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General: Casual Play: What Makes WoW Dumb?
Dana
Member Posts: 2,415
Steve Wilson's second column looks at the simplication of World of Warcraft. "Casual Play" is a weekly column by Wilson on MMORPG.com that looks at MMOs from the eyes of someone less than hardcore.
| For many hardcore MMO fanatics simply asking this question is enough to launch them into a torrent of bitterness. Seriously though, what is it about WoW that earns it such a bad rep among those 'in the know' players and amateur ludologists?
Right off the bat WoW has attracted more new players than all other MMOs previously. It has also proven that the casual market is willing to pay ongoing subscription fees, something many were sceptical of prior to its release. These millions of new players have proven that the MMO genre is one that can be profitable, insanely so for the games that get it right. For the hardcore this is a double edged sword. On one hand it means that there will be a lot of new MMOs developed, but most of them will be directed at capturing that casual market. However an increase in development over all means more independent and niche games, more opportunities that there be something out there that appeals to everyone, just not all at once. |
The full article is here.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
Comments
6 million flies would loves to dig into a pile of dung, does that mean its tasty?
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Reality is for people who lack imagination
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Ahh I think i missed nailing the dilbert reference.
Of course, today, David Copperfield and the Sherlock Holmes stories *are* counted as literature...
But WOW broke through that wall, and brought the MMO to the masses. And those of us who care about sophistication and quality will be like folks who have to spend an extra $25/mo on cable to get decent original drama from HBO.
It's too bad. It *IS* dumb (unless you're making money *off* of it).
And that's the muddy point here, isn't it. The editorial author thinks WOW is smart because they have market share. Toots, there are programs on TV that have market share that I wouldn't want to admit I watched, as a thinking adult -- but damn, they make money.
Dumb can be fun.
Sophisticated entertainment always pulls a smaller market share.
But it'll be sad if the mass market appeal of WOW makes it more expensive for those of us who like those *other* games...
Shava
Every point the author made was simply indicating that he feels WoW is good because it removes the RPG elements (evidenced by statements like "
I'm not my character." and "Most players do not have their ego tied up in achievement, in games at least.")
Yeah,
except all of the 6 million people have never tested anything else but dung, so
how would they know what sweetness should taste like? And if you try to point
out the errors to them, they will never believe you and will blindly continue
to eat the dung while being absolutely convinced it's the best thing in the
world. Those few of us who realize that this dung is bad could never convince
them otherwise. We are like dogs that have seen a rainbow and trying to tell
the other dogs about it, but due to them being colorblind they can not even
imagine
On more
serious note, The only reason WOW has this many subscribers, nothing else out
there to play this year, and so we wait with anticipation for the upcoming q1
2007.
Good read. Wish more people would try a a game before saying it is dumb. Example- Lineage 2 players tend to hate their own game yet think any other game just blows. You then ask them what game they played before L2 and they say "this was my first". You then ask if they have tried any other game they say "yea i did beta in that game and it sucked because there was so many bugs". Ask them to try Wow,EvE, Everquest,UO,Hero or any other and they say "them are kids games". As seen above.
Well I am in a guild that has been in WoW from beta until... today. Most if not all of us have taken several months off during that time but we still play mainly because it is the only real game that we CAN play to enjoy a little PvP and teamwork. Of course we still think many things about WoW are... DUMB. Strange thing is, you conveniently glanced over those... and I will just focus on two issues that are actually quite linked.
1) Levels
2) Gear
This game is almost completely dependant on these two things. And, in the end it hurts the CASUAL gamer who happens to have Hardcore friends. Our guild has the whole spectrum, from the first dwarf to hit 60 on a server to people who probably took 9-12 months before they got their first 60. You know how often the 9-month player could group with the early 60? Well... never in a way that interacted with WoW's world, because level 20s just dont BELONG in a level 60 world according to Blizzard, and I consider that Dumb. A person should be able to go anywhere their friends are. Will they be as impactful on the experience? Nah, but if the game is about FUN as you say, then why should they be required to sit out until the GRIND away the experience to get that shiny little number next to their head?
Gear is a similar problem in that even NOW after 2 years+ in the game some of our casual guildies have rather... outdated gear to put it nicely. We still want them to PvP with us, but it is quite frustrating for them to be COMPLETELY out-gunned in EVERY PvP encounter they face. It becomes less, you know... FUN.
I guess I qualify as a hardcore gamer who now only gets to play a few hours a week due to RL, but I find that the things that make WoW less tham optimal are the things that actually hurt the CASUAL gamers not the hardcore.
That all said, Blizzard knows how to make money, and they are actually changing almost ALL of the above for the current patch and the coming X-pack. They are making it even easier for casual types to aquire competitive gear and HOPEFULLY levels 60 and 70 will be able to quest alongside each other. When game mechanics make it so that a group of friends cannot play alongside each other and have fun... yea I call that dumb.
Pretty awful article. The writer has no understanding of why many hardcore people find WoW to easy. Rather he spends his entire article defending casual players and putting down and atacking hardcore players.
WoW is a great game but many people think it is to easy and flawed. SOme of the reasons are:
1. There is no meaningful death penalty.
2. The game is to easy. Because everything is solable all quests are simply to easy. The margin of error in dungeons is also far to easy. Groups can continually make mistake after mistake and it is alsmost impossible for a group to wipe. Mages can run around without a care in the world peek around corners, not follow the group and draw extra aggro. Big deal it doesn't matter almost all fights are to easy there are little to no consequences for poor play.
3. Quest based promoteds linearity. While I think WoW's questy based system is its buiggest innovation many hardcore players hate and claim they feel they are being handhalked and being led around. This feeling of being led around and handheld is hated by many players.
4. Leveling is siimply to fast. My last character reached level 60 in 8 days played all solo withyout grouping at all. If I was more careful it could have been 6 days played. I am sure there are much better players than me that could do this much faster. The problem with fast leveling is two fold one is makes characters dispoablke and it is hard to bond with a character than one invests such little time in. Second WoW's world has some beautiful fantastic areas but because leveling is so fast players rocket through each area and never get ,much of a chance to spend more than a few hours in each area.
5. The game doies not require players to become mroe skilled or play better. The encounters are not difficult enough to force players to become better. There is no reason to group. There is no reason for a player to have to learn his class or push herself to her lomits as it doesn't matter.
6. Lack of socializationa nd community People commonly say WoW has the worst community. It is not suprising because there is no reason to group. There is no player interdependence. People can act as poorly as they want because there are no consequences. Reputation does not matter and a player can progbress without ever joining a group.
Non-hardcore reasons:
1. The endgame makes no sense. The entire game from 1-60 is soloable and quest driven once one reaches level 60 it becomes a grind fest for either reputation. The switch in the style of play from quest driven solo to group and raid driven grinding is quite the extreme.
2. WoW is all abnout raiding. Raiding rewards greatly outweigh any solo/group rewards. To advance after 60 one has to raid grind. There is only oine endgame style of play.
WolW is a great game but it has flaws and it is what it is. It is fun, detailed, extremely well made game. It is enteratining. But it lacks challenge, does not promnotes good play, does not encourage socialization or grouping and does not help teach players how to play to better. Further its endgame is terrible and completely out of whack witht eh type of play style expected from 1-60.
But he misses one point. Its just not fun to do that. max level characters are simply more fun to play as. They have a wider range of abilities that take more skill to use, both in pve and pvp. Low levels are basic characters with basic abilities. Yes, that is to help you learn how to use abilities effectively as you get them, but its less fun to do all the same content again slightly differently.
Not to m ention, if I sink the time and effort into a character to get im to max level, i'd like to at least pretend it was for something. Yeah, mmorpgs don't have much a point, but at least i can pretend it does. SImply throwing away all my effort and starting over again means I can't even do that. That it really was all for nothing.
Some of those things that are mentioned in the article as having no importance to Mr. Wilson have quite a bit of importance to other gamers. Just because Mr. Wilson does not find them important doesn't mean that the issues themselves aren't important.
Customizability, for one, seems to be of quite a bit of importance to gamers especially in the western world. Otherwise a good number of quality asian mmo's would be a greater success than they are. If it wasn't of importance why would City of Heroes/City of Villains received exceptionally high marks for the vastness that they offer in their customizability? Obviously Mr. Wilson is not a roleplayer as he does not even endeavor to get behind the character he has created and views them as nothing but tools. This is the mmoRPG genre after all and in case he doesn't know... RPG = Role Playing Game. I also think he is trying to label himself a casual player when it is more often than not the more Hardcore that can toss a character to the side to reroll another one and power level it to max level as well. The more casual players are those that will, in the case of wow, have explored and done all the quests they can on the first run through.. it is more likely that the hardcore will do what quests give them experience and move on to the next area leaving wide swaths of the game world untouched because it does not get them to their goal.
I think Mr Wilson is also far from the mark concerning crafting. Several of the best crafters I know in a number of games are very casual players. Having the random chance of failure or success adds to the value of an item. The best encounters in a game are not those that guarantee success but that have an element of failure tied to them. Is it Mr. Wilsons assertion that non combatants should have less of a play experience than those who do go out and fight all the time? Sounds that way to me. A deep and engaging crafting system allows for people who do not want to go fight everyday the opportunity to do something different. In games where a deep crafting system is present those craftables are useable and necessary all the way through the end game. Wow though, only allows for 2 or 3 of their crafts to be of any viability and the amount of power that they can give to a player often times is inappropriate compared to the work it takes to make said items.
Is wow a dumb game? No. It has oversimplified many of the core mechanics of the mmo genre (which is about all that blizzard does in any genre) leading to a dumbed down game. Is this bad? Not necessarily as it serves as a good tutorial for most any other game. Wow introduces people to the basic mechanics of mmo gaming such as party roles etc. The genre as a whole is probably better served because of wow as their will be less total noobs in other games coming down the pike in the near future. Many players, even a goodly amount of those that currently play wow, yearn for greater depth in their gaming hours. Once the wow clones hit and fail companies may bring about the depth of gameplay that classics such as the pre-cu SWG once offered.
http://www.speedtest.net/result/7300033012
WoW has proved so many things that other mmorpgs are just wondering how they couldn't do that. WoW is great game. It may not be what hardcore mmorpg fans would like. But it's still great.
It has done many things right and many things wrong. As every other game. But still it is by far most successful mmorpg ever. You say it's players are flies. Maybe, but what's wrong with that.
99% of all entertaintment industry is dung. And so 99% of entertaintment consumers are flies. Each in his/her own dung pile. Want hardcore roleplay? Go perform some live rp and not pitiful graphical world.
War does not determine who is right!, war determines who is left!
One thing that many people overlook is that with all of its faults, WoW has done something that NO other MMO has been able to acheive...to remove the stigma of the pasty, overweight, Cheetos-encrusted, living in the basement of your Mom's house gamer by bringing online PC Gaming into the forefront of mainstream entertainment. Why? They make a crap-ton of money for one, but even moreso, they have introduced a vast number of previous non-gamers to the MMO genre. I can't see how this is a bad thing for the games that we all admittedly love to play.
Is it a bit simplistic? Sure. Does that make it utter and complete crap? Not to 7 million people actively paying $15 bucks a month for it.
Granted, I'm a disgruntled former SWG player...I really miss the player-driven economy and crafting, but I'm not so much of a "sandbox" player. It's been hard to find another MMO in the last 2 years that provides the same ease of gameplay in a relatively non-glitchy interface. So for now, I'll still play WoW. At least until Q2 2007.
Self fufilling statement if I ever saw one.
Personally I found the game fun. No other excuses, or trying to say it's anything else. Yeah end game is just like every other boring game (god, it's worse than EQ1 and I never thought that was possible) and the rep grind is again, worse than EQ1. However, overall 1-60 was fun time. I could solo or group depending on my time.
Fun is fun and that's all that matters.
http://www.greycouncil.org/
WoW has too little depth superficially it is fun to play but if you want to spend time actually developi ng your character in wow unless you raid/pvp or buy gold you have a LOT of grinding ahead of you.
Regardless of the authors opinion i believe everyone one benefit from enhanced character customization/housing and totally reworked tradeskills.
Thats just my opinion of course, but I will be voting with my dollars if WAR/AOC or COS turn out to be as good as they promise to be.
I agree WoW is more of a MMO/FPS any roleplaying is being expunged as fast as possible, even on the RP servers Blizzard GM's do little to enforce the RP ruleset and with the new 2.0.1.
PvP seems to be Blizzards preferred (and cheapest) development route with anyone who cares to PvP being rewarded fairly quickly with epic gear.
For me, the really interesting oddity of the wow playerbase is WHY people play for months or even years after finishing the game? running the same instances over and over... it's mind-numbing. I have to think it's because of the friends they have made in game, I can't concieve of what else it could be...
So given that, it's like:
- simple-fun game that gets lots of people playing.
- easy to make new friends, and bring in your existing RL friends.
- super fun from 1-60, and about 3 weeks after getting there
- keep playing, because all your friends are, and you are trapped in the 'entropy' of it all.
WoW is successful simply because it's the Windows 95 of MMO's. It's the first major leap forward in simplicity and entertainment value over previous MMO's. While other MMO developers have concentrated on adding complexity and innovation, WoW took the level of complexity several steps back while retaining the early concepts of a massively multiplayer environment. WoW has also had it's share of innovations which further simplified life for it's customers. The WoW Auction House, though not an original idea, was the best implementation of a hassle free economy that any developer has made thus far. The WoW questing & tutorial system makes starting the game a piece of cake. Just about anyone can step into the game and get themselves going.
I, myself, am tired of WoW and it's upcoming clones. I yearn for a player driven economy and for battles over territory and resources. With WoW showing the way for big MMO profits in the future, I feel confident in saying that if we're going to see the types of games that I'd like to see, they're going to come from small developers who may not have the talent or resources to do their projects justice. Wurm Online comes to mind... Great design concepts, but seriously lacking in polish.
I wouldn't consider myself a casual player, nor a hardcore one (I like the term "Core Gamer" as coined by the Mr. McQuaid and the Vanguard team).
WoW is fun, but if you play to much it just becomes repetitive. I think most people, when they first start WoW are blown away by how fun it actually is. But if you don't like repetitive games and don't get involved in the community WoW won't appeal to you.