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what did WoW do, that other EQ clones didnt do, which made WoW so Successful?
MMOExposed
Member RarePosts: 7,387
what did WoW do, that other EQ clones didnt do, which made WoW so Successful?
There has to be something that other EQ clones are doing different from what WoW did,,, right,,,,,
<quote=VirusDancer>
It is not what WoW did, but what Blizzard had. They already had a huge customer base from Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablo that were used to the game lobby mentality that WoW offers. If they did not have all those players, there would not have been anything special about WoW.</quote>
But that same excuse would apply to Warhammer which had DAoC and Warhammer fanbase behind them, yet it flopped. Same for other strong IP MMO.
need I point out
AoC and LoTRO for debuging this age old excuse?
PS: your MMO was Exposed!!!!
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
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Let everyone win.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
It is not what WoW did, but what Blizzard had. They already had a huge customer base from Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablo that were used to the game lobby mentality that WoW offers. If they did not have all those players, there would not have been anything special about WoW.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
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It must be all those quest that WoW has... oh wait...
In my opinion they basically streamlined EQ. They took many of the features that worked, and changed the ones that didn't. The interface, the questing, xp, item gain; everything was expedited. Personally, I've always thought WoW plays more like Diablo than Warcraft.
As far as compared to other companies who tried the same thing, I think it mostly boils down to polish and timing. WoW was a pandora's box though, in my opinion. MMORPG gaming will never be the same again.
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well for starters wow could be played on a empty bag of burritos with a monitor pulgged into it, and virtually no loading screens was a big deal, plus you have to admit that the story that they had going was a decent one. How many of us that play, know alot of the lore, and why Thrall is such an important orc, or why Edwin VanCleef is so freaking cool, "Lapdogs all of you, Our cause is Righteous"
In order for a story to be compelling you have to have characters that you can identify with, now I didn't play EQ, but I know in EQ2, you really can't identify with Antonia Bayle or Lucin D'Lere, and none of the people you meet seem important. Don't count that stuff out. People bought those For the horde and For the alliance Hoodies and shirts because they knew who there leader was.
Plus, say what you want about the gameplay, its solid, it was solid back then, and despite it has evolved into something some people don't like (how dare healers be able to solo) its solid today.
Thats what I think anyways, you can't look at the state of the game today, you got to look back to Vanilla and Early BC
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Good lore has been said.
LARGE game world, still is really.
They attempted to make the classes play differently. Like rogues using energy and combo points, warriors built rage, and what not. EQ2 at the time had everyone with group buffs that had to be recast, you point then click the icon that wasn't greyed out.
Plus they've always worked on the game. A lot of MMOs after a little bit you don't see things really change.
Love it hate it, Blizzard is a good game company and they always prove it.
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What they did right was use the name Warcraft in the title. They were able to market to both mmo fans and warcraft rts fans. Battle.net emptied real quick and now they are all on wow. That's an assload of people who had never played an mmo before. A lot of them didn't even know what an mmo was so they thought wow was something new and groundbreaking. We were all addicted to our first mmo so imagine that on a bnet scale population. I mean, people have died irl....The fanboys and mmo newbies made wow so popular not the game itself. That's not really a bad thing but that's why I see it as the game newbs play to learn the mmo ropes :-P
no, it's more than that.
The problem with this and other game forums is that people think like gamers. They perceive things like gamers. And the problem with that is that it's a fairly confined space for arguing about games that touch outside the normal gamer experience.
I'll give you that Blizzard's playerbase was a nice help. No argument there. But that in no way, shape or form, constituted millions of players.
What they did was to release relatively bug free game. I realize that some people have said "loads of bugs" but compared to my experiences at the time, WoW was so darn smooth it was amazing.
they streamlined the game play so that players were not running all over creation or grinding hours on end for advancement.
The game ran well on low end machines.
The art design wasn't threatening or imposing in any way. It was quirky. Meaning, it wasn't blocky like earlier games, it didn't contain the overt sexuality of some of the asian offerings, and was fun and disarming.
So a good many players play it. Then they tell friends, there are decent marketing campaings, non-gamers try it as they are given the "wow is great" by their gamer friends. They find it easy to play, fun, something different than what they are used to, a chance to experience adventure in a small amount of time if they want.
the game is accomodating. You aren't forced into pvp situations if you don't want to be. Money is easy enough, rewards are easy enough, you can explore the more difficult parts if you are so inclined. It essentially becomes a game for a wide variety of people.
In the end, after all is said and done, it's accessible and marketed well and well made.
that is why wow is/was successful.
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WoW is a phenomenon that's an isolated incedent.
Fact is, there were lots of people who didn't play MMOs, now they do - and it's because of WoW. Part of that is holding a decent advertising presence at all times, but the major part of it was having someone you know in RL play, and convince you that MMO gaming is not just for nerds.
People were inducted by real-life acquaintances to start MMO gaming, and WoW was a lot of peoples first. It was just the right time for the climate to change, and have WoW come out on top.
I personally can recall how a group of close friends that I know had "that one guy" who played WoW for years before the rest even considered trying it... now they are WoW players allllll.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
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Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
That basically sums it up.
WOW made many things easier and available to casuals. That basically opens up a big chunk of the market.
WoW offers gameplay to a variety of gamers. If you're a PvE player you can just quest and level. If you're an elite PvE player, you can take on heroic dungeons at cap and raid at cap. If you like FFA PvP you can join a PvP server and hunt the other faction in contested zones. If you're a competitive PvPer (CoD MW2 type) you can BG and Arena at cap. You can also BG while leveling. Like to role play? Join a role play server.
So, yeah, Blizzard had a ton of lore to back the game up to start with. They also have a ton of gamer fans due to the, "Blizzard won't release it until it's ready and polished," mythology surrounding Blizzard.
But they also scratch the itches of a number of different play styles with World of Warcraft. Maybe not all of them are perfect, but they are all there. And the players with those play styles enjoy them.
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Fun Factor. Along with polish, great music and sound quality, classes that played differently giving it a good replayability factor without early burnout(unlike AoC). The PVP, love it or hate it, along with pve I suppose, flowed smoothly and was fast and hectic but felt very responsive. On top of a very manageable UI. Tons of things going for it.
It's only problem, and is what is being seen now and why tons of people claim to "hate" the game is it didn't grow horizontally but instead vertically.
Polish and simplicity.
WOW has VERY smooth movement and combat mechanics and is simple design (9 basic classes vs the unnecessary 48 that some games try to use.)
WOW is simple and it works.
It brought IT'S OWN PLAYERBASE to the genre, not try to steal existing playerbase from other MMO's.
They also made the game more user-friendly.
These two factors are the key to massive subscriptions.
well didnt Warhammer also have these Optional gameplay paths? Yet that didnt turn out so well for that advancing game.
Why didnt older games like Everquest, pull in new members by word of mouth?
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
If I could take the controls(smooth movement and combat mechanics) to Vangaurd classes, that game would be on top. Just saying, the amount of classes isn't the issue, its the attention to detail on each class. Because on the other hand, EQ2 has too many classes that are far too similar, so in a sense your right in a way.
This is simple....have a large fan based that already knew about your quality game skills, and then tell them you are making an MMO.
Blizzard made WoW a success by their past track record and solid fan base. That's what EQ (and most other MMO's) don't have prior to going into a project.
The term "horizontal progression" is something few people even knew about until it became a recent catchphrase. People have been hating on this game because it's popular. People have hated anything with high popularity since the dawn of time.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
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Well, I agree there. I was thinking that for me, the negatives of the game have to do with the lack of depth. I personally still love the game, I just wish it had the depth of a game like FFXI or EQ2 is all.
well that logic is flawed.
Everquest 2? Exposed
AoC? Exposed
Warhammer? Exposed
LoTRO? Exposed
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
Mass advertising, how many other mmorpg's have Mr T and William Shatner advertising there games or Ossy Osborne telling everyone what he play's in WoW, I've seen WoW ad's on bus's, seen them at the movie's and even on my rented DVD's before the movie, what other mmorpg does this?
Have you seen the French ad's?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNg5ysYd0zc&feature=related -(where's Chuck Norris when you need him?)
Mass advertising!
did Wow have all of that during Vanilla? or better yet, TBC?
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
Toward BC. WoW hit its peak with minimal traditional advertising.
I got in cuz I was a MMO fan (UO, EQ, SB, and at the time EQ2) and a Blizzard online fan. Brought a ton of people with me. But I quit like 3 years ago, and man they can't turn away.
I kill other players because they're smarter than AI, sometimes.
I'm not sure if this is accurate but I think something that make a big difference was that had a ninja launch more or less. When it came out not everyone knew about it and were so over hyped up to play it. Then Blizzard finally finished getting all the bugs out from launch and marketed it like mad.