Yeah but they're spread across of bunch of different servers so it's not really a good comparison to a single City. I think EVE still holds the top slot for most people on a single server.

I played the free 10-day trial of Wow during rainy days of our summer vacation with my girlfriend on 2 computers in the same room and we had a lot of fun.

The game is very addictive, but it is a lot more fun than TV, so I don't wonder.

Since we are not 2 nerds just sitting at the computer at all times (common misconception I think), we decided wait until next winter, when it get very cold and dark here in nothern europe, and continue playing with a retail pack + monthly fee (which adds up to about 50c/day).

We didn't have any trouble with servers and I can't say paying the monthly fee could be considered expensive.

I do think they should have some kind of 'family plan', If a couple wants to play, or a family with 3 kids want to play simoultaniously, so you could log on from 1 IP with the same account and play 2 different caracters.

NEW YORK CITY!!!!!

(PACE commercials) Sorry, couldn't resist

its a bit misleading that... That is 9 million units sold and does NOT reflect total subscribers. It reflects units sold... Which is suppose to mean a subscription, but here is the truth, it doesn't. Back when WoW was still in beta testing they had a free server system available which still exists to this day. But when the game went gold they removed the promised world server from the game and thus made all free servers illegal.
Now here is the rub. they may be illegal but they are still out there by the 1000s... and very active. What does this mean? well a good 10% of the units sold is NOT subscribing at all to Blizards extortion fees. They play their purchased game where they want too, when they want too, and are not required to pay one red cent. ok so thats only 900,000 people right? wrong again... More still do NOT play the game anymore because they have been banned for doing some kind of EULA or RoC violation on the normal pay servers, thus making them not be allowed to subscribe anymore, and if they want to play they go buy a new game (wow added unit sales, Genius).

And then there are the people that left the game after the 1st month of freeplay (included in every retail box) from the main servers never to return. That is where I fit in. I purchased the game, and it sits on my self, but mostly just so I can, on occasion pop on a free server(which now included Burning Crusade expansions as well for nothing). The game is just not that fun, and the added insult of having to pay to play something you already paid $50 for. well. It was the last blizzard product I ever bought... If you want the WoW experience with no subscription its a pretty easy choice. go to Guild Wars... It was made by the people that left Blizzard in protest over the bait and switch they pulled on their consumers, and in the end Arenanet (thats them) made a fantastic legal, and free to play game that is everything WoW purports to be and more.

If you look at activity for the 12 realm servers you will see that its more like 3 million active subscribers, which would make it actually 3rd place in the MMO market, but Blizzard touts their unit sales numbers every few months in hopes of generating renewed interest in subscribing.... Its a poor tactic, but they are certainly not at the top of their game now that superior business models are proving themselves on the market. and traditional MMO subscription structures are being thrown out the window. Opening the game to sell in China market is a huge step in the wrong direction. There are vast sweatshops of people farming game gold for resale in that country, and its become a multi million dollar industry in and of itself. The bad news? its not allowed. Which means Blizzard bans the account forcing hem to buy more to keep up. Another boost to sales numbers. but all the while all that they are selling to are people they are banning continually for cheating and making a profit from it. So I fully expect a 10 million number as soon as that market hits the main stream in China. However it will not change the number of subscribers with any major significance.

The only problem with the free servers is that they are all incredibly bugged.

Many items don't function properly (if at all) and a lot of the quests are still borked. Regarding TBC, very few servers have working maps, quests, mobs, etc. especially in the Outlands (Where many of the encounters require a good deal of scripting).

All I remember them saying is half the servers hosting the game was broke all the time they were so over crowded. I tried playing this game for about a half hour and I just simply could not get into to it. It takes 10 mins to simply run to another part of the board, so if you want to actually do anything its no wonder it takes such a long time.

If you like to push yoru mouse button, alot for hours. This is the game for you. I never played again perhaps im missing somethign? I remember everquest back in 2001 was like this, I had a bunch of friends who lived for that game. guess this is the new one that fills that niche.

I know they have had some special reports on cnn talking about this game, people losing their jobs, getting divorced, calling in sick from work I mean its crazy.

Where do I start with this sad bit of reality?

I just want to clarify - is this story being reported as good news or bad news?

;-)

I want to try this game, but I think $12.95/month or whatever it is is too much just for this game.

I bet they're raking in the money though because of it. 9 million x $12.95/m = A lot of money.

i wont pay for a game that requires subscription, if i buy a game i expect to be able to play it as much as i want for only the base cost. and hell i want to be able to sit back 10 years from now, and pull out a game and play, not have to resubscribe.

A friend of mine is currently flunking out of college and was already fired from his job because all he does is sit and play this game. He has XFire so when you log in you can see what your friends are playing. He was playing at noon yesterday, at 11:30PM when I checked in again, and at 7AM when I got up this morning. Basically he plays from daylight to dark, most of the night, sleeps a few hours and plays some more. That's so sad and pathetic...

This is when you walk in, unplug the PC and toss it out the window.

Sure, he'll hate your guts, but he'll probably be better off for it.

I recently disband my guild shortly after the expansion we were doing very well, but I had 7 people fail to get their degrees in college and had to go to summer school. With myself attending college next month I myself have stopped raiding but am still an active player controlling 4 accounts. One bots all day and makes money, one is so I can gank my friends on the same server, 1 is paid for so family can play with me. And one is my hardcore account I got all my 70s on (all but 1 which is the horde)

9 million users? Nah, most of the recent new ones are duplicate accounts from the same person. They have millions of active players I'm sure, but almost everyone that was in my guild told me they paid for 3 to 5 separate accounts at the same time (why????? Don't ask me!).

Playing multiple accounts at once is actually very common.

Raid instances, for example, don't allow solo players to enter. A player who's using multiple accounts can simply party two of their characters, set on to follow, and their golden.

Good grief listen to yourself man.

Actually, it's more likely 3.15 million and another 5.85 million trial accounts selling gold or farming it as bots.

*laughs*

You know what happens when you assume...

That would probably increase significantly if they included the number of users playing the game on private servers.

There are tons of them out there. Some of them even top blizzards servers in online users on occasion.