MMOGChart.com Update

I don't know how I missed it but last week Bruce Woodcock updated his highly informative site, MMOGChart.com, for the first time in months. His data only goes out to late last year, but he promises another update soon. From the Edge Online blurb: "The charts, neatly broken into separate genre-giants, mid-size, and more-modest categories (largely due to World of Warcraft's unprecedented population squelching its competitors below), show at first glance few surprising results. As expected, World of Warcraft dominates the charts, with the Lineage pair coming in beneath, Final Fantasy XI continuing to gain ground, and UK indie-developed RuneScape coming in at a very respectable 5th, well above several blockbusters below."

Comments

SWG numbers completely wrong

[WCMI92]

There is NO WAY SWG still has over 250K subscribers. Someone recently used a packet sniffer and discovered that the number of people logged in was sent in the clear to the client (this has since been patched), and that it had only 10,400 concurrent logins among all servers in prime time (friday evening).

We've also seen server populations dwindle, including the server I play on, which is still one of the 5 most active. Used to be you would see 100 people PvP'ing on any given evening, now you are lucky to have 20 total.

SWG is lucky to have 50-75,000 subscribers left AT MOST.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[SpacePunk]

Those idiots are counting characters registered on servers, I'm positive of that. After they allowed people to have two characters instead of one, their 'player count' skyrocketed. Just more phraseology from the morons at SOE.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[WCMI92]

Press reports back in November `05 (when the New Gawfaful Experience was revealed) had SWG's subs at 200K. That was down from 250K during the CU era, and 300K during the pre-CU era.

I estimate that SWG lost 50-60% of it's sub base as subscriptions expired after the NGE bombshell. There are servers that almost completely lack population now, and even the "large" servers have declined.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[scaryjohn]

Friday night is prime time for SWG? No wonder they have no subscrubers left.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

The data on that chart is pretty old, he still hasn't had time to update it past January 2006. The SWG figure on the chart comes from June 2005. In fact, only Ultima Online has data as new as January 2006 - everything else is November 2005 or earlier.

The worst offender for out of date information in popular MMORPGs (defined as "it appears on Chart 1, 120,000+") is Dark Age of Camelot, which hasn't had updated figures in over a year.

Note that this information is from the Excel sheet, not trying to trace lines on the chart.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

Simple reason: They are counting SOE's Station Pass subscribers. Basically if you play more than one SOE offering, its cheaper to buy Station Pass to have access to all the games.

So if you play both EQ and EQII, and have Station Pass, you are also counted as an SWG subscriber (and PlanetSide, and... I think Matrix Online?)

Nice way to push up the sagging numbers. Ensures that they have nothing to do with reality, but then again as long as the stockholders and beancounters do not yell 'ENRON!' it's all fine.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[jandrese]

This chart is largely thought to be bogus in many circles. Lots of MMOs overreport their subscriber bases or do sneaky stuff like count every single person who tried out their 15 day free demo (even if they didn't join) as a free subscriber.

Even so, it looks like WoW really took the wind out of the sails of Lineage and Lineage II.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[jason ward]

They are down 1 more as of yesterday. I found it amusing that their 'exit survey' gave no options for the real reasons I left.

I think this is more a reflection of people who have multiple memberships paid up for a year. It should drop steadily soon, but SWG still does have a fair number of users.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Reapman]

I don't know about that... I never played Lineage 1 or 2, but even if those numbers are double what they should be... someone's making a ton of cash. I'd be happy in 2nd and 3rd with that! I do agree with the numbers being bogus tho... these are interesting to view but I would'nt bet much on em.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

Some folks will just keep paying their MMO fees without logging into the game. That's why migration to a new billing system can be catastrophic if you cannot convert over customer information seamlessly.

I wouldn't be surprised if the number also incorporates Station pass users.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Kookus]

why would someone over-report their active subscribers? you'd have to be a moron if you can't show what happened to the revenue generated from those subscriptions when the amount of taxes you paid doesn't add up. Face it, it's a count of active subscriptions. SWG might not have as many active players as they did before, but I'm pretty sure they offered subscriptions in excess of 1 month. Just because you cancelled your automatic billing doesn't make you an inactive subscriber. You have to wait until your subscription runs out.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[jandrese]

People lie because it makes them look better on charts like this.

Some of the numbers are pretty decent. Some companies are forced to report the number of active subscriptions they have because they're publicly traded and need to release membership statistics to their shareholders. Others are far more vague and are based on things like press releases and other marketing spin.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[hab136]

Friday night is prime time for SWG? No wonder they have no subscrubers left.

It's prime time for most MMORPGs. When do you think most people have free time, Tuesday mornings?

(actually you'd think that if you read WoW's forums on Tuesdays..)

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[hab136]

The audience for revenue numbers is investors. The audience for number of subscriptions is potential gamers. It's easy to lie^H^H^H inflate your numbers to one while telling the truth to the other.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[Per Abrahamsen]

The Lineage numbers are mostly from Korean computer cafes, and not easily comparable to US/EU subscriptions.

Re:SWG numbers completely wrong

[garylian]

Three words for you: Sony Station Pass.

All of their subscriptions seem to run together via that. And a lot of folks have signed up for that, just so they can play whatever game they want.

Link to the site

[prator]

Zonk, you could at least check if there is a link to the site described in the summary.

http://www.mmogchart.com/

-prator

Re:Link to the site

[Anonymous Coward]

Nono, it's much better to post a link to a blog that links to a blog that links to an article that links to the real website, Digg-style.

still out of date

[Shivetya]

does not acknowledge fact that Asheron's Call 2 closed in December. Does not acknowledge any new launches since the last true update (D&DO).

In fact, is any of it valid?

Perhaps he attempts to claim validity by overwhelming us with numbers and pretty graphs? I admit that he first started his charts I believed there was valid data. As it has gone on I begin to seriously doubt its relevance.

Re:still out of date

[falcon5768]

I simularly feel the same, a lot of the numbers are very weird, he doesnt consider Lin or Lin 2's official figures to be valid, when he does consider WoW's when its been proven by many people that Blizzard greatly scewed the number by counting past and trial subscriptions along with current subscriptions.

WoW would still come out on top, but if you actually used real number and not Blizzards official, you would come out well under 4 mill for the game.

Would love to know where the FFXI numbers came from too. I know we did get a server increase and that other servers noticed it too, but I didnt think it was THAT much of a increase that we are closing in on 750 thousand.

Re:still out of date

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"April 11, 2006

Wow, okay, so it's been a while. I updated my data last November, but for some reason the data never got pushed to the web site. I've temporarily released a new Version 19.0 with some of that data, going up to approximately January. I'm going to try to complete a fully revised set of data and analysis as soon as possible. In the meantime, enjoy the new release."

Re:still out of date

[Anonymous Coward]

Get some new glasses, or download the spreadsheet. FFXI is at 650,000, and hasn't been updated at all this time around. It's still showing the same data it did almost a year ago. It has some of the most stale data on the chart - only Dark Age of Camelot beats it in the "old data" department, and only by two months.

That being said, the last time I saw Square-Enix release figures, they said they were around the 500,000 mark and that 650,000 figure is based on that. Essentially, the FFXI figures are figments of Square-Enix's imagination since they've never released real figures.

STOP! Don't link to the census. I've seen it. It's already been disproven as not matching up with previously released figures.

Like all Asian MMORPGs, it's hard to get accurate "current subscriber" figures without them being artificially inflated, so it's hard to compare FFXI with the other Asian MMORPGs it competes with.

Re:still out of date

[Swanktastic]

To your first point, I think he acknowledges that the data only goes to the end of the year. However, I agree with the overall sentiment. The primary source for his data is publicly released information, and, as we know, PR mouthpieces rarely trumpet bad news.

If you examine each individual MMORPG, very rarely do you see declines in subscriber base. Typically, you see a growth period followed by an eternal plateau. I'm suspicious that the lack of news isbeing interpreted by the author as a "no change" when in reality, it could be a significant decline which is not announced by the publisher. Users moving around between MMORPGs would result in them being double/triple counted for these purposes.

Has anyone compared the total subscriber numbers to numbers obtained through other methodologies (incidence surveys?). The chart (which excludes Lineage I/II) above extrapolated using his method would predict something like 15-20 million total subscribers by December of this year.

Re:still out of date

[ZombieWomble]

when its been proven by many people that Blizzard greatly scewed the number by counting past and trial subscriptions along with current subscriptions.

Well, Blizzard does explicitly say in their press releases that their figures include trial subs (which by this point must only make up a tiny fraction of the whole, anyway), but it does say it excludes expired subs - got a link to this proof? I'd be very intersted to see it (preferably an up-to-date one, obviously)

Re:still out of date

[Avatar8]

I think it is valid if you consider that it's relative not absolute values you want to compare.

Regardless of how the companies reported it, they're going to report their best, biggest numbers. Assume that all the companies fudge their numbers in the same way. Therefore, all of the games start on an even, though falsified, basis: "At some point, we had this many players."

I think pointing out the obvious of "out of date" is a bit harsh on the chart's author, too. Of course it's out of date. He even states that. Companies only release this info (unwillingly sometimes) every quarter or so. I used to play UO, so I know they don't want anyone to know how their numbers are sinking (F you EA!!)

I for one am impressed at the collection and comparison of data. I think it shows us a good history and track record of what succeeded and what didn't. It also shows the typical lifespan of an average MMO: big spike in the first few months, leveling out and a slow decay. More accurate numbers aren't going to change the chart that much.

Re:still out of date

[falcon5768]

ahh my stalker is back.. god I wish AC's automatically couldn't post so i could block your moronic ranting toward me by name.

up until recently he has used the 500,000 figure, he explicitly said he moved it up based on character to player ratio. this was JUST updated and is not "over a year old" like you seem to think.

the 500,000 figured though is NOT a figment this is hard data from 2004. SE just stopped playing the number game since it doesnt much mater to anyone but Blizzard, most MMO's dont even have 100,000 thousand.

in 2005 they said the number had not much changed, meaning it could have gone a little up, it could have gone a little down, but based on number of players on at any one time likely did go up since servers went from 2000-3000 players to 2500-3500 players with another 1000 on the weekends.

They have yet to state anything beyond there was a player increase at fan fest. Likely they wont say anything till they see how many new vs transfered characters come from the 360.

Re:still out of date

[Anonymous Coward]

Man, you really need to get your glass's perscription checked.

up until recently he has used the 500,000 figure, he explicitly said he moved it up based on character to player ratio. this was JUST updated and is not "over a year old" like you seem to think.

First off, I said "almost a year old" because that figure dates to May 2005 - which makes it one month shy of being a year old. You can download the Excel sheet to verify this yourself, it opens fine in OpenOffice.org.

Secondly, he's always used that player ratio, and you can read his reasonings for using it on the MMOGChart.com website. I'd strongly encourage you to actually do that.

the 500,000 figured though is NOT a figment this is hard data from 2004.

Read his reasonings - it was never a hard figure, it was always random guesses based on vague releases from Square-Enix. Not to mention that even if it were "hard data" from 2004, that's two years ago. A lot has changed since then - like WoW being released and dominating the MMOG market.

SE just stopped playing the number game since it doesnt much mater to anyone but Blizzard,

Yeah - when you're losing, who cares about the exact details of just how badly you're losing? I mean, Bush doesn't need to play the "poll numbers game", who cares how many Americans currently support him?

most MMO's dont even have 100,000 thousand.

You're right, not even World of Warcraft has managed to gain one hundred million subscribers. Maybe you really do need to go to an optometrist.

Re:still out of date

[aztektum]

I don't think this is a full update of all the games shown. The numbers for say SWG only go on the chart as being through July of last year. Read the news blurb on the main site, it says this is a partial update with data through Jan '06 and he is working on a completely new release of stats to be out soon. (hopefully)

RuneScape

[Tickenest]

Geez, how has the success of RuneScape gone so unnoticed? I mean, yeah, it's Java-based, and its graphics pale in comparison to other games, but yeowza, they're pulling in the subscribers, and they not backed by some huge corporation. Their accomplishments in this marketplace are nothing short of remarkable.

Re:RuneScape

[simpleparadox]

well it's one of those games that grow due to user base, lots of people play just once to see what's the fuss about it is, and people get on because their friends are on their, the active user base is probaly much yes then the number of subscribers.

Re:RuneScape

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they don't advertise their game in any way, and magazines aren't interested in putting them in their magazines because it's hard to make it look in any way interesting in a magazine. They depend entirely on voluntary links and, more to the point, word of mouth. But since their target audience is 10-16 year olds (not an insult, just a statement of fact), people outside of this age bracket aren't likely to hear about it.

Re:RuneScape

[MacBrave]

You are right on with the 10-16 year old target audience. If you go to our public library you'll consistently see 75% of the computers in the children's (and someitmes the adult) section running RuneScape. Our 11 year old son has gotten the RuneScape bug and plays it as much as we let him. We even got him a subscription (only $5 a month) that will last as long as he keeps his grades up.

Re:RuneScape

[Tickenest]

I'm calling Mod Parent Up, because yes, I think your analysis is correct. It is for the younger set and magazines aren't so interested in it. Nicely put.

Guild Wars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting that the chart has no entry for Guild Wars.

I'm willing to assume that this is because Guild Wars... Ah! Because Guild Wars does not use a subscription model, i.e., they do not collect a monthly fee.

Pity.

It would be interesting to see how they compare, at least in terms of concurrent users.

Re:Guild Wars?

[GundamFan]

That would be like adding Diablo 1 and 2 to this this chart.

None of these games are MMOs, and if you like Guild Wars beter than MMOs so be it... but you can't make it an MMO by comparing it to World of Warcraft and Everquest.

I am not judgeing GW because I have never played it (I hear it is fun) all I am saying is that it fits in to a very diffrent catigory of online games and tends to attract a diffrent type of gamer.

Re:Guild Wars?

[GmAz]

I agree. I do play Guild Wars and its fun, but I also play World of Warcraft and there is absolutely no comparison other than a lot of people play it in real time. Thats it. Unlike WoW, Guild Wars has a story line and an ending. WoW on the other hand has no linear story (well, it kinda does, but the path taken isn't direct and is so broad, its hard to call it linear).

Re:Guild Wars?

[Jamu]

City of Heroes has a very similar game model. The only significant difference, as far as the charts are concerned, is that CoH has a subscription model.

Is Guild Wars an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game)?

Guild Wars has some similarities to existing MMORPGs, but it also has some key differences. Like existing MMOs, Guild Wars is played entirely online in a secure hosted environment. Thousands of players inhabit the same virtual world. Players can meet new friends in gathering places like towns and outposts where they form parties and go questing with them. Unlike many MMOs, when players form a party and embark upon a quest in Guild Wars, they get their own private copy of the area where the quest takes place. This design eliminates some of the frustrating gameplay elements commonly associated with MMOs, such as spawn camping, loot stealing, and standing in a queue in order to complete a quest.

Quoted from the Guild Wars FAQ.

Re:Guild Wars?

[GundamFan]

There is still a diffrence... again I can't speek to Guild Wars but I can comment on City of Heroes as I do play it and CoH does use instancing but it is more like WoW's raid instance implementation where almost every mssion is instanced... with an interactive shared "overworld" and not a colection of meeting places much like a more traditonal MMO. CoH has been called barely an MMO in the past... I think this is mostly because it doesn't have a loot system... this is also why many prefer it to fatasy MMOs. Again Guild War is essentaly the next logical step for games like Diablo... that is not a bad thing.

How about XFire?

[cluke]

Getting the details out of the people who run Xfire or similar should provide a big enough sample size to get some real figures. It's a MSN type program geared towards gamers, and it shows you what game your friends are currently playing, MMORPGs included. I'm sure they collate this data.

I'm sure getting the information out of them would be a tall order though!

Re:How about XFire?

[cluke]

Just to clarify, I'm not for a second thinking this is feasible, but it would be cool if XFire would do it, similar to the periodical PC hardware surveys Steam creates.

Incomplete

[Anonymous Coward]

I know the population is miniscule, but i dont see Neocron 2 on there. Probably only about ~4000 subscribers total and 200 simultaneous on prime time, but still fun to play.

Re:Incomplete

[4D6963]

I don't see Urban Dead neither, although is population is about 50,000. Maybe it's cause it's web-based?

Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

So many posts, and no one has pointed that his name is Woodcock! As in Wood Cock!
Hello, McFly?
What's going on? Is everyone observing Uranus from Titikaka?

And AC Closes in 3..2..

[fyrie]

How much longer until turbine pulls the plug on this one? It will always be my favorite, but it's not able to bring new people in or keep existing players around anymore.

Sigh

[cspariah]

While Bruce's work is sort of interesting, it is very frustrating when people take it as gospel. Even the numbers that he feels confident enough to give a "B" to, "The numbers may not be exact for the MMOG in question, but are certainly in the ballpark," can sometimes be waaaaaay off.

Re:Sigh

[PhoenixOne]

True, but it's the easiest way I know to get some numbers. Most of the companies hosting these MMOGs certainly don't want to give up that sort of information (especially the ones that have had major drop-offs).

If I was in a job that required solid facts on these numbers, I'd pay the money and (hopefully) get something more exact. But I'm blessed with only having to worry about selling single-player games, so tracking MMOG numbers is just a hobby. :)

Re:Sigh

[BloodAngel_Au]

Well I for one am pleased at the hard work, effort and detective work you put into your hobby of trying to pin down these numbers, especially when the companies involved don't want to tell the truth about these figures.

Hazzah!

Why are we still listening to this?

[Anonymous Coward]

And once again...

Bruce Woodcock is a longstanding message board troll who finds himself serially banned from community after community. His chart is based on numbers that have been roundly denounced by multiple developers, and is not worth the paper it's printed on. Nothing is served by articles such as these except to stoke his overwrought ego, which is ultimately all he seeks in publishing this trash.

eve online

[jkcity]

I think his number for eve online are quite off its definatly passed 100k accounts now and that was ages ago.

Re:eve online

[Jaeph]

eve has 20k+ at primetime (max of 25k or so lately). It absolutely has more than 100k subscribers.

Note that eve's primetimes are bit different than other games. I often see tons of people sunday afternoon.

-Jeff