Article Analyzes World of Warcraft and What New Titles Face In Beating It

vxea — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:07:39 GMT

what the "#"¤"%"¤

ladycosmo — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:03:00 GMT

As others have said, WoW is not the model that should be followed for PvP. It is fun for a time, but so very limted. Try something like Warhammer, whose PvP was integrated into every aspect of gameplay (at the expense of PvE). THAT was the epic, never ending tug-of-war that PvP should be. :)

dahrgo — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 09:24:37 GMT

Nice going Shamus :)

However, You forgot the one most important aspect of WoW : The social one.

I have never come across a realm where my social skills and knowledge in group- and individual psycology have been put to such vast and continuous test as when I stepped into Guild management in WoW. Worklife management is a breeze in comparison(!)

I can tell you one thing : Maturity has nothing to do with age. I have had 60years old people acting like they were 5 and 14 year olds leading raids like they were seasoned 25 year olds!. Ability to match your ambition with patience and dedication, ability to excercise love to your fellow man/woman but unselfishly helping and supporting others towards their goals, are all traits that WoW help you grow in a simply outstanding way.

In WoW the The Golden Rule is the ultimate law (Do to others only what you want to experience yourself). Those who try to scam, steal loot from others, use or manipulate others, usually end up /gkick:ed and frozen-out so quick that their heads spin for a day and they probably are better of deleting that char and start from scratch with a new one. -Yes the social judgement in Wow is usually swift and harsh! Feedback is usually split-second and basically allways within seconds(!) so the 'soil' for growing social your aspects is *very* fertile.

Occasionally maybe even visiting that guildie in some country or having a barbecue with local (< 20miles radius) guildies, turns Wow not only into a scene of digital exploration and conquest, but to a combined IRL- and Online social landscape that is truly exciting and staggering (to me at least).

/Neisha @ Quel'thalas

Alternator — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 01:08:33 GMT

I like the article and pretty much agree with most of what it said, particularly its core concept - You wont beat WoW by focusing on just one or two aspects. However I think that the MMO to beat WoW probably won't be focused on that goal and will instead be its own game not some game trying to keep up with the Jones (WoW)

To those that don't like WoW, play or do something else. There are a lot of options and not just in the MMO genre - It's costing you money and time to play a game you don't want to play. If you are hooked and just looking for an excuse to leave, make the excuse that you could be using your disposable income and time on something that you enjoy more.

Chasim — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 19:59:58 GMT

"to casual point-and-click for people who like to play while watching American Idol. (Hunters in WoW.)"

Clearly the author has not played a Hunter recently, at least not a well-played Survival Hunter...

mttrsll — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 13:10:57 GMT

You're absolutely right.

Some of the posters want to pick apart a few specifics & claim the PVP isn't up to snuff or the interfaces are lacking but in reality, everything in Wow is adequate or better for a very large number of gamers. People rarely leave Wow & many who do come back when new expansions come out.

The game is rounded out better than any MMO to date & Blizzard has done a good job with constant attention to areas that have been lacking in Wow. I don't feel that any serious issues have been ignored as they've kept in touch with the player community. I'd do a good job tending to ANYthing that made me 1.8 billion a year too.

Bottom line, Wow may not be an A+ in all categories to every player, but it's at least a solid B+ for 11 million players across the board & that's a grade to beat if you want to pull aggro off Wow.

Simulo — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 17:49:01 GMT

PvP in WoW, you can't be serious. More like "lolPvP". Heck even Age of Conan has better PvP.

Fact the 'only' reason why WoW is still popular is not because of the above; it's because of the fact that more people play it. And because the current player-base has made such "progress" they are not going to simply just drop it the game. So new players join because "my friends play it".

That and the Masses don't like challenges; they'd rather be spoon-fed their rewards...

[btw, I play because I've made to much progress to just leave it; but if I was banned today I wouldn't create another account]

shadowjack — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:46:25 GMT

Beside some of the good points that article takes about what its needed to have a successful MMO ( a lot of which WoW misses or is lacking to develop even in 4yrs of history ), theres something that i find most of the ppl are missing in all the talks about why WoW is such a hit.

I personally do think that open source for developing mods for the game give it a huge boost compared to the other games at the time it started which helped in the years to become so popular.

Think - would all those ppl be playing it, especialy raid content with the cripple blizz interface or lack of boss abilities anouncments, raid stats mods etc etc.

This imo was one of the most smartest moves that Blizzard took with WoW.

Azroliak — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 08:30:12 GMT

I won't bash on wow (since i'm a player obviously) but god, this article looks awfully naive... Apart from a few points, WoW is lacking in all categories on different levels.

Just the chat one is a pain to manage, the ah is not even worth mentionning compared to EVE's one, just poorly designed while looking at the EQ2 one.

Same with the interface, and a lot other things, like char personalisation and so on (god, it's awfull to have so few models and modifications after more than 4 years activity).

The biggest strenght of WoW, and what keeps it running is the aura of Blizzard (everything that Blizzard makes is THE SHIT for most peoples out there), that a LOT of people started with it and don't wan't to change, and always think that other games are "too much like wow" (nevermind if they have been out for far longer), or not enough like WoW (let's say people don't want to change, and hope everything is the same without being the same) and the fact they brought nearly all their friends into it, and that's what keeps most people playing and bare them to change game, they miss them, and can't make them change.

(that and the abilities/tree system that is really nice, but it's not the only game like that out there).

And for "bug free" and "stability", we must not have been playing the same game for the past 3 months at least....

(i don't know that much games with 4+ years behind that are so clumsy and with so much server side problems overall)

WoW is a good game, there is some really nice things into it, but it's mostly overrated for most people, and it's not because it's the best in all those categories that it stays on top of sales, far from it.

Meatpieandwow — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 04:22:10 GMT

A player needs something to look forward to. They need the game world to change with each mini patch that comes it. While a nerf to your class might feel like a bummer, it makes you feel as if what you were doing before had some effect on the other players in the game. This would have been done through intentionally stacking a certain stack because it inadvertantly stacked with a talent or whatever.

For a player to have fun he needs to fee important, while WoW may have homogenized the classes a bit to much with Wotlk, every class has a few unique abilitys that make them them. Dk's - Death Grip, Warriors - Shockwave/charge, Pallidans - Bubble and hearth. Three melee classes that fundementally have some abilitys that are similar, but play in entirely different ways. As long as a player has a new spell or talent / change to their class to look forward to, they will keep playing. The change is what keeps them.

DrPimpenstein — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 06:04:39 GMT

Don't forget the fact that you can always find something to do. Bored with your main? Start an alt in one of the 4 different starting zones for each faction. Done all of the quests? No you haven't. Go to another continent or zone. Bored with the horde (if you're a commie)? Switch to a new server and start an ally. Or you can just hang in Org and listen to the guild chat. If you're in a good guild, you'll soon find you aren't the only crazy person out there.

I've never played another MMO, but that's because everything I hear about the others is that none of them have this stuff. And I hear it from people that left WoW to try them AND THEN CAME BACK. There are people that started again after a couple years off when WotLK dropped, and can't believe how much it's improved. Sure, there are other games for "the hardcore" out there that think that it's gone downhill since BC came out, and everything is to easy and want to switch. Have fun with that. 11 million of us are hanging out and are gonna watch the fireworks at the midsummer festival. And we won't miss you because we know you'll be back for Hallows End so you can dance around with a pumpkin on your head while you're dressed like a pirate. Stuff like that is what makes Azeroth alive, and all of the others cardboard cutouts.

davewolfgang — Sun, 31 May 2009 15:22:26 GMT

I've tried all the WoW killer MMO's since WoW has come out - LotR, Conan, WAR - and all of them lacked everything mentioned. They all had one, two or even three of the nice flashy new stuff, but once you got past that (a few months playing time), they didn't have anything else. I've even said to others in posts on forums, and even in RL converstations, most of what you mentioned and the reasons were the same.

The biggest for me is the vast expanses of stuff you can see without once getting a loading screen (and I will say, it's really spoiled me for any other game). Change Zones? No loading screen. Ride into a major city? No loading screens. Go into a building (that's not an instance)? No loading screens. It makes the world "big", not just a collection of walled of areas.

Daginni — Sun, 31 May 2009 06:47:47 GMT

I would have to agree with this, a good MMO needs to take a lot of time to craft.

MMO's are basically someone 'Second Life', and no one wants their Second Life to be played on some Shovel Ware game.

A lot of current MMO Creators look at the Skin of WoW and make a MMO from what they see. They never really look at the Meat of it, to see why it works.

Occumbo — Sat, 30 May 2009 18:15:24 GMT

I've been there since a few months after original launch and I must agree that you got most of the topics of discussion correct. However you missed another key feature that adds another level of diversity; The ability to create and manage your own guild. There is nothing more satisfying then being the direct manager of a collective of people while still in college. The addition of a guild banking system really assisted in the viability of donating to your guild.

All in all good article, just the one little segment I felt I should add.