I also believe this is largely true. Certainly on a large, front end project scale.
One must look at the history of successful MMORPGs that launched the industry. The VAST majority of them were created by original development teams, custom built for that very project. The companies were either much smaller, still supporting niche marketed games, and/or were bought by larger developers who eventually dismantled the original team.
The current, industrialized production has clearly had a very poor history of maintaining the original flavor of many of the projects that launched their success.
MMORPGs require a uniquely intimate focus on both product and audience. Something woefully lacking in recent years.
I also believe this is largely true. Certainly on a large, front end project scale.
One must look at the history of successful MMORPGs that launched the industry. The VAST majority of them were created by original development teams, custom built for that very project. The companies were either much smaller, still supporting niche marketed games, and/or were bought by larger developers who eventually dismantled the original team.
The current, industrialized production has clearly had a very poor history of maintaining the original flavor of many of the projects that launched their success.
MMORPGs require a uniquely intimate focus on both product and audience. Something woefully lacking in recent years.
Are you made out of flowers or rainbows?
Oh oh. I sense someone deflecting using memes.
Nah, just show an actual interest in something and it's amazing how far logic and understanding can take a subject.
Is anyone left from the team who brought us classic?
Seems like they were listening to feedback from people who never stepped foot in classic. It feels like they do not know what they are doing thus relying on feedback and having to cross reference their work which is leading me to believe this may or may not be classic in the purest form.
Feedback is simply feedback, they are not relying on it, and when appropriate, it seems, responding to it which is cool. This is the problem with giving people any kind of information about whats happening internally, people misinterpret it.
I keep saying it, but i'll repeat it, they should have announced a complete remaster of WoW, not just a fkg "classic server"
Classic has nothing to do with any attempt to re-invent Wow. It is 100% due to Blizzard trying to regain control over the older versions of the game that has been taken over by private server hosting. This is why Classic is a very small project, outside of Blizzard's normal project management.
Please do not confuse yourself.
Put on your thinking caps people...
Classic is Blizzard's desperate attempt to reign in old players who would rather play classic on a private server than play any current version of WoW on Blizzard's servers.
They know their game has gone to crap and at this point, it's either classic or port WoW to mobile.
Classic unfortunately is a little too late... much like their release of the Warcraft movie. Had they released it back around the WotLK timeframe, they would have made a mint no matter how awful the movie was. But no, they waited until basically half their player base moved on to something else to release it.
All the people really wanting classic have long since moved on. They know they can get it on any private server if they really wanted to return. So Blizzard making it available to them, in a reinvented form for a fee isn't going to bring people back.
Too damn late.
Nothing but memes left for Blizzard. It's their legacy now.
I keep saying it, but i'll repeat it, they should have announced a complete remaster of WoW, not just a fkg "classic server"
Classic has nothing to do with any attempt to re-invent Wow. It is 100% due to Blizzard trying to regain control over the older versions of the game that has been taken over by private server hosting. This is why Classic is a very small project, outside of Blizzard's normal project management.
Please do not confuse yourself.
Put on your thinking caps people...
Classic is Blizzard's desperate attempt to reign in old players who would rather play classic on a private server than play any current version of WoW on Blizzard's servers.
They know their game has gone to crap and at this point, it's either classic or port WoW to mobile.
Classic unfortunately is a little too late... much like their release of the Warcraft movie. Had they released it back around the WotLK timeframe, they would have made a mint no matter how awful the movie was. But no, they waited until basically half their player base moved on to something else to release it.
All the people really wanting classic have long since moved on. They know they can get it on any private server if they really wanted to return. So Blizzard making it available to them, in a reinvented form for a fee isn't going to bring people back.
Too damn late.
Nothing but memes left for Blizzard. It's their legacy now.
Not accurate. The biggest portion of private server players are people who never played Classic at all. That's just math. The average age of private server players means a bulk would be in diapers or still pissing their beds when Wow released. Yet, a very large portion who played private servers also played retail. This is apparent from in game chat and discord.
Private servers were becoming so big, it was stealing a real market share from the industry. Blizzard was FORCED to address it. There is considerable hype for it with easily followed metrics from forum and social media. There is no desperation. There are only logical and reactive choices to events in a dynamic and changing system.
Are you scared Blizzard won't make money off this? Are you scared that they will, but won't make enough? Are you masquerading as an Activision investor who is scared you won't meet the next quarterly projection and BE DAMNED with what consumers may think? Really, it's hard to understand your position and wants.
You over simplify in order to validate your conclusion against false premise. You are partly right of course. You just need to tap back into the larger picture to construct an accurate reality independent of your personal position.
The true story as to how we got to this place within the history of this industry is fascinating. It's well worth exploring and discussing.
There is considerable hype for it with easily followed metrics from forum and social media.
Yes, there's a long history of internet loudmouths clamoring loudly for something and then, when something goes wrong, screaming bloody murder and doing their best, collectively, to ruin entire corporations because baby didnt get exactly what it wanted. I wouldn't be so sure about how solid "social media metrics" are.
I keep saying it, but i'll repeat it, they should have announced a complete remaster of WoW, not just a fkg "classic server"
Classic has nothing to do with any attempt to re-invent Wow. It is 100% due to Blizzard trying to regain control over the older versions of the game that has been taken over by private server hosting. This is why Classic is a very small project, outside of Blizzard's normal project management.
Please do not confuse yourself.
Put on your thinking caps people...
Classic is Blizzard's desperate attempt to reign in old players who would rather play classic on a private server than play any current version of WoW on Blizzard's servers.
They know their game has gone to crap and at this point, it's either classic or port WoW to mobile.
Classic unfortunately is a little too late... much like their release of the Warcraft movie. Had they released it back around the WotLK timeframe, they would have made a mint no matter how awful the movie was. But no, they waited until basically half their player base moved on to something else to release it.
All the people really wanting classic have long since moved on. They know they can get it on any private server if they really wanted to return. So Blizzard making it available to them, in a reinvented form for a fee isn't going to bring people back.
Too damn late.
Nothing but memes left for Blizzard. It's their legacy now.
Not accurate. The biggest portion of private server players are people who never played Classic at all. That's just math. The average age of private server players means a bulk would be in diapers or still pissing their beds when Wow released. Yet, a very large portion who played private servers also played retail. This is apparent from in game chat and discord.
Private servers were becoming so big, it was stealing a real market share from the industry. Blizzard was FORCED to address it. There is considerable hype for it with easily followed metrics from forum and social media. There is no desperation. There are only logical and reactive choices to events in a dynamic and changing system.
Are you scared Blizzard won't make money off this? Are you scared that they will, but won't make enough? Are you masquerading as an Activision investor who is scared you won't meet the next quarterly projection and BE DAMNED with what consumers may think? Really, it's hard to understand your position and wants.
You over simplify in order to validate your conclusion against false premise. You are partly right of course. You just need to tap back into the larger picture to construct an accurate reality independent of your personal position.
The true story as to how we got to this place within the history of this industry is fascinating. It's well worth exploring and discussing.
Over thinking it I suggest.
AB asked themselves: if we release "vanilla WoW" will AB make more money than if they didn't. Not - I point out - will vanilla WoW make money but will AB make more money. And they will have factored in development costs, possible revenue reductions for WoW, legal costs associated with keeping private servers in check etc. etc.
Could classic be "late" - entirely possible but AB don't care.
Were they forced - no AB don't "care" - and pretty sure private servers are not that big a deal in China say. Don't disagree that they will have been factored in just that they will not have forced AB to do anything.
Late to market - wouldn't disagree.
Thinking that this is about anything other than - what they hope - will be extra revenue goes against years of what has actually been happening.
2 big content holidays together totalling nearly 4 years = don't care about players' experience just the money.
They announced 2 expansion back I think it was that they were doubling the team to 250 ..... meaning they had cut it back to 125! Even 250 is a puny size given the revenue WoW has - clearly - been generating but 125! clearly they have been after every last penny.
Long story short, private servers exist that are far closer to true Vanilla than ActiBliz will ever release. Lineage 2 sent the FBI after the private servers, and their re-imagining of Lineage 2 is a nightmare (wtb my old Dwarf Priest). DBG actually worked with Project1999 for the EQ time-locked and varied progression servers. They even legitimized them legally, and made an insane profit in the process. Don't look to ActiBliz for that "old vanilla feel." I give them one in one hundred odds of getting it even half right in ten percent of the content.
I keep saying it, but i'll repeat it, they should have announced a complete remaster of WoW, not just a fkg "classic server"
Classic has nothing to do with any attempt to re-invent Wow. It is 100% due to Blizzard trying to regain control over the older versions of the game that has been taken over by private server hosting. This is why Classic is a very small project, outside of Blizzard's normal project management.
Please do not confuse yourself.
Ding Ding Ding! we have a winner!
This is nothing but blizzard seeing pirate servers with thousands of people and telling themselves, we can take those players and squeeze them for some money.
I did the vanilla wow thing on a free server, and i watched population plummet when people hit 60 and are bored. and that was free, imagine having to pay.
I plan on messing around in classic for a bit. I can't see this as something most are going to play for long though. After a few months people will be asking for BC to drop
I was thinking of going for a little nostalgia trip with Classic, but Bobby makes the decision really hard lately.
So I played on the emulated servers only because Blizzard didn't have classic servers. The thing is Blizzard that made vanilla WoW is long dead and gone. I love vanilla WoW but it's really hard to support Activision Blizzard with where they are and what they are doing. Between Diablo Immortal, the focus on mobile, and being completely out of touch with their core audience it's hard to see things like record revenue and firing 800 people and maintain my excitement to play vanilla at all.
One thing this does is really make me appreciate playing WoW from launch until Pandaland even more than I already did.
I don't have any hope of seeing the new next big thing come out of the current Activision Blizzard. It's going to be rehashed, remastered old classics and chasing the mobile dollar signs along with employees crying in the parking lot while Bobby dances on a pile of cash.
Just sad.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
I would play on the emulated servers of WoW if there were any PvE servers but they merged Lighthope with the PvP one.
That's the biggest limitation of vanilla private servers. The only time I had rl friends playing vanilla was when the pve server had a decent population but the wave of server drama, server closures and mergers, drove them away.
A huge audience is not represented currently on private servers. The stability of official servers is an equally important factor for many players are is server choice. Pve players don't like drama, they can't all adapt to pvp servers and stability is required in order for the construction pf the social community they desire.
I've repeated this nearly endlessly: Vanilla Private servers largely exist because of the pvp meta. They have become their own beast ... hence why I say they have their own meta. Pve Wow players are largely turned away by this meta.
Blizzard seems to be aware of this too. Classic is being developed for a larger audience than private servers have the ability to attract. I actually LOVE pvp, but in order to find that correct balance between pvp and pve, I feel I must choose a pve server once Classic launches. I'm not sure that there will be enough pvp server choices to spread out the private server population enough to stray away from the current pvp meta on private servers.
Part of that meta I love, but not enough to enjoy it 24/7 after 3 years of it. This is coming from someone who can be considered a hardcore pvp'r (in methodology, not outlook). Pve players will flock to pve servers with heavy sighs of relief. Classic is a very big deal for them and why Blizzard see Classic differently than the private server hardcore players do.
Is anyone left from the team who brought us classic?
Seems like they were listening to feedback from people who never stepped foot in classic. It feels like they do not know what they are doing thus relying on feedback and having to cross reference their work which is leading me to believe this may or may not be classic in the purest form.
No. That's just how you choose to read it.
They take feedback because it was a game play test. Developers ALWAYS take feedback from play tests. That is sort of the entire f'ing point.
It's a small team, recreating Wow Classic on their modern engine. It is based on 1.12 game mechanics but this is emulated. They have to plug Classic functions in and this takes time and testing.
There has never been any confusion with those experienced on private servers (the most valuable feedback Blizzard can get ... it sure as shit isn't from retail players who have no experience playing Classic). Classic is an emulation in the same way private servers emulated the game. Never has anyone, familiar with the campaign to get Classic made, thought that the game would be an exact copy of how Wow played at release.
They are emulating 1.12 game play. The details of how 1.12 mechanics worked are known. They are not guessed. There may be slight differences in how the modern engine renders certain things outside of game play, but that is also expected. It's hosted using modern server tech, and that is expected.
Perhaps I am confused over the drama everyone seems to need running through their veins, but Classic is being emulated the best way they can manage, with a small team diametrically opposed to Activision's normal business model. It's basically an indie project within Blizzard. The thought of this is rather mind blowing considering their recent past. This alone fascinates me.
We are LUCKY AS F@#$ to even be getting it.
But feel free to worry about more shit outside of your control. It appears to be the driving force for many people's existence today.
So....how much did Blizzard payed you to suck up to them this hard?
Is anyone left from the team who brought us classic?
Seems like they were listening to feedback from people who never stepped foot in classic. It feels like they do not know what they are doing thus relying on feedback and having to cross reference their work which is leading me to believe this may or may not be classic in the purest form.
No. That's just how you choose to read it.
They take feedback because it was a game play test. Developers ALWAYS take feedback from play tests. That is sort of the entire f'ing point.
It's a small team, recreating Wow Classic on their modern engine. It is based on 1.12 game mechanics but this is emulated. They have to plug Classic functions in and this takes time and testing.
There has never been any confusion with those experienced on private servers (the most valuable feedback Blizzard can get ... it sure as shit isn't from retail players who have no experience playing Classic). Classic is an emulation in the same way private servers emulated the game. Never has anyone, familiar with the campaign to get Classic made, thought that the game would be an exact copy of how Wow played at release.
They are emulating 1.12 game play. The details of how 1.12 mechanics worked are known. They are not guessed. There may be slight differences in how the modern engine renders certain things outside of game play, but that is also expected. It's hosted using modern server tech, and that is expected.
Perhaps I am confused over the drama everyone seems to need running through their veins, but Classic is being emulated the best way they can manage, with a small team diametrically opposed to Activision's normal business model. It's basically an indie project within Blizzard. The thought of this is rather mind blowing considering their recent past. This alone fascinates me.
We are LUCKY AS F@#$ to even be getting it.
But feel free to worry about more shit outside of your control. It appears to be the driving force for many people's existence today.
So....how much did Blizzard payed you to suck up to them this hard?
How sad your life must be to be so passionless about anything.
There’s a completely untapped market for old school style MMOs. Not just WoW, but EQ, SWG, FFXI, etc all have private servers. I think AB will underestimate how popular this will be.
But feel free to worry about more shit outside of your control.”
-These are the kind of thoughts that have brought the company where it is today, imo. If they totally mess classic up and its nothing like most players expected, then how lucky should we all feel? Customers have more control than you think. If the company was in a better spot they probably would not care about classic at all.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
There’s a completely untapped market for old school style MMOs. Not just WoW, but EQ, SWG, FFXI, etc all have private servers. I think AB will underestimate how popular this will be.
I would disagree there is some huge demand for the old school style games. I would argue that there is more people who want to play the older games they love in their original form due to nostalgia than that will pick up on the newer games coming out. SoL will appeal to a tiny base of folks and Pantheon ought to be bigger but I do not believe you will exceed 100k players either.
Comes down to time and the old school games were time investments. People just do not have as much of it these days as they once did which is why mobile tends to be big because you can play it in spurts when you are on the go.
I will play Pantheon but I am not under the illusion that they games will be monster hits to even make the bigger games flinch. Is there an audience? Sure but then there is also an audience for the old XFL league as well.
I see this cited as the reason mobile is popular and time-intensive games are less popular, but what metrics do we have to show the average gamer spends less time gaming these days than did the first-generation MMORPG gamers? I've yet to see any statistical comparison that would lend credence to the idea gamers "just don't have time anymore." All the data I've seen indicates the average gamer spends about the same time gaming these days as they did back then.
I want to play wow without dungeonfinder, just spamming in zone and summon ppl and fight with the other faction to have a summon.
Many will disagree I'm sure but for me this was one of the best parts of playing pre-dugeon finder which is completely lost in the modern game. I often reminisce with guild mates from back then about this very thing
Comments
Nah, just show an actual interest in something and it's amazing how far logic and understanding can take a subject.
You stay sassy!
You stay sassy!
Feedback is simply feedback, they are not relying on it, and when appropriate, it seems, responding to it which is cool. This is the problem with giving people any kind of information about whats happening internally, people misinterpret it.
Classic is Blizzard's desperate attempt to reign in old players who would rather play classic on a private server than play any current version of WoW on Blizzard's servers.
They know their game has gone to crap and at this point, it's either classic or port WoW to mobile.
Classic unfortunately is a little too late... much like their release of the Warcraft movie. Had they released it back around the WotLK timeframe, they would have made a mint no matter how awful the movie was. But no, they waited until basically half their player base moved on to something else to release it.
All the people really wanting classic have long since moved on. They know they can get it on any private server if they really wanted to return. So Blizzard making it available to them, in a reinvented form for a fee isn't going to bring people back.
Too damn late.
Nothing but memes left for Blizzard. It's their legacy now.
Private servers were becoming so big, it was stealing a real market share from the industry. Blizzard was FORCED to address it. There is considerable hype for it with easily followed metrics from forum and social media. There is no desperation. There are only logical and reactive choices to events in a dynamic and changing system.
Are you scared Blizzard won't make money off this? Are you scared that they will, but won't make enough? Are you masquerading as an Activision investor who is scared you won't meet the next quarterly projection and BE DAMNED with what consumers may think? Really, it's hard to understand your position and wants.
You over simplify in order to validate your conclusion against false premise. You are partly right of course. You just need to tap back into the larger picture to construct an accurate reality independent of your personal position.
The true story as to how we got to this place within the history of this industry is fascinating. It's well worth exploring and discussing.
You stay sassy!
Yes, there's a long history of internet loudmouths clamoring loudly for something and then, when something goes wrong, screaming bloody murder and doing their best, collectively, to ruin entire corporations because baby didnt get exactly what it wanted. I wouldn't be so sure about how solid "social media metrics" are.
Over thinking it I suggest.
AB asked themselves: if we release "vanilla WoW" will AB make more money than if they didn't. Not - I point out - will vanilla WoW make money but will AB make more money. And they will have factored in development costs, possible revenue reductions for WoW, legal costs associated with keeping private servers in check etc. etc.
Could classic be "late" - entirely possible but AB don't care.
Were they forced - no AB don't "care" - and pretty sure private servers are not that big a deal in China say. Don't disagree that they will have been factored in just that they will not have forced AB to do anything.
Late to market - wouldn't disagree.
Thinking that this is about anything other than - what they hope - will be extra revenue goes against years of what has actually been happening.
2 big content holidays together totalling nearly 4 years = don't care about players' experience just the money.
They announced 2 expansion back I think it was that they were doubling the team to 250 ..... meaning they had cut it back to 125! Even 250 is a puny size given the revenue WoW has - clearly - been generating but 125! clearly they have been after every last penny.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/That's the biggest limitation of vanilla private servers. The only time I had rl friends playing vanilla was when the pve server had a decent population but the wave of server drama, server closures and mergers, drove them away.
A huge audience is not represented currently on private servers. The stability of official servers is an equally important factor for many players are is server choice. Pve players don't like drama, they can't all adapt to pvp servers and stability is required in order for the construction pf the social community they desire.
I've repeated this nearly endlessly: Vanilla Private servers largely exist because of the pvp meta. They have become their own beast ... hence why I say they have their own meta. Pve Wow players are largely turned away by this meta.
Blizzard seems to be aware of this too. Classic is being developed for a larger audience than private servers have the ability to attract. I actually LOVE pvp, but in order to find that correct balance between pvp and pve, I feel I must choose a pve server once Classic launches. I'm not sure that there will be enough pvp server choices to spread out the private server population enough to stray away from the current pvp meta on private servers.
Part of that meta I love, but not enough to enjoy it 24/7 after 3 years of it. This is coming from someone who can be considered a hardcore pvp'r (in methodology, not outlook). Pve players will flock to pve servers with heavy sighs of relief. Classic is a very big deal for them and why Blizzard see Classic differently than the private server hardcore players do.
You stay sassy!
So....how much did Blizzard payed you to suck up to them this hard?
You stay sassy!
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.