With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
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With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
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Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#2Jump on the iOS bandwagon or get left behind ....
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#3> Subscription figures have fallen from 12 million just after the release of the last expansion to 10.2 million
That's probably a cycle that follows every expansion: all of the old players come back, play it, get bored again and leave. I'm not sure this is evidence that it's "fading"
But they've already announced their next game, Diablo III, and they tend to only have a few games in their peak at a time anyway, so we know what they're doing next because they've told us.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#4> Subscription figures have fallen from 12 million just after the release of the last expansion to 10.2 million That's probably a cycle that follows every expansion: all of the old players come back, play it, get bored again and leave. I'm not sure this is evidence that it's "fading" But they've already announced their next game, Diablo III, and they tend to only have a few games in their peak at a time anyway, so we…
10.2 is the lowest it's ever been. Usually the numbers rise and fall depending on what other games are released -- every time a big-title MMO comes out, WoW generally loses 1-2 million players to it (and then they come back).
If the figure stays around 10 mil (i.e. if SWTOR keeps them), I guess that'll be 'proof' that WoW is fading.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#5The numbers are getting lower because many people are leaving due to Blizzards repeated failure at basic concepts: trying to balance the game for both PvE and PvP, trying to make the content challenging enough for hardcore players, but accessible and rewarding enough for casual players. The first expansion was pretty good, but I think the number of guilds that finished Sunwell were something like 1-2%. I know a lot of "hardcore raiders" quit after the second expansion (myself included) simply because of the design changes. Even among friends that still play, I don't know anyone really looking forward to the upcoming expansion, it's not that people are sick of WoW in as much as they are sick of what Blizzard is doing with it.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#6[deleted]
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#7The numbers are getting lower because many people are leaving due to Blizzards repeated failure at basic concepts: trying to balance the game for both PvE and PvP, trying to make the content challenging enough for hardcore players, but accessible and rewarding enough for casual players. The first expansion was pretty good, but I think the number of guilds that finished Sunwell were something like 1-2%. I know a lot o…
While calling these "basic concepts" is technically correct, I suppose, they're also among some of the most difficult aspects of game design. In a community as large and diverse (in terms of both ability level and time commitment) as WoW's, it's hardly surprising that Blizzard would err on the side of populism.
10.2 million may be a step down from the peak of popularity, but WoW is still wildly profitable and maintains a userbase larger than most of its competitors combined.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#8I wouldn't expect WoW to lose any more players in the next quarter due to some austerity measures they are doing (the Diablo 3 offer, Scroll of Resurrection) but it is clear that see a down trend and are trying to stem the tide.
They are not planning any new content until the next expansion which we can assume will be the standard November release (although no confirmation yet). That doesn't bode well since even I, a mediocre player in a mediocre guild, have killed Deathwing. If you haven't done it on regular, you've done it in the Raid Finder.
So what are some going to do for the next 9 months? I'd expect quite a subscriber drop during the summer with more in the fall. The numbers will jump back up with the new expansion but most likely not be back over 10 million.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#9I'm going to guess they take a break to lounge on their huge pile of money then ramp up Diablo 3 stuff.
Re: With World of Warcraft fading, what will Blizzard do next?
#10The numbers are getting lower because many people are leaving due to Blizzards repeated failure at basic concepts: trying to balance the game for both PvE and PvP, trying to make the content challenging enough for hardcore players, but accessible and rewarding enough for casual players. The first expansion was pretty good, but I think the number of guilds that finished Sunwell were something like 1-2%. I know a lot o…
While calling these "basic concepts" is technically correct, I suppose, they're also among some of the most difficult aspects of game design. In a community as large and diverse (in terms of both ability level and time commitment) as WoW's, it's hardly surprising that Blizzard would err on the side of populism. 10.2 million may be a step down from the peak of popularity, but WoW is still wildly profitable and maintai…
Just because I don't agree with their choices, doesn't mean I don't understand them. Even though Sunwell was an unplanned response to Black Temple being "tuned too well", the next expansion not being ready, the top guilds crushing existing dungeons, it doesn't make sense to release content that 5% of your player base ever has a hope of seeing, much less finishing. I mean I get it for sure. From a monetary/subscriber point of view, they absolutely did the right thing, the hardcore crowd for sure was the minority (the vocal minority), but minority nonetheless. I think we're seeing that in the subscriber numbers, 10% of so people got fed up and left, and the remainder are [happily?] plugging along. But playing through the various expansions, you can definitely feel that the top designers, etc have been pulled off onto Project Titan. The game has lost some of it's epic feel (which could also be due to it's age as well).