Is it "different" this time?

[kamikaze148]

Take a massive break from the game, come back in 6 months to a year...see how you feel.

Thats it, that is literally it. If you still feel like the game isnt for you after such a long gap, then its probably not for you any more.

[KCguy]

Every expansion Blizzard is criticized from all directions by enthusiastic players who wish the game was going a different direction. This time; having playing alpha/beta the past 2 months, I find that my own criticism is much more serious. At this point i am having very serious doubts on how this expansion will succeed. I am beginning to feel like cata trumped this one. Is anyone else getting a scary feeling that WoW may be dying and this is the first major indication?

Based off what exactly? What is the major indication? What are your doubts? Explain please.

[Holtzmann]

Nostalgia, routine and mild addiction.

Nostalgia, routine, mild addiction, and the people they've been playing with. Seriously, a lot of people only keep playing because they have a group of friends on WoW that they can play with. Even the oldest games can still be enjoyable when you play them with friends.

[quras]

But here's the problem, this is based on the assumption there is a infinite amount of players and all blizz needs to do is get them to play. But time and time again the mmo market has shown it has a cap on its playerbase. All mmos lose subs over time, they may pick up with a content patch or going f2p ( which then btw you can no longer compare it to wow) but it's always a losing game. Judge wow based on how you would judge ANY OTHER PRODUCT, revenue and profit. Subs plus mount/ pet store together keep revenue high , developers employed and expansions forth coming. Don't go off on subs to much

You cannot lose over 3 million subs and not expect some negativity around the office. Short income VS long term income and all that jazz.

No matter the current profit given whatever got them their, they suffered a big loss during MoP. Subs have indeed been going down but to lose that many in one expansion and then coupled with 14+ months of no new content to live is a bit hard to swallow for in investor as well as a game.

MoP is a business failure even if other aspects of wow are successful.

[Maw]

Is anyone else getting a scary feeling that WoW may be dying and this is the first major indication?

No rudeness intended; I find it literally staggering that someone would consider this the FIRST indication.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Of bloody course WoW is dying, but people making these complaints and acting as if it will be dead in the NEAR future when it has over 6 million subs at such a content drought really grind my gears.

It also feels very much like flamebait when you say you feel a certain way about the content, but you can't say WHY you feel that way just to then instantly throw in the "dying" phrase.

[TDevine]

Considering the same shitty philosophy that bleed subscriptions in Cata is back, even losing power way before it did in cata (cata was last patch, in WoD it's losing momentum already in BETA), I'm not very confident with THIS expansion.

But since the strength of the crappy side of Blizzard seem to be dwindling THIS SOON, I have hope for an Legion Expansion that could be as successful as WotLK... Who knows?

Been playing since release and this is the funnest Beta/Lore they've done since LK.

Just my opinion, but I'm having a blast.

Skill pruning, more random events like rare spawns and time-warped towers and random bonus quests along with Garrisons is a great time.

Looking forward to it.

[Aucald]

Without preamble or flame-baiting, I would agree that WoW is in decline. In the same manner that a 50 year-old person is now in decline in that their life is more ending than beginning, they've got past the middle point of the lifespan and are entering the grim specter of old age. But "decline" is a far cry from "dying," and just like the example with an older person there's a great many things that could happen between now and some point in the future that changes the context. If the status quo persists as it has for the last few years than WoW's subscription rates will seesaw up and down but continue in a gradual downward trend until more server merges occur and finally the servers close or the live team stops adding content patches to the game (a state I refer to as "MMO torpor"). Is that the inevitable destiny of WoW? Some would say so but I think the there's an unknowable amount of potential that could change things either way.

It's entirely possible the Warcraft movie could revitalize WoW and bring in tons of new subscriptions from people who love the movie and decide to get into the games that spawned it. It's entirely possible a new expansion could hit all those demographic and experiential sweet spots and cause an upsurge in subscription rates across the board. It's possible the next expansion could be so horrifically bad that people desert in droves and rioters attempt to storm Blizzard HQ with sandwich boards that read "the end is nigh" and foam replicas of Frostmourne. Anything could happen at any point between now and whenever is my point.

[Deleted]

Every expansion Blizzard is criticized from all directions by enthusiastic players who wish the game was going a different direction. This time; having playing alpha/beta the past 2 months, I find that my own criticism is much more serious. At this point i am having very serious doubts on how this expansion will succeed. I am beginning to feel like cata trumped this one. Is anyone else getting a scary feeling that WoW may be dying and this is the first major indication?

After all the controversies over the last few weeks, I feel this expansion can really turn out to be a terrible experience overall.

[Kavorka]

Yep. Even if his prediction is correct and WoW ends Warlords at 3 million players, that's nowhere near a dead game. Especially since it's a subscription game.

WoW managed to redefine what "successful MMORPG" means, and that's not a good thing. Everybody is waiting for the next WoW to push 10+ million subscriptions, but that's not going to happen. WoW broke new ground, it was the exception. Its subscription numbers were massively inflated by the fact it became a cultural icon. Damn near everybody with an interest in games (and quite a lot of people who wouldn't otherwise care about games) at least tried it. It's like Minecraft: sure, it might have sold over 50 million copies, but how many people out there have it installed but only touch it once in a blue moon, usually after a big patch? I know I'm one of these people.

Only now we are beginning to see what WoW's sustainable playerbase is. We're probably not there yet (my guess is 4 million, maybe 3), so I won't be surprised to see more sub drops as the time goes by. It's part of a game's natural cycle: release, growth, peak, decline, plateau. All in all, I think WoW will remain profitable even after it reaches the plateau and its subscriptions stabilize.

Nice post...totally agree with it.