Number of active players Blizzard games drops despite success of WoW Classic

By admin On Nov 8, 2019

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Blizzard is struggling with a decrease in the number of monthly active players of its games compared to last year. This is despite a sharp increase in the number of WoW players in the third quarter, due to the arrival of Classic.

The number of monthly active Blizzard game players dropped from 37 million to 33 million in the previous quarter, which ended September 30. This is according to the quarterly figures of Activision Blizzard. The publisher does not specify which games the decline occurred. The company does report that in the third quarter more subscriptions for World of Warcraft were closed in a quarterly period than in any previous quarter.

That’s because of the arrival of World of Warcraft Classic on August 27. Blizzard has stopped reporting how many World of Warcraft subscriptions it provides since 2015. In its heyday it was about 12 million subscribers, last year there seemed to be 1.7 million left, based on leaked data through an API.

Blizzard hinted in the explanation of the quarterly figures, quoted by Seeking Alpha, that Heartstone and Overwatch are struggling in terms of player numbers. The company’s revenue fell 38 percent to $394 million. Blizzard expects improvement with the arrival of WoW: Shadowlands, Hearthstone Battlegrounds, Warcraft III: Reforged, Diablo Immortal, Diablo 4 and Overwatch 2.

Activision also saw the number of monthly active players drop, from 46 million to 36 million. The company expects Call of Duty to improve on this: Call of Duty: Mobile reached 100 million downloads in October and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is said to have sold more than Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 in its first week of sales. after his appearance.

Activision Blizzard’s total revenue fell 15 percent to $1.28 billion. The decline is partly due to the loss of Bungie’s Destiny sales. That studio regained the rights to Destiny in February.

The company softened the impact that the arrival of the next-generation consoles, planned for next year, will have on its bottom line. Activision chief executive Coddy Johnson said consoles account for a third of sales and the company focuses on multiple platform franchises.