I’m very sorry because this is very irrelevant to both SC2 and Co-Op mode. I just stumbled on this Reddit post, and reminded me when I said SC2 earned too little money compared to gacha/mobile games.
This started with a talk about someone spent $13,220 on a gacha game that was just released last month, to test what chance of this “lottery” is. Then, someone replied with this:
No, it’s really a whale. Oil shieks and investment bankers routinely spend more than $100k on IAP. I once played wow on a server than had a top-4 US guild. It was formed by a sheiks son and he paid players $350/night to raid 4 days a week. Most of his guild legit did it as a job, and they were the best of the best. Someone worked it out and he was essentially paying 35 people $65kUSD/yr to raid in WoW. He wasn’t even paying to be carried, he’d pay for raids he was not present in, like 10mans and gear up raids etc, and was apparently up there himself as one of the best in the world. He was just paying wages to ensure he was also playing with the best. Big money billionaires live in a totally different world.
To be honest, I’m surprised. If this story is true, WoW might actually earn ton of money as well. What’s wrong with SC2 then? Why could it not be as successful as other games?
SC2 isn’t a subscription game. All of it’s revenue comes from campaign sales, Commander DLC, and skins/consoles/announcers used in Multiplayer, on top of what little is made from the “Premium” arcade games.
This means that it is going to make very little in the long rong compared to WoW, in which you have to pay for the game’s expansion, pay a monthly subscription fee to keep playing, and I think can pay for experience boosts, but don’t quote me on that one. On top of this, MMORPGs are vastly more popular than RTSes.
Whenever this topic is brought up, everyone seem to never mention the merchandise.
It isn’t just the strictly gaming aspects of the franchise that brings in money. Any brand is profitable because of a multitude of platforms, which include in large part the sales of goods of all kinds.
Selling a $10 skin/bundle to 5mil users is chump change compare to the figurines, collectibles, t-shirts, caps, plushies, etc. That sells to even 1mil consumers. Those are far more profitable.
So to that end, there are some limitations for sure to a blown up, quick money mobile app game. Per singular revenue stream, I would totally agree it is far more profitable but per brand it may have some absolute limitations. And frankly, rightfully so. It takes time to build a franchise and a brand worthy of a ton of consumer to continuously to buy into it. A new game, however fun and quickly profitable it may be, unless has longevity will fall short on the aforementioned streams.
I saw an Alarak pin I wanted once. I don’t know if I can still find it or get it… But that, alongside of maybe some CarBot plushies, is all I’d probably get of SC merch. The rest I got from Battle Chest purchases or hand-me-downs.
http s://www.ebay.com/itm/Blizzard-Collectible-Pin-Series-4-Alarak-Starcraft-Heroes-of-the-Storm-/273305093525
I gotchu lol
1 Like
You mean you wish Starcraft was a ‘pay to win’ ?
Even if you bought all the games, all the microtransactions…You’re only spending a few hundred dollars. That’s not a whale. That’s trout. Maybe a walleye.
I want to expand on this point a bit.
I have an ok amount of disposable income that I’d be happy to spend on merchandise, but frankly most of the blizzard gear doesn’t appeal to me. Looking at what’s in the store right now, it’s like 50% clothing (and I don’t wear t-shirts for the most part) and a bunch of posters. The only thing I would buy in this is the BC replica. The Artanis statue is also kind of cool but I’m not into statues of individual characters. I’d buy a Carrier replica too if it was there. Hell, I’d be open to buying mini replicas or figures of whatever cool units they put in there (fat Zerg Leviathan!), especially if they’re less than $100.
What else would I be open to buying? Pins - small, metal, colourful pins of the racial and faction logos, the kind you can put on as an understated decoration on a coat or something. If there was a collection of different faction pins I’d be seriously tempted to buy them all. I’d also be open to stationary, but that’d depend on the design. I’m open to buying the masks too but I’m lukewarm on their current design.
That’s all my preference, but the point is that there’s a lot more variety of merch that could be offered for customers who might not want t-shirts or wall posters. There used to be a bigger variety of merchandise for both SC and Heroes (which is currently like 90% clothes) and it’s possible that it might have sold too slowly for Blizzard’s tastes but over the past 4-ish years I’ve looked at the store page, I’ve struggled to find something I would actually buy.
1 Like
To be honest, in only 2 years playing mobile games (after they announced Diablo Immortal), I’ve spent 500 bucks, much more than what I paid for Starcraft games in 22 years.
I don’t know. Is it bad? Yes. Is it necessary? Well, at least I hope it could have kept this game active longer. Even if I want to use those 500 bucks in Starcraft 2, what are my options?