wow... congrats... I bet 10 Million by December 2007!!

Make sure you run your mouse pointer over the picture in the article on the WoW website.

Where do these extra 1 million keep coming from every few months. I'd be interested if they released demographics.

[edit]

Ah answered my own question:

"The company is currently working with its partner for World of Warcraft in China, The9, to prepare the game's first expansion, World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade™,"

Figures...censorship China.

I would say that the numbers are NOT from North America. Anybody playing on a NA server will tell you that people are leaving faster than they're being replaced. That's what it seems at least.

taken from the original news: -- paste begin World of Warcraft's Subscriber Definition World of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees’ territories are defined along the same rules. -- paste end

Basicaly, anyone that actually pay for the game, and every player from internet cafe (ie: Korea people play in internef cafee, soo pay hourly rate or something ) count toward those number.

Keep in mind tha expansion doesn't release at the same date in every country (China still to come).

i play in a NA server and we do have new people all the time and the server has been running since may 06 i think

I really dont believe. With some titles coming out just before that and with War coming out on ~feb.2008. I dont see how WoW will achieve the 10Mi. Only if they release any Xpack or cool free Raid patches and so on on Nov.Dec.

Only releasing the expansion in China should do the trick

Since the number is raw number of active paid accounts, you must also remember that there must be a huge number of bots among those as well. After all, they need a paid accounts for farming and even for some of the advertising (due to limitations in trial accounts).

@ Intangiblepho208 If not earlier!

Expansion in China should bring the number higher than 10M for sure. Keep in mind that a success in the MMO history usually represent 200-300k user max. That mean unless a game is really more than other MMO, nothing will cause a great hit in the WoW player base.

AoC and WAR, unless they are major breakdown by being 5 or 10 time the size any MMO success generaly attain, won't kill WoW for sure.

Many other MMO are coming, but I really don't see a game that can GET over a few millions really quick. Keep in mind it took time for WoW to become that big, and player base doesn't switch on a dime.

If Blizz would keep to their word...which they never do....we would have a new xpac every year....don't have the link but thats what they said....i know alot of ppl who recently quit because of the ridiculous amount of grindng rep and gold u need to do any thing...5k gold for and epic mount. Jeez thats a lil much. i been playin over 2 years with alota of high lvl toons and all of them together havent seen 5k. but if blizz keeps fresh stuff movin in...which they don't...more ppl would be less likely to quit and that 10 million ppl playing would probly happen fast. Looking forward to Zul'Aman but that in its self is not enough for others. Basically blizz has crushed the "casual" player title. If you can't dedicate 40 hrs a week to rep grinding and raiding (which is damn near impossible on some servers ::cough::BaelgunUS::cough::) you are going nowhere ingame there for you quit..but anyways i know i just QQ all over this..sry...gratz blizz on brain washing a million more of us

9 million, thats amazing.

To the insistent crying about how "so many people are leaving" etc, please. I'm glad to see the old horses go and get some new blood in here. Keeps things fresh and keeps the people entertaining.

The whole Blizzard rep grind takes 40 hours a week, etc, etc. I'm calling shenanigans all around. I am the 'casual' raider. I play when I want and have a life outside of WoW, even playing other games *shock*. I have all the heroic keys now and have raided most of Kara (taking our sweet at our own pace, the way we like it). There is no 40 hours a week, maybe 11 hours on weeks I play a ton (yeah I said it, 11 hours ton of playing time). I did it through helping friends when I was on, to trying once in a while just to do an instance I had not done yet down to just doing some solo quests once in a while. I will add one more time, at the pace I am more than HAPPY with.

Now I diverge a bit and will agree to the 5K being a bit high. It should be around 2.5K - 3K for the mount. The numbers just even out much smoother at that point, 5K is arbitrary and just a random line in the mud.

In closing I will say the most important thing I can say about WoW, "You don't like it? Play another game." There are a ton of them out there and they will gladly take your money. Heck they WANT to take it. Just please stop crying about how horrid the game is while you play, all it does is make my ignore list longer. Finally as always, PEACE!

But not in Germany. The localisation here is aweful, many people quit just because of this.

Can you imagine, someone renames everything while you are playing? It is not acceptable!

All you people whine about those 5k. And those heroics keys, that you need to be a hardcore gamer for Kara and such.

ALL BUT THAT IS TRUE!

Because you dont need to have that epic mount do you? there is a 60% mount that does just fine for my, while im questing my way up with daily's to get some gold every day, while im leveling my alt too.

And you dont need those heroic keys, because why would you want to do heroics? for the improved gear maybe yes, but hey then you need to put some time in. And to be honest, if you do some instance runs for the quest, you are near revered before you know it.

And about the hardcore gaming, thats more untrue than anything. Im a tank, lvl 70 ofc, MT or OT since me and the other tank exchange rolls. both around 12k unbuffed and 490 defense. we dont have epic gear or shiny swords to kill that other, but our whole party has a relaxt aura. we dont do /cry if we dont make it to Netherbane or whatever his name may be, even if we wipe 3 times on Moroes we dont care.

Because the game is designed to have FUN.

Yes fun is what its ment to be, and if you wanna be a hardcore gamer, freak out in heroics about noobs, or keep doing daily's and shitloads of heroics for you gear and whatever those hardcore gamers do, sure do it. but dont forget you need to have FUN.

Yinx.

PS. invite me to a party any time, ill show u fun. /dance ftw.

EDIT: And fyi, they are constant working on new features, like BT, Hyjal, ZUl'Aman, the whole daily system, see about that and think again! you think blizzard can pull extention packs out of thin air? they are humans too!

EDIT2: Good Job Blizzard!

I don't really see WAR as a threat to WoW, maybe I'm being ignorant, but I do think it comes out at a bad time, has too strong focus on hardcore PvP(which while some people think otherwise, in my experience is not what the vast majority of MMO players seeks) and lack polishing at it's current state(I know it is in Beta but EA doesn't have a tremendous history of listening to customer feedback), to beat WoW. It'll certainly be successful, but I don't see it as a "WoW killer".

As many people said, I think having TBC come out in China will help to easily surpass 10 million customers.

MrYinx, you forgot the part where you need to be exalted with 3 different factions just to be able to turn in a token as we are starting to experience in my guild now, after we made our first steps in The Eye.

Sure, we don't 'need' to be able to turn in the tokens, but the tokens were there to make less farming required, and demanding exalted with 3 factions, one of which is a decisive AH faction to grind rep with, seems slightly over the top, don't you think?

I don't care if anyone is going to "kill" WoW, I just want someone to finally make a fun and good MMO

The fact that WoW has 9million subscribes tells you they have to be doing something right? I mean, do we play WoW because its crap? or for the right to whine to blizzard not doing what we want.

Blizzard appeals to all who play WoW, Casual content is great, there is loads to do when you're leveling and after you've peaked at 70. Instances, quests, new items to obtain!

For the raiders, there is a total of 7 raid instances! 7! in TBC alone, and soon to be 8 when Zul'aman is released.

You can't complain if your a raider, raiding is a hardcore past time (except Karazhan anyone can run it) raiding needs dedication, it needs you to spend. Don't complain about raiding, its not meant to be log on, 4 hours work, and hey you got an epic. TBC raiding is as close to perfect as you would want, no bosses are real blocks, or require insane amounts of pots anymore, with the right group setup and good players theres no reason not to progress.