Every game company with a recurring subscription wants to increase their total number of subscribers. Slowly phasing out prepaid time is a poor guess at Blizzard’s strategy, that seems very unlikely. The cost of prepaid time was increased in Canada because that country is implementing a digital goods tax. Blizzard chose to pass that tax on to consumers and it seems likely that other digital goods providers, like Amazon and Netflix, will do the same. See my post here.
I can’t see that they have “upped the price for all other regions,” I only see announcements AU and CA. AU was paying $11USD/mo and their price hike brings them in line with US and EU at $15USD/mo. Please cite other regional price increases with some source.
Canada’s price hike has to do with taxes Canada implemented–nothing to do with inflation or exchange rates (see response to Bae above).
This is really all you needed to say about a potential US price increase. The implications about other regions having price increases are irrelevant. According to the US CPI Inflation Calculator, $14.99 back in Nov-2004 has the same purchasing power as $20.42 in Nov-2020, so US inflation over 16 years is adequate justification for a US price hike to $20/mo; no other reasons needed.
They would be foolish, imo, to implement a US price hike now rather than wait until the US economy rebounds after Covid inoculations are widely administered. I wouldn’t be surprised if they did something foolish though–look at recent Torghast changes! …or the recent price hikes to AU and CA which also could have waited for economic recovery to some “new-normal.”
Well, no, that’s demonstrably false. Granted it’s “game time” & BNet balance, not subs (yet) but today they went from CAD pricing ~= USD pricing to CAD pricing > USD pricing.
If it meant that Blizz would stop torturing poor furry critters and upgrade their servers then I would gladly pay more, but the Canada change has nothing to do with it.
Assuming it was $5, they’d be pulling in an extra 33% income per month from subs. That could pay for a lot of talent and development. It isn’t just my $5.
If they were going to raise the sub fee, it’d make a lot more sense to do that before the expansion launches, not after it’s launched and players have already seen all the current content.
But yeah, the currency conversion argument is a bit unconvincing when the US dollar’s been sliding for 6 months vs. CAD.
I don’t get how people don’t realise that the $15 Blizzard gets per sub today is $10.61 in 2003 dollars. They’re doing more with less money, for the last 17 YEARS. You want the sub price to stay the same? Well, say hello to more and more things being put into the in-game shop then.
If they actually would put the sub money into making content we wouldnt have repetitive garbage systems that they have to throw something so important that you have to do it.
I’m incredibly cheap, and would not likely to continue my subscription if the rate were an additional $5.00 a month. It was hard to justify the expense as is, not to say I think wow is a lousy game - I’m just cheap. I don’t like paying subscription fees for games, it irks me.
I would likely spend more time in GW2, EverQuest, and Rift to fill my MMO addiction Not nearly as good as WoW, but they scratch the itch.
…or the recent price hikes to AU and CA which also could have waited for economic recovery to some “new-normal.”
Not nearly as good as WoW, but they scratch the itch.