I know WoW in china operated under a completely different business model where you pay by the hour instead of a expansion packs and a monthly subscription
That is true, although as mentioned above the Chinese get their own deal. And Blizzard did get into the 'real gold for virtual goods market' which is quite large. Teasing apart the revenue per subscriber from their reports, talks, and sometimes off hand remarks is very challenging. There is the 'max' rate of $15/month, there are the 'free til level 20' players, there are the 'Yearly Pass' types, and of course there are the pay per hour guys in China and elsewhere in southeast Asia.
So my guesstimate at $10 per was a 'blended' rate. Pessimists seem to put it closer to $7, not sure why though.
Chinese wow enthusiasts can rejoice as they will get to play their favorite MMORPG for another 3 years, thanks to an accord reached between wow creators, Blizzard Entertainment and Netease.com. In an announcement today, both the companies decided to renew the license for mainland China for 3 years following the expiration of current license agreement.
About 5 million of those people are in Asia, where they're paying less money.
Also, in China for example, Blizzard licenced WOW to some other company (The9 ?). I'd be interested to know how much money Blizzard gets from WOW china.
Here's a very old (2005) link with some interesting financials.
That's very minor and IIRC occurred after they had already made a fortune in China.
There were political hurdles and that's why Blizzard partnered with The9, but the market was satisfied enough with the art assets to spend gobs on WoW.
That's only partially true in the case of Activision Blizzard. World of Warcraft has provided them with something that very few gaming companies have ever had: massive, dependable monthly payments.
That has gradually declined of course, over a decade. They still have ~5.6 million paying subscribers to WoW, generate a billion in sales annually from it, and hundreds of millions in profit.
As much as I want to think change will happen, it's much more likely this will be a few weeks of PR and ultimately nothing will change.
For something to change people have to vote with their wallets. In this context that means cancelling subscriptions or dropping games they are already playing in favor for ones by competitors with better integrity, and I don't see that happening.
Diablo players could go to Path of Exile, its closest competitor, but that game is massively invested into China as well and partially owned by Tencent.
Warcraft RTS players represent a small market right now with almost no microtransactions or ongoing revenue.
WoW players have alternatives, but not many I am aware of that aren't heavily Chinese based as the MMORPG category is dominated by Chinese companies like Perfect World.
Starcraft players don't have a lot of alternatives as SC has dominated the esports and highly polished RTS category for over 5 years with the same game. The closest competitor would be Age of Empires or Warhammer, I'm not sure how much influence China has over them, but they are different types of RTS games.
Heroes of the Storm players can go to Dota or LoL. LoL being owned by China and Dota being owned by Valve with strong Chinese market involvement.
World of Warcraft is a monthly fee and has been for 10+ years now. They also charge for major releases. It's incredible how much commercial value the Warcraft brand has generated and how it's been able to do it in light of other games not being able to do so.
Not before Starcraft 2 or World of Warcraft anyway. (And WoW is a six year old game that requires subscription, and Blizz still require you to purchased all previous expansions in order to enjoy the latest xpac, albeit at a lower price)
Why give it for free when people are willing to pay for it?
I know WoW in china operated under a completely different business model where you pay by the hour instead of a expansion packs and a monthly subscription
(no idea about their other games)
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