WoW pretty much has every player under the sun playing right now. My question is who exactly did WoW target back during it's release, and does it still target that same group now? If it is targetting a different or broader range of groups, is it viable in the long term to maintain it's current success?

Please try to minimize the "VANILLA WOW WAS FOR HARDCORE PEOPLE AND THE CASUALS RUINED EVERYTHING!" and the "CASUALS ARE THE PLAYERS THAT PAY MORE MONEY IN THE LONG RUN AND THE HARDCORES ARE JUST SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE ELITIST D-BAGS" bullcrap. I already get enough headaches reading the WoW forums, I don't need another one.

Originally posted by Enigmatus"VANILLA WOW WAS FOR HARDCORE PEOPLE AND THE CASUALS RUINED EVERYTHING!"

^

You basically answered your own question there I think.

My personal research though had indicated that it wasn't the casuals, but that the original development team was no longer working on WoW near the end of the burning crusade. Most (Not All) but a lot of the developers near the end of BC had all been replaced, because they had just started working on their next upcomming MMO called Titan, and the developers who had worked on WoW were now working on Titan. New Developers - New Idea's - WoW Changed

This is just from Research done over the internet though, so I'm not sure if all that information is correct as not everything you read is correct. The only way to really know is if you worked for Blizzard Entertainment around that time. Everything else is just Theory or peoples opinion.

GhostCrawler changed WoW a lot. Most of the hard core gamers hate him, but I don't care because I left WoW when Wrath of the Noobking came out. Good Riddance

Originally posted by Enigmatus

WoW pretty much has every player under the sun playing right now. My question is who exactly did WoW target back during it's release, and does it still target that same group now? If it is targetting a different or broader range of groups, is it viable in the long term to maintain it's current success?

Please try to minimize the "VANILLA WOW WAS FOR HARDCORE PEOPLE AND THE CASUALS RUINED EVERYTHING!" and the "CASUALS ARE THE PLAYERS THAT PAY MORE MONEY IN THE LONG RUN AND THE HARDCORES ARE JUST SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE ELITIST D-BAGS" bullcrap. I already get enough headaches reading the WoW forums, I don't need another one.

They targetted Warcraft fans, Blizzard fans, MMO fans and RPG fans.  They basically looked at EQ and probably a few other games and improved them a whole lot.  They never could have dreamed it would become as huge as it became.

Even in Vanilla, the hardcores were only like 10% of the population.  They quickly learned to cater to a much bigger portion of their playerbase.

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

Not to be racist but their target audience is now the chinese. Remember reading somewhere that a majority of their subs come from china so why not cater to them more. Sure it pisses vets off but that's what investors care about at the end of the day. Heck if I were an investor I'd want the same. 

Originally posted by Enigmatus

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

They absolutely used EQ as an inspiration and hired many EQ devs.  They also fixed a lot of the problems with EQ but still included world bosses for guilds to fight over their spawns.  Blizzard has always been focused on making games fun.  EQ wasn't really fun for most people.

WOW vanilla raids, starting with BWL was really hard.  It was hard enough finding 40 competent people but the content itself was much harder than 25 man content that came later.

Originally posted by FrodoFragins

Originally posted by Enigmatus

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

They absolutely used EQ as an inspiration and hired many EQ devs.  They also fixed a lot of the problems with EQ but still included world bosses for guilds to fight over their spawns.  Blizzard has always been focused on making games fun.  EQ wasn't really fun for most people.

 

WOW vanilla raids, starting with BWL was really hard.  It was hard enough finding 40 competent people but the content itself was much harder than 25 man content that came later.

^^^

+10

Originally posted by prpshrt

Not to be racist but their target audience is now the chinese. Remember reading somewhere that a majority of their subs come from china so why not cater to them more. Sure it pisses vets off but that's what investors care about at the end of the day. Heck if I were an investor I'd want the same. 

Now that's a dubious claim!

The asian players pay by the amount played, not a subscription.  They have more than 50% of the players but not 50% of the revenue.  A lot of their players have been clamoring for Pandarens since the game released.

Originally posted by FrodoFragins

Originally posted by Enigmatus

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

Blizzard has always been focused on making games fun. 

Unfortunitly in doing this, they also started sniffing paint, started doing crack, and then they found this green... oozee.. stuff and in the end mutated them into albino monkeys with autism, and they went a little overboard pushing the big red easy mode button in the service room over and over again spasticly jumping up and down, and then slowly over time it became so easy that we had our 6 year old son plowing through raids like no tommorow... the service manager 4 years later opened the door and saw 6 dead albino monkeys, and thats when the idea of Mist of Pandora Came into his mind...

One Monkey... To Rule them all..

Originally posted by stratasaurus

I would love to play Wow private servers but when I tried to find one I did not really have any luck.  Prolly just didn't do enough research into it shrug if you have a good place to start I would love a pm.  Anyways the OP seems to already have the answer but just doesn't want to accept it.  Wow was made more for hardcore gamers as that was the only MMO market known at the time.  Casuals eventually became the majority of the playerbase so they tailored the game more for them.  Hardcore players are no more dueche or anything then casuals just the fact is there are more casuals so that maens targetting them gets you the highest sub numbers, if you ran a company you would prolly do the same thing.  Now honestly I always scratch my head at how everyone says "Wow is so easy" but then you go and look at raid progress and the vast vast majority of guilds have not completed all hardcore content.  So if the vast majority of raiding players have not finished the hardest raiding content I don't see how it can all be too easy?

Doesn't want to accept WHAT exactly?

---

Originally posted by Enigmatus
Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

---

There is absolut no logical flaw as WoW started off with a much higher challenge level and a setup that was almost similar to an open world with directed travelpaths.
Travel i.e. was done per Ship Journey, Flight or Undergropund ingame in real time and not as teleport etc.

Then the great degradation of WoW and the MMO market started to leave all the wonderfull virtual world concepts stomped into dust for quick and dirty "streamlined" gameplay cashgrabs.

Originally posted by Thorqemada

There is absolut no logical flaw as WoW started off with a much higher challenge level and a setup that was almost similar to an open world with directed travelpaths.
Travel i.e. was done per Ship Journey, Flight or Undergropund ingame in real time and not as teleport etc.

Then the great degradation of WoW and the MMO market started to leave all the wonderfull virtual world concepts stomped into dust for quick and dirty "streamlined" gameplay cashgrabs.

Uh...

How exactly does taking longer to get somewhere = difficulty?

I get that traveling can be used to make a virtual world feel like a world, but outside of that, it seems more like a means to slow you down if anything.

I started playing WoW on day one of it's release and besides some short contact with Ultima Online it was my first MMO. I think the developers tried to take the Everquest blueprint and bring it to massive Blizzard Fanbase in a polished form. This worked perfectly and the player base exploded way beyond what they expected or targeted.

Vanilla WoW was not that hardcore as many make it to be, it was less confinded and a bit more sandboxy. PvP happened in the open world as players defined their own targets (Crossroads, Southshore vs. Tarrens Mill and so on). The actual PVE learning curve was relatively smmoth. Including the raids, they ramped up the difficulty with Blackwing Lair and what came after. The Burning Crusade was more Hardcore upon release than Vanilla ever was, especially the dungeon and raid difficulty was way higher, on top there was an ultra complicated attunement system that was a nightmare to manage for guildmasters/raidleaders. Only with the relase of Black Temple and Hyjal they lowerd the difficulty quite a bit (and then smashed everyone with Sunwell).

For the record played until we cleared Ulduar, then quit, came back for two month to level a new char from 1 to 85 in Cataclysm, but never went back into raiding since...

I spoke of the open world in that case which has changed to an instanced moba like gameplay today and mentioned the challenge level only as other aspect.

To understand the challenge difference you would have to play early wow or a game of a similar challenge level which does not exist today.
Every single mmo is way easier than it was b4 WoW was released.
That is not bad at all as people be different and play for different reasons.

Bad is that WoW is the benchmarksetter for challenge level and almost nobody dares to make a more challenging game.
The one who try be underfunded indies that deliver underdeveloped products that have a 99.9% chance of failure.

TSW is being "accused" to be a hard game but in fact its quite easy - people only got used to "easy" gaemplay and now some feel overwhelmed.

Atm i play the MWO beta (As Founder i am allowed to say this) but sadly i cant tell anything about it.
Let me say i have stopped to play any other mmorpg since then (but may start to play DDO to stay in touch with my friends of our ex-WoW-Dungeon-group, maybe that game offers some mmorpg challenge).

-------

Pandarans - the wives feel the bey very cute and would love to play them.

The level of min/maxing and theory crafting that goes into Raiding-- I would say it is for Mathmatical geniuses.

On the other hand questing and leveling are very easy, anyone can do it.

Those that like to group have thing that need grouping, Those that like playing solo can play solo, you can level by questing, pvp or doing dungeons through the dungeon finder.

It has battlegrounds but on pvp servers it also has limited but still harsh open world pvp. (Limited because there are some safe areas for beginners, and alliance can't attack alliance, horde can't attack horde.  Harsh because you can be ganked pretty much any time because horde and alliance share many questing areas)

You can level your guild, you can do achievements, you can run dungeons, you can play mini games.

So in the end, I would say Blizzard is going for a very Broad Appeal. Hardcore, casual, social, alt-o-holics, completionists, ADD, Easter egg hunters, young, old, first timers. Basically there is something for you to do in the game.

There target audience... Everyone (Whether you think that is good or bad is up to you)

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

So in the end, I would say Blizzard is going for a very Broad Appeal. Hardcore, casual, social, alt-o-holics, completionists, ADD, Easter egg hunters, young, old, first timers. Basically there is something for you to do in the game.

There target audience... Everyone (Whether you think that is good or bad is up to you)

You know what just struck me?

Broad Appeal, at least IMO, is actually also a niche.

After all, in broad appeal, you do a ton of stuff decently, but you don't really get any single area beyond good at best.

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/5287974#5287974

Originally posted by Enigmatus

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

The difference is perspective.  Hardcores find the game too casual, while casuals find the game, especially end game, too hardcore.  This is what happens when game developers think they can have their cake and eat it too.  Eventually, you end up alienating one segment of your player base over another and in this case, each expansion would swing wildly in one direction then back again, causing all kinds of frustration to the differing player types.  Blizzard's own philosophy is to draw in players with intially casual gameplay, then try to force or indoctrinate them into more hardcore play, such as the raids at end game.  What they didn't take into account was that those casuals would send a huge backlash after the Burning Crusade expansion and they realized their huge mistake and really started to cater more and more to casuals throughout the entire game, not just the earlier levels.

Originally posted by Enigmatus

Elaboration:

I've seen statements from various possibly dubious sources stating that WoW was more or less a casualized/easier/less tedious/more colorful version of older MMOs such as Everquest and such, or at the least possessed systems from the MMOs of that time period.

Thing is, more recently I've seen equally numerous and dubious sources stating that WoW was some kind of hardcore uber difficult and awesome virtual world that was, and I paraphrase, "dumbed down in the name of making money and pandering to brainless teenagers/kids/basement dwellers/whoever the flying fuck they attach a label to."

Now frankly, this is highly exaggerated, but these two messages I commonly see on forums (yes I know they are a minority in general, but it's not like the SILENT majority are going to tell me much of anything) are so strange and conflicting that I can't help but feel I'm missing something here; a leap in logic or a gap in the timeline if you will.

Not that strange or contradicting, you have the first bunch that vetted from older titles who thought it was easy, then you have a second group which had that game set the bar for what they thought of as difficult.

And then it got easier than that.

As for my own opinion on the matter, I've commented on it enough previously. :p