Star Wars: The Old Republic is going to be huge, there’s no doubt about that. But just how big the game’s player base will be at launch, we really can’t say just yet. What we do know is that some 2 Million players signed up for the game’s recent beta test, a staggering turnout to say the least.
This news comes to us by way of Electronic Arts’ CFO Eric Brown who revealed that 2.4 Million people have registered for the Star Wars: The Old Republic fan site, and 2 Million volunteered to do the free beta test over Thanksgiving weekend. This beta test, which was meant to stress test the servers during a busy play time, saw 725,000 unique users during its three-day availability.
Brown also added that during peak hours there were “just over a quarter of a million people playing the game simultaneously.” With the game set to hit right before Christmas, December 20th to be exact, one has to imagine The Old Republic will be playing host to way more users than that during peak hours.
Which begs the question of whether or not the servers will be ready for the onslaught of Star Wars: The Old Republic fans? Sure, this Thanksgiving beta test might have given BioWare and EA a brief picture of what the player base might look like, but that’s typically never the case with these types of launches.
If you remember the launch of World of Warcraft, the biggest premium MMO launch ever, resulted in copies being pulled from store shelves after a wave of simultaneous users crippled the servers. While I can’t imagine The Old Republic’s launch being perfect, I’d like to think that EA learned a thing or two from Blizzard’s example.
If not, BioWare better expect their new customer service center to receive quite the influx of calls, perhaps 2 Million+ calls on Christmas morning.
Do you think that BioWare and EA are prepared for the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic? How many players do you think will be online simultaneously during the game’s first weekend?
Star Wars: The Old Republic releases December 20, 2011 for the PC.
Source: Gamasutra