Venturebeat Interview with Ion Hazzikostas on WoW's Future

[Noblia]

Its so easy to make wow a 500 million player world. This guy has no idea about economics, game design, current technology trends or anything for that matter. Although he is good at virtue signaling and DIVERSITY!(remember that means hiring a person based on race, gender etc. not on their qualifications or synergy with the company)

People probably wont even see this post. I get more infractions and deleted posts on this site then my other self in the multiverse where the Nazi's won the wwII and monitor all speech and communications.

[korijenkins]

"Diversity makes a better game. They don't want WoW to be for a niche audience."

The latter point is exactly why the game is dying. They had a stranglehold on their target audience through Wrath of the Lich King, but changes were made to make the game more broadly appealing to general audiences over time. What happened was they drove away the original target audience and new people aren't replacing them faster than they leave.

The reality is most people who fall into that "general" crowd of consumers in this industry look towards games that don't require large time investments like WoW and don't continuously ask them for money.

- - - Updated - - -

There's that BS again. Faff off IAN!

I'm of a mind that if someone was genuinely offended by anything in-game that was removed they probably should seek therapy. It's not possible for someone to live a healthy life if a World of Warcraft emote triggers them.

[Jshadowhunter]

I'm of a mind that if someone was genuinely offended by anything in-game that was removed they probably should seek therapy. It's not possible for someone to live a healthy life if a World of Warcraft emote triggers them.

Especially if they have a problem with the word "damsel".

[McNeil]

They better not stretch out SL for too long or they won’t have many players left

[Ielenia]

• Diversity makes a better game.

No. Not really. Diversity, by itself, doesn't make a game better or worse. What makes a game good, or better, IMO, is gameplay. Forced diversity, on the other hand, can only ruin a game.

I don't think the game would be any better if Anduin was a black man. Or if a dwarf or night elf was the leader of the Alliance. We would still have the same dumb systems upon systems nonsense we got nowadays.

They don't want WoW to be for a niche audience.

... He's joking, isn't he? Please tell me he's joking.

[Ihavewaffles]

THEY DON'T WANT WOW TO BE FOR A NICHE AUDIENCE, so not for 99.99% of players!!!

[Godric]

Something people don't want to admit is a big part of WoW's toxicity is its playerbase which you can see numerous examples of in this thread - the self proclaimed anti SJWs who think the problem with Blizzard is too many LGBT, minorities and females being hired. These people shouldn't be feel welcome in the playerbase, just as they don't in FF14 (which has an infinitely better community for it, too.)

That's a very odd and definitely deluded way of looking at their stance. I don't think they care one way or another who get's hired, it's for what reason and the cost of such behavior to their game. Better buckle up bucko because you're going to be seeing a whole hell of a lot more of those people. Oh and last I checked, FF14 didn't really ever go out of their way to accommodate contemporary politics so that's probably why the community is better overall. So no, I don't think you can grant yourself that one.

[MoanaLisa]

Kind of paraphrased but I think it was something about 80-90% of twitter posts being made by 10% of accounts on the platform of which a good portion are considered bots.

Personal anecdote from here: Back in Warlords we kept the entire flying controversy more or less to one thread which eventually ended at over 40,000 posts. I did a few basic analytics on it as it was all ending and something like 18,000 of those 40,000 posts came from less than 100 accounts. It's one of the problems of relying on post counts or anything that is prone to mass swarming to reflect the reality of what people think.

[Kyphael]

Cross-faction raiding is a bit more on the radar now. If Jaina and Thrall are working together, why can't the players?

Probably the more interesting idea, too bad it took years and the game being in its worst state possible in every way imaginable for them to even begin teasing entertaining the idea.

[Thelxi]

They have had so many opportunities at this point to indicate some actual willingness to change direction from ruthlessly escalating profit driven game design that narrows its focus with every hotfix. "Lessons instilled on us that don't reflect how the game is enjoyed today" is the very best they can do. It really is kinda crazy. It is baffling to see how they went from kings of PR and marketing to this.

[Swnem]

Should have reacted sooner? You mean when preach told you about it and you didn't give a s**t? That soon?! Yes, you should have. But, we heard that before. Talk is cheap.

This interview is the usual controlled BS we are accustomed to.

Not talking about 9.2 cause of spoilers? Spoilers of what? Your anemic useless excuse for a story? Nobody cares anymore.
You can give details without spoiling the story.
Hey, at least you confirmed a 9.2 will exist.

Also, thanks for being MIA since April. It really helped during this period of exodus to have no one steering the boat.

Hints of having learned lessons and possible features are pretty but don't cut it at this juncture anymore. The team needs a vision. Start with that and where the game will go and the kind of improvements you want to make cause all i'm reading is that you actually learned as much as the times before and will continue to do the same.

[Th3Scourge]

Someone explain how "Diversity makes a better game"

By all accounts, diversity has made the game objectively worse, by their measurements of 'diversity'

Wow was at its peak when it was a niche product for a niche audience.

[hulkgor]

You mean when preach told you about it and you didn't give a s**t?

Preach? Seriously? lol

[Swnem]

Preach? Seriously? lol

And everyone in the forums. Preach told it to his face.
What are you loling about? The joke is on us you know? It's no laughing matter.

[darklogrus]

"9.1.5 reflects a shift toward more accessibility and letting go of old lessons instilled on the team from the past that don't necessarily reflect the way that the game is enjoyed today.

Cross-faction raiding is a bit more on the radar now. If Jaina and Thrall are working together, why can't the players?"

2 things I have been defending for a decade now. You dont need proof as the why this bozo needs to be demoted... lol

[Vintersol]

I can't hear the diversity bullshit anymore.

[Doombringer]

Nothing we haven't heard before. "We didn't take X into consideration early enough/at all, but we are now" ... "we want to, need to, do better" ... we players always want to believe THIS will be the time it all comes true but it hasn't ever happened.

I won't comment much on the "smoothing out" of what content may or may not have aged well... WoW is not our world and should be given some leeway to be itself, and not take too much of our reality too seriously. Content related directly to abusers and/or a hostile work environment should be axed. Jokes and flirts I think they slashed and burned far too overzealously.

[Prothall]

Personal anecdote from here: Back in Warlords we kept the entire flying controversy more or less to one thread which eventually ended at over 40,000 posts. I did a few basic analytics on it as it was all ending and something like 18,000 of those 40,000 posts came from less than 100 accounts. It's one of the problems of relying on post counts or anything that is prone to mass swarming to reflect the reality of what people think.

Please. I've been here for over ten years, and there has never been one thread about flying. There were weeks when I'd see a new one once a day. It usually went something like: flying good/bad, tinker good/bad, player housing good/bad, casuals good/bad, rinse, repeat.

[Chilela]

... He's joking, isn't he? Please tell me he's joking.

To be fair, WoW has always tried to push accessibility to wider audiences since the start. That was arguably one of the hooks since day one. Then again, if Blizz thinks that it's been for "a niche audience" at any point in its history, then who even knows what "broad appeal" is to them. At this point, a relatively niche audience is the best possible play for them. Most people outside of the MMO subset have moved on to other genres that better tickle their fancies. Even with the current renaissance of the genre, it's still never going to be as big as more "mainline" ones. The faster Blizz comes to terms with this, the faster they can focus on the important things.

[Macnessa]

Ian claims they want to look at fan feedback but completely ignores the fact that fans don't want agenda crap shoved in the game as a misplaced snap reaction to Blizzards own issues internally. No one wants a woman's picture replaced with a bowl of fruit or /flirt removed or changed or the name/icon of Big Love Rocket changed. Those aren't priorities.