Uhm... 

Yeah.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/01/28

The link came from this article

LOL!  I actually thought it was pretty funny, although not accurate, but hey...that's kind of the Penny Arcade style.

p.s. As pointed out on the main forums, Kate Paiz is even cute as a cartoon

Yeah Tycho also made this post on the blog. Also from that article you posted.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/2008/01/28

Totally don't agree with it, but that is his opinion.

Oh, I think the guy's blog made him look like a complete idiot!!!

After describing how WoW continues to be the apex of MMOs and DDO can never compete, he describes his previous evening of gameplay...

"I spent almost two hours killing Yeti for their skins last night with Kiko. I needed ten skins, and apparently these were some kind of f'ing GM Yeti with no Goddamned skin on them. What is holding these Yeti together, I wonder? Their arctic resolve? Are they literally snow men? Oh, now here is a gourmet Yeti, one with a Roasted Quail, but no pelt."

Yep, that's the top of the mountain in gaming all right

....I think its continously hilarious how everyone assumes games are trying to 'compete' only with wow....I don't think DDO ever intented to compete with WoW...to niche a market they were looking at.  I'm waiting for when some one goes "Nintendo Wii tries compete with WoW ...fails!" i'll die laughing my arse off at that one.

Either way the toon is hilarious.

Originally posted by Vincenz

Oh, I think the guy's blog made him look like a complete idiot!!!

After describing how WoW continues to be the apex of MMOs and DDO can never compete, he describes his previous evening of gameplay...

 

"I spent almost two hours killing Yeti for their skins last night with Kiko. I needed ten skins, and apparently these were some kind of f'ing GM Yeti with no Goddamned skin on them. What is holding these Yeti together, I wonder? Their arctic resolve? Are they literally snow men? Oh, now here is a gourmet Yeti, one with a Roasted Quail, but no pelt."

 

Yep, that's the top of the mountain in gaming all right

It made me tilt my head like a dog hearing a strange noise.

Nobody makes games for a niche market. Least of all people franchising one of the largest game names in the industry.

They make games to sell to as wide an audience as possible. They do it for pay. Games that don't sell well are often described as being for a niche market.

Like it or not, (and only Blizzard likes it), all MMO's are in competiton with WoW. They might not want to be, but they don't have any choice.

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Originally posted by baff
Nobody makes games for a niche market. Least of all people franchising one of the largest game names in the industry.
They make games to sell to as wide an audience as possible. They do it for pay. Games that don't sell well are often described as being for a niche market.
Like it or not, (and only Blizzard likes it), all MMO's are in competiton with WoW. They might not want to be, but they don't have any choice.

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I have to agree, although it could be argued that WoW is not directly competing with other MMOs. Many (I would even venture to say most) of WoW's subscribers are people who did not subscribe to an MMO before. WoW created subscribers from non-MMO gamers, out of thin air. These other MMOs are not competing with WoW, because WoW made its own subscribers, rather than stealing them from other MMOs.

However, if ever there was an MMO that competes with WoW, I'd have to say it is DDO, since they are both trying to appeal to the same market. Anyone who argues otherwise clearly has no idea how this works. WoW (and all of its predecessors) are based on the D&D model of picking your class, leveling up by doing dungeons and quests, and getting uber loot along the way. Given, D&D was less about the loot and more about the quests, and had a lot more flexibility (at least in later editions) in class structure, but still. The two games are effectively the same, with slight differences in style.

The two games are effectively the same, with slight differences in style.

I would have to disagree with that beyond theme/setting.  That's about where the similarities end, IMO.   The combat is totally different, the character customization is totally different, there's no robust PVP or PVP focus, there's no real grind (and what there is is totally optional), quests are totally different than WoW, everything is instanced (which I like), there's no real "travel", there's no paid expansions, I'm sure there's more...but as game to game comparisons go, DDO is about the least like WoW of any game I've played (again, except for theme or setting).

I really like this discussion!

I've thought about it on and off for awhile actually.  Before subscription gaming, I wouldn't really say true competition existed.  Quality was all that mattered, in the end 5 teams could release First Person Shooters and so long as they were all of great quality they would all sell about equally.  The console market has always been that way....with the only competition being that which exists between consoles, and that which defines actual quality.  It was more about standard setting.  Those whom met the standard got just about as many sales as the next guy who did.

However......

MMO's are not this entity.  They require monthly subscriptions.  That means they require a player to constantly be invested in them.  Unlike a single player game....it simply is not good enough to be good.  You cannot "share" sales with other games in this genre.  Most players do not pay for multiple MMO's a month.  Therefore, any sale SOE gets is not typically one that Blizzard gets as well.  Sure, some will.  But when doing your business plan, it is not wise to BANK on this.  In the end, all MMO's are competing with each other for those subs.  They know this.

To summarize, I think many of you are very wrong about this.  They all compete with each other.  WoW is indeed the apex of gaming, in so far as subs go.  However, because of its success there is also going to be a stagnation of that "niche"...of that style.  Once players tire of WoW, they will seek out things which embody the elements of that game which they found most enjoyable.  The raiders will seek games with more massive group content.  The PvP'ers will seek games with more PvP content.  The casual will seek games with more casual content. 

It also set a new bar, players who wanted things from WoW which it did not deliver.  Things like character / class control.  Crafting, economy....ect.  What WoW has now done is generate the NEED for a niche.  WoW is the first and last game to try and cater to everyone.  Players understand now that in doing so, no one element can be perfected...and that is fine for what Blizzard is doing.  There is only so much good adding devs can do, and in the end they have to spread their focus out way to far.  Now players are seeking the niche games which focus only on the elements they want.

We need more niche games.  Those niche games now must meet the standard of polish and quality service Blizzard set forth.  You will see a very sharp change in this industry now.  If not, you will see WoW dominate for many more years to come.  A company cannot hope to contend with WoW, it can only hope to draw in players by focusing on a segmented need and making it the best ever.

I have never understood why people constantly mistake popularity for quality. McDonalds sell a lot of burgers, possibly more burgers than anyone else, but I think it would be impossible to pretend they are the best burgers, or even a good burger.

I think with MMOs it is more a wish to conform to the norm, a sheep mentality if you like.

Quality is of course subjective. For the purpose of this conversation, because prices are almost exactly the same across the board, we'll stick to fast food.

A person that has only tasted McD's burgers might think they're the greatest thing in the whole world, but not realize that they may like Wendy's better.

One must say that McD's and Wendy's are in competition, even though their burgers have very different tastes (which for the sake of argument we'll say neither of which is bad) because they are both making burgers.

In the same context, all MMOs are in competition, maybe not direct competition, as say jack in the box is working to improve their break while McD's is working to improve their meat.

However many people WoW brought to the table, everyone is now clamoring to get a piece of WoW's pie. Age of Conan hopes to take a piece by improving on maturity and style, WAR hopes to steal their PvPers.

In a lesser fashion, all games in general are competing, as gamers only have so much time, which is for the most part their accompishment. A player can eat Wendy's while drinking coke and playing WoW, and devote himself to all those things without them competing against one another.

Anyway, just some thoughts.