No Dragonflight numbers from Blizzard means??

[Lolites]

I gave SL a 0 vote. That's because it maximally negatively affected me

so you were not objective, but at least you played it before reviewing it

[Dhrizzle]

there is big difference here
1) this isn't first time they burn bridge, this is now the 4th
2) this is however first time they make an agreed shit exp 2 times in row, cata followed mop, wod followed legion, bfa followed SL which compete for shit exp
its ironic how cata no more compete for worst exp now...

Cata, MoP and WoD were "agreed shit" at the time yet after three in a row people still flocked back for Legion.

[Lolites]

Cata, MoP and WoD were "agreed shit" at the time yet after three in a row people still flocked back for Legion.

people have very short memory, they seem to already forgot how much bitching and whining there was about MoP when it was current, and that it was only at its end to improve its reputation a bit, and even more after it was no longer current...
hell, even legion didnt have as positive reaction in the begining as it have now...

[Osmeric]

so you were not objective, but at least you played it before reviewing it

Why are user reviews expected to be objective? They should honestly reflect subjective impressions. That isn't bias, that's accurately reflecting customer experience.

When reading reviews, I want to hear how the reviewer felt about the product, not some Spock-like emotionless rational take on the game. I'm not going to playing the game like a robot, I'm going to be doing it to get something subjective out of it.

[Pann]

Cata, MoP and WoD were "agreed shit" at the time yet after three in a row people still flocked back for Legion.

Considering they stopped releasing sub numbers at the beginning of WoD I am not sure how you reached the conclusion that people flocked back for Legion.

[Relapses]

Considering they stopped releasing sub numbers at the beginning of WoD I am not sure how you reached the conclusion that people flocked back for Legion.

He's likely referring to Tom Chilton's comment about Legion having hit 10 million subscribers shortly after release. Blizzard almost immediately walked back this claim so take it with a grain of salt.

[NineSpine]

I really enjoy my Trump example. Nobody saw him winning, including bookmakers with 100x money back.

Point is - even if they showed how many subs they got, how the sales are - you would NOT be qualified to analyze it. This is NOT a topic for the average Joe with the tinfoil hat(yet alone school dropouts calling themselfs streamers).

Compare it to the Trump example, they had data, interviews, reviews backed up with billions of dollars - still, the forecast failed.

This whole speculation is utterly nonesense. But I also blame Blizzard for not being in this conversation(BTW each time you hate - you actually generate PR. They might like that at the HQ).

The largest online election forecaster (538) had Trump at a 1/3 chance of winning. Not exactly low odds. Betting markets were at about the same.

As a former corporate consultant, I can say unequivocally that an iron rule of marketing is to advertise wins and hide losses. People love to buy into winners, and they hate to buy into losers. Nobody hides amazing sales.

[Kul]

I think shadowlands messed up and DF is setting it straight. But time will tell.

[HansOlo]

The largest online election forecaster (538) had Trump at a 1/3 chance of winning. Not exactly low odds. Betting markets were at about the same.

As a former corporate consultant, I can say unequivocally that an iron rule of marketing is to advertise wins and hide losses. People love to buy into winners, and they hate to buy into losers. Nobody hides amazing sales.

You still have other forecasts done by phone calls and professional analytics doing conclussions. Bookmakers can also be used as an indicator. It's not like they are guessing 100X moneyback and risking thier own business. But that's not what I challenge?

Hypothetical:
If they told us, that the sales are 2M copies of DF. People would start making up thier own conclussions, because that means DF is much worse than SL(with nothing in between the lines). This is exactly why they wouldn't share any insights.

People don't care about how corona affected the market(contributing to the SL sales record, that you can't compare with today), how Asmongold moved people(rightfully or not) or how the community culture actually affects the sales.

As a consultant - don't you ever facepalm, when you see what people are posting?

[Kralljin]

You suggested that people shouldn't overlook the marketing aspect of a particular expansions release and offered this as a factor influencing initial.subgrowth. I'm not moving the goal post, I'm suggesting your excuse is bullshit. Which it is.

Then you just needlessly assume i hold a position i do not hold.

I pointed out that the initial sales of an expansion are also influenced by its marketing campaign, i think WoD had a very good one, as we saw it had massive sales and a tremendous subgrowth.

That is it, if i'm going to defend the actual design of DF, i'm going to say that, respond to what i say, not a position that
A. i'm not holding
B. is unrelated to what i've written

As a matter of fact, i give a rats arse about the quality of DF, because i don't play Retail anymore, i have neither bought SL nor DF, because i have serious, fundamental issues with how modern WoW is being designed.

DF had a massive campaign, even after I bought the expansion I was still being inundated with ads. Again every thing to deflect away from a poor product.

Simply because its massive, doesn't mean it was good.

Compare Lords of War to Legacies, the animated series for DF.

Lords of War kicks off with characterizing Kargath and how the Shattered Hand actually formed, offering new lore to both more casual and dedicated followers of Warcraft.
Legacies kicks off by retelling the story of a book, offering absolutely nothing to anyone that has read the book or some synopsis of it.

I also think the cinematic was pretty meh, it shows a character no one knows anything about and goes over into Alexstrasza pulling off flying moves for 40 seconds.
Other cinematics such as the Troll and Human(?) riding some dragons were also not particularly great.
Neat visually but didn't get me hyped, nor have i seen anyone getting really into the mood to play WoW (or more specifically, Retail) based on these.

[HansOlo]

We have not seen any bragging from Blizzard about Dragonflight on any metrics whatsoever, is this because Dragonflight just didn't create enough hype or is it because Bfa and Shadowlands burned away a lot of player loyalty?.

It doesn't matter. It's Blizzards own criteria of success that matters - it's not necessarily based on, what you think success is.

If Blizzard is not happy with the result, they will improve. WoW will not die tomorrow and nothing is going to kill it. You are talking about one of the biggest companies in the industry and with a product lasting well over 18 years. Meanwhile another giant called Microsoft supports them.

Don't show up with the tinfoil hat. That's what it means.

[BrokenRavens]

So far I see some responses and apparent “shrugs” for answers about why an old player should return. Basically the answers are “this is what WoW always was” or “that is what mmos are” or some variation on that theme. Not one person has a “they made (x) better, you’ll like it” argument.

Again, I am playing other mmos.

So why should I come back to wow? Apparently it’s not the nature of mmos themselves that drove me away.

People here are saying that Dragon Flight is an excellent addition (“Dragonflight might be the most positive expansion since ever” was said), but no one can come up with a reason why a player that left should come back?

If an argument is being made that this is a great game and players are coming back. What exactly changed that is attracting players? Is it just the presence of dragons? Is that it?

Because again, as an outsider, the game looks exactly like it always has. Same ship, same direction, just the lounge chairs have been rearranged a little.

[arkanon]

...you can have a thoughtful, legit negative score. But when your rating of "0" for WoW is because it's no longer Wrath of the Lich King or because humans can now have pink hair and that review is counted with the same amount of weight as somebody who actually played the fucking game, you cannot reasonably infer that the information on that website is a remotely fair representation of the playerbase's actual thoughts.

You are only focussing on the negative reviews AGAIN. What about the people who give it 10/10 but havnt even reached max level yet? You keep focussing on the negative while ignoring the positive because you know it ruins the entire narrative.

- - - Updated - - -

It doesn't matter. It's Blizzards own criteria of success that matters - it's not necessarily based on, what you think success is.

If Blizzard is not happy with the result, they will improve. WoW will not die tomorrow and nothing is going to kill it. You are talking about one of the biggest companies in the industry and with a product lasting well over 18 years. Meanwhile another giant called Microsoft supports them.

Don't show up with the tinfoil hat. That's what it means.

Speaking of to foil hats, what do you mean Microsoft "support" them?

[Relapses]

You are only focussing on the negative reviews AGAIN. What about the people who give it 10/10 but havnt even reached max level yet? You keep focussing on the negative while ignoring the positive because you know it ruins the entire narrative.

Because the number of people expressing these kinds of opinions on review aggregate sites is disproportionate. There aren't an equal number of people arguing in bad faith as there are people embellishing their scores. It's almost all negative because metacritic has a reputation of being the place gamers go to air their grievances.

[HansOlo]

You are only focussing on the negative reviews AGAIN. What about the people who give it 10/10 but havnt even reached max level yet? You keep focussing on the negative while ignoring the positive because you know it ruins the entire narrative.

- - - Updated - - -



Speaking of to foil hats, what do you mean Microsoft "support" them?

I just meant that Blizzard can't and won't comprimise this product to a level, where the game would just die out. It would be sad way to burn 60B dollars.

[Dracullus]

Because again, as an outsider, the game looks exactly like it always has. Same ship, same direction, just the lounge chairs have been rearranged a little.

And this is what people wanted. Classic WoW adventure, not something else. I understand you didn't know that if you didn't follow community last 2 years. Key 4 problems with SL were:

1) weak patch support especially in first year

2) too 'otherwordly' theme, people wanted classic fantasy

3) too complicated reward structure, Shadowlands removed most grinds from BfA/Legion, but still you would have to keep up with covenant, soulbinds, conduits, legendaries + usual talents/gear/consumables

4) forcing people to do specific content - Torghast to be more precise

Dragonflight fix all 4. Rest is just evolution, there is more world content in every expac, M+ got more various pool, PVP got solo que, professions and UI big updates, dragonriding is so good it will stay for sure, only raids seems to be pretty stale.

[HansOlo]

So far I see some responses and apparent “shrugs” for answers about why an old player should return. Basically the answers are “this is what WoW always was” or “that is what mmos are” or some variation on that theme. Not one person has a “they made (x) better, you’ll like it” argument.

Again, I am playing other mmos.

So why should I come back to wow? Apparently it’s not the nature of mmos themselves that drove me away.

People here are saying that Dragon Flight is an excellent addition (“Dragonflight might be the most positive expansion since ever” was said), but no one can come up with a reason why a player that left should come back?

If an argument is being made that this is a great game and players are coming back. What exactly changed that is attracting players? Is it just the presence of dragons? Is that it?

Because again, as an outsider, the game looks exactly like it always has. Same ship, same direction, just the lounge chairs have been rearranged a little.

I don't see why a person, who never played WoW would start playing WoW. Back in the days, every person you know would play it and it had some influence. But that's 18 years ago. That makes me believe, that the majority of players, been playing WoW for many years. And DF is satisfying this group.

Again - you are talking about a product, that is 1/4 of a lifetime. Compare apples with apples - WoW is special in many ways.

[arkanon]

Because the number of people expressing these kinds of opinions on review aggregate sites is disproportionate. There aren't an equal number of people arguing in bad faith as there are people embellishing their scores. It's almost all negative because metacritic has a reputation of being the place gamers go to air their grievances.

How do you know? You have said this twice now but where did you get that information from?

[Relapses]

How do you know? You have said this twice now but where did you get that information from?

I can read question mark?

[arkanon]

I can read question mark?

Thats not an answer. Explain how you know that more people give a product an unjustified low score vs an unjustified high score.

There were people on this very forum saying DF is "easily the best wow expansion ever"........on day 3 of the expansion.