Now that Game Update 1.2 is here, the big question that everyone is asking is “Was it worth the wait?” I suppose a good secondary question would also be “Will it bring subscribers back?”
Gaming Target said prior to the release of 1.2 that they thought the big game update might cause SWTOR to reach one million paying subscriptions. With 1.2 and future update promises, will it be enough to keep that many players hooked?
SWTOR, like Blizzard’s dominate World of WarCraft, has the potential to be “a successful long-term online subscription PC game,” according to the report. This is due in part to the high-profile Star Wars name, the game’s massive budget and the regular DLC drops including next month’s SWTOR Game Update 1.2. This has been the right mixture to hook subscribers, who are paying upwards of $15 a month for access to the game.
“The current trend among large massively multiplayer online games is to have strong initial sales, after which users quickly lose interest and are not converted to long-term paying subscribers.” said DFC Intelligence analyst Jeremy Miller. This is in sharp contrast to the highly successful Activision Blizzard game World of Warcraft, which has maintained a large subscriber base since its release in 2004.
The story by Gaming Target was based on a study of survey data of over 4,000 Xfire users from December 20, 2011, which was SWTOR’s release date, to February 20, 2012, two months after its launch.
Gaming Target reports:
Despite the short amount of time, DFC Intelligence defines a long-term subscriber as someone who pays for over six months – even though the game had been out for a third of that time. With that said, the report cautions that the data is still preliminary given the newness of SWTOR. Expect DFC Intelligence and Xfire to be back with more SWTOR stats because, as Miller says, “the next three to six months will be critical to determine if the game can attract a large and sustained paying subscriber base.”
So now that 1.2 is here, will this prediction ring true? While a lot of people are thrilled with 1.2 and the future updates that are promised in 1.3 and beyond, there are some players who are let down. At least 3 from my guild last night said they will probably be unsubscribing now- that they were hanging on for 1.2 and they’re not happy with it.
Some players are saying that big things were promised in 1.2 and not delivered on and for this reason, they’re leaving the game. Still others are coming back after hiatus to see if 1.2 is worth keeping their subs alive so maybe they will counter-balance the ones who are leaving.
What do you think? Will SWTOR reach 1 million subscribers and will game update 1.2 help them do it?
Are you happy with 1.2 or are you one of the ones feeling let down?
