World of Warcraft

The more I watch what the current development team is doing to WoW, the more I'm convinced they've gotten so high off of their good publicity, that they believe they can do no wrong. What prompted this little outburst from me? Well, ever since their introduction last year, arenas have been a point of contention; the developers have rebalanced PvE and non-arena PvP around them, and then a few months ago actually announced that they're decided to turn WoW into an "e-sport".

As if these the recent trend towards "World of Arenacraft" wasn't enough, the devs have now decided that gear gotten from BGs will require an arena rating. Most of the playerbase (including quite a few arena players, from the posts I've read) haven't been happy with arena becoming the new raiding of WoW (meaning that everything is balanced around it), and so Blizzard goes and now tells anyone who wants to do any kind of organized PvP that they'll have to do arena to buy their gear? This does not sound like a good business decision, as is demonstrated by the huge uproar on their forums, with BG PvPers, PvEers and arena players alike all teaming up to bash this as a horrible idea.

So here's my question: does whoever makes these sorts of decisions at Blizz look at the same market as the rest of us? Do they really think having arena take over the game is going to stave of Age off Conan (which comes out next month)? Do they not realize that pissing off the majority of the game's player base isn't something you can get away with when there's competition on the horizon, sometimes only a month or so away? What are they thinking?

First off, this whole "e-sport" business is not really a factor since it's on it's own special tournament server that you have to pay a seperate fee to play on.  I'm not really sure what that has to do with the PvE and PvP servers most of us play on.  It's a completely seperate issue.  You could argue that some decisions are being made to support this seperate arena tournament server, but I find that pretty hard to believe since it's one stinkin' server.  I don't believe that Blizzard is dumb enough to make changes for 1 server that would have a negative impact to 10 million paying customers.  Basically that's a bunch of speculation that has no basis in truth.

As far as the rest of your concerns, well this has been an on-going discussion since arena's were introduced with BC.  Before we jump to conclusions I think we need to see what the next expansion does to the current PvP situation before we start declaring doom and gloom.  People have been doing that for over a year and yet there's still a ton of PvP going on  in WoW.  It may not be what you want, but it apparently does have an audience especially considering the whole new arena tournament server.  I'd be very interested to know how many entrants they have received.

This is the first I've heard about Blizzard stating that BG gear will require an Arena rating.  Can you tell us any more or point us to a link?  I'd like to find out more.

Originally posted by Pappy13

First off, this whole "e-sport" business is not really a factor since it's on it's own special tournament server that you have to pay a seperate fee to play on.

So you have to pay more for the same grind?

I think they smoke dutch green stuff..

if you are correct it wont make things very good for blizzard.

Does the horde still win 95% of the time still in BG's?

Originally posted by Briansho

Originally posted by Pappy13

First off, this whole "e-sport" business is not really a factor since it's on it's own special tournament server that you have to pay a seperate fee to play on.

So you have to pay more for the same grind?

Unless stated elsewhere it seems to look like it. Though I feel sorry for the subscribers if that is the case because they are already paying a monthly fee for the game. Just another attempt to squeeze more money from the players pocket.

Call me paranoid or delusional if you will, but I tend to agree that Blizzard are getting very lazy when it has the potential monthly income of $150,000,000 PER MONTH.

Ok, so its not a constant subscription.  However, the likes of Eve online can successfully hold its head above water with 200,000 subscribers, and yet brings out a complete graphics revamp and then aims to bring out yet another giant leap in its games development within a year. 

However, a company who has a subscription base that is 20 x that amount struggles to bring out ONE complete expansion within a year.  Blizzard has the money to keep WoW at the forefront when it comes to releasing large amounts of content for its game.  Its not as if it doesn't have the money to pay for enough developers to keep time down to a minimum.

Originally posted by Tarka

Call me paranoid or delusional if you will, but I tend to agree that Blizzard are getting very lazy when it has the potential monthly income of $150,000,000 PER MONTH.

Ok, so its not a constant subscription.  However, the likes of Eve online can successfully hold its head above water with 200,000 subscribers, and yet brings out a complete graphics revamp and then aims to bring out yet another giant leap in its games development within a year. 

However, a company who has a subscription base that is 20 x that amount struggles to bring out ONE complete expansion within a year.  Blizzard has the money to keep WoW at the forefront when it comes to releasing large amounts of content for its game.  Its not as if it doesn't have the money to pay for enough developers to keep time down to a minimum.

You can't always throw money at a problem and expect it to get resolved.  There are only so many cooks you can have in your kitchen so to speak.

Originally posted by Vozz

 Do they not realize that pissing off the majority of the game's player base isn't something you can get away with when there's competition on the horizon, sometimes only a month or so away? What are they thinking?

They're thinking, "What competition?" And guess what?  They're right.  AoC isn't competition for WoW.

Originally posted by TookyG

Originally posted by Tarka

Call me paranoid or delusional if you will, but I tend to agree that Blizzard are getting very lazy when it has the potential monthly income of $150,000,000 PER MONTH.

Ok, so its not a constant subscription.  However, the likes of Eve online can successfully hold its head above water with 200,000 subscribers, and yet brings out a complete graphics revamp and then aims to bring out yet another giant leap in its games development within a year. 

However, a company who has a subscription base that is 20 x that amount struggles to bring out ONE complete expansion within a year.  Blizzard has the money to keep WoW at the forefront when it comes to releasing large amounts of content for its game.  Its not as if it doesn't have the money to pay for enough developers to keep time down to a minimum.

You can't always throw money at a problem and expect it to get resolved.  There are only so many cooks you can have in your kitchen so to speak.

Can you smell what the Blizz devs are cooking?