Any observer of the MMO genre knows that gaining traction in an already-packed field of competitors isn’t easy. Apparently that’s even true for a game bearing the Star Wars name. During an EA investor call, the publisher revealed that the number of The Old Republic active subscribers currently sits at 1.3 million. While that number is nothing to scoff at, it confirms that the population base has dropped by 25% since March, despite BioWare‘s previous claims to the contrary.
It’s always difficult to keep a conversation calm and controlled when MMO subscription numbers (and drops) are the issue, especially when World of Warcraft seems to be immune to such trivial matters. The size of the drop itself may surprise some, since just last month BioWare told PC Gamer in an interview that subscription numbers weren’t falling, only the amount of concurrent users during peak times. It’s hard to believe that The Old Republic lost 400,000 subscribers in just over a week, so it’s safe to assume that the decrease was expected to raise a few eyebrows. BioWare’s Daniel Erickson had then said that the team was working to keep users engaged, and the two content packs alluded to in the investor call – the continuing Legacy updates and Allies – are obviously designed to do just that.
While The Old Republic‘s drop to 1.3 million subscribers from the 1.7 million reported in February might be cause for panic, EA and BioWare seem determined to find the positive. According to EA’s Frank Gibeau, it’s the quality of the players who have remained subscribed that the developer and publisher are most pleased with. Gibeau explained that TOR‘s subscription drop is due less to MMO players growing tired, and more to the overwhelming appeal that the Star Wars brand carried among non-MMO gamers.
With names like BioWare and Star Wars attached to the launch of a new online game, it’s a fair assumption that many early subscribers weren’t quite ready for the (some might say too formulaic) MMO nature of gameplay. But those who have stuck around are what Gibeau and BioWare see as “core MMO users,” and they may be right. After all, even Blizzard has acknowledged that many WoW players have left to play TOR. Retaining 75% of everyone brought in by the allure of a Star Wars MMO is a strong start in their eyes, and a point from which the developers can aggressively pursue growth. With the extensive time required to produce fully-voiced class story expansions, let’s hope those “core” users are willing to wait.
Patience may not be the only quality that BioWare and EA will require from their current subscribers, but loyalty as well. With no shortage of promising MMOs, and the WoW expansion Mists of Pandaria set to arrive this calendar year, The Old Republic could have a fight on its hands. Those games may all turn out to be spectacular, but according to Gibeau, all of them lack one thing – lightsabers:
“We are cognizant of competitors coming, but none of them quite fit in the same competitive category as Star Wars. They’re just different fantasies. They’re not the Star Wars fantasy. It’s not the big expansive universe that appeals to so many people worldwide. And as you know with MMOs, every day you’re in operation to get better and better and better. You continually perfect the experience. You continually improve the acquisition component… So building from a base that we’re at right now, we feel very confident that this business is going to continue to stay competitive throughout the remainder of the year.”
It’s hard to argue, especially since the development team has done their best to incorporate as much of the Star Wars lore into the game as possible. But with the emphasis that MMOs place on endgame content for those willing to grind to their heart’s content, there was always going to be a group of Star Wars/Mass Effect/KOTOR fans who jumped ship. Obviously 400,000 in a few months is more than anyone would like to see, so hopefully the team will take that as a sign that more content – and better content – will be the only way to grow the player population.
Regardless of any panic that some might feel, or the host of critics who will take this as a sign that TOR is doomed, there are still over a million subscribers who just want their playtime rewarded with strong content. The Old Republic subscription numbers are still well above the 500,000 needed to turn a profit, but that might change for the better or worse by the end of the year.
Do you think BioWare is too confident in their ability to grow the game from those already hooked? If you played early and stopped subscribing, what changes could the developers make to get your attention once again?
Star Wars: The Old Republic is available now for the PC.
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Follow me on Twitter @andrew_dyce.
Source: EA, PC Gamer, Eurogamer
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Every MMO learns the hard way: it’s keeping them that’s 90% of the job.
This does not surprise me. BioWare didn’t really bring anything new or innovative to the table with TOR. It was to much like WOW for my taste, hope that Guild Wars 2 or Secret World bring a new experience to MMO’s.
Knew this was going to happen sooner or later, just thought it was going to be later.
If they didn’t have that damn subscription I bet that would happen (as severely).
It seems like MMO is an already flooded market, and I think they should have just made a actual 3rd KOTOR.
i played from the new year and quit just after 1.2, i only pvp and it was a hell grind the more u played the better your gear by earning comps, u couldn’t keep up wit hour or so a day, az opposed to wow with arenas for conquest points cap, so u just had noob pvpers in highest tier gear that didnt even know there class. i had full bm gear and could easyily get the next tier, but why? took far to much off my time
I quit swtor, for now at least. I was lvl 34 and it just felt really monotonous for me. There just isn’t enough to mix it up, and the quests are pretty all the same format. I figured I’ll cancel my subscription now and pick it back up when the game improves. No point in wasting money.
I lasted about three weeks myself. Boring gameplay combined with total linear experience, hurt it. And it was essentially a single-player game, but a very basic one.
If there was proper, open-universe space flight where peeps can share and walk around a small ship, I’d still play.
I wish they’d done an actual KOTOR 3 and not as an mmo….
Bioware could just have easily made this a console game, and the warzones and flashpoints could have been multiplayer, with a lobby simmilar to call of duty, or halo 3
I played SWTOR, hit level 50, completed everything in less than a month, stopped playing. Patch 1.2 came out, i went back bought subscription, then got 30 days free, making my total 90 days of gametime. I Still have half of that left, and the last time i logged in, was during the world event, which bored the hell out of me. PVP has no goal to it anymore, because of the reward system being changed the loosing team just leaves.
SWTOR is a time bomb, and its failure will come sooner rather than later i think
I’ve been playing since the beta weekend in october, but now I’m just waiting for it to go f2p. I’m thinking about unsubbing for now, especially after I pre-ordered Guild Wars 2. Patch 1.2 sort of killed the game for me.
Completely unsurprised.
they tried to be basically a wow clone with lightsabers
but the game was too easy
not enough end game content
pvp got old
etc etc
But I didn’t expect more anyway with EA having their fingers in the pie. EA kills games with their influence ( example early mass effect games and dragon age origins compared to like ME3 and DA2.. EA forced Bioware to rush the games and thus they sucked )
Hahaha! When will these marketing guys finally understand that lying is bad marketing?
Truth is… SWTOR lacks balls.
It has been developed by a bunch of wimps who thought that taking an already established franchise and tossing in a stale gameplay, while retreating behind the “everybody wants to wield a lightsaber” argument, would readily cash in.
SWTOR is a decent game, but decent is not good enough.
All MMOs want to jump into the MMO subscription model right off the bat and in my opinion, that’s their doom. This is the benchmark that everyone sets for an MMO to be successful. It doesn’t matter if it has better graphics, better storyline or whatever, most players (and if you look at total subscription numbers, the majority of them are already signed up to wow) are not willing to commit until the game is established, based on subscription numbers. so it’s a chicken and an egg thing and unfortunately, even if a game potentially has better all around quality than wow, it seems to be doomed right from the start. No one has the luxury anymore of keeping subscribers around while the game adds more content, cause the competition is too high.
EA and Bioware or any new comer for that matter, need to think outside the box and if they think they have a better game with more to come, then don’t get sucked into the subscription game, cause they won’t win that war.
Before it’s too late, introduce a new system, something like Pay-Per-Day, 50c a day or something like that. You made your money already on game sales, make the game free to download. That’s how you attract more players into the game, especially those already committed for months at a time with wow. A lot of people I talked to don’t want to have two subscriptions going to two diff games, so they’re willing to stay with wow, until they see another game establishes itself as a potential alternative with better game experience.
Just to point out, the games forum moderators are currently deleting posts left, right and center to hide the backlash fans are starting.