Game News Diablo III Sells 10 Million Copies

[flushfire]

10 mil sold, 800 people in public games. i wonder what the other 9.9m+ are doing with their copies.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Trying to sell the copies on eBay?

 

[Jojas]

I doubt they could pull off the same schtick again, at this scale at least.

What scares me though is there must still be hundreds of thousands, no, millions of people who bought and continue to play D3 and praise it as Kotick's gift from Heaven.

Not sure what's so scary about that. Some people play just to get their minds off stuff, not needing much for that. The same people who might not care about this industry at all. And why not? It's an industry bent on fucking you over. Why care about it? The times when it was different are long gone.

 

[Black]

Why would you play in public games?

 

[Kane]

http://i763.photobucket.com/albums/xx279/true-z/bigblack.jpg

 

[Rpgsaurus Rex]

nice

 

[Mastermind]

and for any one wasteland or dead state or ago of decadence, 100 more diablos and skyrim will see the light of the day.

Where are these 100 skyrims that you speak of? I'd love to play more first person RPGs (preferably open world too), but in the fantasy genre it's pretty much just TES and outside fantasy there's still just the odd not fully open game like dead island or borderlands.

 

[Rpgsaurus Rex]

I doubt they could pull off the same schtick again, at this scale at least.

What scares me though is there must still be hundreds of thousands, no, millions of people who bought and continue to play D3 and praise it as Kotick's gift from Heaven.

Not sure what's so scary about that. Some people play just to get their minds off stuff, not needing much for that. The same people who might not care about this industry at all. And why not? It's an industry bent on fucking you over. Why care about it? The times when it was different are long gone.

How is D3 even enjoyable in that "taking the mind off stuff" way? There is zero motivation to grind with boring loot and best equipment from the AH. There are so many mindless games out there that are heaps more fun.

Why does it have to be an industry for fucking me over? Surely, there is enough competition out there that I don't have to bend over to the same company over and over again if I want a fix for my hack 'n slash addiction? Torchlight 2 and PoE seem a lot more promising than D3 already.

 

[Mother Russia]

Studio 38 employees must be weeping and masturbating as they read this news.

Anyhow...

at $60 a pop, that's around a $600 million revenue. Now, paying back the publishers investment + fee + bonuses for employees probably takes around $150- $200 million. That's $400 left for the owners + company (retained earnings) + upper tier management + BoD. Take out around $50-$100 million for corporate taxes (have no idea if this is correct though, just guessing) Now with $300 million left it can be distributed among the cream of the company. Taking away income taxes and shit, I say the owner/chairman will be left with around $100 million tops.

Now, Diablo 3 took around 4 years to develop AFAIK, so that's a net profit of $25 million per year.

Pretty pathetic for such a big name brand. Just goes to show how shitty the profitability of the video game industry can be.

These ppl must really loathe Notch's guts TBH. He made Minecraft in 2 weeks by himself (ofcourse he must have bought the art assets from someone on the cheap. Probably a 3rd worlder ) He made $100 million + in around 2 years. I THINK that amount is AFTER deducting tax, but I could be wrong.

No wonder publishers + some devs + Gariott go for MMOs, far far more profit potential, even if it is not a WoW style hit. Niche MMO's are the cash cows these days. Koreans figured that out years ago. Kwans are just getting there.

Even more profitable ofcourse, is a 'good idea' + interwebZ. Jewgle, Yahoo, Jewbook, have made billions upon billions. And there are probably hundreds of companies that have made millions, some even hundreds of millions, that are under the radar. Porn sites are an (disgusting) example, as are filesharing sites. Wikipedia is worth scores of Billions, as it is the 4 th most visited website on the web, and has more potential than any other website currently (same as Google). I have to hand it to Jimmy Wales, he is no Jew. He could make hundreds of millions if he put adverts on Wikipedia, or heck just sell it to Jewgle or Microsoft or whomeever for $100 Billion+ (I kid you not, Wikipedia's potential is limitless, just like Google's)

Instead Wales puts his mug on the front page every year and puts out the begging bowl, knowing full well he is mocked by the Internet Dweebs. His employees must secretly hate his guts, praying every day for the company to put up adverts and go public, so they can become multi millionaires overnight.

Why the FUCK couldn't I have gone into website design? Why couldn't I have come up with fagbook, or Wikipedia, or what have you? (google is way too tough as I would need to be an engineer/mathematician to come up with the initial secret formula/alogorithim that powers their search engine)

The sad thing is I did take internet design classes back in the late 90's, for teh lulz. I learned how to design websites in Flash and Dreamweaver in around 3 months. Easy as shit. Had no idea how much money there was in websites though, and more importantly I was a retard in those days and did not care about money in the least. I actually thought dumbshit like 'finding yourself' and 'personality' were more important than money. Now ofcourse, have tasted the turd that is the real world I now know that when you have money, you are the king. You will find yourself as much as you want, or hire someone to do it for you. Most importantly, with a lot of money you don't need to work a dumbfuck job where you put in 10-12 hours for shit pay and retarded work, but can actually use that time for more important stuff (i.e. Worshipping the One True God, serving humanity and helping making pplz livez bettah, bodybuilding/fitness, martial arts, rpgs, buying politicians and de facto running nations and causing major changes in the world via military and economic intervention like the Jews + Zionists are doing, purchasing the Dex and making myself Admin # 1, etc etc)

 

[Infinitron]

 

[EG]

An entire Website . . . in only Flash?

Oh, the horror.

 

[Konjad]

Activision-Blizzard should have exhausted their credibility even with the "masses" by now, though. No doubt a fair share of these 10 mil were sponteneous "oh shit a new Diablo game/Blizzard game, must buy!", before the wholesale disillusionment with imbalances, banalshitboring loot, AH etc.

I doubt they could pull off the same schtick again, at this scale at least.

What scares me though is there must still be hundreds of thousands, no, millions of people who bought and continue to play D3 and praise it as Kotick's gift from Heaven.

Oh, but Bethesda pulled exactly the same thing with Skyrim as they did with Oblivion and it worked, unsurprisingly Codex fell for it as well. I'm sure whatever-comes-after-Skyrim will get the same reaction.

 

[Marsal]

Why the FUCK couldn't I have gone into website design? Why couldn't I have come up with fagbook, or Wikipedia, or what have you? (google is way too tough as I would need to be an engineer/mathematician to come up with the initial secret formula/alogorithim that powers their search engine)

Don't sell yourself short, little bro. You can do anything you set your mind to, don't anyone tell you differently!

The sad thing is I did take internet design classes back in the late 90's, for teh lulz. I learned how to design websites in Flash and Dreamweaver in around 3 months. Easy as shit. Had no idea how much money there was in websites though, and more importantly I was a retard in those days and did not care about money in the least.

 

[Castanova]

The reason it works over and over again is because every 5-10 years there's a new batch of kids who never played the previous one and certainly never played older games that were actually good.

 

[kaizoku]

snip

And you could have achieved all that.. if you had just spent less time on The Codex.

 

[Mother Russia]

Actually, in the early 2000's the trend was for every new cutting edge website to be designed in Flash, believe it or not. Also, it did not look bad at all and had many plus points, at least compared to the old HTML websites of the late 90's like geoshits.

 

[Rpgsaurus Rex]

Activision-Blizzard should have exhausted their credibility even with the "masses" by now, though. No doubt a fair share of these 10 mil were sponteneous "oh shit a new Diablo game/Blizzard game, must buy!", before the wholesale disillusionment with imbalances, banalshitboring loot, AH etc.

I doubt they could pull off the same schtick again, at this scale at least.

What scares me though is there must still be hundreds of thousands, no, millions of people who bought and continue to play D3 and praise it as Kotick's gift from Heaven.

Oh, but Bethesda pulled exactly the same thing with Skyrim as they did with Oblivion and it worked, unsurprisingly Codex fell for it as well. I'm sure whatever-comes-after-Skyrim will get the same reaction.

Expectations, man.

Oblivion obviously was a shock after Morrowind, since everyone including the 'dex had high expectations for it. OTOH, judging by KKK reactions no one really expected anything of Skyrim - if anything, most were pleasantly surprised that at least it had *some* gameplay value ("good for what it is"), unlike Oblivion which was pure shit, 100%. You would be taking in the shock for the first 30 minutes, slowly realizing how atrocious and copy/paste every single aspect of it was, from dungeons to NPCs, before hitting uninstall.

D3 to D2 kind of like Oblivion to Morrowind, only the reaction is not limited to the KKKodex (mainsteam LOVED Oblivion, after all - what with the 999 dick piercing mods, Sephiroth swords and what not). D3 is hated by all, pretty much, except for "10/10 GOTY" game reviewers and the people who are paid $ to post praise.

 

[Average Manatee]

You are looking at ~$600 million in one time revenue. Retail/publisher cut usually takes at least half of this, so $300 million revenue, and this is after years of development, advertisement, and community screaming for the game. Maybe a bit more from digital copies and collector's editions, but then probably a bit less from foreign editions that are lower priced.

WoW makes that much every 2 months. Doing nothing. Just sitting there.

Initial sales don't matter. Blizzard wanted this to become another WoW income printer. It will not, considering how quickly people are leaving. And it has very much damaged Blizzards reputation, and that will definitely hurt them far more in the long run. Blizzard ONLY has 3 properties and if this continues then they have basically killed 1 of them.

 

[EG]

Actually, in the early 2000's the trend was for every new cutting edge website to be designed in Flash, believe it or not. Also, it did not look bad at all and had many plus points, at least compared to the old HTML websites of the late 90's like geoshits.

And early 2001, it was the trend for every old dulled edge website designed entirely in flash to be laughed at as being a bloated piece of shit.

I've got books from that period of time warning people "If it's un-necessary, don't do it in a heavyweight manner! Do you really need that splashpage in Flash, huh? Huh? Will your audience sit there for twenty seconds waiting for your awesome animations to load?"

Sorry, I'll take off my rose-tinted glasses and stop pretending that's how it was. How naive we were.

 

[mbpopolano24]

I thought you didn't like Age of Decadence.

This is a misconception (I assume you referred to my post; if not, my apologies). Even the resplendent VD, apparently, does not get this. I don’t like many features of AoD but the game HAS soul. The game HAS potential. The game TRIES to delay the decline. And the fact that I don’t like some parts of it counts exactly zero, never assumed VD should change it for me. I, contrary to many others, am well aware of the insingificance of a single voice. As said several times, I’ll buy the game IF ever will see the light of the day. I am critical (many would say hypercritical) simply because I see the soul in it. Do you think I waste my time to criticize Diablo or Skyrim in their forums?

 

[mbpopolano24]

Speak for yourself. I didn't buy Diablo, Mass Effect or Skyrim. Instead I backed 13 kickstarter projects.

So what if the 10 million do not play oldschool games? It is a niche, and small devs are able to survive by making niche games. Always have, always will. Paradox is making a nice profit, we have seen a new quite good 4x game being released, and the hardcore spreadsheet gaming of Football Manager makes millions (!). Toady One, who writes Dwarf Fortress, is making a nice income by donations only.

Speak for myself? I am speaking for myself. Listen, man (or kind lady), unless your plan involves building a rocket, shoot yourself and a bunch of others backers (13 Kickstarter projects, uhmm, how impressive) into space, and create a new species of very intelligent people (let’s call them Homo backer), all your effort counts for nothing. Look around yourself: the ship is sinking. You can preach and dance and jump and fuck and be the most intelligent and only king of the ship, but when the ship is under the surface of the sea, your intelligence and resistance and greatness will count exactly as much as the stupidity of the other 99% people sinking with you. And the funny thing is that we are talking here about games, and in particular RPG games, but the sad reality is that can be translated, verbatim, to our entire existence.

 

[mbpopolano24]

and for any one wasteland or dead state or ago of decadence, 100 more diablos and skyrim will see the light of the day.

Where are these 100 skyrims that you speak of? I'd love to play more first person RPGs (preferably open world too), but in the fantasy genre it's pretty much just TES and outside fantasy there's still just the odd not fully open game like dead island or borderlands.

Funny… (not in any offensive way, just the same objection I always get).
Quoting Harsztas from the Book of Fire: “Where are all the trees that you spoke of, Master?” cried the disciple standing in the middle of the forest… “Open your eyes, because the Great Illusion is making you blind to the obvious things in plain sight”.

The most powerful rule of the decline is to make you think 'evil' does not exist. Many people think that the best tricks always involve making something to appear in front of your eyes. Not so. Evil likes to work in plain sight - without being noticed.
Spend one day in fucking New York (just an example, but any place everywhere would do), man, trying to see, I mean, actually fucking see what’s happening all around you, and then let’s talk again…

 

[Mastermind]

and for any one wasteland or dead state or ago of decadence, 100 more diablos and skyrim will see the light of the day.

Where are these 100 skyrims that you speak of? I'd love to play more first person RPGs (preferably open world too), but in the fantasy genre it's pretty much just TES and outside fantasy there's still just the odd not fully open game like dead island or borderlands.

Funny… (not in any offensive way, just the same objection I always get).
Quoting Harsztas from the Book of Fire: “Where are all the trees that you spoke of, Master?” cried the disciple standing in the middle of the forest… “Open your eyes, because the Great Illusion is making you blind to the obvious things in plain sight”.

The most powerful rule of the decline is to make you think 'evil' does not exist. Many people think that the best tricks always involve making something to appear in front of your eyes. Not so. Evil likes to work in plain sight - without being noticed.
Spend one day in fucking New York (just an example, but any place everywhere would do), man, trying to see, I mean, actually fucking see what’s happening all around you, and then let’s talk again…

Note the distinct lack of any names of Skyrim clones in your post.

 

[Computer Gamer Refugee]

"No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby."

— H. L. Mencken, "Notes on Journalism"

I submit the movie Battleship.

 

[Average Manatee]

"No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby."

— H. L. Mencken, "Notes on Journalism"

I submit the movie Battleship.

It almost certainly made a profit. Don't believe the Hollywood accounting jews trying to rip everyone off. As far as they are concerned not a single movie ever has made profit.

 

[Malpercio]

If they are done right and are better than D3, I say let them come.

Online-only single player games? Fuck no.
I'd rather stop gaming.