WAR (Warhammer Online)

Here it is from Marc Jacobs on VN boards.. unoficially ofc. However a few pages up there is a hint about surprises later this week. (I suppose an official announcement or somesuch)

http://vnboards.ign.com/warhammer_online_age_of_reckoning_general_board/b22997/109280505/p9

/quote

1) Our retention rate is higher than 70% based on current data. DAoC was indeed 72% in North America. WAR's number is higher and remains higher than DAoC since billing began. I'm quite happy with WAR's numbers as they are exactly what I expected they would be.

2) No retailer has sent back copies of WAR, they are still selling nicely especially considering new games out/coming out, the economy, etc.

3) We opened the amount of servers we thought we would need for the sales volume we expected and opened a few extra to help with initial population load in the starter areas. If we had opened too few, there would have been queues on most servers and people would have been screaming at us (just as they screamed at Blizzard for WoW's initial server queuing). If we could have known the perfect number, we would have done that but we didn't so we took a guess and decided to open more rather than fewer servers. We might have been better off opening fewer (obviously) but we figured we'd be better off erring on the side of making life easier for the players rather than making them queue.

Those are the facts.

Oh, here's another fact FYI. I've never, ever said anything about WAR hitting WoW's numbers or anything like that and since we have already sold more copies of WAR than any other MMO (with the usual caveat of maybe WoW since I don't have their exact numbers) during the first 6 weeks how can I be anything but pleased with that? All my quotes/interviews have always focused on us being #2 as my goal and in terms of initial sales, well, we have met and/or exceeded that goal. In a year we'll really be able to judge how successful WAR is overall.

Mark

/endquote

I suppose this won't stop all the doom trolls from proclaiming that "WAR is dead" "worse off than Vanguard/AoC etc.." or all that nonsense with Xfire. However those with a shred of decency left might think twice before posting such crap again.

Originally posted by markoraos 

I suppose this won't stop all the doom trolls from proclaiming that "WAR is dead" "worse off than Vanguard/AoC etc.." or all that nonsense with Xfire. However those with a shred of decency left might think twice before posting such crap again.

Good information, thanks for the find.  As to doom trolls, I'm starting to think there are people getting paid to say negative things about WAR, even though it has been a completely successful game, with a great launch, from any sane persons viewpoint.  I really wish I could get at the psychology of the WAR hater who spends so much time here dogging it instead of playing a game they actually enjoy. 

Although, to be fair, I did spew some venom at AoC... but that game had it coming for all that instancing and lack of promised content.  Ugh.  Perhaps that is the reasoning... a feeling of betrayal? I don't know.

Oh well, here's to shreds of decency,

 - LC

see the beauty of the internet is that people can say whatever they want even if its a blatent lie. Thus, trolls will never stop.

Originally posted by Frostbite05

see the beauty of the internet is that people can say whatever they want even if its a blatent lie. Thus, trolls will never stop.

LOL. Never has truth been more blatently spoken! 

Originally posted by Frostbite05

Thus, trolls will never stop.

But the more obvious the troll, the more we may mock. :-)

Mark Jacobs fully expected the retention rate to be "Drum roll please"

 70%

In his next whistle stop tour of the forums he'll be providing the lottery numbers next week

/psychic FTW

Originally posted by markoraos

Here it is from Marc Jacobs on VN boards.. unoficially ofc. However a few pages up there is a hint about surprises later this week. (I suppose an official announcement or somesuch)

http://vnboards.ign.com/warhammer_online_age_of_reckoning_general_board/b22997/109280505/p9

 

/quote

1) Our retention rate is higher than 70% based on current data. DAoC was indeed 72% in North America. WAR's number is higher and remains higher than DAoC since billing began. I'm quite happy with WAR's numbers as they are exactly what I expected they would be.

2) No retailer has sent back copies of WAR, they are still selling nicely especially considering new games out/coming out, the economy, etc.

3) We opened the amount of servers we thought we would need for the sales volume we expected and opened a few extra to help with initial population load in the starter areas. If we had opened too few, there would have been queues on most servers and people would have been screaming at us (just as they screamed at Blizzard for WoW's initial server queuing). If we could have known the perfect number, we would have done that but we didn't so we took a guess and decided to open more rather than fewer servers. We might have been better off opening fewer (obviously) but we figured we'd be better off erring on the side of making life easier for the players rather than making them queue.

Those are the facts.

Oh, here's another fact FYI. I've never, ever said anything about WAR hitting WoW's numbers or anything like that and since we have already sold more copies of WAR than any other MMO (with the usual caveat of maybe WoW since I don't have their exact numbers) during the first 6 weeks how can I be anything but pleased with that? All my quotes/interviews have always focused on us being #2 as my goal and in terms of initial sales, well, we have met and/or exceeded that goal. In a year we'll really be able to judge how successful WAR is overall.

Mark

/endquote

I suppose this won't stop all the doom trolls from proclaiming that "WAR is dead" "worse off than Vanguard/AoC etc.." or all that nonsense with Xfire. However those with a shred of decency left might think twice before posting such crap again.

Well, I can't speak for the retention rate but the rest does seem true.

If they didn't open enough servers there would have been queues and people would have complained immensely, as well as the "I tried to give the game a try but couldn't get in so later Mythic" posts.

It is also true that he never stated they would reach WoW numbers and was not aiming for them.

They already announced their expectations are for 250k subscribers awhile ago.  I don't think anyone 'trolls' about that.  We generally 'troll' when posters start saying Warhammer is going to break a million soon or that it made a dent in WOW.   Warhammer was always planned to be a very niche game.

I just don't buy the 'we released too many servers on purpose'.   They had to know that gameplay suffers drastically on low population servers and that average players /played  time drops pretty considerably after the first two weeks.  If they did do it on purpose, it was an unwise decision.   Players rarely complain about a 10 minute queue.. and not nearly as much as we see players complaining about their 'ghost' servers.

Probably the biggest complaint players have right now (and the reason I quit) is that there simply were not enough people in the RvR zones to make it fun.  One part is scenarios, but the other part is just low populations.

Originally posted by Azrile

I just don't buy the 'we released too many servers on purpose'.   They had to know that gameplay suffers drastically on low population servers and that average players /played  time drops pretty considerably after the first two weeks.  If they did do it on purpose, it was an unwise decision.   Players rarely complain about a 10 minute queue.. and not nearly as much as we see players complaining about their 'ghost' servers.

Really? Flip back a few pages in this v