Should Blizz delay Shadowland launch to make sure it starts in a good state?

[Nyel]

Rushing yet another expansion that’s filled with bugs and barely working / balanced systems right after BfA sounds like a horrible thing to do.

Delaying until end of November or even early December would be good, but they don’t do it. The thing is, the new consoles launch two weeks after Shadowlands and with AC Valhalla, Cyberpunk and Demon‘s Souls there are already three lengthy RPG games coming.

[Lucetia]

I haven't had any of those issues. It is possible the issues are your computer and not on Blizzard's end.

100% absolutely not the case. Just because you don't experience them doesn't mean they don't exist.

Also, if the issue was my computer only then I wouldn't be having similar issues on the four other computers in my house that we use for retail WoW. I wouldn't also have a couple friends who aren't close to me, have different internet providers and machines, having similar issues as well.

[Zig Zug]

Holy shit. Did you know that it's possible to still enjoy a product while being critical of certain aspects of the development process?

Careful now, you're being a rational thinking adult, which is forbidden on the internet.

[Relapses]

Careful now, you're being a rational thinking adult, which is forbidden on the internet.

The guy I quoted lobbed me in with people who were "shitting on Blizzard while still buying their product." I buy the product because I want to support the company which makes it. I know, crazy right? But I can still be critical about Blizzard's insistence on meeting arbitrary deadlines rather than polishing the game. I mean FFS they've been deploying class tuning changes on the PTR rather than the beta because they just want to get shit out the door as soon as possible. It's actually kind of insane. This whole "patch it later" mentality for game development is one of the worst things that has emerged in recent years.

[Jastall]

Even if what you're saying is true, it doesn't make what they say (Even if it's worded pessimistically) is actually incorrect. The WoW team tries to develop its systems as best as possible to keep you subscribed and have fun doing it. They obviously don't always succeed on either front, but that's part of their business for their own game.

It's been the business model since the game launched. Lengthening gameplay to pad subs is how sub based games keep the players playing and make money in the first place. As we see with Classic, it's mostly gotten better over time about it actually, yet you still have people who think themselves great geniuses and protectors of the consumer because they point out that Blizzard cares about money more than about their personal feelings. Yeah, thanks Sherlock, almost like they're a business and that's been the entire point since before they released WC1.

The date is set, a delay isn't going to happen until catastrophe strikes, and this type of game is always in a constant state of development and always will be, that's the nature of the beast, and I doubt making us spend 2-3 more months in BfA will change much of anything or garner more good will.

[facefist]

Holy shit. Did you know that it's possible to still enjoy a product while being critical of certain aspects of the development process?

Thats why I said "trash talk" and not "being critical". There are shit tons of people who find pretty much everything wrong with what Blizz does, yet excessively use their products. Your post wasn't exactly being critical either, but just an attempt to bash the company.

Abso-fucking-lutely yes.

Will they? Of course not. They have quotas to meet and fun little blurbs to put into their Q4 QRs about "engagement" and "breaking records" and other bullshit nobody other than Activision suits actually gives a shit about.

If you don't want to get associated with those that bash Blizz all the time, then you might want to be a bit more constructive with your critique.

[Boricha]

I think it could use an extra 2 months. Launch it when they come back after New Years, but I don't see that happening.

[Trend]

Holy shit. Did you know that it's possible to still enjoy a product while being critical of certain aspects of the development process?

So you do not notice the widespread paradox that people rage about Blizzard as being lazy, stupid, greedy, etc and their product as absolute trash and yet they still play the game year after year? To me it is super striking and it is a sociological and psychological curiosity. The closest parallel I can come up with is to professional sports teams (not all of them.) Some sports teams' fans love to rage about how horrible and stupid their teams are, yet they continue to buy tickets and merchandise.

[Relapses]

It's been the business model since the game launched. Lengthening gameplay to pad subs is how sub based games keep the players playing and make money in the first place. As we see with Classic, it's mostly gotten better over time about it actually, yet you still have people who think themselves great geniuses and protectors of the consumer because they point out that Blizzard cares about money more than about their personal feelings. Yeah, thanks Sherlock, almost like they're a business and that's been the entire point since before they released WC1.

The date is set, a delay isn't going to happen until catastrophe strikes, and this type of game is always in a constant state of development and always will be, that's the nature of the beast, and I doubt making us spend 2-3 more months in BfA will change much of anything or garner more good will.

Compare Leigon to BfA's launch. Then consider that Antorus was one of the shortest end-tier patches while HFC was one of the longest. There is definitely a difference between rushed launches and ones which Blizzard polishes.

(And before you mention it, yes, I know MoP's end tier was quite long and WoD's launch was an abortion. But I think WoD's botched launch is what forced Blizzard to develop the sharding technology that made Legion's launch so much smoother so it wasn't all for naught.)

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Thats why I said "trash talk" and not "being critical". There are shit tons of people who find pretty much everything wrong with what Blizz does, yet excessively use their products. Your post wasn't exactly being critical either, but just an attempt to bash the company.


If you don't want to get associated with those that bash Blizz all the time, then you might want to be a bit more constructive with your critique.

I'm sorry I didn't add "but I still love Blizzard and I'm going to continue simping for them" to my post when I was responding, literally, to the question in the poll.

[Velerios]

What should be cancelled is the never ending thread creations of how SL is unfinished, trash, “filler” and so on.

Butler: Same procedure as last expansion?
Mrs. Sophie: Same procedure as every expansion!

And no, they should not wait: it will not get better in such a short time, and i personally don't think that it needs to. Fixing bugs is a necessary evil, and they will have surely enough to do it when the patch goes live in a few days.

[Mirishka]

Eh, I would argue that some. The stability of the game itself seems like it is less than BFA's. I've had more random crashes, etc from SL Beta than I have had from Legion / BFA's. There's also the issue of scaling not working, yet again, as it should. So they will end up having to go in and putting in more blanket tunings. Some class tunings are still off. I'm sure there will be more conduit / covenant balancing. Not sure how well PvP is yet as I haven't touched it and testing just started recently. There are probably other things people can chime in about that I haven't experienced yet.

Different experiences I guess, beta has been really stable for me. There have been minor issues (missing/black textures, bugs with new customization, etc) but most of them have been addressed as I've reported them. I haven't had a CTD since probably... July, I'd reckon.

I'm sure there need to be balancing passes, of course, but the game's never going to be perfectly balanced no matter what they do so I honestly don't worry much about that. I play what I enjoy mechanically, and I'm going to pick covenants based on how the themes match up with my characters.

[Eazy]

No matter what they did after BFA, it was full of bugs and I will remember it that way.

[Mars_Trueskills]

Hell naw, tune it as we go along, can't wait any more :P

[Dimsum84]

Since when has wow been balanced?

[Jastall]

Compare Leigon to BfA's launch. Then consider that Antorus was one of the shortest end-tier patches while HFC was one of the longest. There is definitely a difference between rushed launches and ones which Blizzard polishes.

(And before you mention it, yes, I know MoP's end tier was quite long and WoD's launch was an abortion. But I think WoD's botched launch is what forced Blizzard to develop the sharding technology that made Legion's launch so much smoother so it wasn't all for naught.)

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I'd think a much bigger difference is that WoD was cut short while Legion wasn't. As you said yourself Mists had a 14 month end patch WoD still came out with too many issues to list. ICC lasted a helluva long time -the OG content drought- and Cata had a buggy mess of a launch too if memory serves and had many half-baked aspects to it design wise, in fact I think every xpack launch except Legion's and to a lesser extent Mists's was rocky in terms of bugs and stability, to say nothing of vanilla barely even being functional for the first few weeks back then, with how often it was down for maintenance and fixes.

To add to this, Shadowlands's beta was the most reactive I've seen Blizzard be to feedback in recent memory, so to me it doesn't look like they're half-assing it unlike BFA's beta where we barely even got to test Azerite and Warfronts at all before release. I've no doubt the xpack will have balance issues aplenty on launch, but that's inevitable and the best that can happen is to get the outliers in line when Mythic releases. I can understand concerns, but doubt Blizzard will fix enough in a handful of months for a delay to be worth it for them and for most players.

[Kumorii]

What is a "good state"? When things are exactly as you want it? Then what if someone else don't think it's a good state? Delay it again?

[Velerios]

No matter what they did after BFA, it was full of bugs and I will remember it that way.

This was NOT the reason BfA was bad; because every wow expansion was filled with bugs, so...

[Martymark]

It's like OP isn't even putting short-term stockholder value first!

[Relapses]

I'd think a much bigger difference is that WoD was cut short while Legion wasn't. As you said yourself Mists had a 14 month end patch WoD still came out with too many issues to list. ICC lasted a helluva long time -the OG content drought- and Cata had a buggy mess of a launch too if memory serves and had many half-baked aspects to it design wise, in fact I think every xpack launch except Legion's and to a lesser extent Mists's was rocky in terms of bugs and stability, to say nothing of vanilla barely even being functional for the first few weeks back then, with how often it was down for maintenance and fixes.

To add to this, Shadowlands's beta was the most reactive I've seen Blizzard be to feedback in recent memory, so to me it doesn't look like they're half-assing it unlike BFA's beta where we barely even got to test Azerite and Warfronts at all before release. I've no doubt the xpack will have balance issues aplenty on launch, but that's inevitable and the best that can happen is to get the outliers in line when Mythic releases. I can understand concerns, but doubt Blizzard will fix enough in a handful of months for a delay to be worth it for them and for most players.

WoD's launch was a mess because of the unprecedented number of returning players and Blizzard being fully unprepared for such a massive influx. It remains one of the few times Blizzard has ever given people free game time because of the issues most players experienced. In terms of the actual content itself, it was just as polished (if not moreso) than Legion's. And while there were further issues with the deployment of the raid cycles later in WoD, I think a lot of that stemmed from Blizzard needing to refocus entirely after they found out the Garrison feature was not the casual-friendly anchor for subs I'm sure they hoped it would be.

[Velerios]

What is a "good state"? When things are exactly as you want it? Then what if someone else don't think it's a good state? Delay it again?

Probably when they buff the class you play, making it overpowered, then yes, the game is in a very good state!