Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
again gw 2 is no threat to wow as its not a sub game. Diffrent pay models put them in seperate categories u can sub to wow and still play gw 2 sure some players may leave to play gw 2 but alot will keep wow sub and play both.
tor is alot more likely to take wow subs as they are a sub game and as such competing for the sub base of players.
even if gw 2 hit 5 million box sales the truth is a buy to play wow doesnt have to worry about them at all.
they wont steal subs and u can sub to wow play gw 2 easy. i dont understand the people who think tor and gw 2 are competing any more then the wow and gw 2 are since gw 2 is buy to play and the other 2 are subs.
u can play gw 2 and keep a sub to another game its very simple as such gw 2 wont hurt blizz at all.
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
"Not meaning to anger anyone with this thread, though I know in these forums its quite impossible. You can say "I enjoy vanilla ice cream" and still have 50 posts of angry, hot-tempered people who have nothing better to do than argue with you." - Dirkzen
again gw 2 is no threat to wow as its not a sub game. Diffrent pay models put them in seperate categories u can sub to wow and still play gw 2 sure some players may leave to play gw 2 but alot will keep wow sub and play both.
tor is alot more likely to take wow subs as they are a sub game and as such competing for the sub base of players.
even if gw 2 hit 5 million box sales the truth is a buy to play wow doesnt have to worry about them at all.
they wont steal subs and u can sub to wow play gw 2 easy. i dont understand the people who think tor and gw 2 are competing any more then the wow and gw 2 are since gw 2 is buy to play and the other 2 are subs.
u can play gw 2 and keep a sub to another game its very simple as such gw 2 wont hurt blizz at all.
For probably 90% or more of Blizzard's customers, the issue isnt money. Its time. MMORPGs require a large time investment. I dont know of anyone I have ever guilded with in EQ, EQ2, or WoW that played another MMORPG at the same time. They may have stay subbed while trying out a different game, but never played 2 games seriously at once.
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
welcome to 2011. Although Blizzard has been doing this sort of thing since 2005, although more discreetly with the TCG. But thats all the WoW TCG was designed as, a cash grab with rare in game items.
I did buy the hippogryph hatchling though, but that was for a worthy cause. Just like in the other games with a cash shop I dont touch it, but i dont really care that it is there.
again gw 2 is no threat to wow as its not a sub game. Diffrent pay models put them in seperate categories u can sub to wow and still play gw 2 sure some players may leave to play gw 2 but alot will keep wow sub and play both.
tor is alot more likely to take wow subs as they are a sub game and as such competing for the sub base of players.
even if gw 2 hit 5 million box sales the truth is a buy to play wow doesnt have to worry about them at all.
they wont steal subs and u can sub to wow play gw 2 easy. i dont understand the people who think tor and gw 2 are competing any more then the wow and gw 2 are since gw 2 is buy to play and the other 2 are subs.
u can play gw 2 and keep a sub to another game its very simple as such gw 2 wont hurt blizz at all.
Again, regardless of payment model, MMOs pool from the same group of players. There is no mysterious subset of the human population that only plays subscription modeled games and another subset who only plays b2p or f2p games.
Again, the question becomes less about business model and more about how many MMOs players will play simultaneously at any given time. While there surely are players who will play more than one MMO (sub based or non), there are also undoubtedly a great many players who will only focus on one game at a time.
Again, for players who fall in that group, if they find themselves currently favoring a b2p or f2p title like GW2, why would they still continue to pay a sub fee for the other game(s) they're no longer playing? They'd still save $15/month, which is, in fact, the same exact amount they would save if they were instead favoring a different p2p title, like SW:TOR, and decided to cancel their WoW sub. Compare paying $0 to paying $15; then compare paying $15 to $30. You get the same savings. That's the correct number to focus on.
Again, the "different business models are not in any competition with each other" argument is ridiculously bogus. Again.
Let it be noted that i'm not arguing for or against GW2's imminent impact on WoW. I'm simply trying to dispell this idiotic fallacy that these models are immune from each other's competition.
We all know that Blizzard is a whore for money. Well... all companies are, but that's besides the point. Everytime a game is released, Blizzard does something to hinder making people switch over. Whether is be the release of an expansion, a huge patch, or some other little way to hinder another company.
So my question to is, What will Blizzard do?
Talint
To what?
If you mean to TOR it seems like they will release a rather large patch that will hit later this autumn.
I don't think they can do anything to GW2s release, it seems to be aiming for different people than the current Wow subscribers.
To me it seems like Wow are focusing on south Amerika right now and getting players there instead of competing with the other western games.
Morhaime did say that he wanted to be faster with adding more content when he had that press release this spring about them losing half a million players. I guess they will work on that as well to keep their current players.
If all banks in US go broke, we can have a happy ending as every small town will have its own bank, indie bank, and no more corporate thieves. We will all happily live ever after, and we have to mail cash to our friends abroad.
Actually, this might not be so bad for Americans (especially working Americans, who would have decent paying jobs in this fantasy scenario). Especially if dollars were worth what they were then. Now the huge corporations are just selling America out to China as fast as they can shove the money into their own pockets.
But back on to the topic, Blizzard and WoW will be around for a long time. And there will be WoW nostalgia, and probably Classic servers, and so on. Even if WoW *only* had a million subs, they would still be the leader (unless another game surpasses and maintains that number, which we have yet to see).
Who even knows about how the payment models will work? As others have pointed out, they make so much money on transfers, faction changes, name changes, mounts, etc. I'm guessing possibly more than sales or subs.
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
So what? It just could as well reflect your inability to appreciate the fun in that game option.
Fun is subjective, everyone measures his own sense of fun and willingness to pay for it. None of my business, hope you see its none of yours as well.
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
So what? It just could as well reflect your inability to appreciate the fun in that game option.
Fun is subjective, everyone measures his own sense of fun and willingness to pay for it. None of my business, hope you see its none of yours as well.
I never minded when new mounts were released, I was one of those players who enjoyed searching for the new mounts, what annoyed me the most is the cash grab blizzard began with the item shop, I admit I purchased a Pandaren Monk pet, mainly due to the charity donation blizzard was offering for the pet at the time but i cannot understand how somebody can spend large sums of money on a bunch of pixels on a screen then attempt to showoff their hard earned money on such a thing, it's the cash grab which hit me the hardest not the players, apologies if my initial post was somewhat bias.
"Not meaning to anger anyone with this thread, though I know in these forums its quite impossible. You can say "I enjoy vanilla ice cream" and still have 50 posts of angry, hot-tempered people who have nothing better to do than argue with you." - Dirkzen
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
So what? It just could as well reflect your inability to appreciate the fun in that game option.
Fun is subjective, everyone measures his own sense of fun and willingness to pay for it. None of my business, hope you see its none of yours as well.
I never minded when new mounts were released, I was one of those players who enjoyed searching for the new mounts, what annoyed me the most is the cash grab blizzard began with the item shop, I admit I purchased a Pandaren Monk pet, mainly due to the charity donation blizzard was offering for the pet at the time but i cannot understand how somebody can spend large sums of money on a bunch of pixels on a screen then attempt to showoff their hard earned money on such a thing, it's the cash grab which hit me the hardest not the players, apologies if my initial post was somewhat bias.
First it is really not a lot of money, for some, the price of a mount is smaller than the cost of going downtown for a drink, gas included.
Second, laughing at people for their decision to buy a 2 seater? Just because you think it is a bad decision? Does it matter what you think? I can laugh at you being so intolerant and inconsiderate, but no I will not laugh, none of my business.
Cash grab? In a capitalist economy, does that mean good or bad? If you are a supplier, is cash grab a good thing to try? Where do you draw the line? Everyone should only charge when the service is vital to life and death? Every price should be break even pricing based? Or what?
You cannot understand why people spend their money there. Right. Try to understand, without prejudice. Sometimes an open mind can bring in a lot of new knowledge.
Understand that you are not really that "elitist", I sound harsher than I mean to, cos too many elitist have polluted forum discussions for too long. Peace out.
For everyone talking about blizzard 'bleeding subs'...
In Quarter 2 they were down less than 3% of subs.
Show me an MMO, besides AoC, that was not down 3% subs in Q2 2011.
Its just big news because its never happened to wow before. Its not like WoW's servers are going low pop. The only low pop servers are PvP ones, and there have ALWAYS been low pop PvP servers.
They released a bad expansion. It happens. The fact that a 7 year old game after a bad expansion has lost less than 10% of its subs in the first 6 months after with no significant content releases (4.2 happened after q1) isnt exactly signalling the doom of WoW.
You're right. "Bleeding" is a strong word that we are using rather lightly when we speak of World of Warcraft. But, to be perfectly fair, let's see if we can't put this in perspective:
Cataclysm launched in December of 2010. The last numbers I saw put out - by Blizzard - acknowledged a loss of approximately 900,000 to 1,000,000 subscriptions since the launch of the expansion. (The last numbers released said 12,000,000 active subs, the most recent say 11,000,000 active subs. Meanwhile, reports released by Blizzard in March stated that Cataclysm sold 4,300,000 copies. So, honestly, I'm not at all certain what the correct number is here, but let's be generous and go with those higher numbers for this discussion.)
That is approximately 100,000 subscriptions per month. Actually, a little more than that because those numbers were released prior to September, but let's be generous and say nine months.
100,000 subscriptions is $1.5 million dollars in revenue per month.
900,000 subscriptions is $13.5 million dollars in revenue.
1 million subscriptions is $15 million dollars in revenue.
Does a revenue loss like that hurt a company as large as Activision-Blizzard? No, not really. Annually, if that decline continues at that rate, it's a loss of 18 million dollars in one year's time. To a company that size, that's a tax writeoff (and possibly the size of Kotick's expense account - who knows? ).
To the vast majority of gaming companies, that's bankruptcy.
What people tend to forget is that even Blizzard has called WoW a freak success and said that no other company should be so unwise as to measure any other MMO's success or failure against WoW's numbers. In the real world, though, yes, 100k subs per month is not simply bleeding - it is a hemmorhage that would destroy any other MMO on the market.
"You are obviously confusing a mature rating with actual maturity." -Asherman
Maybe MMO is not your genre, go play Modern Warfare...or something you can be all twitchy...and rank up all night. This is seriously getting tired. -Ranyr
They will try as everyone said to release either information or a beta to Diablo 3.
Here is my deal here. Real tired of the religious fever that WoW seems to possess with some people. I am in no way saying WoW hasnt done a great thing for the industry, it has, but to say it is god's gift, please.
What some fail to realize is, Blizzard could promise me a real job to make WoW have everything I personally want in a game and it wouldnt get me back in and here is why....
1. .. I'm BORED to death of it.
2. ...I am a fan of Star Wars and Bioware and that is the pure main reason and focus of my desire to play SW:TOR.
My only game desire is to play with like minded players who love the game they are in , and seeing how , from what I have seen, Star Wars fans tend to have a better grasp of having fun rather than hating first and caring later like many, MANY "WoW" players tend to do. And yes, I'm gonna go "there", but by FAR , SWG had a much more, way better community than World of Morecrap ever had.
And to quote Vader (somewhat haha)... "Search your feelings, you know this to be true."
...p.s. , Sorry for the small rant. Atleast I answered the OP's question
They are already giving in to a big community want that the developers have been against, the appearance slots.
Deathwing will be soon, and 4.4 will be 'a world event leading up to the next expansion'. My guess is that world event will be what youll see in January to draw the people back from SWTOR. Blizzcon will likely unveil the features of the next expansion, which is due out quarter 2 next year, at Blizzcon. So there will be lots of expansion hype.
My guess is they will introduce both new races and a new class, since that will draw players back (without the competition incoming I bet it would just be a new class. I would bet youll see guild halls (another HUGE request), but not housing (too costly to implement right (aka EQ2 or SWG style) with 11 million players).
Expansion will probably have some type of public quest sytem and psuedo-dynamic content (EQ2 has added PQs as well before Rift even came out, these will be an industry standard soon enough). The big one, that I don't think Blizzard will do, is an AA type system. You never know though.
I want to address some things stated here.
The next X-pac (based on the LIST conspiracy) is the Emerald Dreams. thats makes sense, because Blizzard recently launched a book dealing with the lore behind the bad things going on in the dream (just like Anet released a GW2 book months before GW2 comes out. same thing here. Blizzard does this kind of thing)
ANd yes there will be a new class. if you do the secret event in Kalmador, you will find a scroll (AND A DRUID AND A DEMON HUNTER) trapped in a cave. When you kill the Demon Hunter the scroll drops which the Scroll say its a riitual for becoming a Demon Hunter.
Again the Druid thats in the cave is another Symbolism, since many of the first Demon Hunters were nightelf druids, Illidan being the first Demon Hunter was twin brother to one of the most powerful druids.
Blizzard has a way with their symbolism. you have to keep a eye on it.
The new class is Demon Hunters. No idea what their PvE roles will be, but all classes have a DPS role, so we know that will be in there (since Blizzard will never or almost never revert back to the concept of Support only classes [Paladin = Tank/Healer not DPS for example back in TBC]. Blizzard would upset many people by making such a game design again unless it was able to fight well in PvP unlike TBC Paladins)
I been speculating on the lore and what will happen.
I have come to this conclusion, that in the lore, the NIGHTMARE will return (seeing that right now in CATA the Old Gods are coming back into focus).
Well you may be wondering, how the Nightmare can come back if it was destroyed in the book.
Well this is the mistake many of the readers made. the NIGHTMARE WAS DEFEATED, BUT THE SOURCE OF THE NIGHTMARE REMAINS ANONYMOUS (OLD GODS WORK).
So no, the book didnt fully stop the Nightmare, only defeats the Nightmare Lord.
Also you may be wondering what the Emerald Dreams have to do with Demons if the next X-pac is in the Nature Land of the Dreams.
Well again going back to the book,,,, the Emerald Dream has a path to the Twisted Nether (WHICH IS WHERE DEMONS COME FROM HINT HINT). also the Old Gods made some unknown deal with the Legion during the great sundering. it makes sense that the Old Gods would summon forth the Legion to help them gain control of the Emerald Dream and the Green Dragon Aspect.
From my theory on the Old God, the Aspects are the Keys to their prisons. so by killing each aspect, they become closer to freedom from the Titan's prison. Well how will they go about this. (We killed the Blue Aspect already. Next the Black Aspect. Well a Emerald Dream x-pac opens up a chance for the Green Aspect to die. Hint hint)
Also remember how I said Blizzard has a way with Symbolism? Well keep in mind, on a lore level, each time we fight one of these major bosses (By major I am talking the most powerful of badassery in the lore, like Aspects, and Reggy and Lich King for examples)
We are always accompanied by a opposite lore figure that is also powerful enough to balance out the power in the fight from a lore point of view.
Example
*Blue Aspect (Bad)=Red Aspect (our helper who is equal in power)
*Lich King (Bad)= Trion/Ashbringer (our Helper)
*Death Wing (Bad) = Red Aspect+ Mal (our helpers)
Well if we fight the Green Aspect, wouldnt we need a equal helper in power? Again Symbolism: Blizzard had the Green Aspect in the book to say to Mal that he is more powerful than she is (Hint hint, we have our helper here)
I speculate that the Old Gods will choose a new champion to lead their nightmare against Mal. and that champion is no other than the Naga Queen.
Symbolism Hint: In Cata, they were about to fight each other in darkshore, but she just laughed at him and slither off like he was no threat. that show how powerful she is, yet she isnt even a boss in CATA. She will be the new Nightmare lord
We all know that Blizzard is a whore for money. Well... all companies are, but that's besides the point. Everytime a game is released, Blizzard does something to hinder making people switch over. Whether is be the release of an expansion, a huge patch, or some other little way to hinder another company.
So my question to is, What will Blizzard do?
Talint
When SWTOR releases...probably offer it's players the ability to start at lvl 80 with a full tier 3 set of gear, and epic flying mount, and 1000g.
We all know that Blizzard is a whore for money. Well... all companies are, but that's besides the point. Everytime a game is released, Blizzard does something to hinder making people switch over. Whether is be the release of an expansion, a huge patch, or some other little way to hinder another company.
So my question to is, What will Blizzard do?
Talint
Same thing they've always been doing. Flash the sequel or an expantion for one of their titles to be released in 2-3 years from now.
They are already giving in to a big community want that the developers have been against, the appearance slots.
Deathwing will be soon, and 4.4 will be 'a world event leading up to the next expansion'. My guess is that world event will be what youll see in January to draw the people back from SWTOR. Blizzcon will likely unveil the features of the next expansion, which is due out quarter 2 next year, at Blizzcon. So there will be lots of expansion hype.
My guess is they will introduce both new races and a new class, since that will draw players back (without the competition incoming I bet it would just be a new class. I would bet youll see guild halls (another HUGE request), but not housing (too costly to implement right (aka EQ2 or SWG style) with 11 million players).
Expansion will probably have some type of public quest sytem and psuedo-dynamic content (EQ2 has added PQs as well before Rift even came out, these will be an industry standard soon enough). The big one, that I don't think Blizzard will do, is an AA type system. You never know though.
I want to address some things stated here.
The next X-pac (based on the LIST conspiracy) is the Emerald Dreams. (This however does conflict with the Mists of Pandaria TM. )thats makes sense, because Blizzard recently launched a book dealing with the lore behind the bad things going on in the dream ( An even more recent book will be released soon dealing with Pandaria.) (just like Anet released a GW2 book months before GW2 comes out. same thing here. Blizzard does this kind of thing)
ANd yes there will be a new class. GhostCrawler has stated several times after their experience with class balance post DK they will not add any new classes. if you do the secret event in Kalmador, you will find a scroll (AND A DRUID AND A DEMON HUNTER) trapped in a cave. When you kill the Demon Hunter the scroll drops which the Scroll say its a riitual for becoming a Demon Hunter.
Again the Druid thats in the cave is another Symbolism, since many of the first Demon Hunters were nightelf druids, Illidan being the first Demon Hunter was twin brother to one of the most powerful druids. Yet Illidan was a mage and deemed not talented enough to be a druid by Cenarius.
Blizzard has a way with their symbolism. you have to keep a eye on it.
The new class is Demon Hunters. No idea what their PvE roles will be, but all classes have a DPS role, so we know that will be in there (since Blizzard will never or almost never revert back to the concept of Support only classes [Paladin = Tank/Healer not DPS for example back in TBC]. Blizzard would upset many people by making such a game design again unless it was able to fight well in PvP unlike TBC Paladins)
I been speculating on the lore and what will happen.
I have come to this conclusion, that in the lore, the NIGHTMARE will return (seeing that right now in CATA the Old Gods are coming back into focus).
Well you may be wondering, how the Nightmare can come back if it was destroyed in the book.
Well this is the mistake many of the readers made. the NIGHTMARE WAS DEFEATED, BUT THE SOURCE OF THE NIGHTMARE REMAINS ANONYMOUS (OLD GODS WORK).
So no, the book didnt fully stop the Nightmare, only defeats the Nightmare Lord.
Also you may be wondering what the Emerald Dreams have to do with Demons if the next X-pac is in the Nature Land of the Dreams.
Well again going back to the book,,,, the Emerald Dream has a path to the Twisted Nether (The Burning Legion Travels through the twisitng nether, but they live on worlds like the rest of the populous in the WoW cosmos.) (WHICH IS WHERE DEMONS COME FROM HINT HINT). also the Old Gods made some unknown deal with the Legion during the great sundering. (we call that deal DeathWing) it makes sense that the Old Gods would summon forth the Legion to help them gain control of the Emerald Dream and the Green Dragon Aspect.
From my theory on the Old God, the Aspects are the Keys to their prisons. (No, this is the Titans, while the aspects were empowered by the titans, it is the titans power that is imprisoning them.) so by killing each aspect, they become closer to freedom from the Titan's prison. Well how will they go about this. (We killed the Blue Aspect already. Next the Black Aspect. ( Blue Aspec (now Varegos(sp))t and Black Aspect will be replaced in Cata (Thrall is taking DeathWing's place.) Well a Emerald Dream x-pac opens up a chance for the Green Aspect to die. Hint hint) (If this even happened Malfurion would step up.)
Also remember how I said Blizzard has a way with Symbolism? Well keep in mind, on a lore level, each time we fight one of these major bosses (By major I am talking the most powerful of badassery in the lore, like Aspects, and Reggy and Lich King for examples)
We are always accompanied by a opposite lore figure that is also powerful enough to balance out the power in the fight from a lore point of view.
Example
*Blue Aspect (Bad)=Red Aspect (our helper who is equal in power)
*Lich King (Bad)= Trion/Ashbringer (our Helper)
*Death Wing (Bad) = Red Aspect+ Mal (our helpers)
Well if we fight the Green Aspect, wouldnt we need a equal helper in power? Again Symbolism: Blizzard had the Green Aspect in the book to say to Mal that he is more powerful than she is (Hint hint, we have our helper here)
I speculate that the Old Gods will choose a new champion to lead their nightmare against Mal. and that champion is no other than the Naga Queen. I beleive She will be held for when her betrothed Sargeras (The ultimate WoW bad) shows is face, just a guess though.
Symbolism Hint: In Cata, they were about to fight each other in darkshore, but she just laughed at him and slither off like he was no threat. that show how powerful she is, yet she isnt even a boss in CATA. She will be the new Nightmare lord We have 2 more Old Gods to go. They really only put one champion forth, well ever...DeathWing...they work through, fear, doubt, nightmare...
Comments
Blizzard will give us more horses!
http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/2432-Patch-4.3-Preview-Worgen-Racial-Mounts
What will Blizzard do?
Chuckle to themselves and count their money?
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
^^ This
The question isn't "What will Blizzard do?" it's "What is Blizzard doing?" They are already working on a new MMO.
again gw 2 is no threat to wow as its not a sub game. Diffrent pay models put them in seperate categories u can sub to wow and still play gw 2 sure some players may leave to play gw 2 but alot will keep wow sub and play both.
tor is alot more likely to take wow subs as they are a sub game and as such competing for the sub base of players.
even if gw 2 hit 5 million box sales the truth is a buy to play wow doesnt have to worry about them at all.
they wont steal subs and u can sub to wow play gw 2 easy. i dont understand the people who think tor and gw 2 are competing any more then the wow and gw 2 are since gw 2 is buy to play and the other 2 are subs.
u can play gw 2 and keep a sub to another game its very simple as such gw 2 wont hurt blizz at all.
Best response ever.
This bullcrap is what made me quit in the first place, I used to laugh so hard at the people who were getting the 2 seater rocket mount by making a second account and doing all the other crap. I used to ask them, "Im what way is your $70 mount any different from my epic flight form?", the response was always the same "DUHHHH, it has two seats". $70 for a second seat to cart around your unused second character? Right!!
"Not meaning to anger anyone with this thread, though I know in these forums its quite impossible. You can say "I enjoy vanilla ice cream" and still have 50 posts of angry, hot-tempered people who have nothing better to do than argue with you." - Dirkzen
If not, wtf!?!?
BOOYAKA!
For probably 90% or more of Blizzard's customers, the issue isnt money. Its time. MMORPGs require a large time investment. I dont know of anyone I have ever guilded with in EQ, EQ2, or WoW that played another MMORPG at the same time. They may have stay subbed while trying out a different game, but never played 2 games seriously at once.
welcome to 2011. Although Blizzard has been doing this sort of thing since 2005, although more discreetly with the TCG. But thats all the WoW TCG was designed as, a cash grab with rare in game items.
I did buy the hippogryph hatchling though, but that was for a worthy cause. Just like in the other games with a cash shop I dont touch it, but i dont really care that it is there.
Again, regardless of payment model, MMOs pool from the same group of players. There is no mysterious subset of the human population that only plays subscription modeled games and another subset who only plays b2p or f2p games.
Again, the question becomes less about business model and more about how many MMOs players will play simultaneously at any given time. While there surely are players who will play more than one MMO (sub based or non), there are also undoubtedly a great many players who will only focus on one game at a time.
Again, for players who fall in that group, if they find themselves currently favoring a b2p or f2p title like GW2, why would they still continue to pay a sub fee for the other game(s) they're no longer playing? They'd still save $15/month, which is, in fact, the same exact amount they would save if they were instead favoring a different p2p title, like SW:TOR, and decided to cancel their WoW sub. Compare paying $0 to paying $15; then compare paying $15 to $30. You get the same savings. That's the correct number to focus on.
Again, the "different business models are not in any competition with each other" argument is ridiculously bogus. Again.
Let it be noted that i'm not arguing for or against GW2's imminent impact on WoW. I'm simply trying to dispell this idiotic fallacy that these models are immune from each other's competition.
I made a similar post: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/942814-What-trick-will-Blizzard-pull-for-SW-TOR on MMO Champion.
The attitudes and responses were interesting to say the least.
"Never argue with a fool; onlookers may not be able to tell the difference."
I need to take this advice more.
Also, this :P
"Never argue with a fool; onlookers may not be able to tell the difference."
I need to take this advice more.
To what?
If you mean to TOR it seems like they will release a rather large patch that will hit later this autumn.
I don't think they can do anything to GW2s release, it seems to be aiming for different people than the current Wow subscribers.
To me it seems like Wow are focusing on south Amerika right now and getting players there instead of competing with the other western games.
Morhaime did say that he wanted to be faster with adding more content when he had that press release this spring about them losing half a million players. I guess they will work on that as well to keep their current players.
Actually, this might not be so bad for Americans (especially working Americans, who would have decent paying jobs in this fantasy scenario). Especially if dollars were worth what they were then. Now the huge corporations are just selling America out to China as fast as they can shove the money into their own pockets.
But back on to the topic, Blizzard and WoW will be around for a long time. And there will be WoW nostalgia, and probably Classic servers, and so on. Even if WoW *only* had a million subs, they would still be the leader (unless another game surpasses and maintains that number, which we have yet to see).
Who even knows about how the payment models will work? As others have pointed out, they make so much money on transfers, faction changes, name changes, mounts, etc. I'm guessing possibly more than sales or subs.
Blizz has a lot of options.
So what? It just could as well reflect your inability to appreciate the fun in that game option.
Fun is subjective, everyone measures his own sense of fun and willingness to pay for it. None of my business, hope you see its none of yours as well.
I never minded when new mounts were released, I was one of those players who enjoyed searching for the new mounts, what annoyed me the most is the cash grab blizzard began with the item shop, I admit I purchased a Pandaren Monk pet, mainly due to the charity donation blizzard was offering for the pet at the time but i cannot understand how somebody can spend large sums of money on a bunch of pixels on a screen then attempt to showoff their hard earned money on such a thing, it's the cash grab which hit me the hardest not the players, apologies if my initial post was somewhat bias.
"Not meaning to anger anyone with this thread, though I know in these forums its quite impossible. You can say "I enjoy vanilla ice cream" and still have 50 posts of angry, hot-tempered people who have nothing better to do than argue with you." - Dirkzen
First it is really not a lot of money, for some, the price of a mount is smaller than the cost of going downtown for a drink, gas included.
Second, laughing at people for their decision to buy a 2 seater? Just because you think it is a bad decision? Does it matter what you think? I can laugh at you being so intolerant and inconsiderate, but no I will not laugh, none of my business.
Cash grab? In a capitalist economy, does that mean good or bad? If you are a supplier, is cash grab a good thing to try? Where do you draw the line? Everyone should only charge when the service is vital to life and death? Every price should be break even pricing based? Or what?
You cannot understand why people spend their money there. Right. Try to understand, without prejudice. Sometimes an open mind can bring in a lot of new knowledge.
Understand that you are not really that "elitist", I sound harsher than I mean to, cos too many elitist have polluted forum discussions for too long. Peace out.
You're right. "Bleeding" is a strong word that we are using rather lightly when we speak of World of Warcraft. But, to be perfectly fair, let's see if we can't put this in perspective:
Cataclysm launched in December of 2010. The last numbers I saw put out - by Blizzard - acknowledged a loss of approximately 900,000 to 1,000,000 subscriptions since the launch of the expansion. (The last numbers released said 12,000,000 active subs, the most recent say 11,000,000 active subs. Meanwhile, reports released by Blizzard in March stated that Cataclysm sold 4,300,000 copies. So, honestly, I'm not at all certain what the correct number is here, but let's be generous and go with those higher numbers for this discussion.)
That is approximately 100,000 subscriptions per month. Actually, a little more than that because those numbers were released prior to September, but let's be generous and say nine months.
100,000 subscriptions is $1.5 million dollars in revenue per month.
900,000 subscriptions is $13.5 million dollars in revenue.
1 million subscriptions is $15 million dollars in revenue.
Does a revenue loss like that hurt a company as large as Activision-Blizzard? No, not really. Annually, if that decline continues at that rate, it's a loss of 18 million dollars in one year's time. To a company that size, that's a tax writeoff (and possibly the size of Kotick's expense account - who knows?
).
To the vast majority of gaming companies, that's bankruptcy.
What people tend to forget is that even Blizzard has called WoW a freak success and said that no other company should be so unwise as to measure any other MMO's success or failure against WoW's numbers. In the real world, though, yes, 100k subs per month is not simply bleeding - it is a hemmorhage that would destroy any other MMO on the market.
Firebrand Art
"You are obviously confusing a mature rating with actual maturity." -Asherman
Maybe MMO is not your genre, go play Modern Warfare...or something you can be all twitchy...and rank up all night. This is seriously getting tired. -Ranyr
coming soon....companion system from blizzard!
Don't think anyone saw this coming...... introduction to the 3rd fraction!
Yes a new race that's being born that's bend on destroying both old race in Azeroth! (Dun they always do?)
Which will be release in the new x-pac
RIP Orc Choppa
They will try as everyone said to release either information or a beta to Diablo 3.
Here is my deal here. Real tired of the religious fever that WoW seems to possess with some people. I am in no way saying WoW hasnt done a great thing for the industry, it has, but to say it is god's gift, please.
What some fail to realize is, Blizzard could promise me a real job to make WoW have everything I personally want in a game and it wouldnt get me back in and here is why....
1. .. I'm BORED to death of it.
2. ...I am a fan of Star Wars and Bioware and that is the pure main reason and focus of my desire to play SW:TOR.
My only game desire is to play with like minded players who love the game they are in , and seeing how , from what I have seen, Star Wars fans tend to have a better grasp of having fun rather than hating first and caring later like many, MANY "WoW" players tend to do. And yes, I'm gonna go "there", but by FAR , SWG had a much more, way better community than World of Morecrap ever had.
And to quote Vader (somewhat haha)... "Search your feelings, you know this to be true."
...p.s. , Sorry for the small rant. Atleast I answered the OP's question
I want to address some things stated here.
The next X-pac (based on the LIST conspiracy) is the Emerald Dreams. thats makes sense, because Blizzard recently launched a book dealing with the lore behind the bad things going on in the dream (just like Anet released a GW2 book months before GW2 comes out. same thing here. Blizzard does this kind of thing)
ANd yes there will be a new class. if you do the secret event in Kalmador, you will find a scroll (AND A DRUID AND A DEMON HUNTER) trapped in a cave. When you kill the Demon Hunter the scroll drops which the Scroll say its a riitual for becoming a Demon Hunter.
Again the Druid thats in the cave is another Symbolism, since many of the first Demon Hunters were nightelf druids, Illidan being the first Demon Hunter was twin brother to one of the most powerful druids.
Blizzard has a way with their symbolism. you have to keep a eye on it.
The new class is Demon Hunters. No idea what their PvE roles will be, but all classes have a DPS role, so we know that will be in there (since Blizzard will never or almost never revert back to the concept of Support only classes [Paladin = Tank/Healer not DPS for example back in TBC]. Blizzard would upset many people by making such a game design again unless it was able to fight well in PvP unlike TBC Paladins)
I been speculating on the lore and what will happen.
I have come to this conclusion, that in the lore, the NIGHTMARE will return (seeing that right now in CATA the Old Gods are coming back into focus).
Well you may be wondering, how the Nightmare can come back if it was destroyed in the book.
Well this is the mistake many of the readers made. the NIGHTMARE WAS DEFEATED, BUT THE SOURCE OF THE NIGHTMARE REMAINS ANONYMOUS (OLD GODS WORK).
So no, the book didnt fully stop the Nightmare, only defeats the Nightmare Lord.
Also you may be wondering what the Emerald Dreams have to do with Demons if the next X-pac is in the Nature Land of the Dreams.
Well again going back to the book,,,, the Emerald Dream has a path to the Twisted Nether (WHICH IS WHERE DEMONS COME FROM HINT HINT). also the Old Gods made some unknown deal with the Legion during the great sundering. it makes sense that the Old Gods would summon forth the Legion to help them gain control of the Emerald Dream and the Green Dragon Aspect.
From my theory on the Old God, the Aspects are the Keys to their prisons. so by killing each aspect, they become closer to freedom from the Titan's prison. Well how will they go about this. (We killed the Blue Aspect already. Next the Black Aspect. Well a Emerald Dream x-pac opens up a chance for the Green Aspect to die. Hint hint)
Also remember how I said Blizzard has a way with Symbolism? Well keep in mind, on a lore level, each time we fight one of these major bosses (By major I am talking the most powerful of badassery in the lore, like Aspects, and Reggy and Lich King for examples)
We are always accompanied by a opposite lore figure that is also powerful enough to balance out the power in the fight from a lore point of view.
Example
*Blue Aspect (Bad)=Red Aspect (our helper who is equal in power)
*Lich King (Bad)= Trion/Ashbringer (our Helper)
*Death Wing (Bad) = Red Aspect+ Mal (our helpers)
Well if we fight the Green Aspect, wouldnt we need a equal helper in power? Again Symbolism: Blizzard had the Green Aspect in the book to say to Mal that he is more powerful than she is (Hint hint, we have our helper here)
I speculate that the Old Gods will choose a new champion to lead their nightmare against Mal. and that champion is no other than the Naga Queen.
Symbolism Hint: In Cata, they were about to fight each other in darkshore, but she just laughed at him and slither off like he was no threat. that show how powerful she is, yet she isnt even a boss in CATA. She will be the new Nightmare lord
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
When SWTOR releases...probably offer it's players the ability to start at lvl 80 with a full tier 3 set of gear, and epic flying mount, and 1000g.
Same thing they've always been doing. Flash the sequel or an expantion for one of their titles to be released in 2-3 years from now.