NCSoft removed the subscription numbers from all their games in their quarterly reports, so there are no uptodate numbers. Last ones we had were around 125,000-130,000. The sales/profits of CoH in the reports have remained mostly constant since that time, I believe.
Always remember, we were Heroes.
<Puts hand up>
Me
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"Chew Electric Death, Snarling Cur!"
This site is great for just those types of questions. MMO Charts
Hmmm so Tabula Rasa was around 70,000 subs (at first view) when it went under.
Say we were around 125,000 subs around the end of 2008.
Let's be generous and say we lost 1,000 accounts from PvP and lose another 3,000 to the recent events. That would put us around 110,000 or at worst 100,000 subs.
Still not enough to shut down any servers, I'd think.
Questions about the game, either side? /t @Neuronia or @Neuronium, with your queries!
168760: A Death in the Gish. 3 missions, 1-14. Easy to solo.
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Champion, Pinnacle, Virtue Heroes
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Hmmm so Tabula Rasa was around 70,000 subs (at first view) when it went under.
Say we were around 125,000 subs around the end of 2008.
Let's be generous and say we lost 1,000 accounts from PvP and lose another 3,000 to the recent events. That would put us around 110,000 or at worst 100,000 subs.
Still not enough to shut down any servers, I'd think.
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Your not taking into consideration that subscriber increase when I14 came out. I see a lot more people in the game since I14 went live and I believe that number more than compensates for the few people that left. So I think the number of subs is up from 125,000.
Yeah, the increase in advertising, the availablity on Steam, the new box in the shops, the expansion announcement... all should result in an (at least temporary) surge.
Always remember, we were Heroes.
Does the increased cost of advertising affect the amount of subscriptions needed to keep the game going?
Well MMO Charts is a bit out of date. Here is a rough back of the envelope calculation.
Looking at the first quarter report from NCSoft. First they didn't list number of active accounts or daily population of any of their games, just income numbers per game.
Looking at income from 1Q08, 4Q08 and 1Q09. The amount is in millions of Korean Won.
1Q08 -- 5,164
4Q08 -- 6,865
1Q09 -- 6,837
Adjusting the 1Q09 into US dollars that's approximately $5.5 million dollars for the quarter. At $15 a month that's roughly 120,000 accounts. Bulk time purchases being cheaper per month would raise that number, income from $10 add on packs would lower it.
Edit: Found a historic currency converter site. Using the average conversion rate for that quarter I get these numbers.
1Q08 -- $5.4 million ~ 120,000 active accounts
4Q09 -- $5.0 million ~ 111,000 active accounts
1Q09 -- $4.8 million ~ 106,000 active accounts
Well that isn't looking good. Explains why they might have started advertising.
Father Xmas - Level 50 Ice/Ice Tanker - Victory
$725 and $1350 parts lists --- My guide to computer components
Tempus unum hominem manet
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This site is great for just those types of questions. MMO Charts
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Unfortunately, this website hasn't been updated in over a year 
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Well MMO Charts is a bit out of date. Here is a rough back of the envelope calculation.
Looking at the first quarter report from NCSoft. First they didn't list number of active accounts or daily population of any of their games, just income numbers per game.
Looking at income from 1Q08, 4Q08 and 1Q09. The amount is in millions of Korean Won.
1Q08 -- 5,164
4Q08 -- 6,865
1Q09 -- 6,837
Adjusting the 1Q09 into US dollars that's approximately $5.5 million dollars for the quarter. At $15 a month that's roughly 120,000 accounts. Bulk time purchases being cheaper per month would raise that number, income from $10 add on packs would lower it.
Edit: Found a historic currency converter site. Using the average conversion rate for that quarter I get these numbers.
1Q08 -- $5.4 million ~ 120,000 active accounts
4Q09 -- $5.0 million ~ 111,000 active accounts
1Q09 -- $4.8 million ~ 106,000 active accounts
Well that isn't looking good. Explains why they might have started advertising.
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So if those numbers are right subscriptions in 1st Q 09 would actually be less since the magic pack came out then and ii think it had to be the most popular of the add on packs.
You would think that would mean they would worry about people like me and some of my friends with multiple accounts that all unsubed, but meh i guess not.
The numbers are first quarter, ending in March. This was before the Magic Pack was even released. It arrived the same time as AE, mid April.
The Mac edition did come out 1st quarter.
Father Xmas - Level 50 Ice/Ice Tanker - Victory
$725 and $1350 parts lists --- My guide to computer components
Tempus unum hominem manet
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Hmmm so Tabula Rasa was around 70,000 subs (at first view) when it went under.
Say we were around 125,000 subs around the end of 2008.
Let's be generous and say we lost 1,000 accounts from PvP and lose another 3,000 to the recent events. That would put us around 110,000 or at worst 100,000 subs.
Still not enough to shut down any servers, I'd think.
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... And I kept hearing smaller numbers for TR.
Don't forget they'd made massive investment into it that just plain wasn't getting any sort of return - the drop it kept showing wouldn't have helped it make any of that back.
COH, on the other hand, has five years of history. Initial investment - paid off, quite likely. Even current investment has a healthy base behind it.
FWIW, I highly doubt we lost 3000 to "the recent events." I'd be surprised if the number were in the hundreds.
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Well that isn't looking good. Explains why they might have started advertising.
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Er, new studio, more investment, new features with MA, upcoming expansion, upcoming competition... I'd say there's more than one bit of "why they might have started advertising."
So I see these kinda posts from time to time and am just wondering - with all due respect - why are you wondering?
If you work for the company or something I guess you'd wanna know this kinda stuff. But then you work for the company, so I think you'd have more access to this kinda info than we civvies.
Is it just curiosity? Are you afraid the game will shut down and we won't be notified until we try to log on, and can't?
I'm about as curious a customer as anybody else, but there are other heroes in Paragon City when I log in.
For me anyway, case closed.
Again, serious question, no snark intended, but Why do you care?
I believe this was stated in my original post with "just curious." I believe the game will continue on for a long time to come, barring anything unforeseen. My curiosity stems from a personal hobby of attaining knowledge. Anything I don't know for sure, I like to find out. If I sat back and bit my tongue and never got the question out, I'd likely have gone insane. 
My Virtue Projects
AE: 38959 - Invasion of the Dark Realm
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Well MMO Charts is a bit out of date. Here is a rough back of the envelope calculation.
Looking at the first quarter report from NCSoft. First they didn't list number of active accounts or daily population of any of their games, just income numbers per game.
Looking at income from 1Q08, 4Q08 and 1Q09. The amount is in millions of Korean Won.
1Q08 -- 5,164
4Q08 -- 6,865
1Q09 -- 6,837
Adjusting the 1Q09 into US dollars that's approximately $5.5 million dollars for the quarter. At $15 a month that's roughly 120,000 accounts. Bulk time purchases being cheaper per month would raise that number, income from $10 add on packs would lower it.
Edit: Found a historic currency converter site. Using the average conversion rate for that quarter I get these numbers.
1Q08 -- $5.4 million ~ 120,000 active accounts
4Q09 -- $5.0 million ~ 111,000 active accounts
1Q09 -- $4.8 million ~ 106,000 active accounts
Well that isn't looking good. Explains why they might have started advertising.
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I'm sure that is why they did start advertising. You can see that they lost over 10k accounts over the pvp thing...1Q was right before I 12 and by the 4Q you had Issue 13 on the horizon. That and they decided to increase slots so people with multiple accounts cut down to 1 maybe 2.
I'd hazard a guess that they are going to lose another 10K accounts given the current status of the things going on in game and on the boards. I know they are losing 6 when my husband and I leave and that will happen shortly. The nerfs and censorship is more than we can take.
You'd think given the fact that there is another Hero MMO about to launch they would think twice about upsetting the player base like they have.
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I'd hazard a guess that they are going to lose another 10K accounts given the current status of the things going on in game and on the boards. I know they are losing 6 when my husband and I leave and that will happen shortly. The nerfs and censorship is more than we can take.
You'd think given the fact that there is another Hero MMO about to launch they would think twice about upsetting the player base like they have.
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Your deluding yourself if you think a handful of whiners leaving over the MA exploits getting fixed is upsetting the playerbase. ED was a bigger deal than this.
As for leaving for the other game, once you (generic you) see how crappy it is you'll all be back. The only way you'll get people to consider you're serious about not returning is if you delete all your characters. Leaving the characters on the account tells me that the quitters want to keep their options open so they don't have to start over from scratch when they return.
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You'd think given the fact that there is another Hero MMO about to launch they would think twice about upsetting the player base like they have.
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There are some loud people drinking the Kool-Aid. Can be dangerous for the Devs to listen to them.
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Looking at the first quarter report from NCSoft. First they didn't list number of active accounts or daily population of any of their games, just income numbers per game.
Looking at income from 1Q08, 4Q08 and 1Q09. The amount is in millions of Korean Won.
1Q08 -- 5,164
4Q08 -- 6,865
1Q09 -- 6,837
Adjusting the 1Q09 into US dollars that's approximately $5.5 million dollars for the quarter. At $15 a month that's roughly 120,000 accounts. Bulk time purchases being cheaper per month would raise that number, income from $10 add on packs would lower it.
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This thread got me interested in the topic for a second time -- last time my search-fu skills were weak, but THIS time I managed to find what I think is the same nifty PDF file with colored charts -- on page 5 there are the same numbers FatherXmas used:
NCSoft Quarterly Reports
My question is, as that page is titled "Sales Breakdown," is that actual copies of the games SOLD? Actual copies sold plus monthly fees? Just monthly fees? How can we tell? And how come annual/quarterly reports always tend to be vague? (And of course, I'm curious about what "excluding royalty" means, exactly.)
Meanwhile, over on page 8, EVERYTHING first quarter '09 looks amazingly higher than it did the previous quarters..."net income" is up over 300%?! Looks like they're doing something right somewhere -- but what?
"But it wasn't anything some purples and oranges and lots of screaming in fear couldn't handle." -- Werner
30 level 50's: 12 scrappers, 7 other random melee types, 11 blaster/blapper/support squishies, two accounts, and a TON of altitis since 4/28/04
It should be noted that the above link doesn't function (at least on Firefox) unless you change .net to .com
-Rachel-
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It should be noted that the above link doesn't function (at least on Firefox) unless you change .net to .com
-Rachel-
[/ QUOTE ]Rachel: might be something in your installation. It worked fine for me as .net, with Firefox 3. But if it doesn't work for someone else, that's a good tip to try.
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I'd hazard a guess that they are going to lose another 10K accounts given the current status of the things going on in game and on the boards. I know they are losing 6 when my husband and I leave and that will happen shortly. The nerfs and censorship is more than we can take.
You'd think given the fact that there is another Hero MMO about to launch they would think twice about upsetting the player base like they have.
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Your deluding yourself if you think a handful of whiners leaving over the MA exploits getting fixed is upsetting the playerbase. ED was a bigger deal than this.
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Yes Forbin, but it wasn't just the whiners about an exploit being removed that left. The Lead Designer's "whoops, we didn't do enough testing before we rushed this live and missed something huge but now it's fixed. Stop looking for bugs and play MY game the way I envisioned it with rainbows and unicorns or leave and you can go to hell for all I care" speech offended many more people (including some I heard of who didn't even use the 'exploit') and they left out of principle of a lead designer not giving a crap about his subscribers for anything more than their monthly fee.
10 50's To Date! Check out Titan Sentinel; it got my CoH presence synced online
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I'd hazard a guess that they are going to lose another 10K accounts given the current status of the things going on in game and on the boards. I know they are losing 6 when my husband and I leave and that will happen shortly. The nerfs and censorship is more than we can take.
You'd think given the fact that there is another Hero MMO about to launch they would think twice about upsetting the player base like they have.
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Your deluding yourself if you think a handful of whiners leaving over the MA exploits getting fixed is upsetting the playerbase. ED was a bigger deal than this.
As for leaving for the other game, once you (generic you) see how crappy it is you'll all be back. The only way you'll get people to consider you're serious about not returning is if you delete all your characters. Leaving the characters on the account tells me that the quitters want to keep their options open so they don't have to start over from scratch when they return.
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Funny you would be surprised to know how many people who weren't even affected by the bans have unsubed because of the way this was handled, add that to those who were baned. Me and many people i know have unsubed and we all have multiple accounts. In regards to keeping the toons i know many people who are giving away their stuff (billions btw) even their whole accounts since they are paid up. I am leaving my option open hoping that the leadership direction will change.
Is this information available anywhere and, if so, where? Just curious about the numbers currently when compared to past key periods (namely issue releases). I've played since Feb. '08 and the player base seems as stable and now as it did then, IME, but real numbers would help confirm this.
My Virtue Projects
AE: 38959 - Invasion of the Dark Realm