Anyone Know This Answer? For My Letters

[tinkcollector]

Hi Everyone. I was just wondering on the other games, Toon Town, Club Penguin, and the POTC game. Do they post how many players are playing? You know how on VMK's home page we can see how many ppl are in the game? Just thought it would be a good, maybe even a motivating fact to include in our letters to all the different Disney departments to realize. I know I was told once at DLR before the booth was removed that over a million folks had joined, and I know it was very common to log in and see over 7,000 ppl playing the game at any given time. I sure hope someone here knows the answer to my question.

 

[Vary]

I think the more important point is that right now, they don't have any game like VMK. POTC and ToonTown are World of Warcraft to VMK's second life, and if they're thinking that even a fraction of VMK players are going move over to those games (who wouldn't anyway if VMK wasn't closing), they're fooling themselves. I'm amazed that they didn't at least keep the game open until they get Fairies and Cars up and running - those games are looking more social, and a 'Cars and Fairies' cross promotion with VMK would probably have been far more successful than the Pirates and ToonTown months ever could be.

 

[tofubeast]

There is a screen shot on the boards of Lily stating last night that a quarter of a million people play vmk.

 

[WDWTigger72]

Just an fyi, Any number can really be skewed for the most part depending on whether they are (1) Active Accounts (2) Inactive Accounts (3) Time period for active logons (4) Are there mules or not and so on. There are many websites out there designed to help improve traffic to the games, and although this doesn't represent the people actually logging into the game, you can see how many more people visited the other sites outside of vmk...I have also included the Site Analytics description for people count...

You can see that all the other disney sites completely dwarf vmk in comparision regarding the number of people visiting just the site...Anyways, Hope this is some way helps you out...

People Count

People Counts are also known as unique visitors - they only count a person once no matter how many times they visit a site in a given month. People Counts are typically used to determine how popular a site is.
Recommendation: To best understand the popularity of a site, you should consider additional metrics beyond People Counts.

For instance, Site X could drive up its People Count by buying a lot of advertising across the Internet. However, many of these people may leave the site immediately. Use Engagement metrics to understand how much time people spend on a site and how many pages they look at on average during each visit to more fully understand the site's popularity.

http://siteanalytics.compete.com/vmk.com+toontown.com+piratesonline.com+clubpenguin.com/?metric=uv

 

[mouseman68]

http://siteanalytics.compete.com/vmk.com+toontown.com+piratesonline.com+clubpenguin.com/?metric=uv[/URL]

wow that puts some perspective on that!!

 

[Belle1997]

You begin to wonder why 1/2 the people stopped playing. I truly believe if the communication to the players had been at least 50% better VMK would have been a huge success. But each year we saw more and more players tired of the non communication leave. I really believe Disney created a gem but did not really understand the people that were playing the game and why.

And now all that creative work wonderful places will be put aside.

 

[WDWTigger72]

You begin to wonder why 1/2 the people stopped playing. I truly believe if the communication to the players had been at least 50% better VMK would have been a huge success. But each year we saw more and more players tired of the non communication leave. I really believe Disney created a gem but did not really understand the people that were playing the game and why.

And now all that creative work wonderful places will be put aside.

Completely agree with you, I really thought Disney created a gem when they designed Virtual Magic Kingdom. My initial thought when I signed up was that they will start incorporating videos of rides, reservation system, other parks, purchaseable items, and so on...That never came to fruition unfortunately....

P.S. I really thought after beta it would be a pay-to-play game, but that never happened either...

 

[Dreamytime]

WDWTigger72, I have a question.
I've been looking at these numbers since GoofyGeggy PM'ed them to me last night.

The information just shows the traffic to vmk.com. As we know you do not have to go to vmk.com to play the game. This truly only shows the traffic to vmk.com which could be people going to read the newsletter, check the community calendar, etc.

Are there actual numbers for those who play the game? Have you tried the URL for the game GUI instead? I haven't tried that myself as I can't get the URL as 'vmk is not currently open'!

I'm just saying that I do not believe the numbers are TRULY a reflection of the traffic of VMK. I know that I visit the VMK.COM page very few times a month. I use VMKPal to log in. VMKPal goes direct to the game URL and not VMK.COM to be redirected to the game URL.

Thanks!!

 

[Belle1997]

Are you saying that VMK PAL does not register when we play for this chart. So the drop could also be the people that swtiched over to PAL. I for one did that last year. Oh my hope that is not the real issue.

 

[TLinden16]

From the way WDWTigger describes it, as long as each player went to www.vmk.com at least once, they would be included in that total number of users. Even if you used VMK pal to log in every day, as long as you visted the homepage once to see the newsletter, you would have been counted.

I think the unique users are key here.

When I saw that Lily said there were a quarter million active players, I just didn't believe that was true. I believe that there are a quarter million active characters that log on at least once a month, but I think that the mules. I know I played about 10 mules pretty regularly. I know there are a lot of others players who play that many or more regularly. Some may play less, but I would guess that the average player has between five and ten characters the play regularly, which would explain these numbers.

I'm sure Disney tracks all kinds of stuff like, and if they see that their free games isn't pulling in anywhere near the numbers that their pay to play games are, I can totally understand the decision to pull the plug on it.

 

[Dreamytime]

From the way WDWTigger describes it, as long as each player went to www.vmk.com at least once, they would be included in that total number of users. Even if you used VMK pal to log in every day, as long as you visted the homepage once to see the newsletter, you would have been counted.

I think the unique users are key here.

Correction: Unique IP addresses are the key not unique users.

One thing to remember is most of us have the VMK home page bookmarked. VMK home page FULL URL is: http://vmk.disney.go.com/vmk/en_US/index?name=VMKHomePage

You cannot do a site survey on the FULL URL, as Tigger has, or you get the hits to Go.Com only which are over 3 BILLION unique IPs.

Notice vmk.com as was the qualifier that Tigger used. NOT THE FULL URL.

You can also argue that the POTCO information is wrong as well as you never visit the site to play the game. If you play, you have a downloaded GUI from POTCO which is used. If you notice the numbers for POTCO has dramatically increased in the last months due to the bombardment of POTCO commercials on TV.

I am not being argumentative, just saying that the numbers are not completely accurate and only DIG will be able to provide those users/gamers accurately.

 

[TLinden16]

One thing to remember is most of us have the VMK home page bookmarked. VMK home page FULL URL is: http://vmk.disney.go.com/vmk/en_US/index?name=VMKHomePage

Not trying to debate anything here, but I'm curious about the other sites. What are their full urls? The web addresses used to gather these numbers all seem to use "nickname" type urls (for lack of a better description). I'm sure the other websites have full Disney urls like the one above as well.

I just don't think that the numbers will change enough to make it seem that VMK is as popular as many of us think it is.

 

[AmberDaze]

Here's an article from February 2006...

Virtual Magic Kingdom Hits Million Player Mark!

Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online Announces Millionth Character Milestone and Expansions to Online Theme Park

NORTH HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (Feb. 27, 2006) -- Barely more than seven months after its official launch, Virtual Magic Kingdom, a free multiplayer gaming community inspired by Disney's famous theme parks, has acquired the one-millionth character in its virtual community, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online announced.

Quickly establishing itself as one of the coolest destinations online for gaming fans, the virtual theme park at vmk.com has grown to include several new lands, fun new games and more than 1.3 million personalized rooms created by its players.

"We're thrilled that so many players have embraced the fun of VMK," said Paul Yanover, senior vice president and general manager of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online. "To reach this milestone so quickly after the community debuted is extremely satisfying to everyone on the VMK team. Just like in the real parks, we strive to constantly improve and expand our online park to exceed players' expectations."

Where Are We ... Frontierland Newly Added!

In December, VMK opened Frontierland, a Wild-West neighborhood with new areas to explore and brand-new games. Players can create their own log flume ride or hunt ghosts in a new Haunted Mansion multiplayer game.

By Land or Sea ... Adventureland, Main Street and Fantasyland!

Players can enjoy tons of fun activities as they explore a virtual community inspired by Disney's famous theme parks and attractions. Adventureland offers players the chance to steer through treacherous rivers aboard the Jungle Cruise Photo Safari or battle other players in high-seas competition inspired by the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction and movies. On VMK's Main Street, players can create funky music mixes and share them with other players. Fantasyland lets players compete against 100 other characters in an amazing fireworks display game. Throughout each land, shops offer creative items players can purchase to decorate their personal space -- or trade with other characters. More than 1,000 virtual items currently are available for sale and trade within the VMK community.

In a future phase set to launch later this year, Tomorrowland will add an exciting, outer-space dimension to the virtual theme park. Guests can catch a sneak preview of Tomorrowland with three new arcade-style games available now in the Tomorrowland section of VMK: Airlock Escape, Hyperspace Mountain and Blast in Space.

From the Virtual World to the Real World

The fun continues on as it transcends its online community. Gamers can visit VMK Central in the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World and Disneyland park at Disneyland Resort and participate in exciting real-world Quests. And, best of all, guests who successfully complete a VMK Quest in the real world will earn secret codes for game credits and other cool virtual rewards to enhance game play.

Always Something New

Part of the reason VMK is such a fun, high-energy destination is because there's always something new to do. A glance at the VMK Web site at VMK.com gives players a calendar of special online events designed to challenge and entertain while offering the chance to win rare virtual items. These new social activities and community-driven events enhance the dynamic nature of the game, complementing the permanent features players can enjoy throughout VMK. In February, VMK added a cool new game where guests can build their own Expedition Everest ride in celebration of the Spring opening of Expedition Everest in Disney's Animal Kingdom.

Beyond VMK

Other new Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online destinations allow players an opportunity to take advantage of great VMK tie-ins. At VMK, guests can link to disneyeverest.com, an all-new web site for the thrilling new Expedition Everest attraction at Florida's Walt Disney World Resort where players can learn about the ride and win free stuff for VMK. A downloadable game called Yeti Vision lets players become the feared Yeti from the new attraction at Disney's Animal Kingdom. Protect the sacred realm from intruders and earn Yeti Vision Rewards to redeem in VMK by destroying train tracks, causing avalanches and solving ancient mysteries. After each episode, guests can earn different virtual prizes such as Everest pins, Everest ice furniture or an Everest guest room.

Creating the "New" You

When players enter VMK they can really express themselves. Each character is completely in charge of the universe he or she creates, right down to their "look." Blue spiky hair is "in" and your wardrobe is your own, with dozens of colorful clothing pieces to buy or trade. Plus, Virtual Magic Kingdom lets players create personalized guest rooms and decorate them any way they want to reflect their own style.

Experience the magic firsthand at vmk.com. The fun is just a 'mouse' click away!


# # #

Contact:
Coyne Public Relations - 973/316-1665

 

[CelebrationNM]

While that may seem like a big deal, a quick glance at some other published numbers adds to the story:

• In January 2007, DisneyFaries.com was launched...and to date, visitors have created more than 3.5 million personalized faries.
• In Aug 2007, WDIG acquired Club Penguin...with more than 12 million activated users and more than 700,000 paid subscribers.
• Disney's Toontown Online continued to grow in 2007, with more than 17.5 million user-created toons and 6 million active players since the game started.

I'm not saying VMK isn't a big deal, but Disney doesn't need to be reminded how many people use their services; they are well aware.

 

[WDWTigger72]

The information just shows the traffic to vmk.com. As we know you do not have to go to vmk.com to play the game. This truly only shows the traffic to vmk.com which could be people going to read the newsletter, check the community calendar, etc.

Are there actual numbers for those who play the game? Have you tried the URL for the game GUI instead? I haven't tried that myself as I can't get the URL as 'vmk is not currently open'!

Aloha DreamyTime:

You are correct since its only showing unique ip addresses (traffic) that makes a hit on the web site vmk.com. The web site I utilized only shows traffic to a domain site, not their subdomain sites. For example, If I typed in the following:

COMPLETE HYPERLINK OR URL PATH
http://vmk.disney.go.com or http://vmk.disney.go.com/vmk/en_US/i...me=VMKHomePage

COMPETE.COM REPRESENTS AS ONLY ROOT DOMAIN SITE
go.com

Unfortunately, Because compete.com only takes the root domain site its really difficult to identify actual numbers from an outsiders perspective. These statistical sites typically only identify root domains and not all their subdomains. So, If your going directly to the logon page it does not get registered under vmk.com, based on reviewing this it more than likely gets registered only at the main site go.com. The go.com root domain is really too difficult to get actual numbers because much more than vmk goes there and the number says 36.5 million subscribers which is definitely not what vmk has.

Unfortunately, As an outsider from the company you have to rely on these third party sites statistics being as close as possible. The only way to see actual statistics would be to have access directly to the server, which unfortunately none of use will ever get access to, so we have to rely on the numbers disney reports like AmberDaze has posted with the 1,000,000 character "acquired" not active. This is also skewed because it doesn't represent active accounts that have logged into the game over x amount of days. Only the server statistics, third party monitoring/reporting software installed on server, etc could tell you this...but you would require direct access to the server. In my experience, Things such as performance monitor (perfmon), NetIQ AppManager, HPOpenview which can all report statistics and monitor servers have even been skewed with numbers as I have found many bugs with these products also. There are other statistics from compete.com such as Visits, Velocity, Average Stay and so on...

Most companies also don't look at active logons for the past month so the 250,000 reported maybe active accounts over the past 6 months. Similar to where if your account is inactive for 6 months it gets purged/deleted from vmk. Although, Since I cannot see the server directly I cannot guess what the actual physical numbers are and look at different performance statistics. Looking at the graph from compete.com it probably has about 30/35K average people count for the past 6 months, which would end up equaling 180/210K average people count over that time period. Much closer to what has been reported by the hosts, but really comes up short compared to their other sites (pirates, penguin, toontown). As TLinden stated, Really no matter how you look at the numbers comparing vmk to the other sites they just don't generate 1/8 of the traffic. I would imagine if I had direct access to the server that the numbers would look very similar compared to this statistical graph:

DOMAIN GRAPH STATES REPORTED
VMK.COM 28,131 250,000
PIRATESONLINE.COM 198,379 1,763,589
CLUBPENGUIN.COM 948,641 8,443,418
TOONTOWN.COM 2,612,645 23,226,414

NOTE: The vmk number was reported by hosts compared to what the graph states last month, so basically I divided 250000/28131 = 8.89 (rounded). The next three numbers under reported are basically the graph states number times 8.89, so you can see how much traffic the other sites generate roughly based on the reported number. Figuring that each site generates at least 8.89 as much traffic as vmk, just rough estimates here but its a large difference.



Hope this helps clarify some things, especially since many server operating systems have numerous statistics that can be reviewed and utilized.

In January 2007, DisneyFaries.com was launched...and to date, visitors have created more than 3.5 million personalized faries.
In Aug 2007, WDIG acquired Club Penguin...with more than 12 million activated users and more than 700,000 paid subscribers.
Disney's Toontown Online continued to grow in 2007, with more than 17.5 million user-created toons and 6 million active players since the game started.

The numbers reported above are also just an example how companies can manipulate the numbers and utilize words in their favor. DisneyFairies.com having 3.5 million personalized fairies only shows how many where created which doesn't include how many duplicates where created per household which could cut this number down quite a bit. The second one regarding clubpenguin has 12 million activated users (700,000 paid subscribers) which I would believe the paid subscribers are closer to th real numbers of players, but once again what about people that don't logon for a few months or just stop playing? I am sure there are people that forget they signed up or just stop playing and cancel their account much later. Toontown having 17.5 million created toons (6 million active players) I would probably lean more towards the active players, but once again what is this active player account pertain too...The number of people logged in the last day, last month, last 6 months or last year...They never provide you a date range for the active players...At least with financial reports we get numbers every quarter (3 months) so you can see what a company does year over year, quarter over quarter. Thanks for these numbers also just wanted to point out that numbers (statistics) can be manipulated or skewed to place a product in a better light than it actually maybe.

 

[mouseman68]

I too was thinking about these figures and thought of another thing. The VMK server is quite small as I believe it maxes out at 7,000 players being logged into the game. (or somewhere around there) It does not give a good opportunity for growth when the game at the max would create some wicked lag.

 

[Dreamytime]

Thank you Tigger for your clarification.

No matter the numbers presented here, mules or mains, true or skewed, the more phone calls, emails, letters, and the like that WDIG receives the more real those avatars become to them.

Keep doing your part to continue VMK - not the game, but the experience!

 

[WDWTigger72]

Thank you Tigger for your clarification.

No matter the numbers presented here, mules or mains, true or skewed, the more phone calls, emails, letters, and the like that WDIG receives the more real those avatars become to them.

Keep doing your part to continue VMK - not the game, but the experience!

Exactly, couldn't say it better...

 

[cteddiesgirl]

I too was thinking about these figures and thought of another thing. The VMK server is quite small as I believe it maxes out at 7,000 players being logged into the game. (or somewhere around there) It does not give a good opportunity for growth when the game at the max would create some wicked lag.

That's easily fixable by getting better servers.
Disney could easily make this game profitable and without making it pay to play. They just just need to work at it a little bit.

Thank you Tigger for your clarification.

No matter the numbers presented here, mules or mains, true or skewed, the more phone calls, emails, letters, and the like that WDIG receives the more real those avatars become to them.

Keep doing your part to continue VMK - not the game, but the experience!

Exactly!