“This happened in BFA too - it’s normal!”
Yeah, using BFA as a benchmark says it all.
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That same Superdata article also says revenue is down 61% and SL is already at the low point of BfA, that isn’t good no matter how you spin it only 6? months into the xpac. And the numbers from China have been never collected so it’s still fair to use these numbers as a measuring stick. The truth is the numbers have been steadily going down and the decline gets faster with every expansion they put out with forced time-gating and daily log in mobile game type systems. Shadowlands is a WoW mobile game, it’s just not on mobile. It’s basically using all the systems mobile games use to try and get it so you have to log in everyday, yet you still accomplish nothing. Storywise there is less content than BfA where you had 6 storylines (6 zones) to go through (if you played both factions). Here it’s 4 storylines (4 zones) and the main storyline is even less interesting because quite frankly everything with the Jailer is dumb and makes no sense at all. Everyone I know has quit playing guild had 100 some people in Legion, now its just me and the 2-3 people who shifted to classic and log into retail maybe once a month to see what’s happening. For me the biggest issue is the absolute vice grip on anima and how it seems like you have to fight to get even the tiniest scrap of it. Which is an issue that could easily be fixed by just adding an anima reward to the daily calling reward chests. Doing the callings now feels forced and even worse than in BfA and for nothing meaningful except the super small chance at gear like once a week when we get the epic chest. Even getting just a couple hundred anima a week from those chests would make the game feel so much more rewarding IMO, but Blizz is absolutely refusing to do it. There is also the issue of Covenants it feels so bad wanting to pick one for looks, transmog, theme etc knowing that picking a different one means you will be hamstringing yourself damage wise or being forced into a power that feels way more awful or clunky than the one in a different covenant. I understand what they were going for giving em all unique abilities but covenants should have been strictly cosmetic.
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Just want to point out that we’re a little over 3 months into the xpac, not 6 
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They’re spending lot of time and resources on dumb temporary systems that nobody asked and nobody likes. They should focus on improving raids/dungeons, tier sets, balance PvP, customization and other stuff that people enjoy and is going to stay forever.
I’m sick of Azerite and Azerite 2.0 grind. Game feels like a second job!
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Yes! and we lose those special abilities with each expansion. Nothing we worked for carries forward. SUCKS
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Yep. Doesn’t make any sense to farm hours and hours for stuff we’re going to lose next year. It’s not fun at all. Idk who designed this system but is NOT working, it’s trash.
But, there is another solution as well.
Using the voice quest addon as an example. If someone managed to create a addon like that ( i think it got stopped because it had to modify the client somehow) there is nothing that stops Blizzard from starting to cooperate with that mod-maker. Blizzard could outsource that system to the mod-maker and let them create that content but with Blizzards approval as long as they deliver a good product.
That way Blizzard would save up lots of resources to put into other parts of the game were resources are needed.
If they can outsource entire games to other companies that delivers a products that’s scored at the bottom of the ratingslists, why can’t they outsource parts of the game content as long as the content fits inside Blizzards own design and meets Blizzards quality demands?
There is other things as well. How many times didn’t we see Blizzard trying to “balance” things ingame and a few hours after patch people like Rextroy uploaded videos on youtube showing ways to break the class / skills design. Why don’t Blizzard have people like Restroy ( for example ) hired to try to break the game in their own test rig and let them work on solving the ever going failure that is class balancing, even before the patch is uploaded to the ptr? Instead they try do add a % dmg buff here and a % dmg nerf here but it really doesn’t solve anything…
Facts don’t matter! Only feelings!! Lawyer guy bad!
It really feels like they are considering alts content at the moment. 4 separate cov stories, lots of one time content, mostly cov stuff, different covs better for different specs of the same class/different content. I don’t mind so much, I don’t feel like my alts will be so far behind, but it doesn’t seem like legitimate content.
A 41% sub drop in 3 months isn’t normal, no matter how hard you try and convince yourself it is.
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That makes it even worse.
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People will only take so much repetitive farming of some “resource” to keep getting small upgrades to their gear. If the only endpoint is when the next MacGuffin comes along to start grinding on, they eventually get tired of the treadmill ad climb off.
Game’s been dying since they demolished the Azeroth we all loved, then started handing out “legendary” items to anyone who farmed raid finder. But the real cancer was the decision to introduce the never ending grinds.
Indeed it does.
It is actually quite normal when you consider that Shadowlands saw a massive subscription spike, more so than previous expansions.
You need to take into context that the larger the spike, the bigger the drop. More people subscribed temporarily than those who intended on staying.
Yeah thats not how % work. The massive subscription spike has nothing to do with a % of players quitting. All that tells you is that everybody who gave wow a 2nd, 3rd or 4th chance. Just left, and/or other players who didn’t quit before quit. Losing almost half your customer base in 3 months is a massive red flag. Most companies go into the red from that.
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It happens literally every expansion.
If World of Warcraft had one million subs, and it shot up to five million after a huge expansion dropped, then dropped 50%, how many subscribers would World of Warcraft have?
If roughly four million people returned to play Shadowlands (I’m assuming), it’s not too far-fetched to think most of them won’t stick around. Blizzard has actually addressed this subscription behavior in the past.
*since WOD
Is not a good defense for you’re bleeding out your playerbase. If that many people quit. Clearly something is wrong. Thats the point. People don’t buy something and then quit if they like it.
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Not even. This has been normal since Mists of Pandaria.
I distinctly remember Cataclysm causing roughly five million subscribers to drop the game, and when Mists of Pandaria released, it shot back up to around 11 million. I only remember this because Mists of Pandaria was so vehemently hated that it drove everybody nuts when it turned out to be a huge hit.
Thats actually an interesting way to do things.