Activision Stock Drops 17% in Month Since Destiny Launch

Destiny's success can no longer be judged on hype and now must be judged on short and long-term financial results for its publisher. And currently, they're not looking so good.

[LogicLee]

Makes sense....

[krouse93]

Of course, investors want to make money right after the launch hype... I don't think most people realize how the stock market works lol.

Build up hype, gain investment, gradually increase the value of your assets, then once they've appreciated enough interest, the only thing to do is sell them at their appreciated rate and profit! $$$

[g-0ff]

What really, really worries me is that these people - who have no stake in the long-term growth of a company - have immense decision-making power as temporary stakeholders. These are the types of jackasses who devalued guitar hero year after year, knowing they wouldn't be around to suffer for it.

The way corporations work, they don't owe anything to their customers or even to their employees - it's all about making money for investors. That's their first priority according to the goddamn law. It's disgusting.

[venom06]

if Activision didn't have IGN hyping the HELL outta all of their FPS every year (benefits of conflict of interest business dealings with IGN through Activision buying the IGN ProLeague), the stock would've fell by even more than that. What it did sell, was sold by the over-the-top hype from IGN and the hype sites that look up to IGN like little brothers. Activision better be glad it was only down 17%

[Am_Ryder]

Barely-regulated free market capitalism. That's what this is all a result of.

[krouse93]

In my opinion video game companies do best when they are privately held. Indie developers see huge success, and obviously don't have to be at the whim of outside investors. Plus Valve is actually privately held and they're massively successful.

It sucks that guitar hero got gutted because of what happened with Harmonix, but they shouldn't have signed with Activison. I do miss me some Guitar Hero, and Rockband too... I mean they kinda burned themselves to the ground with their yearly releases though.

Sony's shown us that Bi-yearly releases are the way to go for a lot of franchises, and if not by yearly than tri-yearly, or at least switch the platform around, transition from console to portable for one year, and add the extra polish on your games in the extra time.

@G-0ff

I think video games companies should be privately held, especially because as an artistic medium, their fragile and can't really preform the way an investor might want them too, you can't mass produce quantity with out compromising quality in that short 1 year period of time (especially when it comes to video games, because they're insanely difficult to create).

[15988885556]

That's brutal.

[ValKilmer]

Jeez, I thought the game was selling well?

[Am_Ryder]

It was and is selling decently. The stock falling is more to do with investors realising it might not be a great long-term investment and pulling out than anything to do with actual sales made.

Things like Metacritic ratings and cultural impact have a big influence on stocks as much as actual units shifted. And Destiny is not doing great on either of those two signposts.

[SynestheticRoar]

Putting out a incomplete game can be the cause.

[OmegaShen]

Like BF4? Keep trying buddy.

[IVanSpinal]

I like BF4 too :)

[RebelWAC]

Relying on promotion and hype can only get you so far and in this case, backfire... bad. If it was a great game and not only ok, it would probably generate more buzz and sales via word of mouth but I don't hear anyone saying that it's a must buy (like TLOU for example). As for now, it's only a high budget mediocre game that didn't live up to the hype and I reckon gamers are getting sick and tired in general.

That's my take on it

[LordDhampire]

Game is a must buy in my book, if you have friends

If your a shut in pleb, plebs gonna pleb

[FsterThnFTL]

By my calculations that is a loss of approximately $3 Billion in share value, lol. Activision spend $500 Million & lost $3 Billion, all thanks to Destiny. What a success story.

[OmegaShen]

Yet there was report saying they made 326m from Destiny, so I question this. I can see COD Ghost being the reason.

[FsterThnFTL]

$3,000,000,000 - $326,000,000 = Still a long way to go

[OmegaShen]

Yes, but my point is. It can't because of Destiny.

[GameDev1]

How the hell did you come on with that calculation considering they made the most of the money back for Destiny 10 year franchise in a few days, considering we havent been given more information about how Destiny sold?

Destiny is a commercial success, any stock drop is on all franchises of Activision, with reports the COD AW preorders are lower than COD Ghosts, I would say that is more of a money loss

[FsterThnFTL]

Yes Destiny made that $500 Million back but the $3 Billion loss from share value just after the release of Destiny is something that is insanely big and damaging for Activision. You can argue that it may also be because COD Ghost's lackluster performance or low pre-orders for COD AW or the cancellation of Blizzard's Titan MMO or some other reason. But Destiny underachieving is definitely a huge factor in the 17% stock decline which has ended up losing Activision $3 Billion.

[GameDev1]

@FasterFTL

Destiny underachieved reviewer wise, Metacritic scores did not even make a dent in how successful Destiny was commercially and Reviewer and Metacritic scores aren't even parallel with a game's commercial success in most cases.

There is absolutely no proof it was Destiny considering the first instalment made most of the money back for a 10 year franchise

Stop pulling points out of the air cause Destiny wasnt reviewed so well

[Funantic1]

I saw so many used copies of Destiny for all consoles at Gamestop yesterday. People are trading it back in at an alarming rate.

[user367272]

One of the copy you saw was probably mone. Traded in my copy after a week. Very disapointed.

[ITPython]

Kind of amazing how so many are trading it in, every last one of the buddies on my friends list still plays it on a daily basis, and even right now there is a crap load of them on and playing Destiny.

The majority of the people who actually bought and play the game, absolutely love it and are genuinely hooked on it. You really need to drop the butthurt about Bungie going multiplat and giving Sony preferential treatment. It's really pathetic the lengths you guys go to downplay and spread FUD about the game.

@S_D_F_Repellent - Yeah, sure you bought the game. But even if you did, if you only played it for a week then you are doing it wrong. Perhaps you should have researched what a MMO is before buying Destiny. It's like me buying a racing game and saying "Yeah, I hate racing games, I didn't like it at all".

[user367272]

FYI..I am a primary PC gamer and I'Ve been playing MMO before it was a even a genre on consoles so please..that is like saying you love sci-fi movies but have to sit through and torture yourself of watching Battlefield Earth from start to finish. 😬

[ScorpiusX]

Me trading in the game had nothing to do with who bungie wants to butters up too, but the shear fact the game turned out to be a major disappointment. No more no less

[BattleAxe]

It's not just Destiny that is dragging Activision down, it's World of Warcraft and Call of Duty's slowing popularity. If these guys don't have anything else up their sleeve to show us within the next year, then this is potentially going to be a monumental fall from glory.

[CerealKiller]

This article is not fair at all the stock market has been getting destroyed over the last month and many stocks are at their 52-week lows.

[airsick7]

Exactly, people are foolish.

Hardcoregamer is a terribly written site. I've rolled my eyes at several of their "articles" now. There are so many factors that can drop share prices. For instance, Blizzard canceling a 7-year-in-development IP probably looks worse to Biz analysts than a new IP doing $300 million in one week.

[CerealKiller]

The only thing that really matters to a stocks price is earnings. Until they report earnings the day to day trading is based only on speculation and other economic factors and is in no way a reflection of how Activision is doing financially off of Destiny. Once they report earnings they will obviously have a large earnings per share growth since they released an extra game that sold very well this quarter. Also the development expenses have already been incurred over the past few years, not after the game releases. Activision also trades at a low valuation so there isn't much downside to the stock. I think this article is also poorly written.

[Magicite]

gasp!

[urwifeminder]

Sales don't necessarily mean stock will rise I can think of a few companies this is happening to.

[Emme]

Destiny needs new content soon or it ends like TOR.

[LordDhampire]

Lol people who trade it in are ignorant, just do it based on review scores, the game is amazing if you have friends to play with, trying to get past level 20 and level 26 to do raids is way better than 1-20 was

[FrolicKingFlack]

Well it will be back to normal and better after COD:AW launches next month. That is if it really is that much different from the others and can redeem Ghosts.

[Perjoss]

As much as I love Destiny, it would be cool if Activision had a few tragic launches and had to close down, not likely but I can dream!

[spacedelete]

lol at the fanboys saying only reason people don't like it because they aren't playing it right or because of reviews. heres the real reason. its trash thats why people are trading it in.

[GameDev1]

I disagree, I like Destiny, never liked FPS shooters before but the gameplay feels good

There are also many other people who like it with a recent article on N4G saying even though it is not great, they can't put it down.

I dislike the always online aspect as that is annoying when bungie's server goes down as you are playing but I still cant get enough of it, can trade it in after I felt I have completed everything

Many games get traded in all the time due to different factors, doesnt mean they are trash or people who like Destiny are fanboys, that is a really pathetic fanboyism statement from you cause you don't like the game

[spacedelete]

I also disagree with you.i played the beta and even the gameplay wasn't anything special. it was just aim and shoot. nothing amazing that people are going nuts over. the reason why some people haven't traded in is because they are trying to get as much play time out of it as much as possible as they know they wasted money on a turd.