Gamesindustry.biz is reporting a huge drop in /played time over the past month for World of Warcraft players. From August to September, Xfire users played WoW 18 percent less than the previous month.But it's likely not necessarily because of the oft-delayed 2.2.2-- the drop is probably just the difference between students out of school and in school. Over the summer, students were obviously able to play a lot more with all the freetime they had, but as school starts up again in September, there's more homework and less rep grinding to do. Still, 18 percent is a huge drop-- while school starting up is definitely a big part of it, I wouldn't be surprised if the slowdown in patch releases (even though it's since picked back up again) also had a hand in it.
Though it can't be that big a difference-- both Guild Wars and Silkroad Online (the other two big MMO titles on Xfire) saw similar drops. It'll be interesting to see what happens next month. I wonder if Brewfest (and soon, Hallow's End and 2.3) was able to convince students to take their homework breaks in Azeroth.
[ via Incgamers ]
Subscribe
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
10-09-2007 @ 3:40PM
Sanmiguel said...
Halo 3 imo.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 3:41PM
nate said...
Seriously? This is news? I like that you indicated that it's likely students, but then say IT HAS TO BE PATCH TOO!, and THEN continue on to point out that other MMOs have similar drop-offs.
*slow clap 80s style* Bravo, Wow Insider, bravo.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 3:48PM
Cougar3429 said...
#1 exactly. It is DIRECTLY because of Halo 3. Not a debate.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 3:50PM
token said...
What would make this more worthwhile is to compare the datae to the same month of last year.
I will admit, I am lazy and din't read the original article, but comparing data from last year seems a lot more useful then comparing current numbers to last months.
My opinion anyway...
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 3:52PM
braydn said...
let's not forget that Halo 3 just came out too, so many people probly saved up money for that and stopped playing wow temporarily, i don't care about Halo so it doesn't have any effect on me, but with Halo 3 coming out and school starting back up, of course the numbers are dropping, nothing out of the ordinary at all, totally expected, and it is better for the servers with less people hogging them up causing lag....
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:00PM
Ahoni said...
OMG, a meaningless statistic.
Quick, lets attach some meaning to it.
Its the end of the world. Ooooohhhh nooooooo!
Other reasons for why it dropped 18% ...
The weather was nice.
People went on vacation.
People went back to school.
3 hardcore raiders got laid.
People started new jobs.
Halo3.
Long periods of extended maintenence for all realms.
Patch day crashes.
Need to re-create UI/mods due to patch.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:21PM
Azhural said...
As for me, I am pretty burned out from gaming...I still play, but not as dedicated. Also I sometimes forget to turn on Xfire^^
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:23PM
brett said...
halo3
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:27PM
Arras said...
where is this data coming from? Could it be that they're getting their data from people who aren't running xfire before they run WoW?
and yeah, school work, etc
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:29PM
nailPuppy said...
These are xfire rankings... Thats like webmasters using their Alexa ranking to show how many people visit their website. In a word, pointless.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:32PM
Nails said...
people still play CoD2 that much?
man, i love that game. havent played it in a few months though
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:48PM
Mike said...
My playing time dropped 100%... Just got burned out on it. Buddy of mine plays about half as much now (as a result of me stopping), now his other buddy is playing less as well.... and so on and so on.
So it's really my fault, I just didn't feel like playing anymore, sorry.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:52PM
brent said...
what is xfire?
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 4:53PM
rob.thomas said...
Absolutely Halo 3. Rly? Rly.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 5:26PM
RogueJedi86 said...
I play WoW just as much as before. I just stopped using XFire and went to windowed mode + AIM.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 5:31PM
Freehugz said...
People that use xfire are usually the ones that play alot of different games. There's no real point to having it if you just play wow.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 6:17PM
Jason said...
All the kiddies went back to school. It's as simple as that.
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 6:23PM
TonyMotorola said...
"From August to September, Xfire users played WoW 18 percent less than the previous month."
It happens every single year. It's called 'all the kids that play the game go back to school or the university.'
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 6:51PM
roran said...
wow i cant belive warcraft 3 is up there to althogh i still play it from time to time
Reply
10-09-2007 @ 7:17PM
Pook said...
hmm how about this, 18% of the ppl who play WOW; that had xfire (for god knows what reason) realised it was pointless and no longer run it... hmm that would be the same stats.
Reply