How big is WoW classic going to be? Are the retail devs worried about their jobs?

[Fascinate]

Where do you think the players are going to come from? They aren't going to materialize out of thin air, they are going to be recent wow players. The og players who aren't playing now aren't just going to show up and start playing, it was 15 years ago, they probably don't play anything anymore.
I really doubt this will pull many from private servers. Many of those players are going to already be entrenched in their server. And some may find the subscription cost off putting.



Its not a disconnect, it's realism. I also think they should make classic, tbc, and Wrath servers. It essentially doesn't cost them much and is good PR for the company.

Hots is a dead game, everyone agrees. It was shitty how they dropped a big crappy Christmas gift on the pros and staff, but Hots was DOA... A lot of the same guys knew the writing was on the wall.

lol?

So everyone gets married at 30 and has 2.4 kids and 1.3 dogs and thats that? Mah dude there are going to be a TON of people coming back to play this game, not only the ones who tried classic but the ones who started in TBC and wrath who always wanted to try vanilla.

TBH it goes beyond that, even married people with family arent immune to nostalgia. I could easily see someone like i describe above take a few days off work to play classic launch, because its going to be a once in a decade (or more) gaming experience. You dont miss classic launch.

[MoanaLisa]

No, I don't think the developers believe that Classic WoW is any threat to their jobs. If anyone truly believes that Classic WoW success is going to cause someone to sweep through the developer area throwing pink slips around like confetti you should seek help.

I imagine they'll view this with interest. It will be very popular at first. The test will be how well it's doing after six-to-twelve months. We already know that there was some sentiment in the developer group to stiffen the game up (see: pristine realms).

Personally I wish they had done that instead of this but you voice your opinion and the result is what it is.

If people return for reasons of nostalgia I suspect it will tail off rather quickly. The nostalgia glass is shallow and emptied quickly.

One last thought: No one is ever going to know for sure if more people are playing Classic than the current version of the game. Blizzard won't supply specifics. It's unrealistic to think that anyone at Blizzard will come out with anything that says anything more than "Classic WoW is a big success. We're very pleased."

[Dekkers]

People will play it for a month or two maybe, then go back to retail or other games. It will be a flavor of the month release.

So to answer you, no I don't think retail devs are worried about their jobs.

No one is going back to retail lmao
Classic will be wildly successful and will probably put the final nail in retails coffin.

[darkfire979]

You as Classic Wow should be worried instead if Classic does too well.

It's very costly to fire devs in today's world, much cheaper to transfer them to another project/game. And if Classic grew so much such Blizzard management sees Classic has the potential to be their next golden goose, they may consider 'growing' that potential, transferring BFA devs into classic and their BFA design philosophies into Classic.

And the next thing you know, 2-3 years later, instead of just Classic WoW servers, you might have Classic, Classic+, BC Classic, BC Classic+ servers and with all the 'classic' playerbase split up among them.
After all, Blizzard gave the players what they want once and implemented the various versions of raids for LFR, normal, heroic, mythic raids. They could do the same again and give all the classic players what they want for various 'classic versions', which might not be a good thing in general.

[Lurker1]

Vanilla servers have been running for the past 10 years, and yet there's still demand for them, so much demand that Classic is launching.

Stay mad, BFA fanboy

he speaks the truth nobody in there right mind is going to do the same old content over and over forever with nothing new coming out around the corner this is reality.

[Kyphael]

Retail devs should be more worried about retail's direction than a nostalgic throwback with a niche audience.

[McFuu]

lol?

So everyone gets married at 30 and has 2.4 kids and 1.3 dogs and thats that? Mah dude there are going to be a TON of people coming back to play this game, not only the ones who tried classic but the ones who started in TBC and wrath who always wanted to try vanilla.

TBH it goes beyond that, even married people with family arent immune to nostalgia. I could easily see someone like i describe above take a few days off work to play classic launch, because its going to be a once in a decade (or more) gaming experience. You dont miss classic launch.

Agree to disagree then. People aren't going to just come back and play, unless they are invested still.
You might get people who play for a little and stop. But the real community, the ones that actually stay and play will be 100k-200k in my opinion.

Honestly we will never know, because the sub counts don't get released, and it's the same sub for both games.

[Eleccybubb]

No one is going back to retail lmao
Classic will be wildly successful and will probably put the final nail in retails coffin.

Some of you people care way to much about Classic "beating" or "putting the final nail" in Retails coffin. Fucking get a grip.

Why can't they coexist? Why do you need to care so much about a version of the game you clearly won't be playing?

Why does one need to "kill" the other? They are both games designed for a different audience.

[ashblond]

The community was never that great tbh.

Well, I wouldn't say the community was great, but it was indeed better than what we have today.

But on the other hand, the game was absolutely trash back then.

People who thinks the good old community will be back in classic is delusional. It has been 14 years, things have changed, lets move on, people....

[Fascinate]

No, I don't think the developers believe that Classic WoW is any threat to their jobs. If anyone truly believes that Classic WoW success is going to cause someone to sweep through the developer area throwing pink slips around like confetti you should seek help.

I imagine they'll view this with interest. It will be very popular at first. The test will be how well it's doing after six-to-twelve months. We already know that there was some sentiment in the developer group to stiffen the game up (see: pristine realms).

Personally I wish they had done that instead of this but you voice your opinion and the result is what it is.

If people return for reasons of nostalgia I suspect it will tail off rather quickly. The nostalgia glass is shallow and emptied quickly.

So you don't think that some current WoW dev's aren't even a tiny bit worried about the success of WoW classic? Like i said earlier in the thread its not like you can just move them from one team to the other, the creative sort of people that are working on retail would be of no use to the classic team.

[ashblond]

100k to 200k max, after everything is said and done.

200K is very optimistic. I would consider Classic a success if it can maintain 100K active players.

[Fascinate]

Agree to disagree then. People aren't going to just come back and play, unless they are invested still.
You might get people who play for a little and stop. But the real community, the ones that actually stay and play will be 100k-200k in my opinion.

Honestly we will never know, because the sub counts don't get released, and it's the same sub for both games.

You only have to go as fa as twitter to see what im talking about here, when WoW classic was announced people went absolutely nuts! And these are the same people who have quit WoW a loooonnnngg time ago. The hype is only gonna keep growing as we get closer to launch, and if blizzard decides to put real money into marketing this....oh man the numbers classic hits i couldnt even predict.

[Vineri]

Where do you think the players are going to come from? They aren't going to materialize out of thin air, they are going to be recent wow players. The og players who aren't playing now aren't just going to show up and start playing, it was 15 years ago, they probably don't play anything anymore.
I really doubt this will pull many from private servers. Many of those players are going to already be entrenched in their server. And some may find the subscription cost off putting.

Its not a disconnect, it's realism. I also think they should make classic, tbc, and Wrath servers. It essentially doesn't cost them much and is good PR for the company.

It is a disconnect. And Vanilla, TBC, Wrath development is going to cost Activision-Blizzard ALOT. Unless you think paying a team 100-200+k per dev a year to develop Vanilla is cheap.

That all being said after your stance that Vanilla will only pull from BFA (and nobody else). LOL!

"Your" funny

[McFuu]

It is a disconnect. And Vanilla, TBC, Wrath development is going to cost Activision-Blizzard ALOT. Unless you think paying a team 100-200+k per dev a year to develop Vanilla is cheap.

That all being said after your stance that Vanilla will only pull from BFA (and nobody else). LOL!

Your funny

Never said it was only going to pull from BfA.... So much else is wrong with you post you aren't worth the discussion.

Really the only disconnect here is you.

[MoanaLisa]

But the real community, the ones that actually stay and play will be 100k-200k in my opinion.

If it can sustain that after 12 months it would be a very good success. Turning this into a competition with current WoW is pointless and a waste of time. You are correct: Blizzard will never say either way.

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So you don't think that some current WoW dev's aren't even a tiny bit worried about the success of WoW classic? Like i said earlier in the thread its not like you can just move them from one team to the other, the creative sort of people that are working on retail would be of no use to the classic team.

No, not even a tiny bit. You underestimate the flexibility of developers. If Classic is as successful as you say they will likely enlarge the team. There will not be a scene where Brack or Adham goes through the office handing out pink slips to the "losing team".

Jesus, after all the time, the desire to see a WoW Killer is still strong. Effing unbelievable. It's not Mortal Kombat folks.

[McFuu]

You only have to go as fa as twitter to see what im talking about here, when WoW classic was announced people went absolutely nuts! And these are the same people who have quit WoW a loooonnnngg time ago. The hype is only gonna keep growing as we get closer to launch, and if blizzard decides to put real money into marketing this....oh man the numbers classic hits i couldnt even predict.

Announcement for classic wow got 23.3k likes. The recent announcement for classic wow release date and sub requirement got 8.9k likes.

[Fascinate]

If it can sustain that after 12 months it would be a very good success. Turning this into a competition with current WoW is pointless and a waste of time. You are correct: Blizzard will never say either way.

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No, not even a tiny bit.

Well yes and no, while they stopped giving sub numbers in the earnings reports they still do randomly drop numbers out, like when weak auras twitter said they only had 1.3m subs or whatever.

I think if classic gets huge on launch they will let us know, thats a proud moment to show the industry.

[Vineri]

Never said it was only going to pull from BfA.... So much else is wrong with you post you aren't worth the discussion.

Really the only disconnect here is you.

It's cool. People forget to read what they say, or imply. It's a common mistake, and I forgive you.

It's cool you are passionate to defend Activision-Blizzard. You should work there and defend their other products too. Destiny 2 needs help!

[Fascinate]

If it can sustain that after 12 months it would be a very good success. Turning this into a competition with current WoW is pointless and a waste of time. You are correct: Blizzard will never say either way.

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No, not even a tiny bit. You underestimate the flexibility of developers.

But wait a second, say "todd" was hired on as a class designer in mists of pandaria. If todd see's how well classic is doing 6 months after launch (hypothetical here) and wants to be moved over to the team, what is todds role as purely a class designer? That is what he was hired on as and is something he specializes at, what use is there for todd on a team where the classes were fully fleshed out 15 years ago?

I dunno maybe im missing something here but the way blizzard likes to move people around on projects does not seem to mesh well with a game like WoW classic.

[Interim]

I wholeheartedly agree. It seems like a vast majority of people I've seen on numerous posts, sites, in game, etc. who are super excited about classic are people who never played it and started playing late TBC at the earliest. I believe people will play it for a month or two and start to see that all the small quality of life things that were added later on will have a big impact and frustrate people that they aren't implimented. Almost everyone who I've seen who did in fact play since the onset of the game were cringing at the thought of playing vanilla again.

or people detest the "quality of life" changes and are yearning for something with less of them.