Blizzard should swallow their pride to save WoW

[Thage]

Super Mario World too... Could play that game all day.

Covered under SNES titles. :P

Come to think of it, what year was Bumpy Trot (JP)/Steambot Chronicles (NA) released? That's a game that, despite shoddy Steambot controls, I play all the time. It's like Radiata in that the world really feels alive as you progress through the story.

And being able to rock out with a harmonica after you busted up a giant mech is way cool.

[eillas]

Honestly, there's no immersion because all you do is get teleported. LFR and LFG killed a lot of socialization. An MMO being old doesn't kill any community, it's what is implemented in the MMO that does.

maybe, but my server socialization is doing very well.

[zshikara]

I haven't read any replies because I am pretty sure they are all "OP is bad and your idea is bad."

I have read the OP's post and I have to say... I agree with you, OP. Every single one of those things would really bring the immersion back into wow. As I've been saying my play time has gone down from "wow is the only game I play ever. I sleep and dream about wow every night." to, "I log on during the weekends to do LFR with my wife, and even then I can't help but think of other games." Hell, the only reason I still play is because my wife loves the game and its our "together" game. I am really hoping Blizzard either changes their stance drastically for the next expansion or that ESO will replace wow for us.

I used to like flying mounts. I will miss my dragons of awesome, but I will not miss what they brought to the game. Seriously, flying mounts were ok when only level 70s had them (and that was max level), but now everyone has them even only halfway through leveling. Just get rid of them.

I think things like LFD and LFR should be gone. I don't really care about world PvP as much as you do, but I still liked the feeling that I was on a journey to the dungeon I was about to attempt to conquer. I remember one BRD run back in the day that lasted 5 hours. It was so much fun, even though we failed to complete it.

To give you an idea of where I come from 2 of my favorite RPGs of all time are Daggerfall (ES2) and Baldur's Gate. THAT'S the level of challenge and immersion I miss from my wow. A more modern game that did things right would be Dragon Age Origins (definitely NOT number 2).



"Wouldn't it be more improving yourself to que up and get 2 maybe 3 dungeons done in the same amount of time... "

Its not about how quickly you get upgrades. In fact, in an MMO its supposed to take LONGER to get your character decked out than in a single player game, not less time. BC and early (T7 and T8) wrath did it best. When you no longer even have to say one word to anyone in your party to get the job done there is something seriously wrong with the game. Half the time I don't even get a responce from when I say, "hi," at the start of a dungeon.

[Mormolyce]

Honestly, there's no immersion because all you do is get teleported. LFR and LFG killed a lot of socialization. An MMO being old doesn't kill any community, it's what is implemented in the MMO that does.

I think you drastically overestimate how much immersion you got out of 2 people flying/riding to a stone to summon the rest of the party. It's not like you interact with the world in any meaningful way en route. It was just a nuisance.

[CrusaderNerò87]

As soon as Blizzard actually gives a shit about those on low pop realms, this game can get people back. I know so many people that quit due to server issues(Servers that were once very active), and im in same situation myself. I stay on the realm im in cause of my 10 man guild, but besides that its often hard to form a raid for Nalak(!) early in the week.

Servers HAS to be fixed quickly. Its already overdue

[Mormolyce]

Aside from burnout in BC and Cataclysm, WoW. Other than that, Megaman Legends 1 and 2, most of my SNES titles, Radiata Stories (not quite 9 years old but rapidly approaching the due date), Suikoden 1-3... there's a good chunk of 'em, but not many of them are MMOs. Come to think of it, only one of them is.

I have lots of old games I love to death and keep playing for years too. But how many hours a month do you spend playing them?

I pick them up for a week or so and put them down, and don't go back to them for months or years. Would you pay $15 a month for them every month?

And all of those games have lost the gloss they had the first few times I played them anyway. Games get old, no matter how great they are. I can't play Warcraft II anymore for example. Played it too many times. Same with Duke Nukem 3D.

[Theendgamelv3]

Some people like me sometimes just wanted to chill out and just talk to others on our servers. Sense of community if you think about it, I still remember many names from Vanilla and BC.

You can do that now, you can talk on trade. While in a dungeon, you can chat to people there. Nothing stops you from chatting in this game. What stops you from chatting to others not on your servers? I won't see them again isn't a excuse due to battle tags. If they were good people to run with, get their battle tags and chat and run with them again to ensure a good time. I kinda disagree with the convenience being like a drug. I rather spend my time playing and doing dungeons (stuff I want to do) rather that sit and chat while looking for players. If I wanted to sit and chat, I would just do that. While waiting for those dungeon queues, I can go out into the world and do dailies, farm older raids for transmog or farm mats to sell on AH. At least for me, if I really wanted to, I could explore the world since I don't have the achievements for exploration and lore or I can find pets for pet battles.

[Thage]

I have lots of old games I love to death and keep playing for years too. But how many hours a month do you spend playing them?

Do you want the honest answer that confirms I have little to no social life outside work or the answer that makes it sound like I do more than work, go for runs after work, and play games? <.<

I pick them up for a week or so and put them down, and don't go back to them for months or years. Would you pay $15 a month for them every month?

Hm... let's take Radiata Stories as the example for this one. If Radiata came with regular story updates that moved the game forward post-release, and gave me ample opportunities to roleplay within the setting? You bet your jimmies. On the other hand, the games I listed are games I play very often, because I fell in love with the stories and characters within--same reason I've read Harry Turtledove's Darkness series and Joanne Bertin's The Last Dragonlord more times than I can count--and I always relish a chance to reconnect with them and maybe make different choices on another playthrough to see where that leads me.

[Duronos]

You can do that now, you can talk on trade. While in a dungeon, you can chat to people there. Nothing stops you from chatting in this game. What stops you from chatting to others not on your servers? I won't see them again isn't a excuse due to battle tags. If they were good people to run with, get their battle tags and chat and run with them again to ensure a good time. I kinda disagree with the convenience being like a drug. I rather spend my time playing and doing dungeons (stuff I want to do) rather that sit and chat while looking for players. If I wanted to sit and chat, I would just do that. While waiting for those dungeon queues, I can go out into the world and do dailies, farm older raids for transmog or farm mats to sell on AH. At least for me, if I really wanted to, I could explore the world since I don't have the achievements for exploration and lore or I can find pets for pet battles.

If only you understood...

[tangers58]

All ability to teleport to Dungeons, Make everyone ride there. - I would leave, especially since most idiots would sit around waiting for summons
Remove Flying mounts from Azeroth - I would leave, much better off with flying mounts than without them
Remove all high level guards from low level towns and villages - Lol no, if anything real guards are needed not the jokes that are in towns now
Buff Dungeons so that you actually need to play your class properly - That would be nice
Remove at least 50% of wind riders and graveyards, get the traffic back on the roads - Meh, wouldn't do a damn thing
Remove Ability to teleport into Battlegrounds, make us go to battlemasters as in the old days (just make more of them to avoid griefers). - Lame
Remove a lot of phasing as it ruins immersion when you chase someone and they suddenly vanish. - Meh, won't do a damn thing

Add the following things

All future expansions should take place in Azeroth, do not add any more zones, just develop the story on Azeroth so it thrives once again. - Extremely lame

[KeirAdish]

Some people like me sometimes just wanted to chill out and just talk to others on our servers. Sense of community if you think about it, I still remember many names from Vanilla and BC.

You didn't answer my question even in the slightest.

If only you understood...

I really don't though...
I always chat in my random heroics, and even LFR runs, 8/10 times someone responds and we talk, the other 2/10 I just get it done and move on...
I add quite a few people to battletag when I run dungeons etc because we talk and enjoy talking...

[Nihth]

I think you drastically overestimate how much immersion you got out of 2 people flying/riding to a stone to summon the rest of the party. It's not like you interact with the world in any meaningful way en route. It was just a nuisance.

Kind of agree, but what you forget is that at the stone there were often people from the opposite faction, maybe that one rogue that does nothing but gank people all day every day. You engage in combat with him and kill him and proceed on summoning the rest of the party, before everyone accepts there are suddenly several people from the opposite faction showing up ready to fight... Then you got a small war going, ten times more fun than any BG you have ever played.

[mistahwilshire]

You know all that "immersion" happened with FAR FAR less subs than there are now right? Do the morons trapped in Vanilla goggles really not realize that?

When you have massive amounts of people playing any game it changes the way things function. That immersion existed before because the only people that were playing WoW were hardcore RPG enthusiasts. Now it's the call of duty of MMOs and anyone that wants to play an MMO plays WoW because it's unfathomably larger than any other MMO to pick, similar to CoD in the FPS industry. People that don't even like shooters play CoD because their friends play CoD. I personally know of several instances of this in WoW as well.

The immersion you seek will become stronger as the subs continue to decline, leaving only those that really love the game playing it.

[Addiena]

Remove the following things:

All ability to teleport to Dungeons, Make everyone ride there.
Remove Flying mounts from Azeroth
Remove all high level guards from low level towns and villages
Buff Dungeons so that you actually need to play your class properly
Remove at least 50% of wind riders and graveyards, get the traffic back on the roads
Remove Ability to teleport into Battlegrounds, make us go to battlemasters as in the old days (just make more of them to avoid griefers).
Remove a lot of phasing as it ruins immersion when you chase someone and they suddenly vanish.

Add the following things

All future expansions should take place in Azeroth, do not add any more zones, just develop the story on Azeroth so it thrives once again.

Conclusion

Ofc none of this will happen as the tears that would be shed could possibly flood the world and wipe us all out. The new breed of player has no balls, has no ability to shake him/herself down after being ganked and certainly has no patience to ride from A to B. Can you imagine the wow players of today trying to survive in Vanilla, they would have a heart attack at how hardcore it used to be. No I am afraid MMO's now are so easy, so spoon fed that the players today simply could not cope with old wow.

From a business point of view Blizzard are currently their own worst enemy, they are killing the game by making it so easy and forgiving. If they opened a BC server millions would return, but this would be an admission of doing it wrong and the PR department won't allow that

1 - It used to be that way but it was more time consuming then it was worth and honestly wouldn't work for LFD, then there is the issue of many not actually knowing where the dungeons even are or trying to get everyone there quickly .. yeah no, I don't miss that at all.
2 - No, Flying is part of the game now and it would be a lot of work to try and remove it, just redesigning the zones to suit land only mounts would take a considerable amount of resources and time. Both of which are better spent elsewhere.
3 - only point I would agree with, with one exception .. the starting areas get to retain their guards.
4 - Did you miss Cata .. they tried this with the cata dungeons and it failed miserably, if you want a challenge might I suggest you take yourself and your bronies over to the challenge dungeons, they should provide you with the ass kicking you so desire.
5 - Seriously .. its already tedious enough getting around Azeroth without bureaucrats like yourself fouling up the transport routes and making our QOL worse.
6 - Again this doesn't work well if the people have no idea where the QM's are, the current system is fast, efficient and doesnt stop your from doing other things while waiting.
7 - Phasing is an awesome tool for questing and story telling in zones, its benefits out weigh the needs of the ganker. Guess you will have to go find a target closer to your own level now.

Final point .. Azeroth is mind numbingly boring, I for one will be glad to return to Outland and demon killing.

[mistahwilshire]

Kind of agree, but what you forget is that at the stone there were often people from the opposite faction, maybe that one rogue that does nothing but gank people all day every day. You engage in combat with him and kill him and proceed on summoning the rest of the party, before everyone accepts there are suddenly several people from the opposite faction showing up ready to fight... Then you got a small war going, ten times more fun than any BG you have ever played.

Any occasion of this that I've ever experienced since Vanilla has lead to people getting yelled at by raid leaders for participating in these "wars" at summon stones. All it does is waste peoples time and pisses off your raid group. In my 8 years I've never seen one of these wars break out and neither side wasn't pissed about starting to raid later than they wanted.

[Metallikiddd]

they should fire kalgan to save wow!

[KeirAdish]

Kind of agree, but what you forget is that at the stone there were often people from the opposite faction, maybe that one rogue that does nothing but gank people all day every day. You engage in combat with him and kill him and proceed on summoning the rest of the party, before everyone accepts there are suddenly several people from the opposite faction showing up ready to fight... Then you got a small war going, ten times more fun than any BG you have ever played.

and 10x more time wasted that I could be running the dungeons I want to be running rather than PvPing...

I'm all for world PvP, and ganking even, but when it gets to where you can get a raid of bored people to sit outside a dungeon and ensure nobody from the other faction has any chance at getting it... that's just not fun...

[Last Starfighter]

So you want them to make every single casual player quit, because that would be the result of most of the things you've suggested. You want them to revert most of their QoL changes.

I'm a casual. And I don't quit because I couldn't fly, or because I wouldn't be able to faceroll through a dungeon. People love to label casuals as all being the same. But what you don't understand is that there are ppl that play 24/7 and aren't geared whatsoever, don't raid or pvp, and you will call them a casual because they aren't raid progressed and have blues. And at the same time, you have people that play very little, and are progressed that you will call hardcore.

[eillas]

Final point .. Azeroth is mind numbingly boring, I for one will be glad to return to Outland and demon killing.

why settle for outlands, when we can go to Argus?

[mistahwilshire]

I'm a casual. And I don't quit because I couldn't fly, or because I wouldn't be able to faceroll through a dungeon. People love to label casuals as all being the same. But what you don't understand is that there are ppl that play 24/7 and aren't geared whatsoever, don't raid or pvp, and you will call them a casual because they aren't raid progressed and have blues. And at the same time, you have people that play very little, and are progressed that you will call hardcore.

Semantics are pointless. You know exactly what he meant. Why bother?