (a few dungeons and instances don't really count in such a long period). If Funcom can hold on to the majority of current subscribers until the expansion launches they should be fine.
Nice results, and in the far upper end of the last Q's projection. The stock went up 10-12% when the report was presented this morning. From reading the report, I don't think they project lower revenues due to subscriber loss, but rather through lower box sales as mentioned above. The report also noted that revenues from Funcoms other MMO Anarchy online is decreasing.
I don't agree with the lower box sales arguement for lower predicted revenue. If anything the free trial will increase box sales (well digital boxes) this quarter compared to last. They were already selling very few boxes and at a low charge for each box, it was already the case that box sales were a very small part of revenue.
That's of course possible. In that case the reduced revenue forecast would be based on Funcom's expectation that subscription numbers would drop again slightly in the next Quarter. Which, combined with their statement of increased Marketing, does not make them sound too positive.
Thats how I see it, though the fact they have significantly lowered expences its clear there is no short term worry for aoc at all, they have a decent sized team working on it, so while the situation isn't good it's ok.
The company as a whole though are in a much worse position compared to this time last year and that doesn't bode so well for the their new mmo. I'm sure it will be released but don't hold much hope for them really doing it properly this time.
At this point last year they had assets of 102 mill with 7 mill in short term liabilities. Now they are down to 75 mill with 14 mill in short term liabilities. So they have lost about a 1/3rd of their assets over the year that should have been their best ever.
AoC looks like it has been doing pretty much exactly what I thought it was doing. Maybe a bit worse than I thought. It looks like it may still have a slightly declining population which is better than the mass exodus. I had really thought it was pretty much flat. I don't think 1.05 will be out in time to really affect Q2 that much but by Q3 the die should be cast.
I am not much on interpreting financial reports but to me it does not look extremely bad but neither is it exactly setting the world on fire. Overall I would guess that the population is still between 75K and 100K and is probably closer to the bottom of that range than the top.
I miss DAoC
If someone likes a game why is someone else asking them to explain the revenue of the company?
Quite honestly subjects like this just make the OP look like an ass... end of story.
First off anyone who is a game player and enjoys game would want all games to succeed. Every game that fails just convinces more investor to not invest in games. Why would any game player gloat about destruction of their supposed hobby? That to me would be the question.
Talking about system or games and what you like or don't like is one thing. Its a way to express ideas .. exchange points of view.. who knows maybe even get a point across to a developer so that things improve.
Yet asking anyone to explain financial loss on this forum does what exactly? Contributes what exactly?
If I like a game yes I want the company to do well.. so that game continues to run. Yet if they make more or less money I hae no idea why... that's not my "job". I'm not a share holder etc...
I have an idea let's make a thread in every forum except say.. EvE and WoW .. and ask the supporters of all those games why they are losing subscribers... because that will be a good positive conversation...
I'm a Business Consultant/Financial Advisor for a living and i'm telling you, 10-20 million dollars isn't a "Big loss". Look at Sony who lost over $3 billion last year, most of which was to do with loses made on the PS3. I find it funny how people are calling this a "big loss" hehe. AoC did make some bad decisions, like most MMO's (Wish people would learn that turning a profit on a game 5-6 months before it's ready instead of spending the time polishing it off isn't a good idea). The funny thing is, most of it pays for itself.. you can reduce staffing numbers in no time, as while bugs are still in-game, less content needs to be added to make the game playable.
Question is, would people complain after that new content isn't coming fast enough?
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I'm sorry but I struggle to believe you are a Business Consultant/Financial Advisor. Weather a loss is big or not is completely dependant on the size of the company. If you lose a 1/3rd of the total value of the company assets the loss is a big loss. Weather that is a 1 man shop losing 75 grand, or a multi-billion dollar company losing 2 billion isn't that relevent. Sony's loss last year was also not over $3 billion, it was $1.04billion. Funcoms loss while way smaller in dollar ammounts was a much bigger loss in practice. If funcom had 2 or 3 more years like this one they would be long bankrupt. Sony would still be doing fine.
Believe what you want to believe about my occupation (though I see no reason why I would lie.. wouldn't have spent 3 years studying Accounting and Financial Advisory in England to claim otherwise). I know it's relative, but the beauty of game-developers stock is that it fluxuates. The Secret World will push Funcom stock up again. There's a reason people try to get inside knowledge on the Stock market so they can buy/sell before big announcements are made public hehe.
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Oh, and for the Sony comment
"By pricing the PS3 below its production cost, Sony has lost over USD 3 billion during the past two years according to information revealed in the company's fiscal 2008 annual report.
According to a Kotaku report, Sony lost USD 2.16 billion in 2007 and USD 1.16 billion in 2008 on the PS3. The console allegedly cost over USD 800 to manufacture but which was sold in the USD 500-600 range when it was launched in 2006."
Sony announced last year they had lost 3 billion on PS3's. Credit to www.gamesindustry.biz (Article written last June).
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It was more polite to belive you wern't being truthful than to belive you were worse at your job and less knowledgeable than someone with no financial training who just reads the news.
What does fluctuateing stock have to do with the fact you were deriding people for saying 20 mill isn't a big loss, losing one 3rd of the assets of your company is a massive loss, you now say you know it's relative so why did you write your previous post? you surely accept that if you have assets worth 100 mill and you drop to 65 mill in assets and your liabilities increase too that you have not just suffered a big loss but a massive loss. your post was just wrong and you even used out of date and incorrect information to back up your point, something I instantly knew was wrong dispite not following financial markets and not being a buisness or financial advisor I knew sony had lost around a bill last year. Admitadly I looked up the exact ammount but I knew without checking you were off massivly. So again the more polite thing was to assume you wern't a financial advisor/buisness consultant because the alternative is worse.
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
If someone had came up to me in 1980 when I was on my Atari 2600 and said we will be playing games with thousands of people at the same time.I guess my response would have been,"but I only have 2 joysticks"
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/235780/page/8
Wow, again you are showing you surely can't be a fiancial advisor. you said Sony lost 3 billion last year. firstly that shows a loss of 1.16billion last year not 3 billion. Secondly and even more importantly that is talking about Sony's loss on one product by selling it below cost and not talking about the company losing money.
Sony made a profit in 2007/8 and in 2008/9 they made a loss of $1.04 billion there first yearly loss in 14 years
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
And you're also forgetting Funcoms stock spiked up after the launch of AoC. Even with the loss, they are no worse off now than before AoC was launched. Funcom stock was at $25.. then spiked to $54.. now it's dropped to $24.. So really, there hasn't been a significant lost from where they started out before release.
I'm not going to go on and on about this heh. Was just pointing out the fact that, it's not as bad as people think. Maybe I should have posted this part in there to explain it a bit more though.
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I'm not forgeting anything, we arn't and wern't discussing funcoms stock so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up. If you insist on it though we can discuss it but it will prove even further than you arn't a financial advisor as funcoms stock is not currently at anything like $24. It's about 4 times lower than that. We wern't talking about losing stock value we were talking about losing actual assets.
You made a silly comment, got called out on it and instead of accepting it you continue to dig yourself deeper and deeper by posting more and more innaccurate information.
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
Ahh ok thanks...like I said I am no wizard with these things,I would maybe take more of an interest if the money was comming back to me
If someone had came up to me in 1980 when I was on my Atari 2600 and said we will be playing games with thousands of people at the same time.I guess my response would have been,"but I only have 2 joysticks"
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/235780/page/8
I am no numbers wizard when it comes to companies turnover etc but you are only listing AoC turnover for Funcoms Q1 figures.
Funcom are also busy making TSW mmo and I would guess that should also be including as to were there cash is going...or am I missing something here?
He is talking about revenue which is the money coming in, the money being spent on making the secret world is important when it comes to the companys profit but doesn't affect their revenue. They do have other revenue sources other than just AoC subs but that is by far the dominant income stream.
Ahh ok thanks...like I said I am no wizard with these things,I would maybe take more of an interest if the money was comming back to me
Me too, I only came here for 10 mins while I was waiting for something to download and got myself pulled into a debate, I'm far to argumentative for my own good.
That is assuming the subscriber base has plateaued and isn't decreasing at massive rates. I.E. 700k subscribers early summer to less than a seventh of that now.
As for the question of the player base growing or not, I saw a norwegian article today that said this:
"We have significantly more customers in the first quarter than we had in the fourth quarter of 2008. Activity among the players is significantly higher and longer subscription times. I can disprove speculation in the press that we lose customers"
(Google translate)
Article
Make of it what you want.
Thanks for this. So many people were really making it sound worse than it is, and this report is actually quite positive.
One comment of note is that they will be making major changes until the summer (if the translation is correct). So, the focus will still be AoC, but I bet if they do not see major growth, they will slow down after the summer, and push all the focus onto Secret World then.
They also stated a campaign to bring back old players, so all in all, not bad news at all.
I am still subscribed, thanks to support making an effort to resolve some issues for me, and I am still having fun. So many of the other MMO's suck now, and have gotten old. So now I know thanks to this report, I do not need to worry about the game closing shop!!
Cheers
Thanks for this. So many people were really making it sound worse than it is, and this report is actually quite positive.
One comment of note is that they will be making major changes until the summer (if the translation is correct). So, the focus will still be AoC, but I bet if they do not see major growth, they will slow down after the summer, and push all the focus onto Secret World then.
They also stated a campaign to bring back old players, so all in all, not bad news at all.
I am still subscribed, thanks to support making an effort to resolve some issues for me, and I am still having fun. So many of the other MMO's suck now, and have gotten old. So now I know thanks to this report, I do not need to worry about the game closing shop!!
Cheers
The things I said were from the report, the report states that population has remained constant throughout 2009. The fact that revenue was significantly higher in Q4 2008 than Q1 2009 and the fact they expect it to be significantly lower next time suggests his comment is at best misleading.
These people know the actual numbers, if they won't give them out and the numbers we can see don't tally with what you are saying then people are going to concider you very dubious. Especially if this were true it would be in the report. Strange then not to use it in the area where the things you are saying have to be factual.
Edit here is what the report says -
"Improved subscriber retention for Age of Conan and
a significant increase in new customers in Q1
compared to Q4 has led to a stable and solid
subscriber base during the first 4 and a half months
of 2009. The average player also spends more time
in the game."
So they have more "new customers" joining each month than they used to, but the fact that doesn't mean populations are rising means that they are losing a similar ammount of people. His comment has either been mistranslated or it is deliberatly misleading because it is not the case that they have more subs in q1 than in q4.
Every quarter the ammount of money they are bringing in from subs gets less and less and less yet they still manage to spin it so it looks like population is healthy.
But yeah things actualy look decent, not good just ok, but the future of aoc for a significant time is assured and thats all that matters really and encouraging old people to come back will be a very important step.
I went back to the report and cannot find this wording you present here. Can you show me exactly where this was worded?
Is it this?
"This combined with an increase in new customers in Q1 2009 has led to a stable and solid subscriber base for the Game."
or
"Solid, stable customer base in Age of Conan in Jan-May 2009"
Which are both just stating "We are not losing" but does not come off as "constant" either.
Can you point me to where you saw the "Constant" statement?
Thanks