Does anyone else find it really strange how the WoW susbscribers just keep on growing? I recall it being massively popular amongst the people I know, but eventually most of them gave it up. How could word of mouth still be spreading this thing? I assumed everyone that would be interested in it knew of it long ago (it's freggin 4 years old, can't believe it). This growth can't be coming from the US, right?

I guess this is how many people feel when they say everyone is getting bored of the Wii. Anecdotal evidence doesn't mean much, huh...

I believe the country with the biggest base of Wow players is actually China not the US, nevertheless the number of subscribers is pretty much stable in western countries( most of the people I know that quit the game ended up coming back after a while).

Subscribers numbers tend to raise close to an expansion too as the hype from it tends to draw back old players...

I woudn't be surprised if the constant release of competitors MMORPG isn't actually helping Wow too.

Some of these games draw new players to the market and some of those players unsastified with the game but liking the new genre they have discovered end up trying Wow :P

Still I would expect Wow population to peak sometime after WOTLK is released ( somewhere around 12-13 million players). The question being how long the game will stay at its peak before the number of subscribers slowly starts going down...( the next expansion after WOTLK is going to be hard for Blizzard as WOTLK is going to mine most of the remaining lore that has people motivated in playing the game).

Wow is benefiting too from the fact that 4 years after its release the game is still airing commercials...

That's alot imo.

you know what's' scary. Blizzard makes that much. Nintendo makes more profit than all other video game companies combined. Think about that for a second.

One thing to know too is that when a new MMORPG get released and people leave Wow for a while to go try it the number of subscriptions does not dip as people tend to keep their subscription active when they do this.

I really wonder if Blizz can make another expansion for WoW, I mean isn't Arhas is supposed to be "THE" badass?

There are others ideas floating around ( like something based around the Emerald Dream) but yeah it is going to be hard for the next expansion after WOTLK to captivate players as much as WOTLK is.

That's why I am predicting Wow subscribers base will peak sometime during WOTLK ( the game will be more than 4 years old so it has to peak sometime anyway).

Next thing you know they will come out with World of Warcraft: The Void, and you'll be able to 10 man Kerrigan as the last boss in the last dungeon.

@OP
Try Nintendo. They made around 3 billion dollars in profit last year. And this year they have projected to make around 4 billion. That's 3 times the revenue of Blizzard, in profit. Not too shabby.

But yeah, Blizzard is sure raking in the bucks. Myself I have carefully avoided any and every online game, because I know I would just get hooked and loose what little life I have left. World of Warcraft is scary.

This was a few months back, i just googled it (I originally read it on joystiq):

http://www.firingsquad.com/news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=20850