The future of Blizzard and MMOs

[LilSaihah]

This as well. The people on the dying servers feel like they're playing alone, but they don't want to spend 25$ to transfer, so without other people, they leave.

It's really a fascinating case of trying to save face when MMO developers decide against merging servers. I wonder if they're holding back from doing it simply for the sake of keeping people from going "lol servers merging wow dying".

[Deleted]

Future of Blizzard sketchy. Diablo 3 mixed success critically. SC2:HotS mixed success critically, at least in the story department. WoW decline natural; with the rest of the field being packed with leaner, meaner F2P/B2P games, the market share a subscription game can realistically hold is only going to go down.

MMOs will be fine. Only thing at risk is the subscription model, and the F2P and B2P games on the market continue to siphon away market share. I'm expecting WoW's contraction to further encourage alternate payment models.

HOTS was #1 selling PC game of the quarter, with Diablo III still being in the top ten many months after its release. While I didn't like Diablo lack of endgame myself, HOTS is a really really good game. WoW is still the #1 MMO around and they have like 3 new games coming out. I think that Blizzard's future is far from "sketchy".

[Deleted]

It's really a fascinating case of trying to save face when MMO developers decide against merging servers. I wonder if they're holding back from doing it simply for the sake of keeping people from going "lol servers merging wow dying".

Indeed, they need to understand though that after the initial lash... which would last a month at most, people will forget all about the servers merging and will be happy that they have full worlds again. Yes, for that month the forums, both here, on WoW official forums, and other WoW sites, might be filled with "WoW is dieing posts" but... aren't they here now when people see they lost so many players anyway? In fact, the best choice would be to do it right now, since it overlaps with the subscriber losing WoW death comments and in a month both will be gone.

[Tomana]

It's really a fascinating case of trying to save face when MMO developers decide against merging servers. I wonder if they're holding back from doing it simply for the sake of keeping people from going "lol servers merging wow dying".

Pretty much the latter. The publicity would be too damaging.

---------- Post added 2013-05-09 at 03:11 PM ----------

We're probably going to have to repeat this many times, but this is no longer true.

There is an asian MMO with 20 million players over in China since this year. It's why the only claim Blizzard can make is being the "#1 subscription based MMO". But not the #1 MMO anymore.

If you take the Chinese F2P MMOs it wasn't #1 a couple of years ago already. Some of those were already rocking 20+ Mil users. Though it's certainly easier to pull off with Chinese population.

[ro8ter]

I see no indercation of WoW even being close to #2. The game is still evolving and I see no MMO's even coming close to WoW. Has any other MMO even achieved a milestone of five million active players, yet alone active subscribers? I just personally don't see another game even coming close to WoW in the next 6 years, not even this Project Titan (Which is supposedly a FPS, lol).

Aion is the second most successful game at 3 million subs. Aion has a lot less than that these days. Even at it's peak, Aion was no where near 8 million subs.

It's summer. Subs go down in summer as many go outside.

There are tons of games out now, not just MMOs that pull subs away from WoW. This includes Diablo III, a Blizz product.

[Galaddriel]

WoW is still the #1 MMO around

Was. #1 is Age of Wushu.

[ro8ter]

Was. #1 is Age of Wushu.

Age of Wushu is free to play. F2P games have tons of accounts created but never used. You can't compare the two. If you did, even Maple Story would beat WoW.

[Gimlix]

Age of Wushu is free to play. F2P games have tons of accounts created but never used. You can't compare the two. If you did, even Maple Story would beat WoW.

Maplestory has over 200M accounts, F2P is for casuals anyways.

[Tomana]

Maplestory has over 200M accounts, F2P is for casuals anyways.

Yes, when I saw that game for the first time, I knew that the world was doomed hehe.

[Galaddriel]

Age of Wushu is free to play.

Nope. $20 at Gamestop.

[MAXCAVALERA]

Blizzard tried to cater the casual since wotlk PROBLEM is a casual jumps from game to game and prefers f2p. IT simply backfired.

[Deleted]

Aion is the second most successful game at 3 million subs. Aion has a lot less than that these days. Even at it's peak, Aion was no where near 8 million subs.

It's summer. Subs go down in summer as many go outside.

There are tons of games out now, not just MMOs that pull subs away from WoW. This includes Diablo III, a Blizz product.

lol no, it's not summer, this quarter is first quarter, january-february-march. There was no summer then, there was a lot of snow.

If you go with this argument again, when it will be summer you expect them to what, lose 3 million more? This dumb argument "it's summer" is not good. There were summers during BC, there were summers during Wrath yet the number kept somewhat constant, even growing.

Plus, I hear every quarter some dumb argument like "it's summer" "it's autumn, school starts" "it's winter, people are at their family on holidays" "it's spring, people go to smell the flowers". Yea, you know what, they went to school, smelled flowers, went outside and on family trips during other expansions too so give me a break.

[torterra275]

Nope. $20 at Gamestop.

I don't believe you need it to play the game. The Retail edition seems to be all game currency/micro-transaction items.

[Darmalus]

A lot of WoW's big problems are foundational. Things so fundamental to the game you don't even think about them. How you level, how quests work, how combat works, etc.
And because they are foundational, you are better off making a new game with a new foundation than trying to fix the old one. You can polish and maintain the old game, but it will decline over time. Blizzard is pretty responsive for a company try to satisfy 8 million players, I think WoW will last for many more years. Unless Titan just blows it out of the water and steals all those subscriptions. Heh.

[Deleted]

Every other MMO feels clunky compared to WoWs combat mechanics.

This is why I can't play other MMOs. They never feel right when it comes to gameplay and controls.