Spectator Sport: Warhammer Online

Due to the nature of watching the rankings on MMO's, I have what I like to call "speed dial" for the various forums and blogs of the MMO's I track. It is interesting to see the views of different players as I rank their games on the tracking services. Whether they be a standard supporter, forum troll, or fanboi blog, the discussion is ripe for commentary.

Today I will be starting a small series called "Spectator Sports" and present a rundown on what is happening in the forum/bloggo land of various MMO's.

My first victim is: Warhammer Online.

Personally, I think this is the most needed game discussion we should start with.

Something happened in 2010 for WAR and the Mythic/Bioware based team. It was simple at first. Talk of hacked accounts, which happens in most MMO's, started the wheels turning. Then a massive billing issue which lead to a large fiasco for almost 3 months. Players were hurt by large charges applied to their credit cards...even players who were not subbed were struck by large charges and overdraft issues.

Time went on and then news struck of people being let go, including Josh Drescher (who seemed thorougly surprised by this, stating on Twitter "Not EXACTLY how I expected the day to start: As of 11:00 AM today, I am no longer an employee of EA Mythic."
This continued as news that Games Workshop was suing a fan site, Warhammer Alliance for misuse of their logos and product...(which is fine, as the site was using the IP to make money, but does not look good to a standard player).

Then came EALouse. Truth? Fiction? Hard to say. What we do know is in the consumers eye, it creates a disturbance. I will let you read the blog, on the off chance you actually missed this and make up your own mind.

Around two months ago, Mythic released patch 1.4. A much discussed, but controversial patch for WAR. Due to the fact that at the same time as this patch hit, RvR packs were introduced. RvR packs were "Micro-transaction" items like extra levels and more.
Riots ensued. Talk of "buying level ups" and using an items style store while still charging full price caused a clamor in the community. Based on the various tracking services, player retention fell. Discussion of empty servers was bandied about on the forums.

The domino effect was felt throughout the community. The standard monthly producers letter disappeared. The chatter and excitement felt by the Game Director, Carrie Gouskos, and Community Manager Andy Belford disappeared from their Twitter, to the point that WAR is not even mentioned anymore by them.
Fan blogs, a huge staple for the Mythic community, started to close up shop. The rhetoric by various blog posters seem to ask;  "Where is Mythic?" 

This leads us to today. How is WAR holding up?

If we look at the forums, we see many a disgruntled player and troll. When your largest thread is about another game (Rift vs Warhammer) or posts ask "What is Mythic doing" or Why doesn't your Game Director ever post on the forum (Why Doesn't Carrie ever post here), something must be amiss.

Don't even think to head to an offsite forum (like MMORPG.com)...scary.

Lets see how bloggers are talking...

VAN HEMLOCK writes "All in all, I get a feel that the Warhammer Online forums are a somewhat darker place than the other forums I’ve visited so far, and complaints of being ignored and poor communication seem commonplace."

Bootae notes "You just have to look at all the WAR bloggers that are just treading water (if they’re posting about WAR at all) because there is quite simply nothing to write about other than concerns or total flights of fancy. Those flights of fancy these days are just asking to be laughed at and it gets boring writing negative stuff; we want to have exciting things to ponder on, clues and gossip to debate. Unfortunately at the moment it’s a bit flat and the only people that can change that are Mythic."

backseatdev says "The game no longer appears to be growing in content and hasn’t really in a long time. Very small updates released many months apart are mainly just fixes and everything seems to point towards nothing even remotely subtantial in the works.... don’t know what Mythic’s answer will be, but as a player, I feel like I need to help manage their expectations that people will keep paying subscription fees for a game that isn’t living up to a subscription fee model. Hands up, how many people feel like they got a full $45 boxed games worth of features every 3 months from Warhammer Online? It is time for a change."

So, as we "Spectate" here, how is Mythic managing their expectations of their audience? Where is WAR headed?

Comment away!!!

Rift the Champion of Raptr and X-Fire

Today I am taking a quick look at Champions Online and Rift in Raptr and X-Fire. Rift worked specifically in Raptr for tracking players. Champions Online has both Raptr and X-Fire player listings. X-Fire has been having issues with the client data from CO, but luckily it came back with a bang.

Rift launched it's "Try before you Buy" beta yesterday. I wanted to see how that affects player numbers using Raptr. Rift's beta launch was quite rocky Tuesday, but for good reason. The amount of keys that went out and the fact that 25 users could then use one of those keys, meant we should see some good activity.

Raptr had 753 players in Rift yesterday. According to my chart from Monday, that would ensconce Rift in 4th place. Now, even though it would place well versus Monday, I wondered how our top games were doing on the 25th versus Rift? LOTRO had 869 players. EvE had 1041. DC Universe had 1165. So, EvE moved up, but overall, roughly all in the same spots.

This does prove to be interesting to look at.

EvE was not affected by Rift play, but it looks like LOTRO was. Same genre, thus same player with interests. LOTRO's drop was significant from Monday. Bet quite a few are testing the waters.

DCUO also fell, and for good reason, which we will see soon.

Overall, I feel Raptr is giving some VERY good data on trends. Also, this is a good sign for Rift overall. We will see how Wednesday does for charting. Check my Twitter for those numbers tomorrow.

Another "launch" of sorts is Champions Online. The 25th marked it's change to Free to Play. Both Raptr and X-Fire showed some interesting data.

X-Fire: CO - 535 Players

Now if we compare that to the last known data for X-Fire and Champions, they were hitting roughly 86 players. That is a huge upswing. Should be interesting to track CO now and see how this affects City of Heroes and DC Universe on our Monday chart.

For Raptr, Champions also showed a massive surge.

Raptr: CO - 686 Players

Compared to the Monday chart, which had CO at 161 players, this boost was quite significant. As time progresses, it will be interesting to see how well CO retains it's new player base, and if it will grow or shrink.

In conclusion, Rift pulled in quite a few tourists and could be a great launch, numbers wise. I will be more interested to see how these numbers hold up for the next day. As well, I REALLY want to see a Sunday ranking for Rift (weekender beta) and see how the numbers roll.

As to Champions Online, it has proven that free to play is the new market...and that any game that is on its last legs needs to explore this F2P system before shutting down for good.

Cheers

Polling in all the wrong places

Since my main goal is to work on gaining various sources of data to track rankings of specific MMO's, I want to see another avenue of data and how it holds up to our main "game" of tracking.
Using my standard chart, I headed on over to MMORPG.COM and decided to check out some numbers there using their ratings poll.

MMORPG.COM uses a readers rating system to poll players on their favorite games. I thought to myself...how would our chart look if I took the rating system used HERE and see how our chart would compare to how much the games are played on the X-Fire and Raptr services..

Lets take a gander.

MMORPG.COM User Ratings

1. DC Universe - 8.34 (124 Votes)
2. Lord of the Rings Online - 8.25 (3659 votes)
3. EvE Online - 8.25 (7235 votes)
4. Warhammer Online - 8.23 (1963 votes)
5. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 8.11 (1034 votes)
6. Age of Conan - 7.97 (2145 votes)
7. Aion - 7.81 (677 votes)
8. Champions Online - 7.75 (257 votes)
9. Star Trek Online - 6.57 (386 Votes)
10. Final Fantasy XIV - 6.28 (272 votes)

Personally, I think there is a bit more of a bias when you use something like MMORPG, due to the fact that people who just really hate a game or even the developer, can skew the numbers by voting a 1 on any game they choose. Whether they have played or not.

But, I also think we can get a view of what IS popular, and see how it holds up versus their rivals.

Thanks to DC Universe being so new...players will not be so jaded here. Ranking at the top makes sense. New launch, new fun, equals players being happy.
And as we can see, DCUO ranks well across the board both here and in Raptr. This will change over time though as more votes come in (and the 30 days free goes away).

Holding up the next two spots is Deja Vu.

LOTRO and EvE both holding the top ratings here. Also note the number of votes. This proves interesting and I will look at that later in this post.

Look at that. WAR holds up well when being reviewed by players. High vote count and great reviews. So, then why are so many people not playing anymore? I assume a huge skew from launch of people who REALLY wanted an RvR game, and throwing 10's at it due to the players need for PvP.

Moving down the list a little, Aion seems to hold a VERY low spot here. Again, I feel a huge skew due to players voting, even after just 30 days and throwing it off balance. Also, I smell an Anti-NCSoft voting group keeping Aion down.

Finally, at the bottom is FFXIV. This holds up to X-Fire ratings. It also meshes with overall reviews of the game from various news sites and bloggers who have played.

Now, of note, if we look at the games ranked on their VOTES instead of their ranking, we may see something different. Lets check that out.

MMORPG.COM User Ratings by Votes

1. EvE Online - (7235 votes) 8.25 
2. Lord of the Rings Online - (3659 votes) 8.25 
3. Age of Conan - (2145 votes) 7.97 
4. Warhammer Online - (1963 votes) 8.23 
5. Dungeons & Dragons Online - (1034 votes) 8.11
6. Aion - (677 votes) 7.81 
7. Star Trek Online - (386 Votes) 6.57 
8. Final Fantasy XIV - (272 votes) 6.28 
9. Champions Online - (257 votes) 7.75 
10. DC Universe - (124 Votes) 8.34 

Something happens here. We see how certain games garner a larger audience who feel compelled to have their say about the games they enjoy (or hate even).

EvE and LOTRO are back at the top, but EvE seems to garner a more committed audience.  But, even more compelling is the audience structure of Age of Conan. It seems the divide of players here who ran to MMORPG to vote, helps skew this game much lower in ratings. 

So many felt the need to voice their opinion of AoC it seems.

Aion for having so few votes, strikes me as odd of how it ranks here.  I am almost compelled to believe that the audience for that particular game do not frequent MMORPG, thus the opinion skews lower.

STO ranking higher than Champions has been what I have deduced from the X-Fire game.

Of course, DCUO ranking so low here makes sense. I expect that number to grow over time.

Overall, we continue to get a sense of how well loved EvE and LOTRO are. This holds up well across all ranking systems. But, as we may have seen from our previous poll from FFXIV, it may actually be region specific.

Alright, thats enough for now.

Tomorrow we will visit with the Rift beta from Raptr.

Cheers

X-Fire Game: Raptr joins the bunch

Todays report will start a new era of TWO data points for our charting.

Raptr will be tracked to show the top games in it's respective listings.

In case you do not know, Raptr is a tracking service similar to X-Fire. It has a fewer features, but is less intrusive in most games, and has better tracking abilities for players (more compatibility with some games mostly).

Due to not being able to see player listings for World of Warcraft in Raptr (as the service tracks level ups and players OTHER activities losing access to player timing data), there will NOT be a "subs" game for Raptr.

Instead my plan is to list number of players on each service and rank them in order of most played down.

Another note. Today WAS to be called the Champions Online edition, as tomorrow (Tuesday), CO goes free to play. But, a massive issue with the new CO client has caused it to stop working with X-Fire. Thus, no rankings will be noted for it on the X-Fire chart. As well, we still have no numbers for DC Universe which is charting on Raptr. I will include the numbers from Raptr, and in hopes, we will eventually see them on X-Fire

This is disappointing. Since the buyout of X-Fire by another firm, their support has been dwindling.

Lets move on then to this weeks charts...The charts will list THIS weeks numbers and in parentheses (Last Weeks) numbers...

X-FIRE

1. Lord of the Rings Online - 2901 (3000 ↓ ) players
2. EvE Online - 2420 (2229 ↑ )
3. Aion - 1959 (2141 ↓ )
4. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 492 (501 ↓ )
5. Star Trek Online - 385 (402 ↓ )
6. Age of Conan - 321 (335 ↓ )
7. Warhammer Online - 248 (275 ↓ )
8. Final Fantasy XIV - 134 (192 ↓ )
9. Champions Online - NOT RANKING
10. DC Universe - NOT RANKING

Overall, drops across the board. This may be service relevant, as the issues with client compatibility is becoming a concern. Games are taking too long to be added, or when they glitch, the downtime for that game in X-Fire gets worse.

We can still see overall the trend, with EvE moving ahead of Aion now on X-Fire. This has also been noted on Raptr. 

All games seem to have held their spot though, this week. 

Lets check out Raptr.

RAPTR

1. DC Universe - 1396 players
2. Lord of the Rings Online - 1059
3. EvE Online - 1028
4. Aion - 486
5. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 390
6. Final Fantasy XIV - 215
7. Champions Online - 161
8. Age of Conan - 117
9. Star Trek Online - 111
10. Warhammer Online - 101

Since I was not able to get ALL of last weeks numbers, I will not start UP/DOWN rankings until next week. We do get an interesting picture here though, so lets get started.

DC Universe is #1. Not TOO far ahead of LOTRO. But, it is a new launch, and would make sense to see it peaking some for a while. But, please note...last week DCUO had 2564 players. So, that is a pretty large drop-off from one week to the next.

LOTRO and EVE swaps spots this week, and put it more in line with what we see on X-Fire. Pretty much ALL games seem to hold the same spots...but a few anomalies exist.

Final Fantasy XIV has a larger audience on Raptr. And it ROSE from last weeks ranking (209 last week). Champions Online also ranks well on Raptr...even above STO.

One games is clear on both charts though. Warhammer Online is down, both on Raptr AND X-Fire. We will of course keep an eye on those numbers.

X-Fire is not as reliable I think this week, and if the continued drop in players continues...we may have to question X-Fire in the coming charts.

Overall, a great listing and for our first run through, cool to see how games rank on each service. We will try and continue to see movers and shakers and how they compare here.

As an added bonus, each week I will include one game that is not part of the charts. Make YOUR requests in comments.

This weeks games in: VANGUARD

X-Fire = 13 players / Raptr = 10 players

Cheers

DataMineCraft

Thanks to the fact that Square Enix knows it hit a faux pas in the road with Final Fantasy XIV, the company is making every effort to rectify the issues within the game. Due to this effort, a poll was conducted to help Squeenix understand what happened, and what the players may be looking for.

For myself, this became a new data point to study.

Part of the poll consisted of what games the players of FFXIV had played before. This has proven to be interesting as it covers several regions. Not just that, but in the fact we get a glimpse of what type of MMO's are enjoyed by a person who has played or is playing FFXIV.

You can review this rather large image of the chart HERE.

What I would like to do with the chart is use it just like our X-Fire and Raptr data points and compare how games I am tracking are ranking per the poll. I am also going to separate the game ranks per region.
Replacing FFXIV will be FFXI, as it seems to be the counterpoint to the other games listed (seeing it was a Squeenix poll for FFXIV players, this is logical).
As a final note, one game is missing; Star Trek Online. Either they were not part of the chart or did not warrant enough votes to chart. I will assume they fall into the OTHER categories listed.

Lets start with...

JAPAN (JP)

These first results include several major anomalies right off the bat. Several games listed are ones that I have never heard of or are unique to the region (i.e: Cannot find out due to not being able to decipher the Japanese alphabet).
Another data point (even though I do not track it) is the fact that World of Warcraft is ranked EXTREMELY low. Odd.
In addition several PvP games are ranked lower compared to the darling of JP...Lineage 2. This is definitely based on region.
Finally, DDO, AOC, CO and WAR did NOT chart in JP. Not available is most likely the case, or they are considered OTHERS.

But, lets move on to the list, in the order the game is ranked and percentage played.

1. Final Fantasy XI - 20.4%
2. Aion - 4.5% (Called The Tower of Aion)
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 1.1%
4. EvE Online - 0.5%
5. Age of Conan - NO RANK
6. Warhammer Online - NO RANK
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - NO RANK 
8. Champions Online - NO RANK

Several more notes: Everquest 2 actually ranks higher than LOTRO at 2.6% and Ultima Online had a WHOPPING 4.3%; another anomaly to say the least.
Finally, the "OTHER" games with subs or microtransactions ranked pretty high here...actually more than Aion or even Lineage 2.

All I can say is Japan is an odd beast compared to the Western countries. Sure was a great way to start our review of the poll.

North America (NA)

North America brings some normalcy back to the charts. Behind FFXI is World of Warcraft, which fits perfectly with NA audiences (12.1%). FFXI should be on top anyways, since this IS a poll of Squeenix customers.
Of note, 5.2% have played EQ / EQ2. I wonder why these two were lumped together on this poll, but not JP.
Guild Wars shows up on this list at a VERY nice 6.6%.

On to the numbers.

1. Final Fantasy XI - 15.5%
2. Aion - 5.9%
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 5.0%
4. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 4.0% 
5. EvE Online - 3.3% 
6. Warhammer Online - 3.7%
7. Age of Conan - 3.1%
8. Champions Online - 1.8%

NA has a large audience for Aion and then LOTRO. Their rankings on this poll is in line with what we see on X-Fire and Raptr, as being two top games that are still being played or have been played heavily.  

EvE not so much. I would assume the PvP and Sci-Fi aspect are not what a Final Fantasy audience craves.
Champions graces the bottom of the list along with AoC and WAR again, as we have seen corroborated by our two other sources.

Great Britain (GB)

I assume this covers the various isles of Europe like Ireland, Scotland, England, etc. (SOURCE) 

Getting initial notes out of the way, WoW again ranks 2nd behind FFXI, but barely.

Guild Wars cracks a whopping 7.0% in GB. The EQ's fall to 3.6%.

1. Final Fantasy XI - 13.7%
2. Aion - 7.3%
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 5.4%
4. Warhammer Online - 4.6%
5. EvE Online - 4.2% 
6. Age of Conan - 4.1%
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 3.1% 
8. Champions Online - 1.6%

Notes: DDO takes a bit of a dive overseas. Aion though, holds a top spot. I feel Aion's similarities to Final Fantasy's visuals helps sell that game to the FFXIV audience. 

WAR is well liked in GB...I wonder WHY (have anything to do with the fact Warhammer is a British product?). 

Champions of course holds the bottom up as usual.

France (FR)

Wee Wee Monsieur. Next up are the French to show us what they like in MMO land.

1. Final Fantasy XI - 14.5%
2. Aion - 10.3%
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 4.1%
4. Warhammer Online - 4.0%
5. Age of Conan - 3.8%
6. EvE Online - 2.1% 
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 1.3% 
8. Champions Online - 1.3%

The pattern continues, but with a unique twist. The FR REALLY liked Aion, and it ranks very close to WoW on the chart. WAR and AoC are back together again. 

DDO still ranks lowly for overseas. This continues to fascinate me. Is D&D truly such a North American phenomenon that it hardly holds any sway in Europe? Or is it that the game itself is just not good to them?

Guild Wars proves to be a driver here, with it's highest rating of all countries...8%.

Lets close then

Germany (DE)

Lets start with some notes.

Both FFXI AND WoW are right next to each other, with WoW ranking a 12.7%. Guild Wars racks up a 7.5%. The EQ's at 3.7%. And a new high ranker, Ragnarok Online at 5.5% (again, a region based experience).

1. Final Fantasy XI - 12.9%
2. Aion - 8.6%
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 6.5%
4. Age of Conan - 4.8%
5. Warhammer Online - 4.5%
6. EvE Online - 3.2% 
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 1.8% 
8. Champions Online - 0.8%

Of note: LOTRO and Age of Conan seem to rank considerably higher in Germany than other countries. As well, WAR does great, but flip-flops with AoC for ranking. Champions presents with the lowest score of the bunch. Lets take into account, City of Heroes also rates very low in Germany. Guess they do not like Superheroes very much?

This was fascinating. It helped me see some commonalities across data points and some regional specifics as well when it comes to MMO gaming.

Aion and Lord of the Rings Online continued to dominate the charts here, just like they do on X-Fire and Raptr. 

To those who scream Aion was a failure, I continue to see the proof time and again that does NOT corroborate this. Mind you, this is a list of "have played" and may not 100% match what is happening now. But, the fact remains that when a poll like this is done, we can see some favorites being played.

The most noticeable fact is how an Asian based game like Aion could dominate this list, as favoritism of Final Fantasy is noted, skewing the poll.

But, when we moved to the European based countries like GB, FR and DE, we see an upswing of Nordic or Germanic based games dominating (WAR and AoC) along with more of a basis in Renaissance feeling (like LOTRO) holding the top of the charts.

There is also no doubt about LOTRO being a hit. It may not be the "million subs" base that games like WoW hold, but it continually ranked as a game that people have or are playing.

Finally, there is a simple conclusion I can make immediately.

I REALLY think Guild Wars 2 shall sell MASSIVE amounts of copies, as a pre-made audience seems to exist based on ALL my data points.

Hope you enjoyed this bit of fun. 

BTW; TLDR - Yes, a lot of data exists that corroborates my XFire game...thought you should know.

Now to play the Raptr Game

One argument within my gaming review is that our one data point may not be a total reliable factor here.  To alleviate this, I have been reviewing the data on Raptr for a bit.

Raptr is an alternate service not unlike X-Fire, just with a few missing features. Raptr DOES track time, but the totals may not always be what we have seen.
I have noted though that Raptr does give a generalized listing of players and times, and I thought I would see how the games listed on Raptr stack up versus X-Fire via the stats I am tracking for the MMO's I am watching.

Right now, the rankings for X-Fire in general is, as of my last posting...

1. Lord of the Rings Online - 3000 (players)
2. Aion - 2141
3. EvE Online - 2229
4. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 501
5. Star Trek Online - 402
6. Age of Conan - 335
7. Warhammer Online - 275
8. Final Fantasy XIV - 192
9. Champions Online - 86

I plan to use Raptr come next Mondays X-Fire game for comparisons. So, these first listings may be off. (I noted LOTRO had Monday only listings and added the date next to it to notate this)...

For now, lets do this weeks numbers and rank them from Raptr.

1. EvE - 1026 (players)
2. LOTRO - 951 (17th)
3. Aion - 518 
4. DDO - 403 
5. FFXIV - 209 
6. CO - 174 
7. STO - 168 
8. WAR - 111 
9. AoC - 109 

Well, right off the bat...a few anomalies. 

EvE Online moves into first place. Now, of course, since I could not gain LOTRO's numbers for Sunday, this could change. But, as we can see, the top 4 games I track have NOT changed. 

Aion is considerably lower on Raptr than X-Fire though. I wonder if this is a regional issue. 

I could not find any data on which countries have access to Raptr, unlike X-Fire which can pretty much be used ANYWHERE. There could be an issue in that respect.

Moving on, we see Champions is actually more liked on Raptr than X-Fire. City of Heroes has LESS players on Raptr than on X-Fire (actually the numbers are almost REVERSED...). This proves interesting to watch.

BTW, what about DC Universe, that other superhero game which has not even shown up yet on X-Fire? A whopping 2564 players on Raptr. Beating all other games I track (yes, that is JUST the PC version). When I start doing the Raptr game next week, I will note DC Universe in my listings.

Another oddity is how well liked FFXIV is here. I just cannot place my finger on this one. But, I will continue to watch this and see how it progresses over time.

One thing is certain. Age of Conan AND Warhammer Online are right close to each other and are both doing miserably as is usual, even on Raptr.

Looks like I will need to review the listings thoroughly and see if any MMO is doing better on Raptr but not ranking on X-Fire (Hey, did you know Vanguard had ONE PLAYER Sunday in Raptr? LOL...at least X-fire had 10).

Anyways, that was fun. Can't wait for the Monday CHAMPIONS edition of the X-Fire/Raptr game.

Am I missing a game on my list that we should be watching? Let me know. I may expand it to show how the games rank across services.

Cheers

The Blogs are on X-Fire

Quite a few blogs have taken up my "explosive" discussion on Twitter about the use of X-Fire as a trending tool. From those who feel it tells us NOTHING, to those who think it is FUN TO WATCH, and of course those who see the MERITS such a system holds...it has been nothing short of great to see such an open discussion taking place.

First off, I really feel it is constantly necessary to point out that using X-Fire for hard FACTUAL data is next to a no-win situation. What I do believe though is using X-Fire to trend what games someone like myself are interested in and how they rate in gamers eyes, is valid.

Time and again I can see how when a game is advertised heavily, or a game has massive sales to start and loses steam...it reflects this on X-Fire. Launches of popular MMO's always seem to reflect the same on X-Fire. Examples of this would be Age of Conan and Warhammer Online, who both rated highly on X-Fire at one time, even getting into the top 10.
When Lord of the Rings Online went free to play and we saw the exponential jump on X-Fire...is that to say that LOTRO may NOT have had a spike in new players in the real world?

Some believe this to be the case.

One notation that stands out in this regard from one of the blogs is that you cannot compare one game to another game evenly and across the board on X-Fire.
So, even though LOTRO had a jump and another game had a loss...say Age of Conan...this does not reflect real world value.

I disagree.

Tipa notes on West Karana that not all games are present on X-Fire, which throws out the ability to show real world trends. This is true to an extent. As an example, no Browser based games are tracked. This is disappointing, as we would see some major differences, I think, in what games are played the most..(and WoW would probably not even be the #1 game on X-Fire).

This does not mean that we cannot see a trend in games that DO exist on X-Fire. That is what interests me the most...thus why I play the X-Fire game.

I can go look right now at the charts and see how WoW is the most played MMO. Call of Duty is the most played FPS and Starcraft II is the most played RTS. On the PC, mind you...

Would anyone argue this does NOT match real world data?

X-Fire offers us a snapshot of the interests of roughly 17 million gamers. Not all are always accounted for, but that falls in line with polling rules.
I think of X-Fire as like an "Opinion" poll. We get a view of gamers opinions about games and can even extract some generalized data.
The continued argument right now is that Nielsen's data for TV viewing is more accurate. A random sample of the audience who watch TV, which is less than 1% of the overall population that watches TV altogether, gives us a smarter picture of TV viewing habits than say 17 million possible gamers playing games.

That is a closed minded view in my opinion.

Is it possible to believe that there are more gamers than there are TV watchers in the world? I do not believe so. Yet, the sample size in X-Fire is CONSIDERABLY larger than Nielsens. Why can't that be a good sample to look at?

Just like viewers on Nielsen's charts have different viewing habits, thus do gamers have different playing habits. Why can't this snapshot of gamers reflect what real world gamers are playing?

Nielsen and it's less than 1% RANDOM sample says that American Idol is the most watched show on TV. Yet, MY TV has never watched this show. So why did this chosen sample have the right to say that I would have a more than likely chance to watch American Idol above Fringe?
Yet, I have played WoW, and there is a chance I may play it again. I bet there are a LOT of MMO players who could say the same. Based on X-Fires data we can see more people are playing WoW than LOTRO or Guild Wars even. I believe that, because based on other data available, we can note this as a fact.

True, we do not know how real Blizzards 12 million subs statement is...but, I can pretty much agree with X-Fires listing that RIGHT NOW more people are playing WoW and are logged into WoW than say, LOTRO.

I truly do wish there were more data points we could look at (I have attempted to view Raptr's data to add a secondary source, but the information is wacky at best), or that more companies were forthcoming with info...but, they are not.

So, for now, I can look at this snapshot of gamers who use X-Fire and see what games are being played the most and truly believe what I see...as that core audience is like me; a gamer.