only 500k subscribers?

[Edellis]

this is so silly, what are you comparing the numbers to, WoW? TERA? MapleStory?

There are so many other MMOs that strived to be a "WOW KILLER" (never going to happen) that are now either F2P or just dead. I think this game's willingness to stay within its borders has alot to do with its success.

[LunaHoshino]

You'll find that most people actually pay with game cards because they are generally cheaper... and im sure game cards don't count as a "sub"

Not only that, but there are a lot of people who pay month-by-month and may skip a month between patches to save money. One of my friends took a break for a few months until NIN came out and now he's back and playing again.

[Dervy]

Updated: These MMO figures actually come from an original financial report that was filed on March 31st, 2014.

OP, can you read the article before you start shitposting on these forums? kthanks.


Also OP, if we use the subreddit /r/ffxiv to gauge an estimation of the player base, http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/about/traffic/ has around 650k unique visitors each month... And I guarantee you more than half of the FFXIV community don't even use reddit. This game has way more than 500k players.

[Roris]

Considering both the FF brand name and the fact that it's on 3 separate platforms, while other WoW clone MMOs of its ilk that have gone F2P since then were PC only but still managed to get closer to the 1 mllion mark if not slightly surpassed it, I agree that 500k is pretty subpar. Although considering how badly 1.0 was received due to how badly it was rushed, it's no wonder 500k is considered a success.

That said it's still well within expectations and has enough subs to turn a decent profit, but only SE has the hard numbers and can see if subs go down or up to determine if the game is stable enough or if they should go for more aggressive monetization options aka. B2P or F2P. Especially because ARR was built with this in mind right from the start, unlike XI which would take far more resources to retrofit a cash shop and all it entails into its aging codebase, which is one of the main reasons it remains P2P to this day.

[Merylx]

Wait a second, I'm sure the official FFXIV: Realm Reborn website said it had over 3M subscribers? I've not checked the website in quite a while, but I'm sure it had a banner that said so a couple of months back?

I'm unsure of where the OP is getting these claims.

[Roris]

Wait a second, I'm sure the official FFXIV: Realm Reborn website said it had over 3M subscribers? I've not checked the website in quite a while, but I'm sure it had a banner that said so a couple of months back?

Over 2.5 million "adventurers", which is PR fluff for accounts created. They never were active subs, which is also probably why they removed the banner since it was a bit misleading and I remember someone said they called them out on it on the JP forums.

[Deathscythe343]

Doesn't surprise me. While this game is good, I don't see it getting much bigger. It has a niche share of the market. Don't think it will ever get close to WoW's low numbers.

[Edellis]

Nothing will ever get close to wow's low numbers. Any MMO developer who thinks it will is retarded

[ChriZirhC]

the reports on that article are from march 2014.

[Merylx]

Over 2.5 million "adventurers", which is PR fluff for accounts created. They never were active subs, which is also probably why they removed the banner since it was a bit misleading and I remember someone said they called them out on it on the JP forums.

Nevertheless, 500k sub is pretty decent. Although I thought it was well over 1M, 500k is extremely stable in my opinion and nothing to feel sorry about. That number could well increase when the expansion hits, as there's more promo + returning players, etc. I'm really happy about 500k. There's many MMO's that have came out in the last few years that have, for the most part, went immediately Free-to-play after a few months. FFXIV is doing pretty well.