The X-Fire Game: Charts for March 20th

Not much to say as we get this weeks numbers underway.

The only thing I can note is that Final Fantasy XIV will be hurting pretty bad due to a shutdown that took place this past week because of the Japanese disaster. Rift has been smacked this past week with a pretty nasty authentication and hacking bug which could affect numbers as well. Otherwise, good weather and several major sport events on TV may also have some effect on gaming time.

Lets get started then and see the results...

1. Rift -  4912 ( 4968 ↓ )
2. EvE Online -  1988 ( 2090 ↓ )
3. Lord of the Rings Online -  1977 ( 2003 ↓ )
4. Aion -  1948 ( 1995 ↓ )
5. Dungeons & Dragons Online -  401 ( 415 ↓ )
6. Star Trek Online - 304 ( 350 ↓ )
7. Champions Online -  304 ( 349 ↓ )
8. Age of Conan -  275 ( 297 ↓ )
9. Warhammer Online -  164 ( 178 ↓ )
10. DC Universe - 75 ( 100 ↓ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV -  0 ( <28> 129 ↓ )

I think this chart deserves a quote I read on the Rift forums which explains how much people will enjoy Rift...

"There seems to only be two kinds of people that don't like Rift.
Those that think it is too much like WoW
And those that think it is not enough like WoW.
Everyone else loves it =D"

I think we can see how that is still holding up as we wind down into the final week of the free 30 days for Rift. Numbers are still high (though down a touch), and when I look at the Shard population charts, the servers still hit queues during peak play times. Like I said, one more week and we should then be able to see how successful Rift is in retention.

As I noted at the beginning, typical of warmer weather and event driven weekends...EVERYONE was down a bit. This always happens. As a matter of fact, all the numbers were so minimally impacted, there is nothing much to say here.

Of course, looking at FFXIV, we can see what happens when you shut off ALL game access. I kept their last week numbers and then the numbers from last full operations. This way come next week, hopefully servers will be back and we can note any major impact (I have not read any reports yet of when we may see the servers come back yet as well.)

...

1. Rift - 3764 ( 4015 ↓ ) players
2. EvE Online - 958 ( 1092 ↓ ) 
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 949 ( 918 ↑ )
4. Aion - 532 ( 535 ↓ )
5. Champions Online - 285 ( 293 ↓ )
6. DC Universe - 212 ( 203 ↑ )
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 296 ( 258 ↑ )
8. Star Trek Online - 113 ( 100 ↑  )
9. Age of Conan - 89 ( 99 ↓ )
10. Warhammer Online - 67 ( 85 ↓ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV - 0 ( <35>178 ↓ )

Raptr likes to play with my charts in a most "sucky" way (yea, thats official chart lingo...EAT IT). It is bizarre how the numbers go up and down for games in a way that makes following games difficult. I can only assume either new players jump into Raptr or the average player who uses Raptr jumps from game to game...hard to say.

Lets see what took place this weekend.

Rift takes a bizarre dive here. While X-Fire shows a minimal drop, which is perfectly normal...Raptr says "screw it" and has a downward spiral, that would normally look ugly. I will see how next week fares. But, like I said...Raptr is bizarro land in stats.

As an example of Bizarro, LOTRO has a spike. Uh...why? No major event, or anything happening to explain it (especially when most games were down).  Or how about DDO and DCUO being up? How weird. And even Star Trek Online shows a minor boost. Raptr is just all over the map.

FFXIV....at least shows Zero. Never know...

...

Ok, on to our game of the week special. As noted previously, our game is World of Warcraft until the 30 day free time is up for Rift. How did they fare yesterday?

WoW = Xfire 36248 (36510 ↓)


Still going down? Not a lot, but a bit of a small nudge that makes me wonder how WoW will fare after the 30 days are up.


The downward move has been consistent, and it could be a sign, or just a blip. Still tracking and reporting how this pans out.


...
And thus, another week. This time around, we see the effects of better weather and sporting events on TV, etc having an effect on our games.


I am still leery about Raptr as a tracking service. Today really stands out to me, as the bizarre turn of numbers has me questioning the results. Why would games that should be looking downward or at least stable be spiking like they are? As to Rift, it could be a client versus client issue. Raptr could be giving issues for people running it? Hard to say. I mean, I expect drops...but, when X-Fire shows the gradual change, while Raptr has a bizarre loss...It seems weird.


I will keep an eye on it.


Anyways, that is it for today. Stay tuned, as next week the wrecking ball called "30 days are up" will be hitting. How much of Rift will be left standing?


Cheers