It's natural course for such an old MMO. That being said maybe blizz will finally realize you can't hand the development over to rookie devs who continue the policy of nerfing a class almost every patch, and who continue to rehash same old content.
This can only be a wake up call to blizz. they needed to get knocked of the high horse. maybe just maybe they will start looking at the mechincs they have used all these years and see that you can't continue to make raiding the only end game, and maybe you need to provide a more open system that does not lock you into the linear boring same old progression.
Maybe blizz should repeal the idea that their game should be playable to 5 year olds. i doubt it though, they have lost touch with gamers and are more like a big cash machine now.
Much has to change and i don't think Titan can save them if they continue treating customers like mice on a tread mill.blizz needs to make on the promise of housing at least guild houses they should take the training wheels of they installed when cataclysm went live. give back the ability to make your character unique multi classed and much more.
The decline will continue and with GW2 and TOR looming if they don't break their own mold it may slide into the abyss.
Personally, I don't care one way or the other about World of Warcraft, but I'm not going to cling to the words of some hating report from "developer.com" (or whatever).
Warcraft is number 1. Has been, always will be. They have survived all the "wow killers", they survived Lord of the Rings ripping off Lich King to make their Witch King, and are still standing stronger than ever.
I was not aware that a character from a novel written in the 1950s was ripping off a game that was released in the 2000s.
Or were you not aware that the Witch King of Angmar was around long, LONG before Blizzard ever started ripping off Lord of the Rings?
Hint: Warcraft was originally very heavily influenced by Tolkien.
The game loses less then 10% of it's player base and armaggedon occurs -.-... Like seriously wtf, who cares it's less then 10 percent!
I just guess the 90+% don't matter in the game, cause y'know Blizzard will default and become bankrupt losing $15 million of it's $180 million a month profit just off of subscriptions. Just sayin...
First much more than half the Wow population is from China, in which country they are far from paying $15 per month.
Then 600k + 300k nearly 1 000 0000 which is roundly 1/4 of their non Chinese subs. Quite a bunch if you wonder.
"Regarding WoW's numbers it's made up of the following: at peak about 4.5 million in NA and Europe plus a large number from Asia where WoW is basically a f2p and counts people who play once for 2 minutes as "subscribers". EU population is roughly the same as NA. So NA population at peak was about 2.2 million. WoW is nowhere near it's peak now"
I hear people citing the degradation of WoW (or that is just sucked all along, and they use black magic to keep their subscribers)for the loss in players. There are two main factors for that at this time. First, the game is old. Add new content, and it will still be an old game, with new stuff. I loved WoW for the first 5 years or so, but it has just grown stale, and new content is not going to help that. Secondly, a new contender is on the horizon, SW:ToR. With the name Star Wars alone (even after the TRAVESTY that was called Galaxies, to this day I cannot see how anyone could have faith in SOE), they would have taken some subscibers from WoW. But it appears that this game might actually be as least as good of a game as WoW. And if it is, WoW will lose at least half of their subscibers to SW, maybe more.
Everyone (or most everyone) has talked about a "WoW killer" game, myself included. But the fact is that better games than WoW have been around for a while*, people just don't like change. When the gameplay in other games is sufficiently good that it's viewed as "worth the change" people will leave, and that's starting to happen. It's just old and you can only update the same game so much. In summary, call me when/if they come out with WoW2, I'm sure it will be awesome.
*I joined WoW pretty late into the game and never really saw what all the fuss was about, I'm sure others would disagree with me on that part.
Warcraft numbers do often drop off after an expansion has been out for a while, also summer numbers are usually lower due to the fact that people actually leave their houses and go do things in the summer in areas where the winter months might keep them mostly inside.....now.....
With that being said, Bizzard has already seen Warcraft peak and i doubt it will do anything but drop in subs steadily over the next couple years. They've said themselves that they need something new and they want to be the ones to bring a new game to the genre before someone else has the next big hit. The best blizzard empoyees are now working on the new content and it's very obvious with the constant patching, balancing, and the general poor ideas that were part of the Cata rollout, that WoW is old hat for blizzard and all they are going to do is milk it for cash.
Blizzard has become too big and it's all about bottom line now as evidenced by the great idea to add a real auction house for items in Diablo 3. They figure why try to keep beating the evil gold farmers, so theya re just going to start selling items to customers instead of trying to hold some kind of integrity for the artform of the game and what it's challenges represent. I don't want to deny them making money, it's what helps them develop great games, but there is a difference between moeny made from hard work and creating a great product, and money made by whoring their wares to whoever wants to buy them instead of actually earning them by playing the game. I hope they end up with a nice case of herpes for all their greed.
Funny how everytime there is a post even related to something bad happening to wow everyone comes out of the woodwork saying its finally the end!!! YAY It's Going to DiE!!!11!!!
It's not going to die. Havent you learned that over the past 5 years? Does logic completely elude you? WoW will be around for many years to come. It may not be as successful as it once was .. who knows .. it may be more successful than it ever was in the future .. doubtful, but not impossible.
At least pretend like you are out of the third grade and control yourself from posting this kind of drivel.
LFD tools are great for cramming people into content, but quality > quantity. I am, usually on the sandbox .. more "hardcore" side of things, but I also do just want to have fun. So lighten up already
Funny how everytime there is a post even related to something bad happening to wow everyone comes out of the woodwork saying its finally the end!!! YAY It's Going to DiE!!!11!!!
It's not going to die. Havent you learned that over the past 5 years? Does logic completely elude you? WoW will be around for many years to come. It may not be as successful as it once was .. who knows .. it may be more successful than it ever was in the future .. doubtful, but not impossible.
At least pretend like you are out of the third grade and control yourself from posting this kind of drivel.
It is going to die, as all things must. Its energy will be born again with new life.
But honestly, its like watching a bull fight. This is that first spear in the back of the bull, we all know how it will end, but right now that bull is still very powerful and alive. Still the crowd cheers as they see the first signs of blood. Maybe 50 years from now that bull will still be kicking, but you can be sure every spear thrust into its hide will not pass in silence, but with cheers from a blood thirsty mob.
"I swear -- by my life and my love for it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine." - John Galt
With Blizz getting desperate, there is finally hope they add housing! haha XD
Something like this i hope for. As a huge fan of Blizzards, and the Warcraft series, i really would like to see the universe expand in interesting directions like that, and not just new daily quests and reputation grinds.
"I swear -- by my life and my love for it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine." - John Galt
The game is simply too old and too big to attaract new players, who would want to progress through, what, 80 levels just to reach the latest content when one has to grind around level 20 to get to...?
There are several reasons for the decline in their population - everyone has their own reason for leaving.
The most obvious ones would be:
Age; the game is old, and it's hard/nearly impossible (or not profitable) to keep enhancing the graphics in all of Azeroth.
Gameplay; Every new expansion brings the same things (more or less, except for a new class/profession here and there). For those of us that has played for 4+ years, you just reach a certain point where you need something new.
Etc.; Itemshops, nerfs, unbalance, easy raids, easily obtainable epics (which makes everyone look the same - yay).
Blizzard DO know this, and it's impossible to completely revamp World of Warcraft - there is a reason they are developing Titan and Diablo 3.. Blizzard saw this coming years ago, and it will be a few years still, before they see 40-50% drop in their playerbase. And by then, their new games will be ready
I always get this free 7-day pass on my WoW account after I stopped my subscription.
I tried to revisit the "feel" of my WoW days but it's not getting there anymore. I claimed the 7-day free pass and decided to play the recent "story-line" quests. Completed the whole thing in a day. I checked mmo-champion and wowhead for recent updates and nothing posted was interesting enough to make me reactivate. I queued for Random Battlegrounds to complete my last 85's pvp set and the 1-3minute wait made me excited.
Played a few pvp matches and decided to raise my reputation with the Shattered Sun for the "of the Shattered Sun" title. After 3 days of playing,
<Name> of the Shattered Sun, Forsaken Female Arms Warrior
*full Vicious Gladiator's set w/ Vicious Gladiator's Bonegrinder 2hMace
*Witch-Hunter's Harvester (new scythe design olearm) for looks
*fully enchanted and gem'd
5th day I decided to queue for a random instance. While waiting for the queue to pop up, I watched the trade channel explode with "anal <insert whatever>", looked at my still customized User Interface... threat bars, damage meters, recount, raid timers, raid alerts, raid bars, main tank offtank assist windows, pizza timers, pirate speak, focus windows, stance-dance pve/pvp macros... my raiding life came flashing back and all i remember was doing the same stuff i've been doing since vanilla WoW---------watching threat bar/dps bar/health bars and vent communications.
Am I still excited forming the raid group? Clearing and rushing for at least realm-first with all the first patch day lag. Re-activate subscriptions?
Answer: No. I opened youtube and watched new boss fights... mixed old content mechanics with different graphics. I really did not miss anything.
Less than 7 days and I was already bored. INC WOW Sunset.
Whichever way you cut it, two quarters of declining sales and a more than reasonable threat posed by the imminent release of a heavily funded MMO, Blizz is certainly under some pressure.
I for one am expecting them to come out swinging at Blizzcon with a major announcement on Titan.
They got a free pass on the disater WOTLK was and decided to ignore the player base and make everything wrong with that expansion even worse with CAT. This is what happens when you ignore your player base and let a vindictive DEV with no idea about class balance run your game like a private server. Im sorry but one whole year of two massivly over powererd classes followed by the god awful overpowered mess mages are now is just too much for anyone who pvps. On top of the over homoginization of classes, imbalance for favorite classes etc. They ruined the one thing in the game that kept people coming back, the stock areas, the stock areas that were untouched by GC were to only reason to get started in the game in the first place. He ruined that by copying WAR LOL LOL LOL and turning it into a mini warzone/questzone type of thing. Not to mention the DUMMING down of talent trees. Sorry but the games primary players arent 12. Ill just sit here and wait for the subs to get down to 5 million or less before they get a CLUE. But those of us who knew better said this would happen in the middle of WOTLK just from the rumors.
And Titan isn't relevant no matter what anyone thinks. Even if they have a successful new game come out the thought that it will be any more than 3 million or even 1 million is wishful thinking. Besides they should concentrate on WOW thats the game that has over 10 millon players not Titon, what if Titon doesnt do as well as expected or just average? Then where will they be?
They wouldnt be the first company to ignore the good product that they have and produce a piece of garabage and sink their own ship. If they had a clue they would put Tigole back in charge of WOW before Ghostcrawler totally ruins the game beyond repair.
I don't see any of this "pressure" everyone seem to be talking about at all...
They're still making much, much more money than the next Studio below them.
Even if WoW loses most of its subs and only has 2mil - that's still a goal and a figure that most, if not all, of the recently released MMOs and even future ones won't see.
Pathetic little sharks smells whale is old and will die soon? Do not worry ... will not happen so soon. Maybe have only problem with hemorrhoids and that is the blood that sharks enjoy at moment. Wow is here to stay for very very long. Cramp here, cramp there ... but is still healthy.
But is true .... maybe (maybe) golden era is starting to fade. Very slowly however. But this is normal curse of history. No empire last for ever.
Wow is The Game (with very very big G), they did more good things then bad. Formula for success. Until Cata, at least imo. Expansion as such was great, incredible underwater world, awesome quests (despite too linear), a lot of originality, ....
But main problem was they listened to very vocal minority that wanted harder game. Second, buf for pugs that should worked since start was not. So many left. Myself included. After leveled all my 10 alts to max ... I was just frustrated with pugs (oh, just spare me plz with get guild and similar bables ... that work ONLY if you have REAL life friends in and if you are jobless, I'm spending to much time anyway in gaming, but is fun and because of injury had enough time). So I left. Returned after they adjusted ... but now things were even kinda worse. Now everything was feeling many times really to easy. Why? Wow is really to easy? Nope. Is to easy when f***ing ULTRA OVERPOWERED tank make any run just simple run. Tank that is raid ready goes to normal instance, but he does not belong even to hc. As the have put on lower limit on stats to be able to lfg, they should also set UPPER limit. Then run will be again challenging and fun, will need to use cc ... etc.
While I was playing wotlk end game 10 months out of 12.... im afraid now I will be back shortly before next expansion will be out.
And now to second part why subs are dropping faster then usually. There are finnaly good games on horizont, mainly I'm waiting to swotor ... but for now on my list 2nd placed is firmly Rift. Only game after years and years that is in fact The Game and not only. Was since day 1 virtually bug free. Can not believe, but for months while leveling all possible alts in Rift I do not miss at all wow. They made me go away ... and without Rift I guess would be already back. Not now. Then I'm putting in a lot of hope to swotor and conditionally to some other title.
I think Azaria hit the nail on the head there needs to be a change at the top . Was Ghostcrawler at the helm when the cross server looking for a group system and instant access to the bgs from anywhere in the world where implimented??? . To me those are the two major things that killed WoW at least on PVP servers . I always thought that these tools were fine for PVE servers because people went to PVE servers to avoid world PVP . On PVP servers it killed world PVP overnight . The other effect these changes had was to make the world feel pretty empty of players because it made the need to quest redundant . These were the major mistakes but theres 100s of little things that have compounded to make the game a shadow of its former self .
The trouble is if you did get someone in charge that wanted to reverse some of these changes you would proberbly upset a signifcant portion of the current playerbase who are used to the easy game it is now . The only solution I can see is advanced difficulty servers reverseing a lot of the changes like faster leveling ,easy access to instances , in buit quest trackers and allowing players to tailor thier talent trees in the way they once could . Sadly I don't think this will happen and in 3-4 months time we will be here again when Blizzard has bleeded several hundred thousand more subs and again next year when they lose millions to StarWars . Ghostcrawlers is fiddling while Romes burning .
I don't see any of this "pressure" everyone seem to be talking about at all...
They're still making much, much more money than the next Studio below them.
Even if WoW loses most of its subs and only has 2mil - that's still a goal and a figure that most, if not all, of the recently released MMOs and even future ones won't see.
Those 11 mil gamers will bleed off and go elsewhere..........No ammount of badmouthing new games when they come out will stop your guildies and friends from leaving......Look up the stats on the length of the average American marriage.......You will file for divorce as soon as another hotie that likes to do the dirty, dirty a different way enters the picture(so to speak)......Quit pining over your first love and move on.....RIP the band aid off FAST...Going slow only prolongs the pain..... Quit acting like you never had a girlfriend....Ditch the B!#ch, you'll thank me later..............This round of sad but true cliche's was brought to you by the letter X and the number 1 (1 is the lonliest number)............That is all.
Comments
It's natural course for such an old MMO. That being said maybe blizz will finally realize you can't hand the development over to rookie devs who continue the policy of nerfing a class almost every patch, and who continue to rehash same old content.
This can only be a wake up call to blizz. they needed to get knocked of the high horse. maybe just maybe they will start looking at the mechincs they have used all these years and see that you can't continue to make raiding the only end game, and maybe you need to provide a more open system that does not lock you into the linear boring same old progression.
Maybe blizz should repeal the idea that their game should be playable to 5 year olds. i doubt it though, they have lost touch with gamers and are more like a big cash machine now.
Much has to change and i don't think Titan can save them if they continue treating customers like mice on a tread mill.blizz needs to make on the promise of housing at least guild houses they should take the training wheels of they installed when cataclysm went live. give back the ability to make your character unique multi classed and much more.
The decline will continue and with GW2 and TOR looming if they don't break their own mold it may slide into the abyss.
I was not aware that a character from a novel written in the 1950s was ripping off a game that was released in the 2000s.
Or were you not aware that the Witch King of Angmar was around long, LONG before Blizzard ever started ripping off Lord of the Rings?
Hint: Warcraft was originally very heavily influenced by Tolkien.
First much more than half the Wow population is from China, in which country they are far from paying $15 per month.
Then 600k + 300k nearly 1 000 0000 which is roundly 1/4 of their non Chinese subs. Quite a bunch if you wonder.
"Regarding WoW's numbers it's made up of the following: at peak about 4.5 million in NA and Europe plus a large number from Asia where WoW is basically a f2p and counts people who play once for 2 minutes as "subscribers". EU population is roughly the same as NA. So NA population at peak was about 2.2 million. WoW is nowhere near it's peak now"
And clicky
I hear people citing the degradation of WoW (or that is just sucked all along, and they use black magic to keep their subscribers)for the loss in players. There are two main factors for that at this time. First, the game is old. Add new content, and it will still be an old game, with new stuff. I loved WoW for the first 5 years or so, but it has just grown stale, and new content is not going to help that. Secondly, a new contender is on the horizon, SW:ToR. With the name Star Wars alone (even after the TRAVESTY that was called Galaxies, to this day I cannot see how anyone could have faith in SOE), they would have taken some subscibers from WoW. But it appears that this game might actually be as least as good of a game as WoW. And if it is, WoW will lose at least half of their subscibers to SW, maybe more.
Everyone (or most everyone) has talked about a "WoW killer" game, myself included. But the fact is that better games than WoW have been around for a while*, people just don't like change. When the gameplay in other games is sufficiently good that it's viewed as "worth the change" people will leave, and that's starting to happen. It's just old and you can only update the same game so much. In summary, call me when/if they come out with WoW2, I'm sure it will be awesome.
*I joined WoW pretty late into the game and never really saw what all the fuss was about, I'm sure others would disagree with me on that part.
Warcraft numbers do often drop off after an expansion has been out for a while, also summer numbers are usually lower due to the fact that people actually leave their houses and go do things in the summer in areas where the winter months might keep them mostly inside.....now.....
With that being said, Bizzard has already seen Warcraft peak and i doubt it will do anything but drop in subs steadily over the next couple years. They've said themselves that they need something new and they want to be the ones to bring a new game to the genre before someone else has the next big hit. The best blizzard empoyees are now working on the new content and it's very obvious with the constant patching, balancing, and the general poor ideas that were part of the Cata rollout, that WoW is old hat for blizzard and all they are going to do is milk it for cash.
Blizzard has become too big and it's all about bottom line now as evidenced by the great idea to add a real auction house for items in Diablo 3. They figure why try to keep beating the evil gold farmers, so theya re just going to start selling items to customers instead of trying to hold some kind of integrity for the artform of the game and what it's challenges represent. I don't want to deny them making money, it's what helps them develop great games, but there is a difference between moeny made from hard work and creating a great product, and money made by whoring their wares to whoever wants to buy them instead of actually earning them by playing the game. I hope they end up with a nice case of herpes for all their greed.
Not all who wander are lost...
Funny how everytime there is a post even related to something bad happening to wow everyone comes out of the woodwork saying its finally the end!!! YAY It's Going to DiE!!!11!!!
It's not going to die. Havent you learned that over the past 5 years? Does logic completely elude you? WoW will be around for many years to come. It may not be as successful as it once was .. who knows .. it may be more successful than it ever was in the future .. doubtful, but not impossible.
At least pretend like you are out of the third grade and control yourself from posting this kind of drivel.
LFD tools are great for cramming people into content, but quality > quantity.
I am, usually on the sandbox .. more "hardcore" side of things, but I also do just want to have fun. So lighten up already
I wouldn't be surprised if the number they lost is actually bigger than the next top-subscribing MMO currently has.
It is going to die, as all things must. Its energy will be born again with new life.
But honestly, its like watching a bull fight. This is that first spear in the back of the bull, we all know how it will end, but right now that bull is still very powerful and alive. Still the crowd cheers as they see the first signs of blood. Maybe 50 years from now that bull will still be kicking, but you can be sure every spear thrust into its hide will not pass in silence, but with cheers from a blood thirsty mob.
"I swear -- by my life and my love for it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."
- John Galt
With Blizz getting desperate, there is finally hope they add housing! haha XD
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Something like this i hope for. As a huge fan of Blizzards, and the Warcraft series, i really would like to see the universe expand in interesting directions like that, and not just new daily quests and reputation grinds.
"I swear -- by my life and my love for it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."
- John Galt
The game is simply too old and too big to attaract new players, who would want to progress through, what, 80 levels just to reach the latest content when one has to grind around level 20 to get to...?
Has expansion for WoW ever added new mechanics other than more races and content?
oh flying mounts, thats right.
How much WoW could a WoWhater hate, if a WoWhater could hate WoW?
As much WoW as a WoWhater would, if a WoWhater could hate WoW.
There are several reasons for the decline in their population - everyone has their own reason for leaving.
The most obvious ones would be:
Age; the game is old, and it's hard/nearly impossible (or not profitable) to keep enhancing the graphics in all of Azeroth.
Gameplay; Every new expansion brings the same things (more or less, except for a new class/profession here and there). For those of us that has played for 4+ years, you just reach a certain point where you need something new.
Etc.; Itemshops, nerfs, unbalance, easy raids, easily obtainable epics (which makes everyone look the same - yay).
Blizzard DO know this, and it's impossible to completely revamp World of Warcraft - there is a reason they are developing Titan and Diablo 3.. Blizzard saw this coming years ago, and it will be a few years still, before they see 40-50% drop in their playerbase. And by then, their new games will be ready
Subscription
Convert the number to a percentage and it's not a big deal - it's usual for any MMO at this time of the year to lose players.
Cataclsym easily sold over 5.5 million copies http://www.vg247.com/2011/01/10/first-month-wow-cataclysm-sales-hit-4-7-million/ (china not included) so WoW's traditional subscriber base (pay monthly) was easily 5 million within a month of cata's lunch. 300,000 is not a big deal.
Indeed, plus the 600k it lost last quarter puts it down to 4.6 mill excluding china.
This makes me sad.
I always get this free 7-day pass on my WoW account after I stopped my subscription.
I tried to revisit the "feel" of my WoW days but it's not getting there anymore. I claimed the 7-day free pass and decided to play the recent "story-line" quests. Completed the whole thing in a day. I checked mmo-champion and wowhead for recent updates and nothing posted was interesting enough to make me reactivate. I queued for Random Battlegrounds to complete my last 85's pvp set and the 1-3minute wait made me excited.
Played a few pvp matches and decided to raise my reputation with the Shattered Sun for the "of the Shattered Sun" title. After 3 days of playing,
<Name> of the Shattered Sun, Forsaken Female Arms Warrior
*full Vicious Gladiator's set w/ Vicious Gladiator's Bonegrinder 2hMace
*Witch-Hunter's Harvester (new scythe design olearm) for looks
*fully enchanted and gem'd
5th day I decided to queue for a random instance. While waiting for the queue to pop up, I watched the trade channel explode with "anal <insert whatever>", looked at my still customized User Interface... threat bars, damage meters, recount, raid timers, raid alerts, raid bars, main tank offtank assist windows, pizza timers, pirate speak, focus windows, stance-dance pve/pvp macros... my raiding life came flashing back and all i remember was doing the same stuff i've been doing since vanilla WoW---------watching threat bar/dps bar/health bars and vent communications.
Am I still excited forming the raid group? Clearing and rushing for at least realm-first with all the first patch day lag. Re-activate subscriptions?
Answer: No. I opened youtube and watched new boss fights... mixed old content mechanics with different graphics. I really did not miss anything.
Less than 7 days and I was already bored. INC WOW Sunset.
I dunno guys...
Whichever way you cut it, two quarters of declining sales and a more than reasonable threat posed by the imminent release of a heavily funded MMO, Blizz is certainly under some pressure.
I for one am expecting them to come out swinging at Blizzcon with a major announcement on Titan.
They got a free pass on the disater WOTLK was and decided to ignore the player base and make everything wrong with that expansion even worse with CAT. This is what happens when you ignore your player base and let a vindictive DEV with no idea about class balance run your game like a private server. Im sorry but one whole year of two massivly over powererd classes followed by the god awful overpowered mess mages are now is just too much for anyone who pvps. On top of the over homoginization of classes, imbalance for favorite classes etc. They ruined the one thing in the game that kept people coming back, the stock areas, the stock areas that were untouched by GC were to only reason to get started in the game in the first place. He ruined that by copying WAR LOL LOL LOL and turning it into a mini warzone/questzone type of thing. Not to mention the DUMMING down of talent trees. Sorry but the games primary players arent 12. Ill just sit here and wait for the subs to get down to 5 million or less before they get a CLUE. But those of us who knew better said this would happen in the middle of WOTLK just from the rumors.
And Titan isn't relevant no matter what anyone thinks. Even if they have a successful new game come out the thought that it will be any more than 3 million or even 1 million is wishful thinking. Besides they should concentrate on WOW thats the game that has over 10 millon players not Titon, what if Titon doesnt do as well as expected or just average? Then where will they be?
They wouldnt be the first company to ignore the good product that they have and produce a piece of garabage and sink their own ship. If they had a clue they would put Tigole back in charge of WOW before Ghostcrawler totally ruins the game beyond repair.
I don't see any of this "pressure" everyone seem to be talking about at all...
They're still making much, much more money than the next Studio below them.
Even if WoW loses most of its subs and only has 2mil - that's still a goal and a figure that most, if not all, of the recently released MMOs and even future ones won't see.
Every game has its greatest time... and always have downfall time.
"No one will be #1 forever" - Yip Man(Bruce Lee's Master)
Kain_Dale
Pathetic little sharks smells whale is old and will die soon? Do not worry ... will not happen so soon. Maybe have only problem with hemorrhoids and that is the blood that sharks enjoy at moment. Wow is here to stay for very very long. Cramp here, cramp there ... but is still healthy.
But is true .... maybe (maybe) golden era is starting to fade. Very slowly however. But this is normal curse of history. No empire last for ever.
Wow is The Game (with very very big G), they did more good things then bad. Formula for success. Until Cata, at least imo. Expansion as such was great, incredible underwater world, awesome quests (despite too linear), a lot of originality, ....
But main problem was they listened to very vocal minority that wanted harder game. Second, buf for pugs that should worked since start was not. So many left. Myself included. After leveled all my 10 alts to max ... I was just frustrated with pugs (oh, just spare me plz with get guild and similar bables ... that work ONLY if you have REAL life friends in and if you are jobless, I'm spending to much time anyway in gaming, but is fun and because of injury had enough time). So I left. Returned after they adjusted ... but now things were even kinda worse. Now everything was feeling many times really to easy. Why? Wow is really to easy? Nope. Is to easy when f***ing ULTRA OVERPOWERED tank make any run just simple run. Tank that is raid ready goes to normal instance, but he does not belong even to hc. As the have put on lower limit on stats to be able to lfg, they should also set UPPER limit. Then run will be again challenging and fun, will need to use cc ... etc.
While I was playing wotlk end game 10 months out of 12.... im afraid now I will be back shortly before next expansion will be out.
And now to second part why subs are dropping faster then usually. There are finnaly good games on horizont, mainly I'm waiting to swotor ... but for now on my list 2nd placed is firmly Rift. Only game after years and years that is in fact The Game and not only. Was since day 1 virtually bug free. Can not believe, but for months while leveling all possible alts in Rift I do not miss at all wow. They made me go away ... and without Rift I guess would be already back. Not now. Then I'm putting in a lot of hope to swotor and conditionally to some other title.
I think Azaria hit the nail on the head there needs to be a change at the top . Was Ghostcrawler at the helm when the cross server looking for a group system and instant access to the bgs from anywhere in the world where implimented??? . To me those are the two major things that killed WoW at least on PVP servers . I always thought that these tools were fine for PVE servers because people went to PVE servers to avoid world PVP . On PVP servers it killed world PVP overnight . The other effect these changes had was to make the world feel pretty empty of players because it made the need to quest redundant . These were the major mistakes but theres 100s of little things that have compounded to make the game a shadow of its former self .
The trouble is if you did get someone in charge that wanted to reverse some of these changes you would proberbly upset a signifcant portion of the current playerbase who are used to the easy game it is now . The only solution I can see is advanced difficulty servers reverseing a lot of the changes like faster leveling ,easy access to instances , in buit quest trackers and allowing players to tailor thier talent trees in the way they once could . Sadly I don't think this will happen and in 3-4 months time we will be here again when Blizzard has bleeded several hundred thousand more subs and again next year when they lose millions to StarWars . Ghostcrawlers is fiddling while Romes burning .
Those 11 mil gamers will bleed off and go elsewhere..........No ammount of badmouthing new games when they come out will stop your guildies and friends from leaving......Look up the stats on the length of the average American marriage.......You will file for divorce as soon as another hotie that likes to do the dirty, dirty a different way enters the picture(so to speak)......Quit pining over your first love and move on.....RIP the band aid off FAST...Going slow only prolongs the pain..... Quit acting like you never had a girlfriend....Ditch the B!#ch, you'll thank me later..............This round of sad but true cliche's was brought to you by the letter X and the number 1 (1 is the lonliest number)............That is all.