FF14 Failing to dent Wows subs? Wow up to 10 million

Blizzard just released the subscribers count as of November 13, 2014 at 10 million subs. This is up 2.6 million from the Q3 2014 call that listed WoW at 7.4 million subscribers.

http://i.imgur.com/VfgDPSu.png

As Blizzard is a public company, it has to follow the laws, in this case, it needs to be transparent to the share holders. Which means, they have to show subs. So its a straight up legit 10 million subs after the launch of Wod in a 10 year old game. Pretty amazing for an MMO.

With Blizz releasing their sub numbers does it make you want to know FF14's sub numbers so the community knows where it stands regarding the games popularity?

Also are you disappointed that Wow still has such a high number and that FF, Wild*, ESO, SWTOR and the like hasn't done all that much damage to Wow.

Thoughts on the matter.

WoW isn't the enemy of mankind, and how many subs they have has no bearing on whether FFXIV is successful or not. Good on Blizzard for keeping that gravy train going as long as it has, now that they have canceled Project Titan they will have to work extra hard to keep WoW fresh after 10 years of operation. From what I hear a lot of WoW players are really happy with Warlords of Draenor, when they are able to login that is.

I don't know why you include FF in the try-to-DMG-WOW list. Afaik this game have not say any words about it try to beat WoW.

My thoughts: who cares? People can like one game or another or even both. Heck, I'm finally getting a decent computer on December and I'm going to be trying WoW out for the first time (amongst others). FFXIV does get boring due to the lack of (rewarding!) difficult content :T

Who cares!

Turns out multiple online video games can exist at one time.

Are you really surprised that a game that has been around for a decade has more subscribers than one whose current incarnation has only existed for a little more than a year?

I just resubbed to WoW for the WoD story. I'll probably cancel the sub after I play through it and get bored. I'm sure I'm not alone. The expansion released like two weeks ago. O.o

FF XIV probably should have 10+ million subscribers. It is excellent.

A lot of people buy wow expansions to level up their old characters and see the new storyline. But then they don't stick around for end game and come back when the next expansion comes out.

-WoW just had an expansion release
-WoD is something a lot of players that previously quit have anticipated
-With a new expansion comes new economic opportunities and RMT accounts which do contribute to the figures given

Overall, its no big deal, all games have a surge in subscribers when new content/expansions are released. If they can maintain the 10 million and only gain sub numbers from this point, then that would be something to talk about.

WoW released a new expansion and people flock back for a month before leaving again? What a twist.

That said, XIV has been released in China now hasn't it? I thought we were going to get more transparent subscription information after we got China to inflate the numbers?

Not a big deal or concern at all but good for Blizzard.

When it comes to successful MMOs, WoW is a bit of an outlier. It knocked EverQuest from it's nigh-decade long title as King of MMOs and EQ never had half as many subscribers that WoW has ever had.

I really wish people would stop calling new MMOs "WoW-killers", much less compare them to WoW. It hurts new MMOs a lot when that happens. An MMO should stand on its own merit of "Is it fun to play?" If the answer is "yes" then that's wonderful.

That being said, I did re-sub for Warlords of Draenor and I am enjoying what I have experienced so far. I would say it's up there with Wrath of the Lich King being my favorite expansion. Despite the fact that I am actually enjoying WoW for the first time since the launch of Cataclysm, I do like Final Fantasy XIV more. So, yes, I do plan to unsubscribe from WoW at some point.

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Originally Posted by Shneibel

I don't know why you include FF in the try-to-DMG-WOW list. Afaik this game have not say any words about it try to beat WoW.

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huh? it copied quiet much from WoW if you ask me. besides some new stuffs like FATE (GW2)

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Originally Posted by Nalien

That said, XIV has been released in China now hasn't it? I thought we were going to get more transparent subscription information after we got China to inflate the numbers?

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china? it should be launched in south korea.. the country of MMOrpgs..

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Originally Posted by Xieveral

-WoW just had an expansion release
-WoD is something a lot of players that previously quit have anticipated
-With a new expansion comes new economic opportunities and RMT accounts which do contribute to the figures given

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And WoW is released in much more countries than FFXIV.

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

huh? it copied quiet much from WoW if you ask me. besides some new stuffs like FATE (GW2)

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and you say that suppose to be : try to beat wow sub ? or try to dmg wow ?

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

huh? it copied quiet much from WoW if you ask me. besides some new stuffs like FATE (GW2)

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Yoshi has stated that he likes WoW quite a lot, so obviously he is going to incorporate some of the designs.

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

china? it should be launched in south korea.. the country of MMOrpgs..

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It's in both countries . . .

WoW's biggest downfall is that it takes Blizzard absolutely forever for them to push out new content. Overall great game, with content that caters to the most casual player to the most hardcore, with varying ranges of difficulty and offering something that just about every player can enjoy. The issue is that all players, regardless of background or playstyle, get bored. And bored players quit.

The main thing that sets the game apart from others though and helps them retain and/or gain new numbers, is the unparallelled quality of life improvements, ease of use, and customer service. They put a tremendous amount of effort into keeping customers happy where most companies just don't seem to care, and the numbers more than help prove it.

That said, I can totally see FFXIV catching up later in years in terms of subscribers (especially as they release in new regions), but in order to topple the giant they're going to have to go that extra mile and then some.

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Originally Posted by Jaykos

With Blizz releasing their sub numbers does it make you want to know FF14's sub numbers so the community knows where it stands regarding the games popularity?

Also are you disappointed that Wow still has such a high number and that FF, Wild*, ESO, SWTOR and the like hasn't done all that much damage to Wow.

Thoughts on the matter.

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My thoughts? Simple:
Why does it freaking matter to us on XIV that WoW has pulled its sub levels up to what it was before they launched the worst expansion ever?
Why does every new MMO have to be "dat WoW killa!"?
There, thats it. Answer me THAT.

In my honest opinion, we have quality over quantity. I have a far better PuG play experience on XIV than i do on WoW.
With the kind of idiocy that permeates PuG play in WoW, I'd rather NOT have their kind of sub levels, if thats the kind of player the game attracts.

Also, with only 3.3m copies of WoD, that puts 6.7 million subs NOT at the current expansion.
Now really, that means only 3.3m players are playing 'new content' vs 6.7m subs who are probably only there to 'play because friends do'. That says a lot too.

Subs in Asian countries don't need to purchase the current expansion to be able to play it.

Why does the subs of another game even matter?
WOD's influx of subs will be temporary, and once people run out of stuff to do, people will leave the game once again and wait another few years for another expansion.

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Originally Posted by Zumi

A lot of people buy wow expansions to level up their old characters and see the new storyline. But then they don't stick around for end game and come back when the next expansion comes out.

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Sounds like XIV largely.

Log in - Cap Tomes, run Coil, finish Coil, log out and find something else to do until next tuesday if you didn't finish leveling ROG/NIN.

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

huh? it copied quiet much from WoW if you ask me. besides some new stuffs like FATE (GW2)

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Elements of WoW became part of the MMORPG genre, just like how WoW drew existing elements from older MMORPGs, it's really all there is to it.

In a year ARR got to 2 million subs, that's more than enough for SE to turn a profit.

Raw numbers aren't all that important over retention.

Also, there are plenty of people who play multiple mmos at the same time. people in WoW could easily also be FFXIV players.

And lets not forget that for every genuine player there's five RMT accounts trying to exploit them.

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Originally Posted by Zaft

Turns out multiple online video games can exist at one time.

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Not only that, you can subscribe to multiple online games at once.

When was the last time we actually got any official subscription numbers? I'd actually be interested in comparing XIV after a year and a bit to WoW back then...

Ok, that's cool. I'm not interested in WoW, so I don't play it. I play FF14.

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Originally Posted by TessaJalloh

And lets not forget that for every genuine player there's five RMT accounts trying to exploit them.

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So the majority of the 2 million players are RMT, in other words?

WoW has that many now, but that's only because of WoD, once the buzz of the new content has worn off subs will start to drop again, if you check the graph you showed it happened to both Cataclysm and MoP. During the life of MoP they lost over 2.5 million subs. The overall trend since 2011 has been a drop in subs.

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Originally Posted by Nalien

When was the last time we actually got any official subscription numbers? I'd actually be interested in comparing XIV after a year and a bit to WoW back then...

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Not sure if we can really draw any comparisons, back then WoW was an industry revolutionary, while FFXIV is a good MMO, but just "yet another MMO", this in an era where Korean developers are shipping several f2p MMOs per year.

What WoW did back then compared to the older, more time consuming MMOs is what earned them a large loyal playerbase that will keep coming back even after they quit, just to try new content.

In the end streamlining the genre was a good idea, this game is trying to achieve the same so I expect it to stay up for a long time.

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Originally Posted by Nalien

When was the last time we actually got any official subscription numbers? I'd actually be interested in comparing XIV after a year and a bit to WoW back then...

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Absolutely would love official sub numbers for FF. All we have is "2.5 million players" with no info whether that's actual subs, subs with trials, accounts made or even just boxes sold. Wow with 12 months on the market was at 4.5 million subs so it would be good to compare.

Opinions on MMOchampion about FF's subs range from people believing that it has 2.5 million subs to hovering around 300k teetering on a f2p announcement so it would be good to get the truth out there.

WoW is something completely different than FFXIV. FFXIV is relatively small in front of WoW but seems huge when you compare it with other mmorpgs. All of them can exist at same time and be successful and bring profit back to the companies. FFXIV has a big and long way to the future. FFXIV will continue to grow and expand as long as development goes right and progress. They need to keep adding content (which they do) and establish more bridges of communication with the community of players in order to take feedback. I believe FFXIV's number will further grow with the Heavensward expansion in spring. Even if they will never reach WoW's subs this doesn't mean it won't be successful and increase the player base.

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Originally Posted by TessaJalloh

In a year ARR got to 2 million subs, that's more than enough for SE to turn a profit.

Raw numbers aren't all that important over retention.

Also, there are plenty of people who play multiple mmos at the same time. people in WoW could easily also be FFXIV players.

And lets not forget that for every genuine player there's five RMT accounts trying to exploit them.

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Whoa stop right there. Where are you getting that XIV has 2 million subs? Last check on the official subs was way less than 2 million. As of jan/feb 2014 Yoshi said he had 500k subs. Also on the lodestone you see it no longer says over 2.5 million players reason why it dosent as this was deceptive advertisement. The game has not ever had 2 million subscribers and currently has probably 400k or less in subscriptions. The game has sold probably 2.5 million copies but XIV sure as hell did not keep all 2.5 million players.

Now at one point Yoshi said he had 500k daily logins but the question is how many of those logins was due to disconnects and 90k's?

Posts like this always remind me of that one jackhole in grade school who'd suddenly burst into a run to the end of the block and then be like "Hahaha! I beat you!" Nobody was racing but you. :|

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Originally Posted by Bixby

Posts like this always remind me of that one jackhole in grade school who'd suddenly burst into a run to the end of the block and then be like "Hahaha! I beat you!" Nobody was racing but you. :|

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Meh, some people like to think that WoW is the scourge of MMO design and should die a fiery death to validate whatever attachment they have to older designs that have less mass appeal. It helps them sleep at night, I guess, since to some there can really be only one.

That said, from what I've heard they've done a LOT of things players have been asking for Blizz to do with the game. I'm half tempted because they made almost every change I ever suggested for ret paladins since Cataclysm to mid-MoP when I cancelled my account. The fact some are looking at garrisons as long-term sustainable content (you know, that thing people love to claim WoW doesn't have) means things may turn interesting as time goes. I'd keep an eye on it solely to see if there's anything good that can be borrowed and implemented here. *shrug* (you know, like the train-themed dungeon that I would like to borrow and refit in the style of the Phantom Train from FFVI...)

Do people really care about this? I'm sub for ffxiv I have fun and enjoy the game. No interested in wow never was never will. So they won't get my money.

All things considered, it looks as though their sub count has gone up to where they were when they released MoP. I know a lot of my friends (people who don't play FFXIV) have resub'd, but I also know that a lot of those people will get very bored of the game very quickly.

As it's been said before, WoW is not the enemy. It's a popular game that brings attention to the MMORPG universe and potentially guides people along the path to the MMO that they will love (be it WoW or FFXIV or Maple Story, etc).

I for one find it interesting to see the sub counts for sub games and feel that FFXIV could achieve the same attention should it keep along the path it has taken (getting more and more subs as the years go on). Regardless, I don't think that WoD will be taking away from us that much and odds are if it does, those people will come back when Heavensward comes out (considering we should still have a year and a half to two years before the next WoW expo).

Also take note of the update schedule that WoW has. If they don't correct it from their MoP releases we can probably expect to see them lose subs again :p

My thoughts: From your chart, WoW hasn't broken 10 million since Cataclysm and, considering the trend of the chart, 10 million will be WoW's peak until the next expansion. For now, it's probably just a flood of resubs to try the new content, then only the dedicated will stay while the rest will leave. Wait for the third month of the EP to gauge whether people will stick with it or not.

FFXIV is holding strong, though.

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Originally Posted by HakuroDK

FFXIV is holding strong, though.

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How do we know but?

What is FF subs number?