DailyTech - "Why Blizzard is Stifling its Players"
http://www.dailytech.com/Why+Blizzard+is+Stifling+its+Players/article7001.htm
Why Blizzard is Stifling its Players
Tuan Nguyen (Blog) - April 20, 2007 3:33 PM
Addiction is a lucrative business for BlizzardEver since the release of World of Warcraft (WoW), Blizzard pretty much set the standard on what a major massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) should be like. A massive world, an unheard of amount of items and a game play style that makes things fun for just about every MMO player out there. Then on top of all the addictive elements, charge $15 a month per account. Sounds like a recipe for success right? It is.
Unfortunately, Blizzard sat on its behind after reaching a few record breaking numbers in terms of total account signups to WoW. Why do I say this? Because despite the much anticipated release of the Burning Crusades expansion, not much was introduced into the game considering the large amount of resources that flows into Blizzard HQ per month. Considering that WoW is now exceeding a global account list of 8 million players, there's definitely gold in them subscriptions.
What exactly is Blizzard doing with all that cash? Let's take a look at Burning Crusades. An extremely high percentage of mob models in this expansion was ripped directly from the original game. Colors were changed and names were edited, but overall, only a small handful of new models were added. Take into consideration that much of the new popular features of the game were added outside of the expansion and we begin to see that there's something wrong with the picture here.
Blizzard also delayed the Burning Crusades expansion for a long time. Those who paid for the expansion were also asked to pay a retail price that matched the original game when it was released -- that is an obscenely expensive amount considering that the original game is much more grander in scale. Burning Crusades appears like a collage of textures and models taken from the original game than a true expansion.
Besides all of the above, Blizzard is still not addressing some of the strange oddities in the game. Hunter pets that swim deeper and faster than a druid in aquatic form -- I don't know about Blizzard but I certainly have never seen a cat out-swim a seal, infantry that can run faster than the fastest ground mount in the game. I've seen a guard chase down a player on an epic horse mount. Blizzard also recently announced that the druid class will receive an epic flight form -- instantly castable but will cost 5000 gold to learn the epic riding skill. Wait a minute, you need a "riding skill" to turn into a bird and fly away? What exactly are we riding here?
Don't get me started on class balance even, there's no such thing -- gear stats dominate this game. Blizzard attempts to adjust class features on almost a monthly basis and just makes a mess of everything. Fixing one problem reveals another. The problem here lies in the dynamics of each class and their abilities. Because of the large amount of complaints that flow on the Blizzard forums, the company is subject to constantly changing abilities around. In essence, the whole ecosystem of classes is adversely affected by small adjustments as well as large ones.
So take one part large monthly income from 8 million paying subscribers and one part large injection of cash from the release of Burning Crusades and what you get is a missing picture and lots of questions. Make no mistake about Blizzard though, it is in the business of making a profit, not putting its players first. It already achieved what it set out to do with the initial release of WoW.
Jolly Bill wrote:
Just start making decaf in all the machines. Do that for 2 to 3 weeks, until everyone's kicked the habit. Then pour in the double espresso and watch the fun. - on how to deal with coworkers who don't refill the coffee pot
This is why I won't pay for a subscription-based game. Guild Wars manages to do more than other companies for free. A price is all right if people will pay it... but I sure won't.
NOTE: This is not a doodle bug.
BF2142 Stats
Meh. Just someone trying to stir the pot IMO.
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
More like someone looking for their 15 minutes of fame. There are people who make posts on the community boards like this, just to see how many replies they get. They take a few ideas that happen to get posted fairly often, lump them into one post, and orgasm from the attention they get.
IronClad Online: PurEvil
yeah seriously.. when anyone (company..person etc..) achieves almost complete market domination there will always be someone looking to get some "hits" by being the "voice of reason"
His post is just some offhand remarks of a global sweeping nature.. especially the "dont get me started on class balance" and then does nothing to back up the statement.
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
Down in the Park with a friend called Five.
http://wumusicgroup.com/
OMG! Blizzard isn't pouring every penny of revenue from WoW into the game itself to give me free content? I'm totally going to quit! I promise. I'm canceling my account until they change! This is no idle threat! I'm not kidding!
Bah. I'll just keep playing. It's easier.
-Bad Mojo
And man that dog looks like he's having a good time, but that monkey is f*cking into it. This isn't his recreation; this is his life and he knows it in a way I will never know anything. --Danjo Olivaw
Yeah, I agree.
I linked it because it was discussion and MMO news seems to be slow of late. As others mentioned in comments below his blog, he didn't even pick the "best" things to complain about. He should have put some more thought in his post.
On a separate note, do any of you think the price of the expansion will be lowered in the near future?
Jolly Bill wrote:
I'm curious about something. Does anybody have a complete list of instances that were fully implemented and accessible on the opening day of WoW?
(@)
Definitely just searching for something to throw at the largest MMO target. The reused texture complaint is just completely wrong. Outland looks nothing like Azeroth. Maybe he never got out of Hellfire Peninsula which does look somewhat like the desert area leading into it. That is the only possible explanation I can come up with for that one, as I found the rest of the game very visually impressive.
In spite of all the bitching that is generated by having so many players I think Blizzard does a fine job balancing all the classes especially considering the depth of all the talent trees. This is just a guy looking for attention that really has no clue what he's talking about.
AoC- Indozola (Guardian), Bauchelain (Bear Shaman), Aphesian (Demonologist)
I wanna say all the 5 man and 10/15 man old instances were available at launch (not Mauradon etc..)
But I believe through UBRS was at launch.. then shortly after Onyxia and Molten Core for Raiders..
But my memory is fuzzy at best.. its entirely possible that Onyxia's Lair was available at Launch.. since you could complete the key with the existing 5-10/15 man content.
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
Down in the Park with a friend called Five.
http://wumusicgroup.com/
But isn't Maraudon a 5 man? Dire Maul was also not available.
What I'm really intersted in, is how many instances were there from the beginning; how many they added for free; and how many they added in the expansion.
(@)
Speaking of Blizzard, here's an awesome (and old) story about World PvP in WoW.
Apart from a couple level 3's I had with Who Ate The Steaks, I've been PvE only, as my focus has always been questing in groups/instances. After reading that story, I realized that I'd like to try a PvP server someday (probably not in WoW). I love the idea of players acting like the game is a real world, making their own fun, etc.
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
umm..yeah was noting that 5 man instances patched in afterwards were not included in the old 5 and 10/15 man instances that were available at launch.
What was added for Free and not in the original scope of launch?
Basically free I guess would be DM and Mauradon, ZG, AQ20 and AQ40, Naxx, BWL, MC were all added after launch and for "free" But I'm reasonably sure that MC, and BWL were intended to be available for launch they just never got to finish them in time.
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
Down in the Park with a friend called Five.
http://wumusicgroup.com/
When WoW originally launched, up to UBRS, BRS, Scholo and Strath were it. I'm pretty sure Maraudon was the first patch released, v1.02. Onyxia's Lair and MC opened up in January following the launch, as I recall. DM was out in the patch after that.
I could be wrong on this, can't get to the old patch notes from work
As to the guy, I'm with Mordiceius and others; he's stirring the pot looking for some fame.
According to Blizzard, even Naxxramas was supposed to be included at launch. I'm not sure if I even buy that, but given that it was all patched in, it's not terribly farfetched.
I suppose that's the good thing with being able to patch content in. You can lay out a slew of stuff for a game, launch it with enough to get people rolling, then go back and finish everything else, patching as you go in increments.
wordsmythe wrote:
Podunk on Jessica Alba wrote:
The blog poster is probably stirring pot, and some of the examples he cites are kinda meh, but there's a kernel of truth to the post. There are some things Blizzard could still do to really improve the experience of the game. Tops on my list is some sort of guesting system so you can play with friends on other realms.
Blizzard is a company, and they have to make a profit, no doubt. But all the same.
Your Quote Here!
I just read all the comments and they made me giddy. That guy got flamed to hell. And the flames weren't your usual "QQ MOAR NUB!!" they were LONG thought out and INTELLIGENT posts. I rather enjoyed that.
My whole take on the situation: "If you do not like the game, stop playing. No one is forcing you to play. For every one person that doesn't like the game, there are thousands more that do. You are paying for a service, if you do not like it. Stop. Go somewhere else. The end."
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
Guesting across realms is not nearly as easy do implement as you'd think, unless it was limited by battlegroup. Even then, there would be a fair amount of work involved, not to mention all the bloat it would add to the servers. I realize that there's a similar system in place, but that's because the clusters share a partition on the instance server specifically for Battlegrounds. When you join one, you're actually not on your home realm.
wordsmythe wrote:
Podunk on Jessica Alba wrote:
I doubt it will be easy. Blizzard probably didn't architect their realms to make it easy.
But, I think for overall player experience it's a change that should happen. Blizzard has the resources to do it if they were motivated.
Your Quote Here!
There's just way to many servers to have that be logical.
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
I don't see why not. It could be a system that requires you to be invited by someone already on the server. It could be implemented in many different ways to minimize exploitation and abuse.
Personally, I think it would do wonders to help people play with other people they know.
Your Quote Here!
The paid transfer system is a more permanent version of what you're talking about. The problem lies in two parts: One, why would blizzard do something that's clearly going to cause a large amount of increased strain on their servers? Two, why would they implement a temporary free version of a pay-per-use system they already have in place?
Once you've solved both of those, then there's other issues. What kind of limit do you put on this? From the way you're talking, I assume you'd want no limit on it. With that being the case, then there goes the idea behind paid character transfers. Beyond that, do you keep the restriction on PvE > PvP realms? Same problem here; take that away, and you shoot the idea behind the restriction in the foot.
Now that I've thrown out why it's not going to happen, in WoW or any other MMO, I can't say I wouldn't want a free transfer system. I'd like to be able to hop over to other realms for a few days.
wordsmythe wrote:
Podunk on Jessica Alba wrote:
If you notice, servers are in clusters currently (known as the battlegroups). Often times when they need to take servers down for changes they'll do it by battlegroup whereas if ALL servers were clustered together, then ALL the servers would go down for just the maintenance of 10 or so. Also, there'd have to be systems in place to stop PvE from going to PvP or RP etc. It is too much work for not enough payoff.
This would be a huge headache for something that's not worth it. If you want to play with friends, either transfer characters or start a new one. It is not like it takes forever to level to 70.
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
yeah you might be right.. I mean the Argent Dawn where there.. and there were plenty of Lore pieces already in place way before Naxx opened up.
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
Down in the Park with a friend called Five.
http://wumusicgroup.com/
Granted, it's not going to take 2 years, but if you aren't hard core, or you have friends on more than one server, it becomes a slow grind. Add in that most servers already have their population bulk at 70. Add in that a high level even helping you un-grouped eats into your XP. WoW is not about playing with your friends after the fact. It's about playing in the rules to eventually play with your friends. And even if you are lucky enough to have same-leveled friends, better hope you don't have too many or someone will get left out.
Such sticky rules to work around. But then, I'm a social player more than a grinder.
-Bad Mojo
And man that dog looks like he's having a good time, but that monkey is f*cking into it. This isn't his recreation; this is his life and he knows it in a way I will never know anything. --Danjo Olivaw
Maybe to improve the player experience? Game companies do that sometimes.
It doesn't have to be unlimited. It could be that you could guest only once a week, and maybe an invite from someone on the server is required.
Shoot, I'd be Ok with the guesting following the same restrictions as character transfers (e.g., no guesting from PvE to PvP). The PvP friend can always just go visit his PvE friend on the PvE server.
Even with those restictions, you'd satisfy most casual players who'd like to play with a friend who has a main on a different server.
Yep.
I play much more than the casual player, and it will probably take me five (maybe six) months. My guess is a casual player would take closer to 9-12 months. That's a loooong time investment.
This is exactly what a guesting system (even a limited one) would help address.
Your Quote Here!
You couldn't let PvP people go to PvE servers though because if that was how you wanted to work it. I could just create a character on the PvP server and then go quest on the PvE server whenever I had a pass to avoid ganking and such. So you could only allow PvP to PvP, PvE to PvE, RP to RP. And by this time you're already limiting it so much you might as well not have it at all.
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
That would be a very slow way to level a PvP toon. And very lucrative for Blizzard.
If anything, allowing limited guest passes would create a stronger tie between a player's wallet and Blizzard, since the player could have broader ties with the player base. Deeper ties is good for Blizzard's bottom line.
In the end, I think it can and should happen. Doesn't mean it will.
Your Quote Here!
I'd rather Blizz be developing new content than making sweeping changes of old.
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.
And again, Blizzard addressed the issue of hooking up with friends, and that's pay for transfer. As to people rerolling, that does absolutely nothing to increase the amount of revenue Blizzard sees; they get the same $15 a month if you have one toon or 100. Letting people temp transfer isn't going to increase that. In fact, from Blizzard's perspective, your $15 a month is worth less than it is now, because you're getting even more for free.
Overall, I don't see the correlation between a temp free transfer system and an improved player experience, unless you're too cheap to pay to transfer or reroll if you can't transfer.
wordsmythe wrote:
Podunk on Jessica Alba wrote:
Improving the player experience helps keep the player paying monthly subscription fees.
If you have friends on more than one server, a guest system would allow you to play with more of your friends without having to play more than one character. For players that don't want to invest months and months in multiple characters, that's an enourmous improvment. Less time soloing, more time playing with your friends.
A guest system doesn't cheapen the subscription fee, it protects it by broadening the set of friends a player has to play with.
A permanent transfer only works if you've lost all your friends on your original server.
Your Quote Here!
So what about if your friends are horde and you are alliance. Should they find a workaround to that too?
I'm not really a girl. I just play one in video games.