Star Wars: The Old Republic could attract upwards of 50m monthly players says Wedbush

EA's had a rough time with its stock price down over 50 percent since November. The company is clearly still dealing with the turbulence surrounding its ongoing transition, but investors want results now. EA's board stands behind CEO John Riccitiello, and apparently so does Wedbush Securities, which issued a bullish report on the publisher following yesterday's fiscal report (which was about in-line with expectations).

[Quadraxis]

Ok, let's imagine for a second that the game DOES get such a big amount of players, the thing is, for how long are they going to play? I really doubt this will be as successful as those analysts think.

[ATi_Elite]

50m
NO WAY! EA just needs to realize that SWTOR is FINISHED!!

Sure the F2P mode will make some cash but the Game is TOAST!

Rift came out way before SWTOR and it is still going strong with a SOLID 1 million subscription base that is increasing.

Once Guild Wars 2 is released along with Mist of Pandaria SWTOR is No more!!

Investors know it and that's why EA's stock is $7 bucks!!

[kamper]

Were the hell is the 1 million players in Rift, The servers are mostly empty when I log on.

[Ramas]

what are those people smoking? :D

[Panthers]

I love this game and I am sad to see it go free to play. Hope this doesnt affect the quality of the content

[Zha1tan]

I really couldnt care what they do with that shambles of a warcraft clone, it seems EA is incapable of making a game that isnt just a rip off of an activision franchise.

It was just warcraft (star Wars skin) with tedious dialogue and less content in restricted world maps.

[SITH]

It was either this or star trek online when I finally got my gaming pc.

Star trek online is a freaking beast of a game. I am having too much fun. It makes me want to go watch the star trek series again... all of them.

[R_aVe_N]

At first there will be a large increase in player but once they actually play it that will drop off REALLY fast the game was not fun at all and a total waste of time. They where better off making a KoToR3.

[azshorty2003]

And with subscribers already declining, sure, that's totally a realistic number....

[hazelamy]

i know i'm going to give it a try once it's free to play.
i don't know how long for though.

[Jdoki]

Same here.

A lot of people I spoke to had a feeling the game would go F2P, so waited instead of subscribing.

Everything I have heard about the game makes it sound very decent.. Just not decent enough to pay ten quid a month.

Also I think with so many poor launches people want to wait to get better service, more content, and have the rough edges smoothed off.