10 million players played for 700 million hrs in June and Blizzard says retention is strong.
This is in their public earnings report which they can’t lie in. They are expecting strong earnings from the season and it’s battlepass.
I guess D4 is doing OK.
Each of our business units grew net bookings year-over-year in the second quarter. Blizzard delivered its first $1 billion net bookings quarter following the record-setting launch of Diablo® IV, Blizzard’s fastest-selling title to date.
As of the end of the second quarter, Diablo IV had sold-through more units than any other Blizzard title at an equivalent stage of release. Over 10 million players experienced Diablo IV in June, playing for over 700 million hours, and retention trends for the title are particularly strong.
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I played for 1 day (since season 1 released) and stopped. Haven’t played since and haven’t spent a penny on season 1 store. Down to 9,999,999 for next month.
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Agree on earnings calls (and reports) being strong data points.
What we don’t necessarily have there is post-patch retention necessarily, would need to see filling date, and any increase in dropoff afterwards.
We’ll likely know more next quarter if they discuss s1 at all (would likely need to be asked by an investor)
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the game came out June 5th obviously the numbers are gonna be high
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No, but they can make it look better than it is. Best example of that is how they hide activity figures, and just summarize them as “it’s looking good”. Once upon a time they did show activity figures over time in those reports, but once there was a HUGE dip in player activity in WoW and subscription numbers fell down like crazy as well, and then Blizzard simply quit reporting it because they phrased it as “not representing relevant stats” (in other words, it wasn’t relevant because they were increasing sales from the shop at that time as well, so the shareholders shouldn’t worry about it).
Blizzard just do summaries now. And the quarterly report had the numbers from June, meaning during the game’s launch.
The real question is how the season is doing, which the NEXT quarterly report will show how it truly did.
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D4 released in June. August will be a lot more telling.
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june is b4 game released for season.
july - oct is where you want to read the statement.
in june the game was still new an so they could be showing you data from the 1st 2 weeks notice they dont state the lows only the highs data is easily manipulated to say what you want it.
doest matter what actually happening if you know how to use your words an make you look like a saint. ever read a hardcore felons resume. He will come off sounding like a amazing business owner with great skills. but at the end of the day… when a background check comes threw… its a different story.
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Amazing, that a game which released in June performed well riding the hype train when everyone was busy doing the campaign.
More interesting numbers would be the current month and the playtime during the season.
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Yeah, it’ll be much more interesting to see where the game lands between seasons 2-4, than where it is early on. Month 2-3 of the season will also be interesting to look at in terms of metrics.
Consumer behavior has changed drastically in the past decade and people play more video games than ever before. It’s hardly surprising that D4 looks good based on player metrics early on. Still doesn’t mean it’s a good game. Just means consumers are willing to play anything that’s viewed as mainstream.
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And… 9,700,000 of those players quit playing already.
Oh, and the consensus is in: 2.2/10 user rating. Ouch.
29k twitch viewers. 
Do we need to get the tissue box?
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its kinda sad when fanboys only argument is playerbase 2 months ago, not the quality of the game
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So, when you buy a non sub game, you have 100 percent retention. The accounts don’t disappear. Blizzard is always vague in quarterly reports. They use bookings instead of revenue. How do you have bookings for a game that is released? They are including the presale numbers they reported last year again.
I ask this often… if you aren’t playing the game, why exert energy and time in the forums of a game you don’t like and aren’t interested in playing? The patent answer is that you love the franchise and want to see it be better, but unless you’re a developer with experience in game design and programming, all you are contributing to is the noise on the forums that the devs ignore anyway.
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Noise causes changes - look at the recent campfire chat.
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LOL… good critique leads to changes… the noise, like folks who aren’t even playing offering nothing but negative commentary on a game they aren’t currently playing, is ignored.
I have like 4 posts today - One a few days ago - a few on the 22nd etc etc.
I’m not on here crying everyday or wasting much energy. It’s just a lot of people coming in here once in a while to complain.
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Yep, was definitely a strong opening month. But betting there was a noticeable drop off after the season one patch in July. Which necessitated the emergency campfire chat and 1.1.1 patch hitting soon. Hopefully that will re-engage those who paused play after that patch.
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Lizzard white knights baiting yall again. lol
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Uh huh… you’re not playing the game anymore… you have NOTHING of value to contribute… you are absolutely wasting time and energy… find a new game… it’s ok not to enjoy something, unless you enjoy being miserable.
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The game released in June, and ‘played’ means downloaded and opened the game once. “Retention is strong” is meaningless business-speak without numbers. 700M hours in June isn’t bad, but lots of people played 50-100 hours and then quit. It doesn’t speak to the ongoing health of the game. Most people agree the game is fine through the campaign and WT3, the issue is retention after that.
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