Originally posted by Punkre

Why this is in the SW:TOR forum I will not understand, 90% of the OP coments are based on WoW.

 

Its sad that everyone that auto hates WoW either never played the game, played it for 3 secs and hated a minor thing in the game example "Undead can heal themselves and it doesn't hurt? BLASPHOMY!" or lastly blames the community basis for the game as a whole.

The first reason just means your afraid of something that might change your perseption about MMOs, or your just willfully ignorant. The second states that you have no imagination beyond that of what you were told from old games/books.

The last part I want to dive into some more detail here since it is one that I have heard alot lately; You make a game that is very popular to a wide market and its an MMO, doesnt matter what type it is, now that you have this large fan basis you now have attracted alot of weirdos and mentally handicapped people. You don't wanna alienate these players cus their still footing the bill of your game, so what do you do...

Create an Ignore button, sadly those players that come to these forums and whine about players being mean to them generally state that they were not allowed to play with the big boys in raids once they hit max level because they didnt reseach, ever reach max level because no one would run though though Gnomer, or they got into too many fights on trade chanel and no one wanted to deal with you ever again.

Yea players are rude, so are people, games dont make people asshats, people make people asshats.

Honey, I didn't play for just "three seconds". You can find out whether you'll like a game in the first free month, you know. I cancelled right before the month was over. It was a terrible game and the behavior of the many many many rude players was extremely despicable. I've played DAoC, CoH, SWG, EQ1, EQ2, Conan, Eve, LOTRO (beta'd that one, hubby currently has an account), PotBS, PotC (beta'd), WoW and I might be even missing a few in there.

Never have I ever seen a game so overrun by badly behaved people as I have WoW. At least once a week for the roughly three and a half weeks I played, I had someone harassing me in pm because I wouldn't pvp with them. And not just that one person either. They'd get all their buddies to harass me too. And they were all different people. On different servers. Not to mention the aggravation of the l337 on the main channels, the bad language, and worse. And then there's the fact that top level only means endless raiding because they have nothing else to offer and the devs are too lazy to bother with anything else.

I've never seen that behavior in any other game. Just WoW. So stop your defensive superiority complex, huh?

Originally posted by Punkre

Why this is in the SW:TOR forum I will not understand, 90% of the OP coments are based on WoW.

It's not hard friend to notice it all loops around and brings it back to the core of what I am attempting to get at.  Hell... you did reply, so I must have done something correct.  And thanks btw, excellent reply.

And Moirae; in all MMORPGs you are going to get that type of persons... with WoW having the larger subscriber base, you'll run into that much more often it'll seem.  Also seems you spread your mind to too many games.. imo, perhaps attempt to embrace "one" for all it's worth.  I hope SW:TOR it will be.  That was only an opinion by me however.  I appreciate your post as well, thank you.

Originally posted by Moirae

Originally posted by Punkre

Why this is in the SW:TOR forum I will not understand, 90% of the OP coments are based on WoW.

 

Its sad that everyone that auto hates WoW either never played the game, played it for 3 secs and hated a minor thing in the game example "Undead can heal themselves and it doesn't hurt? BLASPHOMY!" or lastly blames the community basis for the game as a whole.

The first reason just means your afraid of something that might change your perseption about MMOs, or your just willfully ignorant. The second states that you have no imagination beyond that of what you were told from old games/books.

The last part I want to dive into some more detail here since it is one that I have heard alot lately; You make a game that is very popular to a wide market and its an MMO, doesnt matter what type it is, now that you have this large fan basis you now have attracted alot of weirdos and mentally handicapped people. You don't wanna alienate these players cus their still footing the bill of your game, so what do you do...

Create an Ignore button, sadly those players that come to these forums and whine about players being mean to them generally state that they were not allowed to play with the big boys in raids once they hit max level because they didnt reseach, ever reach max level because no one would run though though Gnomer, or they got into too many fights on trade chanel and no one wanted to deal with you ever again.

Yea players are rude, so are people, games dont make people asshats, people make people asshats.

Honey, I didn't play for just "three seconds". You can find out whether you'll like a game in the first free month, you know. I cancelled right before the month was over. It was a terrible game and the behavior of the many many many rude players was extremely despicable. I've played DAoC, CoH, SWG, EQ1, EQ2, Conan, Eve, LOTRO (beta'd that one, hubby currently has an account), PotBS, PotC (beta'd), WoW and I might be even missing a few in there.

 

Never have I ever seen a game so overrun by badly behaved people as I have WoW. At least once a week for the roughly three and a half weeks I played, I had someone harassing me in pm because I wouldn't pvp with them. And not just that one person either. They'd get all their buddies to harass me too. And they were all different people. On different servers. Not to mention the aggravation of the l337 on the main channels, the bad language, and worse. And then there's the fact that top level only means endless raiding because they have nothing else to offer and the devs are too lazy to bother with anything else.

 

I've never seen that behavior in any other game. Just WoW. So stop your defensive superiority complex, huh?

I agree with you Moirae, I have a long list of games I have played and beta etc. And as for WoW I have played it several times, I have friends who play it off and on as well, I had a guild there at launch.

Originally posted by nakedcody

From a more realistic standpoint, WoW brought people to MMO's that traditionally may never have considered it. 

And therein lies the problem...
 

Originally posted by Moirae

Originally posted by Punkre

Why this is in the SW:TOR forum I will not understand, 90% of the OP coments are based on WoW.

 

Its sad that everyone that auto hates WoW either never played the game, played it for 3 secs and hated a minor thing in the game example "Undead can heal themselves and it doesn't hurt? BLASPHOMY!" or lastly blames the community basis for the game as a whole.

The first reason just means your afraid of something that might change your perseption about MMOs, or your just willfully ignorant. The second states that you have no imagination beyond that of what you were told from old games/books.

The last part I want to dive into some more detail here since it is one that I have heard alot lately; You make a game that is very popular to a wide market and its an MMO, doesnt matter what type it is, now that you have this large fan basis you now have attracted alot of weirdos and mentally handicapped people. You don't wanna alienate these players cus their still footing the bill of your game, so what do you do...

Create an Ignore button, sadly those players that come to these forums and whine about players being mean to them generally state that they were not allowed to play with the big boys in raids once they hit max level because they didnt reseach, ever reach max level because no one would run though though Gnomer, or they got into too many fights on trade chanel and no one wanted to deal with you ever again.

Yea players are rude, so are people, games dont make people asshats, people make people asshats.

Honey, I didn't play for just "three seconds". You can find out whether you'll like a game in the first free month, you know. I cancelled right before the month was over. It was a terrible game and the behavior of the many many many rude players was extremely despicable. I've played DAoC, CoH, SWG, EQ1, EQ2, Conan, Eve, LOTRO (beta'd that one, hubby currently has an account), PotBS, PotC (beta'd), WoW and I might be even missing a few in there.

 

Never have I ever seen a game so overrun by badly behaved people as I have WoW. At least once a week for the roughly three and a half weeks I played, I had someone harassing me in pm because I wouldn't pvp with them. And not just that one person either. They'd get all their buddies to harass me too. And they were all different people. On different servers. Not to mention the aggravation of the l337 on the main channels, the bad language, and worse. And then there's the fact that top level only means endless raiding because they have nothing else to offer and the devs are too lazy to bother with anything else.

 

I've never seen that behavior in any other game. Just WoW. So stop your defensive superiority complex, huh?

While you have a point, I'd like a few things considered when it comes to community. 

WoW has, arguably, one of the worst communities in the genre. I would like to say that is actually not entirely true. The truth is probably simply this: The more people you get, the more assholes you will have. You have bad behaviour in any game, some more some less, but you will find it anywhere. WoW has more bad behaviour (and I agree with this fully) because there are simply more people. On the other hand, immaturity and outright idiocy do seem to be a bit abundant there.

However, there are different sort of "bad" communities. I would like to put forward EVE as an example. Now I would like to say in my 3 years total I played EVE, I found the community in general to be pretty good. On the other hand, the community is also what made me quit the game. Because the community was/is too extreme for my tastes. When a game overreaches into RL, then that is a no-go for me (I am referring to RL spying for in-game purposes as an example). 

I also played Aion on Chinese servers for a while and the general behaviour of people there was much much worse than what I had experienced in WoW. Kill-stealing, Mob-stealing, no help offering, no friendly heals, no buffings simply for the heck of it, no word of thanks when you did actually help someone else, blatant mob-training etc were all very regular there. 

So, in closing, I'd like to say, yes, WoW is filled with a lot of people I'd rather not have anything to do with. That is however largely owned to the fact that there are so many goddamn people there. And secondary because it attracts a lot of players who have no concept of the -community- as people who have played MMO's since the old days have. 

WoW is the King. You don’t have to like the King, you don’t have to play the King, but you do have to acknowledge the King because numbers don’t lie. To do anything else demonstrates ignorance of the genre.

WoW itself can be a simple game for a child to play … or it can be as complex as the min/max’ers can make it. Yes, they didn’t invent the genre but they put it on the map and kept it there. Even my first MMORPG (UO) couldn’t do that. The community is not that bad when you compare it the communities of bottom-feeders playing games that have FFA PvP like AC1 DT or the AoC PvP servers. Go there if you want to see the worst in people who play games. They are fun for a diversion, but pale in comparison to games that offer true battles where skill is number one.

I’ve always been a little suspicious of people who choose class based games for their PvP fix anyway, instead of games that offer level playing fields but to each their own. Personally, when I run across a hardcore PvP’er who proclaims their uberness in these games, proclaiming anyone who disagrees with them carebears, I tend to ignore whatever they post or say. Far to narrow-minded for me. Either way, WoW’s community is tame compared to games with FFA PvP servers and the huge egos of those that feed there.

I’m not going to pretend to know why WoW succeeded where others have failed. I’m not an insider nor am I gifted with omnipotence. TOR seems to have a lot of plusses going for it from the developer to the IP. If they can figure out why the total WoW package works then more power to them. I wish them luck because the number of MMORPG’s that have truly made it since WoW’s release are few and far between, no matter the company, IP or the hype.
 

Originally posted by Malkosha

WoW is the King. You don’t have to like the King, you don’t have to play the King, but you do have to acknowledge the King because numbers don’t lie. To do anything else demonstrates ignorance of the genre.

 

WoW itself can be a simple game for a child to play … or it can be as complex as the min/max’ers can make it. Yes, they didn’t invent the genre but they put it on the map and kept it there. Even my first MMORPG (UO) couldn’t do that. The community is not that bad when you compare it the communities of bottom-feeders playing games that have FFA PvP like AC1 DT or the AoC PvP servers. Go there if you want to see the worst in people who play games. They are fun for a diversion, but pale in comparison to games that offer true battles where skill is number one.

 

I’ve always been a little suspicious of people who choose class based games for their PvP fix anyway, instead of games that offer level playing fields but to each their own. Personally, when I run across a hardcore PvP’er who proclaims their uberness in these games, proclaiming anyone who disagrees with them carebears, I tend to ignore whatever they post or say. Far to narrow-minded for me. Either way, WoW’s community is tame compared to games with FFA PvP servers and the huge egos of those that feed there.

 

I’m not going to pretend to know why WoW succeeded where others have failed. I’m not an insider nor am I gifted with omnipotence. TOR seems to have a lot of plusses going for it from the developer to the IP. If they can figure out why the total WoW package works then more power to them. I wish them luck because the number of MMORPG’s that have truly made it since WoW’s release are few and far between, no matter the company, IP or the hype.
 

I can tell you why WoW succeeded in getting a large portion of the MMO community and you hinted on one of the reasons. “WoW itself can be a simple game for a child to play” . And it is on that note...you have tons of kids playing it and tons of people who are slow(Bluntly put). And it is also the reason it doesn't appeal to the minority of people who are in the top end of gaming. The pro's if you will of gaming, and yes this is a minority as with anything from pro poker to pro football. Basically people who are faster, smarter and more creative...this is not the vast majority in any genre.

As for me, I am basically a good and fair person and I'm fast and smart...I have been good at just about anything I do. I also love a challenge and I go into those FFA/PVP games but I don't gank lowbies and I'm not an a$$hat persay...I will and can be an a$$hat to those who do gank lowbies and who are a$$hats for no good reason and I will help others who have problems with those types and I'm not the only one like this...there are plenty like me as well. So even in those games there is balance and balance can be had if looked for and you have the ability to recognize things.

So for anyone who blanket states that all who play WoW are kids is wrong and the same goes for those who blanket state that a FFA/PVP game is nothing but a$$hat gankers.

I don't think wow is so popular because it is simple, not saying that it isn't but the main reason it is successful is because it manages to cater and keep everybody busy, they toned down the raids so more people can access them, they don't have prerequisites for any instance and the give elite rewards, not even talking about gear, the little status things that people really want and are willing to spend many hours grinding to get it. Mounts, pets, that funny looking hat or that horrible tabard that only 2 people in the server has.

In short, WoW caters to a really broad audience and that is what makes it successful. In that note, we have to realize that the primary reasons for companies to design games is to make money and they analyze everything in the industry to try to come up with the best formula in a game to do just that, make money.

Let’s not forget that any company will very easily alienate the relatively small number of hardcore gamers if they can attract 10 times as many casual ones.

Originally posted by Baltus

I don't think wow is so popular because it is simple, not saying that it isn't but the main reason it is successful is because it manages to cater and keep everybody busy, they toned down the raids so more people can access them, they don't have prerequisites for any instance and the give elite rewards, not even talking about gear, the little status things that people really want and are willing to spend many hours grinding to get it. Mounts, pets, that funny looking hat or that horrible tabard that only 2 people in the server has.

In short, WoW caters to a really broad audience and that is what makes it successful. In that note, we have to realize that the primary reasons for companies to design games is to make money and they analyze everything in the industry to try to come up with the best formula in a game to do just that, make money.

Let’s not forget that any company will very easily alienate the relatively small number of hardcore gamers if they can attract 10 times as many casual ones.

 

 

Your equation doesn't explain the gamers like me and I know I speak for many because I have gamed with them in MMO's for years and still do today and I see their posts and opinions all over the place. WoW not only did not keep me busy it bored the hell out of me.

Your also wrong about companies, while it may be true for “most” companies who “JUST” want to make money, there are other companies who have some style and vision that want and will bring a change of flavor to the mix. Take the motorcycle companies for instance...Harley Davison does not alienate the small numbers it provides for (compared to Honda, Suzuki, etc) it provides for a minority of people who like that style and it does quite well. This same analogy can be applied in many other areas.

And if a game comes along that is more sandbox, pvp ran world, player cities, in depth crafting...in a nutshell a more complex code I would pay more for it and so would many others who would be willing to pay more for a custom non mainstream bike.

Basically WOW was in a way at the same time the best and the worst thing that happened to the MMO genre.

It was the best in that way, that it destroyed some age old hardcore MMO conventions, which just were tailor made for a very few people only. Downtimes. I recall coming from EQ2 and saw that Boss Mob "Hogger" killed in WOW, and I thought, damn now I have to camp for hours; when he respawned 1 min later, I cried tears of joy! This is just one of many examples. People do not want to wait for the fun or seek the fun. In that WOW paved the way which gladly can not be returned. I found the EQ1 and UO way of doing stuff only overly complicated and time consuming. Sitting down in EQ1 and waiting for Mana to regen, doing NOTHING, was not fun or challanging, it was merely boring.

But all in all today the bad feels to weigh greater.

It is the addiction circle. Essentially WOW is a sort of extension of the Diablio-principle. It is centered by and large around one simple idea: the greed for larger and better gear. The obstacles they put into the way to get those are not fun, they are work, the most dull hamster wheel possible.

Faction grind. I mean, every MMO had that, but the sheer amount of faction grind in WOW is insane. Then you have daily quests, raid dungeons, PVE gear sets, PVP gear sets. And ALL of them require you to repeat the same things OVER and OVER and OVER. Added the devious "inspect" you incite the greed and envy further. Many people in WOW are as a result totally fixated on only allowing the perfect fitting char. WOW gamers don't just look for "a healer" or "a tank.". Oh no! A WOW gamer looks for "a healer of class X, with skill tree Y, doing crit Z, equipped with type A gear". No joke. When a friend of mine ran around with a new axe he had used runes on, instead of... well I dont know what, some other procedure, he instantly got tells, explaining him that this way inferior to procedure X of applying stuff on the weapon. Or that his Pally with skill tree whatever was not rightly skilled to come along. All that stuff. It is elitarian now to no avail!

Esp. the faction and raid grind is terrible now. There are uber-mega-hyper items for PVE and seperated for PVP, then uber rare mounts, and you know you can never attain anything of that with any normal playstyle. Those stories are not from WOW haters! I hear them from WOW vets, who play it out of lack of alternative, as they say, and because their guildies are there. People of whom some are unemployed and STILL they tell me it is nigh impossible to get all that high end uber stuff! People who are so addicted to WOW, that they are seriously GRATEFUL, that there are now MORE factions to grind!

It's like a heroin junkie grateful for his dose.

Originally posted by Narc1

Originally posted by Moirae

I don't respect WoW and I won't ever respect it. Its mmo's light and its crap. Not to mention the behavior of most of the players is despicable.I'll never play it again. Most people eventually leave the game for better games. The endless raiding is aggravating to say the best.

 

The only thing WoW did was take features of all the other games, dumb them down, and put them into the game.

 

If they make this game yet another carbon copy of WoW with different graphics, like every other new game recently released, I'm going to be severely pissed.

 

PLEASE NO MORE WOW, DEVS. PLEASE GIVE US SOMETHING DIFFERENT.

 

 that last statement is SO ironic because WoW revitalized a game genre that was stank with repetition comprising of grinding, grinding and more grinding. You basically want another EQ where content sucks, leveling sucks, and PvP is just ganking. If TOR comes out like that itll sell well for a month then itll be DROPPED. Trust that.

No. I want a story, I want something unique. I loath PvP with a passion that cannot be overstated and I don't mind levelling.

Stop twisting what I said. Its childish.

Originally posted by BarCrow

OP has opened my eyes on one point......or , more like, focused them on a distant memory.. I think graphics do help realism...to a point..but it is absolutely true that realistic animations assist greatly  and can make ...initially sub-par graphics...seem more advanced. I think of  2 games I played on the Commodore 64...."Karateka" and "Prince of Persia"....both done by the same company..I believe. Those games ...for the time (late 80's)...had very realistic animations....all movements seem very "human" and seamless. I think those animations still hold up today.(..and these were side view  2D games). It's kind of sad that many of the animations in contemporary  games...especially MMOs....are not  as realistic as a game made about 20 years ago. I know the mechanics of a SPG and an MMO  are different...but you'd think technology would have caught up at some point...and I think it has for some MMOS.( I think AoC animations aren't too shabby). I hope TOR has this touch....it really does add to the immersion of a game...imo.

I did want to bring attention to this post, thank you BarCrow.  I preach animation often... and this game has potential in that category.

This is a positive response to the thread in general.

/discuss

Originally posted by Warsong

Pros: WoW did bring allot of attention to MMO's overall.

Cons: WoW loving carebear goons may infect SWTOR.

 

Ya...I said it...

Developers are more likely to welcome and cater to the "carebears", who enjoy a game, rather than you, who are trying to create hostility.

Ya I said it, good luck finding a game that welcomes you.

Originally posted by Khaunshar

WoW changed the MMORPG genre from a genre that was rather specific to a more mass-audience-suitable form. Unfortunately, in the process, it managed to change perception of the genre and its profitability to such a degree that the way MMORPGs were designed and played changed with it.

Blizzard didnt reinvent the wheel, nope. Its just the effect of WoWs big success that changed a genre in a way that alienated its original playerbase, diluted it with tons of players who liked parts of it, but disliked others, and suddenly the entire industry preferably caters to this imaginary playerbase, and produces one bust after another.

I can respect Blizzard for making WoW. I dont have to like the consequences of it. It DID pretty much wipe out the original MMORPG genre, replacing it with something else, and up to now, this niche didnt reform. Its just one fail after the other.

This is a solid view, nostalgic but true.

The million dollar question is, why?  Take this story.  There was once a wild life in a small island in the Pacific.  Magellan arrived there during his trip and docked.  A few mouses landed.

The mouse grew, they ate up every wildlife, or infest them with a new disease, and kill them all.  Soon the mouse driven new ecology took over and the old inhabitants died.  Actually the humans died too.

Now WoW did quite something similar.  They round at least 10s of millions of people to try out a form of entertainment that once holds only 300k players.  Basically they swarmed the genre and replaced the old 300k market with a 12m sized market.  The old player group becomes either assimilated or alienated and sidelined (they called it niche, elite, hardcore, non dumped down, whatever).  Market economics.

I remember the times when supermarket chains displaced street corner groceries.

As for one failed after another, its only less than 10 years since the WoW phenomena.  10 years of trial and error is a very short duration for creativity to work out another success.  Give it time.

Originally posted by Orthedos

Originally posted by Khaunshar

WoW changed the MMORPG genre from a genre that was rather specific to a more mass-audience-suitable form. Unfortunately, in the process, it managed to change perception of the genre and its profitability to such a degree that the way MMORPGs were designed and played changed with it.

Blizzard didnt reinvent the wheel, nope. Its just the effect of WoWs big success that changed a genre in a way that alienated its original playerbase, diluted it with tons of players who liked parts of it, but disliked others, and suddenly the entire industry preferably caters to this imaginary playerbase, and produces one bust after another.

I can respect Blizzard for making WoW. I dont have to like the consequences of it. It DID pretty much wipe out the original MMORPG genre, replacing it with something else, and up to now, this niche didnt reform. Its just one fail after the other.

 

This is a solid view, nostalgic but true.

The million dollar question is, why?  Take this story.  There was once a wild life in a small island in the Pacific.  Magellan arrived there during his trip and docked.  A few mouses landed.

The mouse grew, they ate up every wildlife, or infest them with a new disease, and kill them all.  Soon the mouse driven new ecology took over and the old inhabitants died.  Actually the humans died too.

Now WoW did quite something similar.  They round at least 10s of millions of people to try out a form of entertainment that once holds only 300k players.  Basically they swarmed the genre and replaced the old 300k market with a 12m sized market.  The old player group becomes either assimilated or alienated and sidelined (they called it niche, elite, hardcore, non dumped down, whatever).  Market economics.

I remember the times when supermarket chains displaced street corner groceries.

As for one failed after another, its only less than 10 years since the WoW phenomena.  10 years of trial and error is a very short duration for creativity to work out another success.  Give it time.

I remember this time as well, also the same can be said for most other stores vs the Walmart chain...and yet there are still some small shops out there that have success because they may offer things (usually things of better quality or more convenient). Take a food store near my location in Dallas that offers a different variety of fine foods from all over the world...it's packed every day...costs more but there are those in the MMO community that would pay more for MORE!...imagine that.

Originally posted by Kordac

My MMO life started with Final Fantasy xi, I got my Paladin upto level54 before I got bored of standing in Jeuno LFG for an hour each night before I could play. I tried EQ2 on launch and while some parts impressed me I simply could not get it to run right on my PC. One minute it was great then it stuttered like mad.

I got a RunePriest to rank40 RR 55 in WAR and tried out AOC as well but for the most part I played WoW from Euro release to just after WOTLK was released. WoW wasn't my first MMO or the only MMO I've played.

I want to ask what is so simple about WoW compared to other MMOS? I agree the crafting is simple, even though the way you actually crafted is much the same in any other MMO I've played. gather the mats and hit "create" and cross your fingers. One thing I did like about EQ 2 was the crafting.

I'm not trolling I'd like to know what people mean when they say WOW is simple as none of the other games I've played have been any if much more complex.

I would ask a different question, what do I want from my games.  Does it need be complex, or hi tech, or what?

I play for fun.  Kill time, whatever.  Compexity for the sake of complexity don't do me no good.  Complexity as in the form of making it fun will help.  Take an example.

Its complex to disasemble a bike and reassemble it (for me), its no fun for me.  Its complex to optimise in WoW, balancing quest routes, harvesting routes, leveling pace, mob kills, acheivements, within the stretch of just a couple hours available per session.  That is not rocky science, but that little bit of complexity allows planning in game, adaptation (when running into unexpected heavy incidence of competing harvestors) and so on.

Not many games has so many dimensions and facets as WoW.  That aspect I enjoy.  The lacking in focus however is the cost of the many dimensional development.  DAoC has one main dimension, RvR.  That makes the game immensely more focused, but then more easily bored and burnt out.  That, is how I compare and evaluate, and choose games.

Originally posted by Warsong

Originally posted by Orthedos

Originally posted by Khaunshar

WoW changed the MMORPG genre from a genre that was rather specific to a more mass-audience-suitable form. Unfortunately, in the process, it managed to change perception of the genre and its profitability to such a degree that the way MMORPGs were designed and played changed with it.

Blizzard didnt reinvent the wheel, nope. Its just the effect of WoWs big success that changed a genre in a way that alienated its original playerbase, diluted it with tons of players who liked parts of it, but disliked others, and suddenly the entire industry preferably caters to this imaginary playerbase, and produces one bust after another.

I can respect Blizzard for making WoW. I dont have to like the consequences of it. It DID pretty much wipe out the original MMORPG genre, replacing it with something else, and up to now, this niche didnt reform. Its just one fail after the other.

 

This is a solid view, nostalgic but true.

The million dollar question is, why?  Take this story.  There was once a wild life in a small island in the Pacific.  Magellan arrived there during his trip and docked.  A few mouses landed.

The mouse grew, they ate up every wildlife, or infest them with a new disease, and kill them all.  Soon the mouse driven new ecology took over and the old inhabitants died.  Actually the humans died too.

Now WoW did quite something similar.  They round at least 10s of millions of people to try out a form of entertainment that once holds only 300k players.  Basically they swarmed the genre and replaced the old 300k market with a 12m sized market.  The old player group becomes either assimilated or alienated and sidelined (they called it niche, elite, hardcore, non dumped down, whatever).  Market economics.

I remember the times when supermarket chains displaced street corner groceries.

As for one failed after another, its only less than 10 years since the WoW phenomena.  10 years of trial and error is a very short duration for creativity to work out another success.  Give it time.

I remember this time as well, also the same can be said for most other stores vs the Walmart chain...and yet there are still some small shops out there that have success because they may offer things (usually things of better quality or more convenient). Take a food store near my location in Dallas that offers a different variety of fine foods from all over the world...it's packed every day...costs more but there are those in the MMO community that would pay more for MORE!...imagine that.

Aye, for the sake of keeping creativity alive, do not sponsor Walmart or the big chains.  That is my rule.

When on trip, my clients make the hotel books for me at their expenses, they paid.  Even then, I make it a rule eating in the neighborhood small shops or even the street vendors.  They cannot die out, or we will lose a lot of creative minds at work.

Yes yes yes, food quality, game quality above all,  I do not need to play a game that is popular, I only want a game I want to play.  Heck I still enjoy playing tetris.

I have to laugh a bit when I hear that "X" game has all d-bags and they have an immature player base. When will people realize that the d-bags will be in SW:TOR and every other game that has mass appeal. It is because 1/4 of the population is retarded. I have proof ( just read these or any game forums for 45 seconds) 

Yes I said it!

...retarded

Originally posted by Khaunshar

WoW changed the MMORPG genre from a genre that was rather specific to a more mass-audience-suitable form. Unfortunately, in the process, it managed to change perception of the genre and its profitability to such a degree that the way MMORPGs were designed and played changed with it.

Blizzard didnt reinvent the wheel, nope. Its just the effect of WoWs big success that changed a genre in a way that alienated its original playerbase, diluted it with tons of players who liked parts of it, but disliked others, and suddenly the entire industry preferably caters to this imaginary playerbase, and produces one bust after another.

I can respect Blizzard for making WoW. I dont have to like the consequences of it. It DID pretty much wipe out the original MMORPG genre, replacing it with something else, and up to now, this niche didnt reform. Its just one fail after the other.

Yes the face of MMORPG gaming is changing, WoW is a major catalyst in the process. Sure i respect WoW, even though a very much dislike Blizzard for their rutheless whoring of WoW to squeeze every last dollar out of this genre, and I dont think they are done, not by a long-shot. The old days of MMORPG gaming are forever gone and i already miss them. But you cant blame WoW, some game would have come along and done the same thing, its inevitable, nothing stays the same forever.

Mann! WoW ain't my daddy...he didn't raise me!

My mom raised me.....f wow....f wow to hell and back......

lol