Activision Blizzard is a leading publisher of videogames, notably World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, and Tony Hawk.
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Several mishaps over Activision Blizzard's new game Wrath of the Lich King have led it's customers to lose confidence in a game that has several bugs and glitches. As a result several of it's customers have decided to unsubscribe due to poor Quality Assurance testing at Blizzard and more than 3 months of Beta Testing... despite all of that the game still has bugs and several latency issues.On top of that, the company can do nothing right the first time except apologize over and over again.There are better games out there with higher quality and bug-free that customers really should look after and what Blizzard needs to understand is that you can't "Re-invent" the wheel and as more and more expansions are released players have to decide if they want to get married or divorced.With that there is a saying that "Nothing lasts forever" and it is very true with this company who is putting all of their bets on 3 franchises instead of making completely new ones in an effort to be more diverse. In that sense the company is lacking innovation compared to companies like Apple who keep making great brand new products at a much faster rate.
No need to reinvent the wheel when WOW is the only "wheel" around. And please post proof of a subscriber loss. Last reports show it closing in on 12 million subscribers. No other MMO can even claim 2 million. Earnings should hold up fairly well, with Wrath and CoD 4/5 being some of the biggest sellers in the '08 gaming market.
just wait until Feb 11th when the great numbers beat the street!
after you cancell your subscription, check your bank statements. they never stop taking your money.
All the things people are discussing are priced into this over inflated stock already. unless ATVI reports 100% profit increase, this will remain over valued, and the common folk jumping on the video game bubble will drop the stock. Whenever people who are not normally investors start talking about investing in something, it is the definition of a bubble.
3 franchises? Really? World of Warcraft, Starcraft, Guitar Hero, Call of Duty, and Diablo makes 5. Aside from World of Warcraft, all five of those franchises have a new title coming out in the next two years (yearly guitar hero offering, yearly Call of Duty offering, Starcraft 2, and Diablo 3), and all of those titles coming out are likely to sell in huge volume.
Blizzard hardly tries to "re-invent" the wheel, they created the wheel that everyone else is trying to copy. Revenues from WOW alone would make this a good buy and they are looking to add another game this year that will approach breaking sales records (StarCraft II).I have played WOW since its BETA inception in 2004, I can tell you from first hand experience, the game is like digital crack. People will continue to play for years to come.
Those that have unsubscribed don't even affect their cash gains. They gained 1.6 million players with the release of wrath, which is hardly a mass unsubscribing. In addition, developing China has a huge potential player base, even if some are just gold farmers. WoW isn't going to hit its peak for a while yet.Not to mention, Starcraft II is coming out soon, that game will be huge, being the best selling RTS of all time and all.Diablo 3 is also going to be a big release.Once the economy recovers I think Guitar hero will fare a lot better, its high price tag has made it a no-no for most buyers.Call of Duty has done exceptionally well, and will continue to do so with the competition from halo gone until the release of ODST.As for a lack of new products, you seem to forget that WoW is gigantic. You can play for 100 days without breaks for sleep, food, etc. and not play 3/4 of the content. You can't get that from any other game, there's eventually a point where replayability goes away for things like mass effect and such.
Those that have unsubscribed don't even affect their cash gains. They gained 1.6 million players with the release of wrath, which is hardly a mass unsubscribing. In addition, developing China has a huge potential player base, even if some are just gold farmers. WoW isn't going to hit its peak for a while yet.Not to mention, Starcraft II is coming out soon, that game will be huge, being the best selling RTS of all time and all.Diablo 3 is also going to be a big release.Once the economy recovers I think Guitar hero will fare a lot better, its high price tag has made it a no-no for most buyers.Call of Duty has done exceptionally well, and will continue to do so with the competition from halo gone until the release of ODST.As for a lack of new products, you seem to forget that WoW is gigantic. You can play for 100 days without breaks for sleep, food, etc. and not play 3/4 of the content. You can't get that from any other game, there's eventually a point where replayability goes away for things like mass effect and such.
I think this stock will do quite well over the next several years. They have a nice pipeline of upcoming games (albeit subject to the usual Blizzard-style multiple delays in release date), they have a proven track record of releasing high quality games (albeit with some bugs here and there - most people will complain about these, but complaining doesn't mean you stop playing), they are adept at following up their releases with expansion packs that generate more instant cash, they are obviously expanding the merchandising tie-ins to their games (and several of their games are prime candidates to be made into movies, which I think is likely at some point), they have a strong networking effect going in many of their games, they generate a lot of free cash flow, there are a lot of oppportunities for video game companies to expand globally (much of the population still needs to be connected to the internet), and people play video games to escape from reality in times like these.There are obvious macroeconomic risks associated with this one like everything, but I think the upside is more than the downside at this point. As for competition, most of it is weak. ERTS is a joke. It is near impossible for them to produce a well-thought out game that is free of serious bugs. I also think they may look to make some intelligent acquisitions of talent from other developers and smaller shops that don't have enough cash, which should help them grow more.
As a long time gamer and current member of the WoW (World of Warcraft) community I would like to bring up several counterpoints.First off video game customers like to complain... a lot. However they never do anything about it. You hear a lot about how this is bad, and that is messed up but yet you see that same person a month later, after paying another monthly fee complaining again. The bugs and poor quality assurance that you pointed out were rapidly addressed by the development team and most of the problems were corrected within the first 3 months. The loss of paying subscribers is minimal at most and considering that they had to spend 50$ to buy the expansion the loss of 15$ a month subscription is not huge.Blizzard fans are rabid and loyal. They wait in lines, buy special limited editions, buy licensed merchandise and generally eat up anything that Blizzard decides to toss in their general direction. That's not something that you can say about every company. Additionally Blizzard has multiple game franchises that have huge worldwide name recognition, From Warcraft, World of Warcraft, Diablo, and Starcraft. Each additional release in these franchises generates huge sales and in the case of WoW, subscription fees. Each title has legions of fans clamoring for the smallest little scrap of information or screen shot, much less a full game.Finally size matters in MMORPG's, and WoW is the biggest, there really isn't anywhere else to go. You want to play an online game, all your friends play WoW, what game are you going to go out and buy. The ability of this game and the company to fend off the competition is massive. Yes, they are a bit slow in releasing games, but when they do, I guarantee there will be a line at midnight outside the store, filled with people wearing "For the Horde!" shirts waiting to buy the extra special limited edition at 12:01 am.
How can you compare Activision to Apple. I understand the link youre trying to make but Activision makes GAMES...Apple makes a whole bunch of other consumer products that doesnt really include GAMES. Its completely different. I agree with the point youre trying to make that nothing lasts forever and eventually world of warcraft my falter...but i dont think they lack innovation and the ability to come up with new products. I mean Diablo was new and unique, WOW was new and unique, Starcraft was awesome...They will eventaully have something...but as with all game development, it takes time.
A total lie. I've stopped playing twice and both times I simply canceled my subscription and had no problem.
LOL. You stopped playing twice? Had you said once you may have made a totally valid argument. Funny. Unless you have a level 80 toon it might be easier to stop playing. I have too much time, money and effort invested to stop, as do millions of others.
You have too much time invested in playing the video game to stop playing the video game?
My head hurts.