1 million subscribers

[Alhanelem]

It's really not a useful number unless you plan to mislead.

I agree with this part (that accounts is not a useful number); but the issue I have with what you've been saying about player numbers is the 500k for FFXI, which is years ago and even then it was accounts not subscribers. That's one of the things I'm waiting for you to prove me wrong on, and the other thing would be the 300k for DQX, which I also believe is accounts not subscribers. One of the reasons for this is a lot of games in Japan only don't even sell 300k copies, so I find 300k subscribers to be a very questionable number. The game has recently expanded to South Korea if I recall correctly, but I don't think that's enough to produce 300k subscribers.

I'm searching for the original announcement about playercount that was posted on the official site to verify my own claim, but their news archive goes back to 2005 and I'm fairly sure the announcement was made before that.

it has 2.5 million registered accounts

Actually, while the number IS unimportant, the last number that was shown before they changed the button to just say "BUY NOW!" was 3.2 million. Since then, they've stopped showing that number though.

I just can't comperehend why you can't be bothered to back up your own argument. I'm really not asking for much here. That should send a signal to people that what you're saying should be either questioned (if they're the type to participate in an argument) or ignored (if not inclined to participate).

Again though the facts are that all 3 Square MMO titles have less than 1 million subscribers combined (according to the CEO of Square enix last week)

You're actually wrong here:
"Matsuda goes on to play the importance of the company’s MMO presence in Final Fantasy XIV and Dragon Quest X, along with Final Fantasy XI, which is now in its thirteenth year. All three MMOs attract over 1,000,000 paying members each month, resulting in what Masuda refers to as a “solid revenue base.”"

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2015/01/0...and-the-future

Edited with link (from the first page of this thread), because I can actually provide one, unlike you.

[PlumbGame]

There is a big difference between a fan and a "fanboy" A fanboy will protect their object of affection if you dare say anything against it. Whether it's true or not is irrelevant to them, it becomes personal if you say anything negative.

The actual wording he used was nearly 1 million for all 3, so it's less than. Less or around both work though. Again this wasn't read from the financial reports by the media, it was a statement read out by the CEO to shareholders and the media.

Jan 02, 2015


FFXIV never had millions of subscribers, it has 2.5 million registered accounts which was said to be subscribers by some people but it was never actual subscriber numbers and they never said it was (They implied some things but they never actually said it). Registered accounts/registered players is a pretty useless figure, almost every mmo you can mention has millions of them. That, and you have to keep in mind that registered accounts/sales figures of FFXIV was bloated due to the numbers applying to not only ARR but V1 too (and free trials and some betas). It's really not a useful number unless you plan to mislead.

I don't think you are listening to me. I'm not claiming how many users they had, THE FFXIV SITE USE TO SAY OVER 2.4 MILLIONS SUBS, not characters.

[Alhanelem]

I don't think you are listening to me. I'm not claiming how many users they had, THE FFXIV SITE USE TO SAY OVER 2.4 MILLIONS SUBS, not characters.

Unfortunately Pixela is indeed correct on this one point; The image on the Lodedstone said "OVER X MILLION PLAYERS! BUY NOW!" (the number was changed a few times). Given that the CEO of the company said they had *cough* somewhere in the vincinity of *cough* one million subscribers to their MMOs, it is clear that "PLAYERS" was unique accounts, not subscribers. Though I dispute much of his information, since I have seen these things myself I know there is some truth in this part.

[PlumbGame]

who














cares

[Pixela]

Honestly I don't know why you're arguing to strongly that FFXI never had 500k subscribers, what it peaked at is not what it has now so it just seems a pointless thing to argue over given the point of the thead.

However I guess I'll give a little and post the link.

Accommodating players in North America, Europe and Japan, FINAL FANTASY XI is the first massively multiplayer online role-playing game capable of simultaneous multiplayer cooperation across three different platforms. Now in its sixth year of service, FINAL FANTASY XI has a robust community of 500,000 subscribers from around the world. The series continues to evolve and expand, offering newcomers and fans alike an immersive, engrossing and engaging universe to traverse, defend and explore.

http://release.square-enix.com/na/2009/03/16_01.html

[Alhanelem]

HE POSTED A LINK! OH MY GOD! CATS AND DOGS LIVING TOGETHER MASS HYSTERIA!

Interesting that the announcement came so far out. Thanks for backing up the claim, though it does call another into question, your asseriton that games never grow in subscribers past the initial launch. I'm uncertain why they would make a press release touting their number of subscribers six years out if they had more prior. The announcement made earlier in the game's lifespan had a similar number of accounts rather than subscribers, which suggests to me that the game had to have peaked somewhere between the early announcement that was on the official site and that 2009 press release.
That said I'm going off memory here since the pre-2005 news is no longer available on the official site, so I will hold back from asserting it as a fact.

This doesn't address your 300k subscribers claim (or current players guess for XI) for DQX but it is a welcome thing nonetheless. If you would mind indicating where you got that number, that would be very much appriciated.

[Pixela]

HE POSTED A LINK! OH MY GOD! CATS AND DOGS LIVING TOGETHER MASS HYSTERIA!

Interesting that the announcement came so far out. Thanks for backing up the claim, though it does call another into question, your asseriton that games never grow in subscribers past the initial launch. I'm uncertain why they would make a press release touting their number of subscribers six years out if they had more prior. The announcement made earlier in the game's lifespan had a similar number of accounts rather than subscribers, which suggests to me that the game had to have peaked somewhere between the early announcement that was on the official site and that 2009 press release.
That said I'm going off memory here since the pre-2005 news is no longer available on the official site, so I will hold back from asserting it as a fact.

This doesn't address your 300k subscribers claim (or current players guess for XI) for DQX but it is a welcome thing nonetheless. If you would mind indicating where you got that number, that would be very much appriciated.

It doesn't actually since I said modern MMO titles don't grow in subscribers year on year, all older titles started slow and built but that doesn't happen anymore because everyone rushes at them at launch and then gets bored.

FFXI had 2 things going for it, it launched before Warcraft and staggered every release with around a year break between each release.

[Alhanelem]

It doesn't actually since I said modern MMO titles don't grow in subscribers year on year, all older titles started slow and built but that doesn't happen anymore because everyone rushes at them at launch and then gets bored.

That's really just an opinion / ancedotal (aka eyeballing) observation though, you don't have anything to support that. A "modern MMO" can still gain subscribers after launch if it's actually good. The real problem is a lot of the "Modern MMOs" recently have been total crap or failed to listen to their players at all fueling disinterest, thereby forcing a free to play switch which usually doesn't help (but also prevents measurement of success by number of subscribers).

Besides that, "modern MMO" is a very vague statement. Where do we draw the line? Many MMOs today derive a lot of things from World of Warcraft (many of which WoW did not invent and rather got from Everquest), but WoW came out not long after FFXI. So what's your argument? Is every MMO after WoW "Modern?" Because in my opinion, with so many later games bearing a lot of similarities to WoW, it has to be considered modern, and that game most certainly did grow (and grow, and grow) for multiple years.

It's worth noting that FFXIV has vastly more subscribers than it did when the original version launched. When you consider that, we have an (admittedly rare/never before) example of a game that started out pretty badly but became more successful later.

[FrankReynolds]

It actually says "nearly 1,000,000 paying subscribers all together" in the annual report. Not sure why the author of that article decided to embellish. http://www.hd.square-enix.com/eng/pdf/ar_2014_01en.pdf

[Pixela]

That's really just an opinion / ancedotal (aka eyeballing) observation though, you don't have anything to support that. A "modern MMO" can still gain subscribers after launch if it's actually good. The real problem is a lot of the "Modern MMOs" recently have been total crap or failed to listen to their players at all fueling disinterest, thereby forcing a free to play switch which usually doesn't help (but also prevents measurement of success by number of subscribers).

Besides that, "modern MMO" is a very vague statement. Where do we draw the line? Many MMOs today derive a lot of things from World of Warcraft (many of which WoW did not invent and rather got from Everquest), but WoW came out not long after FFXI. So what's your argument? Is every MMO after WoW "Modern?" Because in my opinion, with so many later games bearing a lot of similarities to WoW, it has to be considered modern, and that game most certainly did grow (and grow, and grow) for multiple years.

It's worth noting that FFXIV has vastly more subscribers than it did when the original version launched. When you consider that, we have an (admittedly rare/never before) example of a game that started out pretty badly but became more successful later.

Every MMO that has launched in the past 5 years (especially those that follow the WoW formula) has lost players from the first month and gone free to play within a couple of years. This happens for very basic reasons and it happens every time without fail.

They start big and decline.

FFXIV and ARR are different titles in real terms, it was a relaunch and really doesn't count in the way you're trying to argue.

The actual point again is that the game has not gained subs above and beyond what it had last march (even with the Chinese release it seems), because no CEO of a company in the trouble Square Enix is would knowingly give inferior numbers to share holders. What ever minor points you want to try and pursue and pick apart you can't argue that away.