The X-Fire Game: SUB-stantial data for Rifting

I am going to state this now.

Rift will prove to be a MMO that can at least compete in this market without all of the issues exhibited by the previous years offerings.

All indications are leaning toward customer satisfaction (except for a few concerns, which as they appear, are squashed immediately) and at least a major amount of servers sticking around after the 30 day mark.

I have quite a few reams of data here, so lets get to the numbers...shall we?

1. Rift - 4968 ( OB 3962 ↑ )
2. EvE Online - 2090 ( 2073 ↑ )
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 2003 ( 2108 ↓ )
4. Aion - 1995 ( 2047 ↓ )
5. Dungeons & Dragons Online -  415 ( 448 ↓ )
6. Star Trek Online - 350 ( 427 ↓ )
7. Champions Online - 349 ( 424 ↓ )
8. Age of Conan - 297 ( 253 ↑ )
9. Warhammer Online - 178 ( 163 ↑ )
10. DC Universe - 100 ( 141 ↓ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV - 28 ( 129 ↓ )

Still a small tumble going on with a few games. To be expected.

It is quite clear that Rift has some great numbers, and they are not falling yet. I kept the Open Beta numbers as comparison this week, as previous X-Fire stats were still not tracking Rift data properly. Luckily, the issue has been fixed, and we can start getting a better compare for the coming months. But, it is pretty clear that having a higher set of numbers for launch compared to an open beta says a lot. Time will tell if this holds though.

Lord of the Rings and Aion both have continued to see a drop. But, EvE Online was back up this week and taking back the number two spot.

Star Trek and Champions both fell this week, but still show up well here.

Shocking was the two big launch fail titles...Age of Conan and Warhammer Online... having some upward trending. AoC had a major update this past week and WAR also had a new patch. Whether this placebo will wear off...only time will tell.

Now, please don't look at FFXIV badly here. Due to the disaster in Japan this past weekend, the servers felt major upheavals which have affected overall stats. I will keep an eye on this, and lets hope it is not a permanent down. (UPDATE: As no one understands the wording of my sentence...by "permanent down" I mean the numbers for players...not the servers themselves. I know they have a planned outage, but seems not everyone understands what I am saying here. I hope that AFTER the servers are back online that these numbers will go up. But, based on the fact that this particular game is not doing well, I expect this to be a hard hit, and may stay down quite a bit).

As to the big drop for DC Universe? Yea, I expected that. I have stated many times that the Fantasy genre owns the MMO world, and superhero games just do not have the staying power of elves, dwarves and magic. I hope another game...say The Secret World...can finally push this genre into other realms of enjoyment.

...

1. Rift - 4015 ( 3856 ↑ ) players
2. EvE Online - 1092 ( 1006 ↑ ) 
3. Lord of the Rings Online - 918 ( 993 ↓ )
4. Aion - 535 ( 508 ↑ )
5. Champions Online - 293 ( 485 ↓ )
6. DC Universe - 203 ( 338 ↓ )
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 258 ( 285 ↓ )
8. Star Trek Online - 100 ( 171 ↓  )
9. Age of Conan - 99 ( 84 ↑ )
10. Warhammer Online - 85 ( 65 ↑ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV - 35 ( 178 ↓ )

Rift still holding out for #1. As well, adding a few players in the process. Continuing to impress here.

Standard MMO fare falling. LOTRO, DDO feeling the squeeze. Yet, Aion shows an upward swing.

Champions tumbles, DC Universe drops. Both took major falls. Star Trek also felt the bruises of getting slapped around.

Age of Conan and WAR both exhibit the Vicodin high associated with new patches. Now, can the players keep popping the pills?

And of course, my prayers with the people of Japan, and sadness for the FFXIV fall.

...

As announced last week, World of Warcraft is our game of the week for the next 30 days of Rift-mania. Lets see how WoW charted.

WoW = Xfire  36510 ( 36972 players ↓ )

WoW continued to tumble. Now, we must note that due to the Japan disaster, the shock-waves could be felt in WoW as well. So, whether this is Rift oriented...hard to say. We will continue to watch these numbers and see if next week fixes the problems.
...

As a final add here, I wanted to report on the new "charts" system for Rift I am tracking (you can read about this more...HERE).

As I have noted from previous X-Fire games...Sunday is the busiest day of the week for MMO's. So, here are yesterdays charts for Rift.

German schedule - 7PM

USA EST schedule 7:45 PM

I tried to grab the charts when I could (hey, I was playing Rift, DAMMIT)...but, I think we have a pretty clear picture of how things are looking here.

Germany's prime time really shows some full servers and quite a few high's as well. ZERO lows here. And looking at those charts and seeing that none of the US servers are low either, really says a lot.

When we switch to US based servers and schedules, we still have 6 servers with queues, a majority are at high, and there are even medium servers with no lows...things are looking good.

Now, this will be the last set of these charts I will post until after the 30 days are up. I want to see how many servers stay at least semi-full or even queue'd after that time limit.

***

Whew...lots going on here. I am really excited for the next few months of charts and X-Fire/Raptr data. Stay tuned, as this roller-coaster has just started.

Cheers

Rift: Charting a course for success

Thanks to the fine work of some bloke who has tons of time...we now have a semi-population tracker for Rift.

You can view the main chart here (SOURCE).

I am adding this post for posterity sake, so we may begin to watch how the game progresses and what happens to the servers as time rolls on.

Of course, the main SUCK of this chart is that they have "powerlevel" and gold seller ads. I will attempt to block these as I snapshot them for posting. Otherwise...at times...I can avoid them with an F5 refresh.

Anyways, I am taking this first snapshot to get the EU listing. Later tonight I will add the US shard listings.

You can click the image to get a larger view. Note that each server is color coded to represent how full the server is.

First off, we can already see that some of the PvP servers are quite low at this time of day in the US (and several in the EU also). But, at the same time, the EU had queues on PvP servers. Really telling how fickle PvP can be at times.

The best part of the image though is just how many servers in the US are at medium at mid-day. Impressive. I expect that to change though...downward. By how much will be the true way of telling how well Rift is doing though by the end of the 30 day free time.

I will update again later with the US primetime schedule. For now, enjoy a look at Rift servers at a glance.

UPDATE: Evening chart around 8:30 EST

Note...quite a few servers with queues or high on the US side. I am also impressed with so many being at medium also. 

Next set will be on Sunday, considered the busiest day.

The X-Fire Game: A "Tear" in the Stats

This week, even though I have some initial stats, they are not truly complete. Like a "rip" in the fabric of the statistics plane of existence.

X-Fire finally fixed their tracking bug for Rift...to an extent. It seems there are still TOO MANY missing clients from their database. Using Raptr as a source...Raptr feeds data into X-Fire. Yet, Raptrs numbers are almost TRIPLE what X-Fire is.

That is not right.

So, I want to be able to keep track until X-Fire picks up more clients. So, just note this weeks #'s will be off for them. Raptr looks good though.

Lets get this started. (Note, the comparison numbers are from two weeks ago from Rift OB time. This will be a good comparison to see how purchase is viewed versus an open beta).

1. Lord of the Rings Online - 2108 ( 2493 ↓ )
2. EvE Online -  2073 ( 2263 ↓ )
3. Aion - 2047 ( 2339 ↓ )
4. Rift - (Launch 1150 (OB 3962))
5. Star Trek Online -  427 ( 450 ↓ )
6. Champions Online -  424 ( 722 ↓ )
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 448 ( 443 ↑ )
8. Age of Conan -  253 ( 292 ↓ )
9. DC Universe - 141 ( 265 ↓ )
10. Warhammer Online - 163 ( 168 ↓ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV - 129 ( 139 ↓ )

Need we say more. A veritable across the board loss for most games. Several took it on the chin harder than I thought...while others just languished. And one major surprise.

Lets start with the Rift discrepancy. First off, how can the numbers be half? Like I stated previously, the clients location had been changed for launch. But, then you ask (or foolishly say)..."Well, that is all that bought the game"...where I reply "NO!"

There are more servers for one. there are more FULL servers than Open Beta also. Even this Sunday, my personal server which has not had a queue, had a queue on Sunday.

So, needless to say, those numbers are bogus until the client recognition is fixed.

Now, look at LOTRO and Aion as two games who got hit hard. Now, gaze upon those numbers knowing that the "previous" numbers were Rift Open Beta weekend numbers. Double ouch. Lets go back in time to the weekend after the Super Bowl (SOURCE). LOTRO had 2597 players and Aion had 2458. Now, we can see just how extreme these two MMO's were hit.

EvE also took it down a notch...just not as bad.

But, wow, look at Champions Online. As the Free to Play phenom starts to die down, the numbers are getting lower. Are they still going to drop?

One shocker is that WAR hardly moved. It is down, but not by much. Same for AoC.

This weeks winner is definitely DDO. They seem to be weathering the Rift effect. Congrats to Turbine as always.

Overall, this is a really good comparison to see how most MMO's were hurt after Rift "launched". Trion has to be happy with the purchase mania!

...

1. Rift - 3856 (365 ↑ )
2. EvE Online -  1006 ( 1219 ↓ ) players
3. Lord of the Rings Online -  993 ( 995 ↓ )
4. Aion - 508 ( 606 ↓ )
5. Champions Online -  485 ( 539 ↓ )
6. DC Universe -  338 ( 630 ↓ )
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online -  285 ( 337 ↓ )
8. Final Fantasy XIV -  178 ( 160 ↑ )
9. Star Trek Online - 171 ( 157 ↑  )
10. Age of Conan -   84 ( 140 ↓ )
11. Warhammer Online -   65 ( 95 ↓ )

Raptr's tracking is working much better in this situation. Rift is recognized and some of their data feeds to X-Fire.

As continues to be the case...Raptr always has some oddballs when it comes to play time being up versus down. But, we can definitely see the Rift effect now.

While X-Fire was tracking high for Open Beta and Rift, Raptr always had very low numbers. Not this go round. Each weekend has been pumping out almost 4000 players in Raptr. Rift has become number one with a bullet here. Tripling on our previous #1...Rift is rocking.

Can it hold up?

Oddities abound here. Like DDO taking a big dive here...opposite of X-Fire. FFXIV is actually up during this time.

And look at DC Universe, who is finally feeling the 30 day crunch. Talk about falling down hard. Age of Conan also took it down quite a bit here. And as always (and with much lower numbers to boot), WAR tails.

...

There we have it. The Rift effect is being felt still. But, time will tell.

I will say this much. I expect Rift to hold up after the thirty day window, as the game is good. Not anything "new" per se, but offers something we have not seen in years. A great launch with a game that has no major game breaking bugs. Content is stable, and people are taking their time and enjoying the view.

Enjoy the numbers and cheers.

UPDATE: By special request, we will be watching numbers on X-Fire for World of Warcraft for a couple of weeks to see if the Rift effect is causing any concerns. So, this weeks SPECIAL game is...

WoW = Xfire (36972 players)

CYA next week.

Spectator Sports: The "Rift" dent

Well, Friday arrives...my health improves, and with that, some fun little commentary on how Rift is progressing.

Yea, yea...we can read it on the blogs, in the forums, or playing the game. Success you say? Sure, people can state it as such. But, what we need are some measuring tools. Not only is talk been above the norm for Rift, with the smattering or "Queue QQ" and "WoW Wannabe" blather, but overall the sense of happiness is more alive within the blogosphere and forums, than most previous launches from the last several years.

"It’s bringing to my mind the age old question of “If all your friends jumped off a bridge, would you?” Well, to be honest, I know if I’d hated Rift, felt no connection to the game at all and didn’t feel it was worth money, I probably would have uninstalled after beta testing and never looked back. Time and money are too important to waste on something you don’t like.
But as I recall, I did like Rift,"
MMOGamerchick

"I’m trying not to go on and on about Rift; in fact I have decided to hardly mention it at all. It’s one thing if it’s a game few people play, but that’s not Rift’s problem.
Just wanted to share this screenshot of my Bard/Ranger/Assassin taking down the boss of an earth rift in the Stonefields. Yummy."
WestKarana

This is pretty typical across the board, with the usual suspects calling fail (Keen and Graev). But, looking to Twitter, the Forums and across the blogosphere, the consensus is more of a "like" for Rift than some of our previous launches like Age of Conan, Aion or Warhammer Online (with that final one having a massive battle over love versus hate....with hate finally winning).

Talk is of people who see what Trion did. Making a stable polished game that people can play if they are bored with their other title or need new environs. For myself, I had been on break from the standard DIKU MMO and coming fresh to Rift feels fresh for me. I have fallen into my patterns, and I am enjoying myself very much.

But, lets talk REAL visual success. Lets take a gander at what a GOOD game launch can do.

First off, Raptr numbers have been pretty impressive. I hope to see next weeks X-Fire game in full swing. Until then lets see how Rift sits as of today...
3149 players were playing Rift...ON A THURSDAY! Just to give a comparison, our normal #1 game for Raptr, EvE Online on a Sunday rakes in about 1200+ players. So, over double that. Todays numbers for EvE? 1035 players.

How about also looking at Raptrs REVIEW page for Rift. You can see a fair consensus there of people who are for the most part happy or accepting of Rift's sameness.

For X-Fire, an issue (as always seems to be the case, due to support being pretty bad for X-Fire right now), is preventing the game from being recognized. A patch has gone out though, and my hopes are that by Sunday, all clients should be recognized and we can do the game come Monday.

But, lets look at what I call the "Dent".

Please take a close look at the drop near the end of that chart. Can you guess what game this is?

That is World of Warcraft.

Now, note, you can see another "dip" in that chart, from earlier last month when a patch was applied and they had some major downtime. But, for the most part it would climb back up almost immediately. This time the "dent" stuck. What day is that huge dip? March 1st - Rift Launch Day.

I will watch this chart again on Monday and see if this is just an anomaly or if we have a REAL WoW denter in Rift.

Who else felt the heat?

LOTRO

Again, the same thing. A noted outage from last month struck LOTRO over the weekend (and also for Rift betas)...But, the huge dent near the end, thanks to Rift launch.

EvE Online

This one I did NOT expect. Eve took a dive also. I expect it will go back up....but, the pain was felt even in Space!

AION

This includes the marker showing the day of the drop. March 1st took a chunk from Aion as well.

Now, of course time will tell how well Rift has done say in 3 - 6 months. Progress on stability, fixes and thinking of new content needs to be paramount to Rift's success.

I personally feel Rift COULD be the first million subber game, if they keep their cool, work on the games strong points and hold on tight to their player base they have created. I know I am a 6 monther subber (and I rarely do that for MMO's). So, the formula is there...lets see what you got Trion. And Good job!

Cheers

HIATUS - Illness got me down

Being a little personal for the moment...

It has been a while since I have posted. I have been under the weather due to being diagnosed with Graves Disease. I do not think the disease is the cause of my "under the weather" feeling...as I was not even aware of the problem. I did not have many of the symptoms...or if I did I just notched it up to getting "older". If anything, the medicine I am taking for the issue has made me feel blah even more.

Four weeks into being on medication and I get a severe cold. Now, not flu per se...at least that I was aware of. But, the doctor called it as sinusitis...meaning just a bunch of crud build up, that makes you feel crappy. I am on an antibiotic for it.

Now, of course, it should be over by now (going on 7 days)...but, back to my disease...or should I say the medicine itself... is what hurts. I am not generating enough white blood cells to smack it hard. While I was not on the medicine, one of the side effects of Graves is a TON of white blood cells...so many that they start attacking muscle and bone structure as they have nothing to attack otherwise (thus it has been a while since I have been sick with anything like this cold). Now, it feels like an eternity to get rid of a silly cold.

I miss feeling "good", and thus, I have not had it in me to write anything until today. Overall though, my focus is off. I want to write about how the Rift launch is going, what I perceive in it's success at this time, and of course chat about those idiots who feel they deserve the world from an MMO developer.

But, I can't muster the feeling to wrap up my thoughts cohesively. Basically, what you are reading now is just train of thought...so, I can share what has been happening.

According to the Doctors, I EVENTUALLY will feel better, as the disease was "supposedly" destroying me...yet, I wish I felt like I did the day before my diagnosis...as it was SO MUCH BETTER.

Guess time will tell. For now, bear with me, as I WILL get back to the game and writing some of that scathing commentary that keeps the kids happy...

You've been warned...

X-Fire Game: Rifted

So ends the Open Beta weekend for Rift. And with that note, we should be able to see a very unique list here for our X-Fire game.

What effect did the "Rift OB" effect cause? Lets find out. 

1. Rift (OB 3962)
2. Lord of the Rings Online - 2493 ( 2597 ↓ )
3. Aion - 2339 ( 2458 ↓  )
4. EvE Online - 2263  ( 2263 - )
5. Champions Online - 722 ( 766 ↓ )
6. Star Trek Online -  450 ( 471 ↓ )
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online - 443 ( 478 ↓ )
8. Age of Conan - 292 ( 281 ↑ )
9. DC Universe - 265 ( 370 ↓ )
10. Warhammer Online - 168 ( 220 ↓ )
11. Final Fantasy XIV - 139 ( 129 ↑ )

Some interesting and shocking results here. Lets start from the top.

Rift steadied out since launch of open beta, but still took in enough players to top the list. The first day results here showed Rift hitting 4623 players. Tourists abound and as a result, we would see such a drop. What will prove interesting is how next weeks launch holds up. Watch for it, Retentionista's

Most other MMO's were down, but a few surprises...like EvE holding steady to last week, was fascinating.  But, look at our two risers here. Age of Conan and Final Fantasy XIV. Could it be they were different enough from the familiar Rift, that players who were done with a theme park MMO style headed there?

Lets focus on our continued loser, who lost big here. Earlier last week I had noted on Twitter an unusual drop for Warhammer Online through XFire. It was sizeable. Around Wednesday, a big chunk of players had showed up missing from Xfire for WAR. It looks like it was not an anomaly due to an outage, or what not. The drop has continued through the weekend. This does not spell good news for this fledgling MMO. Unless Bioware/Mythic does something quick, this game will be on it's last legs.

We will continue that Deathwatch through the month of March and see if any new updates happens ...either from Mythic or the playerbase.

...

1. EvE Online - 1219 ( 1108 ↑ ) players
2. Lord of the Rings Online - 995 ( 1064 ↓ )
3. DC Universe - 630 ( 750 ↓ )
4. Aion - 606 ( 659 ↓ )
5. Champions Online - 539 ( 637 ↓ )
6. Rift (OB 365)
7. Dungeons & Dragons Online -  337 ( 318 ↑ )
8. Final Fantasy XIV - 160 ( 180 ↓ )
9. Star Trek Online - 157 ( 202  ↓  )
10. Age of Conan -  140 ( 122 ↑  )
11. Warhammer Online -  95 ( 101 ↓ )

I have tried to figure out the rhyme and reason of how Raptr works compared to X-Fire when rankings take place...but, I just can't. The only logical explanation may be that Raptr is not available in all languages? XFire does have great language support...but, I cannot find much in Raptrs documentation on their accessibility.

Anyways, lets check this out.

EvE continues to hold it's top spot here, with LOTRO holding a close second. DC Universe also in the top 3.

For some reason Raptr does not feel the Rift effect. Will this change come launch? Some switches took place with FFXIV moving ahead of Star Trek Online. Weird.

Age of Conan was up here as well as on XFire. Was there a promotion I am not aware of? And holding the bottom and with some losses is of course, Warhammer Online.
______________________________

Now, for this weeks game, I felt we should hold up another game that had it's own type of event this past week...

EVERQUEST

Launching the new "progression server" which offers an old school style of play for players to reminisce and then realize that sometimes you "can't go back"...offered us a view of how many remember their First Time.

XFire  = 80 players
Raptr = 86 players

So, really...this may not look like much. But, what you really need to see is this.

Note the upward swing there? That would be "Progression Server". 

Congrats to SOE.

Thats it for this week. Stay tuned, as next week the XFire game should EXPLODE with the launch of a new MMO.

Can Rift become our new #1?

Cheers

Rift: Interim Game for Clarity

Just a quick post to share some data before this next X-Fire game.

I decided to see how the launch of Rift's open beta was doing on our services. This way, come next week, we can compare notes to see how retention is going.

The numbers were quite big for X-Fire with 4,623 players. Compared to last beta, which had 2,755 players..we see almost 2000 more players join the ranks. This is on a weekday as well. These numbers clearly put Rift in the #1 position for our charts. This coming "game" report should give some clarity on how Rift is holding up to scrutiny of new and prospective players.

Raptr had Rift at 507 players. This is compared to last round with 243 players. Rift more than doubled their player counts on Raptr.

Quite an anomaly on the numbers between X-Fire and Raptr. But, it still allows us a clear view of how Rift is doing.

Also, as a side note, I will be doing Everquest as my game of the week for the next report. Seeing the new progression server launched the same day as Rift open beta...would be cool to see how it is doing. Raptr had EQ going from 26 to 80 players for a Tuesday and X-Fire was ranked, so numbers are not clear yet. It had 71 players though and jumped quite a few spots in the rankings (from #213 to #180).

Cheers for now, and see you next week for more on the game.