It's just like that 'laughing' response you can use in Facebook. People mostly use it to mock others.
I don't think that's the reason
Coming late wasn't the issue. The game had a healthy playerbase during the first two years.
The 2.0 overhaul killed the game. The interface used to be really simple: get to level 10 on a character to earn their master skin. Buy master skin with coins. Buy cash shop stuff with IRL currency. But then 2.0 made the interface really confusing. Now you can't just buy the skin you want anymore. Now you have to either spend the new IRL currency on it (which was really confusing), or you had to hope that the skin you wanted dropped from a lootbox... and because the lootboxes were padded to hell with shit nobody wanted like sprays and voicelines, you statistically will never get the thing you want.
Any sense of achievement was thrown out the window. Queueing for a game with my Abathur master skin equipped used to be prestigous. "Damn, that guy must be really good! I feel confidant with him playing as Abathur now!". After the 2.0 revamp, any random newb could get an Abathur master skin from a lootbox, so for veteran players that badge of prestige was ripped away from them, and for other players they now don't know if you are actually a good player if you have a master skin equipped.
Maybe I have some of the details wrong, but if I do... well then, that's the point isn't it? I had hundreds of hours invested in this game and couldn't make heads or tails of the revamp. That's quite the failure on Blizzard's part.
Also, Blizzard was salivating over the esports fad, rather than catering to casuals.
2.0 had some decent ideas, but the things it changed were horrific for the game. It screwed the reward system in the game over massively when it had potential to really improve it. Making heroes go above level 20 and the hero level above level 40 was a really good idea. However removing the master skins being unlocked at level 10 and then adding a special hero loot box for each 10 levels was such a bad idea.
Having a unique taunt badge appear above your head wasn't even that cool. Almost no one taunts in this game, because the majority of the time the enemy can't see it and when they do there is a good chance you are going to get killed. Way later they added the mastery rings, which were a sad replacement for the mastery skins. While they are way easier to see and show off than the taunts they still aren't that cool. The taunts should've been additive with a new mastery skin for each 25 levels you reached with a hero.
They also have the problem, still to this day, of reworking heroes that don't need to be reworked and completely destroying them and the meta. Chromie was a fun and unique hero, they reworked her into another generic mage. Malfurion was once the uncontested best healer, they reworked him into the worst healer in the game and then reworked him 3 times after that to try and fix their mistake. Falstad used to have two viable builds and they reworked him very recently nerfing the two viable builds into the ground and over buffing W build. They then nerfed W build into the ground and now Falstad isn't in a good spot anymore. They just overbuffed Zagara and now nerfed her to where she is worse than before.
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The major problem there was Tracer's release
The prestige now is behind the golden-ring around players, which are unlocked at levels 15, 25, and 50 and cost 5000G each.
The 2.0 changes weren't all bad. The XP normalisation made things a lot better for actually getting characters levelled. However, I will say that I managed to get level 37 on Hammer before 2.0, and have found it significantly more time-consuming to hit even level 25 on other characters after 2.0. Maybe I just played significantly more back then, or maybe the XP awarded was higher.
I think opening up almost everything for purchase with shards or real world currency was a good one as it gave people options, but I agree that the master skins should have remained behind some sort of level requirement. I believe you can buy any skin with one of the currencies in game, though I think for a time, they didn't allow masters skins to be purchased, and they were random from lootboxes.
The game simply ceased to be popular after a while, unfortunately this happens.
Last edited by Lilithvia; 2023-03-03 at 11:31 PM.
Lilithvia Thread Directory| Go Utes!
Are you really responding to stuff said almost 2 years ago?
The sorry emote was removed at the same time as the release of Whispers of the Old Gods, and got replaced with the "Wow" one.
Fun fact is that there isa legendary card in Gadgetzan called "Mayor Nogenfogger" who makes all attacks random (when you make a minion attack an opponent, it attacks a random one instead). It's not written on it, but this card also randomizes emote (you speak a random one when you click on any of them), and there is a chance that you get the "Sorry" one thanks to that goblin.
MMO Champs :
Lilithvia Thread Directory| Go Utes!
The only moba that gives different challenges on every map for the players. I'm still a bit disappointed that they removed the role of wave pusher for some character.
But this game is the best of its genre. Too bad they didn't invest on it in a way that worked for its popularity.
No. Why would that be the reason. Like how does that make sense..?
I think it was too niche. I absolutely adored the game. I didn't like most of the mechanics of LoL. I liked hots more because the team fights start from the very beginning most of the time. And that is where I find fun in a moba. I enjoyed smite for a similar reason with Arena. It is sad to see HoTs fizzle out... as I said... I adored the game.