The real question here is how site traffic translates to registered users -- the bread-and-butter number for most MMOs. In many cases, you don't need to visit the site to play the game because the MMO runs on an installed client. So what does an increase or decrease in site traffic really tell you about an MMO?

Take the Free Realms numbers, for example. www.rsgoldstore.com shows that Free Realms' site suffered a drop in unique users the same month publisher Sony Online Entertainment announced the game hit 10 million registered players, which came only two months after they told us they'd hit 8 million. When we contacted SOE for this story today, they told us they hit 12 million users only a few weeks ago but declined to give any other stats on the game, per company policy. Wizard 101, meanwhile, currently reports 10 million registered runescape gold users.

The point of this is that when it comes to MMOs, there's no one way to figure out if a game is healthy. Increased site traffic is probably a good thing, as is a steady increase in new registered users -- but when we see dips in these numbers, it's not a definite sign of doom or of health(rs gold). To get a fix on that, you usually have to wait for server shutdowns or something more drastic.

Interestingly, here's how Wizard 101 compares to Battle.net and World of Warcraft on  www.rsgoldstore.com . What do you make of that?You can buy runescape.