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If anyone is familiar with the Alexa ranking, it pretty much tracks how popular sites are, and how they change over time. So for people who are not aware I'd like to share some statistics as a sort of reality check to an extent.
We like to think SC2 is exploding and getting bigger, and that everyone has high hopes for the future. Although let's take a quick look at a graph to see Teamliquid's popularity.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/EUa8P.png)
As you can see, the steep rise about a quarter into the graph is when SC2 came out, then we see a continuous increase in visitors, until maybe April or May of 2011. Since then the visitor increase of teamliquid stagnated, and actually appears to be on the decline. Is it a coincidence that there haven't been any new groups to start new tournaments? We have MLG, IPL, NASL, GSL, Dreamhack, but all those were founded before May 2011, and now we have what we have, but nothing new is coming out. Coincidence? I think not.
These numbers on their own are slightly misleading. Take a look at this graph.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/Iuot2.png)
This is the percent of visitors that arrive from search engines like google. As you can see, this graph indicates that initially many people didn't know about SC2, and stumbled upon the site using search engines, and at the beginning of the SC2 life Teamliquid had many possible players to attract, but in a year this number went from 20% to 5%. The player pool has been exhausted, and there is nowhere to attract a new audience from. For example if you go on battle.net and you ask someone if they know what Teamliquid is they all do.
I'm not sharing this information to scare people, but to make them understand how fragile this scene is, and try and help people understand the importance of attracting new players if they wish for the scene to succeed. Many seem to have this mentality "Oh HotS will fix everything, although I think that is a poor misconception, sure the HotS will bring in some new players, but expansions don't just magically double, triple, or make the player base go 10 fold.
If anyone has been here for a while, do you guys remember the HDH Invitational in BETA? It's finals peaked at nearly 30k views if my memory serves right, how about TSL3? Nony vs Strelok in ro32 having 60k+ viewers? These events were not the large scale events we have now, but they attracted a huge audience... Where did all these players go? Events like NASL being way below that, Dreamhack keeping on par with TSL3 numbers, and I'm going to take MLG numbers with a grain of salt because those figures are often exaggerated.
So hopefully you guys better understand the scope of size of SC2, and if you share a passion for it, you'll do what you can to keep it alive.
More graphs:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/pU48u.png)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/LgTom.png)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/90SUO.png)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/0hyuZ.png)
Poll: What direction do you think SC2 is going into?Constant (110) 45% Decline (75) 31% Increase (47) 19% Sharp Decline (7) 3% Sharp Increase (3) 1% 242 total votes Your vote: What direction do you think SC2 is going into? (Vote): Sharp Increase
(Vote): Increase
(Vote): Constant
(Vote): Decline
(Vote): Sharp Decline
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There are more websites where you can get SC2 info than before so it`s pretty misleading to do a size of sc2 analysis based on 1 website..
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Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3.
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Thanks for the info? It speaks for itself really, don't know what else to say.
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did the bubble already burst?
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On December 31 2011 06:01 Kammalleri wrote:
There are more websites where you can get SC2 info than before so it`s pretty misleading to do a size of sc2 analysis based on 1 website..
Are you saying the info Alexa gives is incorrect?
If you need more evidence, you can check the amount of players on Sc2ranks (lots less people play with each new season)... Or just look at the number of people on TL on the top left, this number RARELY dropped to below 10k, now in the evenings here in NA it's often at 7k-9k for just a few examples.
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I think SC2 will more or less stabilize in 2012. 2011 was the year of growth, and in 2012 we'll get a chance to settle down. Viewership might decline slightly, but I think that will be mostly negligible. Then when HotS is released, there will be another sharp growth. If Korean BW legends switch to SC2, there will probably be another spike.
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On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3.
See the way many many hobbies in life work is that yes, people will leave, but new blood comes, the problem with SC2 is very few new players are coming into the scene.
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Troubling statistics indeed.
However, I believe it all depends on the money: If tournaments are in the green in terms of finances, and have stable sponsor relations, then tournaments can continue to host events. If players can make a living from SC2, whether from salaries, winnings, or streaming, or a combination.
Finally, I feel if GSL is financially solvent and the Korean market is maintained or growing, SC2 will always have the fallback. If major tournaments like Dreamhack, MLG and IPL can become sustainable, then the scene can survive. SC2 does not have to necessarily become as large as football, but just large enough where the scene becomes sustainable.
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+ Show Spoiler +On December 31 2011 05:59 FiWiFaKi wrote:If anyone is familiar with the Alexa ranking, it pretty much tracks how popular sites are, and how they change over time. So for people who are not aware I'd like to share some statistics as a sort of reality check to an extent. We like to think SC2 is exploding and getting bigger, and that everyone has high hopes for the future. Although let's take a quick look at a graph to see Teamliquid's popularity. As you can see, the steep rise about a quarter into the graph is when SC2 came out, then we see a continuous increase in visitors, until maybe April or May of 2011. Since then the visitor increase of teamliquid stagnated, and actually appears to be on the decline. Is it a coincidence that there haven't been any new groups to start new tournaments? We have MLG, IPL, NASL, GSL, Dreamhack, but all those were founded before May 2011, and now we have what we have, but nothing new is coming out. Coincidence? I think not. These numbers on their own are slightly misleading. Take a look at this graph. This is the percent of visitors that arrive from search engines like google. As you can see, this graph indicates that initially many people didn't know about SC2, and stumbled upon the site using search engines, and at the beginning of the SC2 life Teamliquid had many possible players to attract, but in a year this number went from 20% to 5%. The player pool has been exhausted, and there is nowhere to attract a new audience from. For example if you go on battle.net and you ask someone if they know what Teamliquid is they all do. I'm not sharing this information to scare people, but to make them understand how fragile this scene is, and try and help people understand the importance of attracting new players if they wish for the scene to succeed. Many seem to have this mentality "Oh HotS will fix everything, although I think that is a poor misconception, sure the HotS will bring in some new players, but expansions don't just magically double, triple, or make the player base go 10 fold. If anyone has been here for a while, do you guys remember the HDH Invitational? It's finals peaked at nearly 30k views if my memory serves right, how about TSL3? Nony vs Strelok in ro32 having 60k+ viewers?... Where did all these players go? Events like NASL being way below that, Dreamhack keeping on par with TSL3 numbers, and I'm going to take MLG numbers with a grain of salt because those figures are often exaggerated. So hopefully you guys better understand the scope of size of SC2, and if you share a passion for it, you'll do what you can to keep it alive. More graphs: Poll: What direction do you think SC2 is going into?Constant (110) 45% Decline (75) 31% Increase (47) 19% Sharp Decline (7) 3% Sharp Increase (3) 1% 242 total votes Your vote: What direction do you think SC2 is going into? (Vote): Sharp Increase
(Vote): Increase
(Vote): Constant
(Vote): Decline
(Vote): Sharp Decline
Speaking to just the first graph the only real decline came at the very end of the year. Holidays and lack of events may have something to do with it. Also the popularity of esports has nothing to do with how many people visit TL because TL doesn't actually hold anything SC2 related except forums and TSL. And because of the amount of trolls on the forums as well as TSL being over there really isn't much need to come here except for any news once every few days and the stream list to the right.
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On December 31 2011 06:07 Bagration wrote:
Troubling statistics indeed.
However, I believe it all depends on the money: If tournaments are in the green in terms of finances, and have stable sponsor relations, then tournaments can continue to host events. If players can make a living from SC2, whether from salaries, winnings, or streaming, or a combination.
Finally, I feel if GSL is financially solvent and the Korean market is maintained or growing, SC2 will always have the fallback. If major tournaments like Dreamhack, MLG and IPL can become sustainable, then the scene can survive. SC2 does not have to necessarily become as large as football, but just large enough where the scene becomes sustainable.
I think, maybe surprisingly, League of Legends will overtake Starcraft 2 in viewership. No matter what people say, ultimately, most eSports fans are fans of the game they play. By being free, League has a huge userbase, and thus a huge fanbase. Unless Starcraft 2 goes free to play, it will be hard to keep up with League.
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On December 31 2011 06:07 Bagration wrote:
Troubling statistics indeed.
However, I believe it all depends on the money: If tournaments are in the green in terms of finances, and have stable sponsor relations, then tournaments can continue to host events. If players can make a living from SC2, whether from salaries, winnings, or streaming, or a combination.
Finally, I feel if GSL is financially solvent and the Korean market is maintained or growing, SC2 will always have the fallback. If major tournaments like Dreamhack, MLG and IPL can become sustainable, then the scene can survive. SC2 does not have to necessarily become as large as football, but just large enough where the scene becomes sustainable.
It does come down to the money, but understand. Less viewers = less sponsors = less money = less sustainability to the scene. And once viewers begin to go down a little, it all keeps on compounding which can lead to it's death. Who wants to invest into something that is dying, I know I'm exaggerating slightly, but I'm just trying to get a point across.
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Increase with a few small declines.
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This is also abit missleading because alot of the people that are coming in and getting into starcraft aren't die hard fans right away. They probably don't even visit teamliquid. Maybe they watch some streams or attend some local tournaments just to watch every now and then. Maybe they just go to the barcrafts in their town. Maybe they have a friend or family member who tells them what to watch or what's good. Those people wouldn't show up on any of your graphs. If you think sc2 has lost popularity look at the live crowds of events, they are pretty huge!
Besides you're saying sc2 isn't growing because there's no new world class tournaments started in the last 9 months or so? That just sounds pretty ridiculous overall. Very rarely will you ever see a new tournament of that scale "pop" up, the only reason alot of them did about a year ago was because sc2 was new and didn't have many big tournaments at the time.
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I think tournament events and their success has a lot to do with it, but since SC2 is so young it's in a lull while organizers figure out the best format to present to the viewers.
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Missing the unpredictable option.
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Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/cMm4t.jpg)
Dreamhack Summer 2011
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/40ix0.jpg)
Dreamhack Winnter 2011
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On December 31 2011 06:03 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:01 Kammalleri wrote:
There are more websites where you can get SC2 info than before so it`s pretty misleading to do a size of sc2 analysis based on 1 website.. Are you saying the info Alexa gives is incorrect? If you need more evidence, you can check the amount of players on Sc2ranks (lots less people play with each new season)... Or just look at the number of people on TL on the top left, this number RARELY dropped to below 10k, now in the evenings here in NA it's often at 7k-9k for just a few examples.
I'm not saying it's straight up wrong that it's declining, but basing an analysis on one website is just a really weak analysis.
And what pays is how many people watch streams, go on websites, go to events not how many people actually plays the game.
I know here Hockey subscription went down the last 5-6 years, yet they beat a record of viewers in the playoffs 2 years ago.
I just feel like there's not enough information to show that it's declining with what you showed
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This analaysis is lackingl. You definie size as number of users. What about defining size in terms of viewers watching vods or streams constantly.
Eg. if 30.000 ppl are watching streams or vods constantly, thats the size of sc2.
The size of lets say a soccer league where 9 games are played each week, and each game has an average viewership of 1.000.000, and lasts 2 hours, has a viewership of: (1000000/((24*7)/2))* 9 = 107.000
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nice insight and display.
I would love to attract new players but I'm quite happy with the people we have now.
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On December 31 2011 06:25 Hider wrote:
This analaysis is lackingl. You definie size as number of users. What about defining size in terms of viewers watching vods or streams constantly.
Eg. if 30.000 ppl are watching streams or vods constantly, thats the size of sc2.
The size of lets say a soccer league where 9 games are played each week, and each game has an average viewership of 1.000.000, and lasts 2 hours, has a viewership of: (1000000/((24*7)/2))* 9 = 107.000
It's hard to measure number of viewers like that, and I believe there is a lot of correlation between the number of TL users number of people watching streams.
People like a community like TL because they can easily find all the info they need, I'm quite certain there's only a small portion of players that always know when GSL or MLG is happening, and they just happen to visit their website to watch.
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The vertical axis of the first graph begins at 12,000 and ends at 0. Is that graph totally screwed up or are the numbers just reversed by accident?
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On December 31 2011 06:47 hitpoint wrote:
The vertical axis of the first graph begins at 12,000 and ends at 0. Is that graph totally screwed up or are the numbers just reversed by accident?
The graph ranks the popularity of the site in comparison to others on the net. Right now Teamliquid is about the 3300th most popular site on the net.
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On December 31 2011 06:48 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:47 hitpoint wrote:
The vertical axis of the first graph begins at 12,000 and ends at 0. Is that graph totally screwed up or are the numbers just reversed by accident? The graph ranks the popularity of the site in comparison to others on the net. Right now Teamliquid is about the 3300th most popular site on the net.
Ah, ok that makes a lot more sense.
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On December 31 2011 06:43 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:25 Hider wrote:
This analaysis is lackingl. You definie size as number of users. What about defining size in terms of viewers watching vods or streams constantly.
Eg. if 30.000 ppl are watching streams or vods constantly, thats the size of sc2.
The size of lets say a soccer league where 9 games are played each week, and each game has an average viewership of 1.000.000, and lasts 2 hours, has a viewership of: (1000000/((24*7)/2))* 9 = 107.000 It's hard to measure number of viewers like that, and I believe there is a lot of correlation between the number of TL users number of people watching streams. People like a community like TL because they can easily find all the info they need, I'm quite certain there's only a small portion of players that always know when GSL or MLG is happening, and they just happen to visit their website to watch.
There is a high correlation undoubtely. But i still think there is a possiblity that total viewer counts have gone up even though ppl are visiting TL Less. Maybe 1 year ago ppl primarily visited TL to check for news, then they logged off, and checked it again 1 hour letter. Perhaps today ppl at logging into TL to see a stream which they will watch for a few hours.
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30k and 60k? holy shit =O those aren't even players I would consider to be that big name
thanks for the analysis, it is nice!
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Personally, I felt a bit of an oversaturation in terms of major tournaments. I think there was a big tournament to watch almost every weekend from September to November. Certainly we noticed some players have fatigue issues with all the traveling. One weekend even, I believe it was IEM NY and MLG Orlando were scheduled the same weekend. I'm not saying having tons of events is bad, but hopefully one can see that the sc2 fanbase is in fact limited and splitting their attention with two events hurts one if not both of those events that rely on the viewership to survive.
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I find the only major tournaments in SC2 that help promote true skills are GSL, NASL, and (as much as I hate to say it) MLG. GSL and NASL are not getting as many attention as they deserve, especially GSL where the top level players are displayed. I see people saying Stephano was the best player a few weeks ago, but he would be absolutely demolished in Code S RO 16 and thereafter. The TeamLiquid community is paying too much attention to tournaments that confine to mainly foreigners and honestly have little idea who are the best players.
Sorry as I have gotten off topic a bit, but my point is that the competition of StarCraft 2 is falling because of the amount of tournaments and how the attention is being diverted and distributed to tournaments that, in all honesty, don't matter.
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I would say sc2 like sc1 will wither slowly but never die. So long as you have a professional level you will inspire more people to join filling lower leagues and the few that get better will replace quiting higher league players.
New expansions will start the process over but the options given in the OP are not quite fair.
I picked decline however I only meant that in the way that the overall player base will decrease as it does with all games but starcraft as an esport only grows.
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On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3.
My guess is that there are a lot of people like me who barely play anymore but still follow the scene. Personally I recently sold my gaming PC because I didn't use it anymore and college, my social life and work take up most of my time to be honest.
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juicyjames
United States3815 Posts
On December 31 2011 07:02 bopoznpvt wrote:
Personally, I felt a bit of an oversaturation in terms of major tournaments. I think there was a big tournament to watch almost every weekend from September to November. Certainly we noticed some players have fatigue issues with all the traveling. One weekend even, I believe it was IEM NY and MLG Orlando were scheduled the same weekend. I'm not saying having tons of events is bad, but hopefully one can see that the sc2 fanbase is in fact limited and splitting their attention with two events hurts one if not both of those events that rely on the viewership to survive.
I agree with the fact we have an oversaturation of SC2 tournaments.
At first glance, having an abundance of content is great because only the best will survive, but simultaneously I feel we are spreading the viewership too thin and making it hard for casual viewers to feel connected. Too much supply with not enough demand.
Although I prefer SC2 as a spectator, I think Korean BW has better content management. BW generally has one team league (Proleague) to give exposure to all teams and most players, and one (formerly two) individual league (OSL) to give exposure to star players. That's it. With a limited amount of content available the value of each game goes up, all fans know when / where to view the games, and view all the same matches (allowing better discussions, etc.).
I doubt this is possible at the moment with SC2 still being so young, teams needing to get more exposure and sponsors, and it being as international as it is, but I would definitely prefer this in the future.
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On December 31 2011 06:05 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3. See the way many many hobbies in life work is that yes, people will leave, but new blood comes, the problem with SC2 is very few new players are coming into the scene.
I agree with you, except there is no problem. Sc2 is not dieing. The people who wouldnt just watch sc2 are leaving..it may be going down, but dont be worried
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Starcraft and eSports are clearly in a "bubble" growth, we just ahve to hope the bubble doesn't pop..
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On December 31 2011 07:33 xXxSepirothxXx wrote:
Starcraft and eSports are clearly in a "bubble" growth, we just ahve to hope the bubble doesn't pop..
I just highlighted the important part of your post.
No we don't hope, we caress it so it doesn't pop, not just pray or whatever you wish to say.
Why do people just assume that everything will work out, it's not a reality, and if you look at the raw facts and statistics, I don't think it will succeed if we let esports run its own course.
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haha, these aren't very good stats. tl.net isn't going to be affected drastically by any trends b/c only sc freaks post here ;p. if you want to watch graphs plummet, check out more mainstream stuff like youtube views. all the "2011 esports is huge guys" might have a heart attack when they find out 2010 was sc2's peak.
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I'd say a slow and steady increase.
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the stats may not be good, and also the analysis falls short. the majority of people i meet on battle.net ( lower ranks ie bronze- > gold) have no idea what TL is
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Kind of expected this sc2 decline. I think the reason (at least for me) that people stop playing as much is that starcraft is such an intense game and often is really fustrating, while other videogames like Cod, LoL, and Skyrim are fun and relaxing. Don't get me wrong, I think playing is fun, but its hard to pick starcraft over other games when you know that you might rage and be in a bad mood the rest of the day, while for other games you know you will have a good time.
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It's true i spend less time in teamliquid.net because i also visit other starcraft sites and i also believe the scene will eventually lose players that only wanted to play SP, people with bad pcs, people with no internet or bad internet.
I don't play starcraft regularly, i don't think i played 200 games on Bnet and i have the game since dez 2011. Now i spend my time in starcraft watching streams, GSL, tl and other sites, I think I'm a fan of starcraft and of teams and players.
First you get overwhelmed with the content and after a while i might get a bit bored and then you become more selective, you chose what you want to see and wait for it, i see a few MLG games each day if you can or even travel there and watch it live. If you want to play skyrim a few hours a day for a few weeks maybe you wont spend it watching a stream or whatever.
My point is if you consume to much of anything because you are not a pro player or a guy trying it's only natural and even healthy to take a break sometime.
EDIT:
One possible solution would be if Blizzard created a calendar for e-sport events and tournaments with starcraft and their other e-sport games, in a very exposed part of battle.net in-game and site. Help promote the events they charge for..
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maybe it's not less new people but more people leaving because of doom and gloom threads?
this hurts my head.
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On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011
Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft
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On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft
Ontop of those graphs being completely useless because it doesn't compare how to viewer trends have changed. That is a graph of like one day, what exactly is that good for?
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the people who actually have the numbers we need to see to make a judgement all work for the major lans, and they are the ones saying they are seeing huge growth. who are we to doubt them. youtube links, 1 day stream views and the popularity of the daily will never give a decent picture.
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I feel like this kind of debate often gets confused.
Players =\= viewers. Just because people aren't playing as many bnet ladder games doesn't mean that the esports scene is stagnating at all, and just because viewership is increasing, we can't conclude that there will always be a stable ladder player base.
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all this analysis shows is the popularity of team liquid. Even if you would include b.net and reddit and god knows what other sites it only says something about the popularity of SC related forums.
If you really want to make a good estimation about the popularity and the trend, you should include all the sc related forums, all the viewers of all the streams, all the b.net users, and tickets sold to events. Im sorry to be this harsh but if you think that this research can conclude anything about the actual popularity of SC entirely then you didnt do your homework.
It's always nice to see someone put effort into their post, but the conclusions you are basing on the available data are only misleading.
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On December 31 2011 08:26 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft Ontop of those graphs being completely useless because it doesn't compare how to viewer trends have changed. That is a graph of like one day, what exactly is that good for?
It shows that there were 5k more people who watched the sc2 winter dreamhack finals than the summer one.
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On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft
Those were SC2 numbers. Other games had a separate stream except the grand finals of Quake and SF which unfortunately didn't seem very popular.
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On December 31 2011 08:26 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft Ontop of those graphs being completely useless because it doesn't compare how to viewer trends have changed. That is a graph of like one day, what exactly is that good for?
To demonstrate viewership growth. The above two graphs compare viewership numbers between Dreamhack Summer and Dreamhack Winter for StarCraft 2 English stream. Dreamhack Winter (Nov 27th) clocked over 90k peak viewership, compared to 60k peak of Dreamhack Summer (Jun 20th).* This invalidates your following argument.
If anyone has been here for a while, do you guys remember the HDH Invitational in BETA? It's finals peaked at nearly 30k views if my memory serves right, how about TSL3? Nony vs Strelok in ro32 having 60k+ viewers? These events were not the large scale events we have now, but they attracted a huge audience... Where did all these players go? Events like NASL being way below that, Dreamhack keeping on par with TSL3 numbers, and I'm going to take MLG numbers with a grain of salt because those figures are often exaggerated.
Alexa is fundamentally a flawed metric, dependent on people using the Alexa Toolbar to measure traffic. Even if it can be relied on, its numbers does not measure viewership or fanbase in any meaningful matters, and actually counters all other indicators.
* Note, Day9tv was a restream of the main Dreamhack Winter stream, the viewership numbers are added for peak concurrent number.
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At this point everyone should be aware how eSports work.
From time to time, a new game brings a lot of interest to it and then it dies.
It happened to WoW, CS, Quake, etc.
SC2 had its moment, now it's going down, no doubt about it.
It might look cool to say that SC2 will grow immensely and become a real sport, but that is just a dream.
Sometime soon a new game will take its place in the competitive scene.
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On December 31 2011 08:33 Wren wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 08:26 FiWiFaKi wrote:On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft Ontop of those graphs being completely useless because it doesn't compare how to viewer trends have changed. That is a graph of like one day, what exactly is that good for? It shows that there were 5k more people who watched the sc2 winter dreamhack finals than the summer one.
Just remember that Winter had more hype to it. There are some tournaments that utterly failed. Compare IEM anything to IEM NY for example... way lower numbers. GSL numbers went down as well.
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On December 31 2011 08:37 FiWiFaKi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 08:33 Wren wrote:On December 31 2011 08:26 FiWiFaKi wrote:On December 31 2011 08:24 adrenaLinG wrote:On December 31 2011 06:19 Primadog wrote:Alexa is a very poor gauge of viewership trends. Here are some actual numbers. Dreamhack Summer 2011 Dreamhack Winnter 2011 Dreamhack has more than just Starcraft Ontop of those graphs being completely useless because it doesn't compare how to viewer trends have changed. That is a graph of like one day, what exactly is that good for? It shows that there were 5k more people who watched the sc2 winter dreamhack finals than the summer one. Just remember that Winter had more hype to it. There are some tournaments that utterly failed. Compare IEM anything to IEM NY for example... way lower numbers. GSL numbers went down as well.
Actually, IEM NY broke a Twitch.tv stream record (due to LoL): http://www.twitchstats.com/lab?type=streams&names=&start=1318531500000&end=1318891500000&cb=multi_obj_chart_cb
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Can we just say that the new battle.net is hurting esports?
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Alexa can't provide 100% accurate data because of the way they get their information. They rely on Alexa Toolbar users (anyone here? anyone?) and a variety of other web panels to generate what they think are the most popular websites on the internet.
The data is excellent for giving someone some information to chew on when they are wanting to purchase a website from you, but when it comes to predicting, tracking, analyzing, or anything else (especially with TeamLiquid.net) the only way to get accurate info is to dig into the tracking software actually on the site.
As far as search engine visits declining goes, when people find this site they usually don't need to go and start searching again, so they end up becoming repeat visitors (40% bounce rate). As this site gets increased age and authority, the search engine visits will never drop to 0, but may not peak again until another new game comes out and gets more people searching for more content.
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I think we will see more increase next year. It may start to level off, if HoTS doesn't come out, towards the end of the year.
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This is pretty interesting information. I personally pretty much quit around season 3 and just recently have started playing again. My friends list of 60+ only has 3-5 people that get on still. I think there are a lot of reasons for that. Some people play the Flavor of the Month/Year etc etc game. AKA they go to LOL or get lost in Sky Rim for awhile. For me in particular I got irritated with a lot of things in the game. I always expected them to patch certain things etc etc and the game failed to live up to my expectations and I finally just came to terms with it. As a die hard BW zerg player I was very bitter about SC2 for a long time. Oddly enough I have been coming back and started playing again I think it is based purely on the competition.
One interesting thing is even while I quit playing for almost 8 months I still watched a lot of the tourney streams. I think a big part of me is playing again in hopes of HOTS but honestly I am expecting to be let down really hard. That being said the expansion will bring a lot of people back but it will probably be similar to SC2 WOL with people falling out every season. That's to be expected with every game though.
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Most of the people I've met at my local barcraft have no idea what TL is or don't visit it at all, yet they still come to watch games 1-2 times a week. Most of them visit Reddit I believe, since the barcraft is announced there alot more than here on TL. Also, I think you can find alot of streams just on twitch.tv, you don't have to come to TL to see who is streaming. My point is that I think there are alot of starcraft fans/viewers who simply never visit TL.
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im freakinggggggg outtttttttttttt its doomsday! Sc2 on the decline?!?!?!?!!?!? i just stocked up on peanut butter since that doesnt go bad for a long time since clearly the world is going to end in 2012 ergo ending the life of Sc2. THE GRAPHS are predicting it!!!! All kidding aside its mostly just from shitty advertising by tournaments. They don''t even try to advertise or hand out flyers to the main stream. When was the last time someone handed u a flyer saying for ex) June 22nd TUNE IN TO MLG BOSTON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! O_o
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On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3.
This. I've turned my friend list over multiple times, usually with each season start. All the "fad" players are dropping out.
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teamliquid != sc2.
Moderation is sometimes way too ridig. This has lead to a decline of interesting/fun posts.
I enjoy reading about a player having found a successful all-in (its interesting metagame wise) or some non-standard strategy (even if it fails i like to elaborate, discuss and understand why). However often some wannabee pros (most often idra'ized hardcore droners) enjoy to walkover read-worthy posts. What stays are real low-level evergreen discussions/questions about basic build orders.
So I'd assume people walked away from TL, but not necessary SC2.
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On December 31 2011 09:08 Humanfails wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3. This. I've turned my friend list over multiple times, usually with each season start. All the "fad" players are dropping out.
Many of those still follow starcraft. I didn't play on ladder last season, but watched all major tournaments and player streams couple times a week.
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You have to understand how the gamer community works. The vast majority of video gamers only play a game for a few months, until the next new Favor of the Month hits, rinse and repeat. The large player spike at release just shows the game was the Flavor at that time.
Those who enjoy a truely deep and challenging strategy game will stay.
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Aren't the ladder number diminshing every season?How is this data relevant to your analysis?
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On December 31 2011 12:17 mrafaeldie12 wrote:
Aren't the ladder number diminshing every season?How is this data relevant to your analysis?
They are not diminishing.
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the thing is that i think that theres such an enourmous amount of content, that people have turned form hardcore to casual watchers simply because if you wanna follow everything... it's a full time job now.
We had a Major tounament nearly every 2 weeks for months on end... i gave up following MLG and IPL because to know everything about the backstory of the players and the tournaments simply wasn't feasible anymore.
and seeing as the GSL is at 8pm my time cause i'm in australia... it's the league of choice that i follow and watch every match.
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On December 31 2011 06:02 adrenaLinG wrote:
Anyone that's been on BNet knows that more than half their friends list doesn't go on anymore since Season 3.
This ^
There were a good dozen people I knew IRL that played during the 2-3 months after release. Now there are maybe 2-3 that ever go online, and I'm the only one that plays consistently.
Half of them went back to WoW, and the rest just don't come online... Moved on to different games, I guess.
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On December 31 2011 12:20 Lebzetu wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 12:17 mrafaeldie12 wrote:
Aren't the ladder number diminshing every season?How is this data relevant to your analysis? They are not diminishing.
LINK
Yes they are.
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Love the scene, think it's fine.
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i don't visit or post as often as i used to, mostly because i figured out how a lot of stuff works compared to being a total n00b before. so i'd keep that in mind.
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EPT
