World of Warcraft: A victim of circumstance

[Golden]

So the sky is falling because numbers are low but it's not something just attributed to wow it's the entire mmo genre. The genre is driven by a certain type of gamer and when wow first came out they attracted the younger versions of this type of gamer. However, age and other interests have seen the backbone of the mmo genre move on leaving only the instant gratification and lazy new generation of gamers with a genre built on patient gameplay. Remember the original EQ and how difficult things were to advance levels? Remember vanilla and the sheer amount of time and gold it took to become a top tier raider? Heck in vanilla only the most dedicated players had high level alts that were geared but now anyone can have 7-8 alts all raid ready. The challenge has been drained from the game. It's not the end but it's a bad sign. Maybe blizzard will take notice and turn this game into one that attracts the remaining certain type of gamer and allows it to grow organically like it once did. Obviously focusing on the new target audience has proven to be short sighed for a long term business model. It's not the end but blizzard need to make the right changes.

Hardcore gamers have a lot in common with crack addicts. After a while, the "game" rules your life. I can't speak for all old gamers but some of us realized how silly it was to revolve our lives around a video game. If you want to pretend you are morally right by talking about how patient you are and how lazy everyone else is...good luck with that.

[Seranthor]

The only thing blatantly clear is that you still have yet to define casual.

Why dont you define it.....

[Frozen Death Knight]

I wonder how many more years it will take till people get tired of talking about the subscription numbers and how Blizzard is steering the game into the ground because of x, y, ∞ change (my apologies to all mathematicians for using the infinite symbol in such a manner).

At some point people should be realizing that WoW reached its prime long ago and no change can bring people back in masses to prevent the inevitable subscription decline. MMOs like these will continue with this trend, since there is not enough interest to drive customers to keep playing the same game/games when this heavy weight has been around for about a decade now.

Only way for the MMO market to gain new customers is by making new games that fit the current standards games have and not by standards that worked back in the 2000s. There is no other option if you want the MMO market to grow like in the early years of WoW, especially since WoW no longer has the ability to attract more players to the genre.

[Snakehead]

Why dont you define it.....

A person that plays infrequently during a typical week that has no discernible lack of skill in game.

That's my definition. Too bad that kid was too scared to give us his I wanted to know why he was so defensive all the time.

[Vorticough]

A person that plays infrequently during a typical week that has no discernible lack of skill in game.

That's my definition. Too bad that kid was too scared to give us his I wanted to know why he was so defensive all the time.

He said that he thinks you're gonna 'trap' him in some argument and have people call him an idiot.

Then something about bears again.

[Snakehead]

He said that he thinks you're gonna 'trap' him in some argument and have people call him an idiot.

Then something about bears again.

Ah yes the top of my bucket list is to trap some random poster that I likely will never encounter in my life outside of the forum.

Foiled again

[valliant13]

First off, thank you for the compliment. It's not often I have anyone on here who sides with me lol

And I totally feel you on the bottlenecking. Even gearing up my main was a pretty difficult task, and I had to pour a little more time into it then I had hoped for. But now, were halfway through the expansion, 5.3 is approaching fast, and I have a ton of alts who I can't get 463's to drop for for the life of me, and a shitload of other alts that I haven't even leveled to 90 yet (although with the XP nerf incoming, I might just suck it up and do it now).

So for all of this bitching and moaning about how shitty WoW is and we should just change everything back to TBC, this expansion has catered much more towards the hardcore (or at least those with a little more time on their hands) than casuals, moreso than cata or even WoTLK. It might not be in the traditional top tier raiding sense, but the fact is you still need more than just an hour or two a day to really get anything done. Especially LFR, seeing as how it usually takes at least 20 minutes for a dps just to get in, as opposed to the 10-15 minutes from DS. But the point is, to everyone bitching about how TBC is the best there ever was, you got what you wanted. Maybe not how you guys envisioned it in your all powerful, oh so superior minds. But the return to a more difficult play style is EXACTLY why Blizz is losing subs. So stop with your delusional fantasies about how WoW needs to be MOAR HARD, because obviously this path isn't doing them any good. Nostalgia is great for remembering good experiences, but being blinded by it to determine what's best for the player base and the company while rejecting or forgetting all of the bad stuff?

As far as the bold parts go,

I have two alts on top of my main. One alt I spent about 12,000G just to get to 460 so I could queue for MSV when it hit 90. After 5.2 hit, I went from 460 to 481 in all the 5.0LFR parts one week and then just a Terrace LFR run on week 2. My newest alt hit 90 two weeks ago and I spent about 1000g on the 450 engineer cog trinket. Within two weeks I was able to run ToT LFR and currently have a 483 ilvl. It's not more time consuming at all...they just force you to actually you know...play the game in a progressive path now like it should have always been. Sorry you can't have your catch up purps from ridiculously easy five mans.

The game didn't lose subs because this expansion is too hard or "more time consuming". The game is almost ten years old. People are getting tired of the game in general and they aren't really bringing in new subscribers. Also with all the GOOD F2P mmo's out there people are finding it hard to follow/play a subscription based mmo when they can play something like tera or swtor(although the end game sucks leveling is pretty fantastic). Or consumers can get the Buy to play MMO's such as The Secret World or Guild Wars 2. Not to mention that another reason wow isn't bringing in many new customers is because currently just to play the game you need to buy the battle chest, cataclysm, and mists. Thats about $100 in US dollars. Not a lot of people are willing to drop $100 on a game just to play it. While yes you don't HAVE to buy the expansions, anyone that person feels like asking about wow will say you need all the expansions for the best experience. So no, it's not because it's hard/more time consuming. It's simply because there are a LOT of quality options now that cost much less than wow to play and enjoy.

[SodiumChloride]

A person that plays infrequently during a typical week that has no discernible lack of skill in game.

That's my definition. Too bad that kid was too scared to give us his I wanted to know why he was so defensive all the time.

Does such a person exist? To get good at anything you have to invest time. If they play only infrequently ...