WoW is likely one of the greatest games of all time.

[DeltrusDisc]

Yeah this pretty much sums up my feelings on it. It's hard to argue the impact it used to have, but these days it's just kind of carted around as a hell of its former self, run by people who were fans of the original and don't know what made it good to begin with.

There's no denying that WoW was a monster of a game in its prime time, but these days it kind of just feels like a parody of itself.

100% agree with this sentiment.

While its current iteration is a joke, a stain even, an offense against what it once was, it cannot be denied that World of Warcraft, when looking on the whole at the 18 years and just the base game - is without a doubt one of the most successful and also one of the most defining games of the 21st century and of all time. Even though I am probably not going to be subscribing again unless a miracle happens and I loath it in its current state, I still am beyond happy that I got to play it at all, especially all the way back in mid-TBC and up through into the beginning of Shadowlands. Sure, there were ups and downs, there always are, but this was a very powerful game.

I wholeheartedly respect it and its original creators.

[arkanon]

This is why comparing an MMO to single player games (even traditional multiplier) is a little silly.
.

And THIS is my EXACT point - for the reasons i gave. Your first comments about W3 are way off - thats your choice - the game hasnt moved on without you, you have likely just forgotten what you were up to and lost connection with the story. But back to my point - anyone trying to claim wow is one of the "best games of all time" they are not being honest, or at least not understanding the comparison properly. Now, someone saying "this is one of or my absolute favorite game of all time" thats totally fine, no issue at all.

But really, wow wasnt even close to the first mmo, but what it did do is give it a small amount of mainstream publicity and popularity. I just think people confuse "the best of all time" with "my personal favorite". Because i cant think of a single objective measure that would put wow even in the top 10 games of all time.

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Just look at the amount of people who supposedly have quit the game but keep browsing forums/fansites and have opinion on the content even though they no longer play.

How many other games you know that keep people so invested they can't let go even if they no longer even enjoy the game? If wow was "oh so bad" people would just move on but nope. Everyday we have hundreds of posters, even here on mmochamp who claim to quit X expansions ago but keep getting info on wow nearly on daily basis.

That is the true sign of one of the greatest games. It impacts your life even if you stop playing. Kinda scary and cringy though.

CoD, Battlefield etc, all "annual" release games have bigger communities than wow, current and past players. Any other mmo is the same or bigger as well, both past and present players. Fortnite, dayz, rust - those games also have HUGE communities - i know many people who watch rust videos all day at work and have never even installed the game.

People sit in their bubble thinking its the biggest bubble to ever exist, without realizing they are dwarfed by the communities from other games. The big difference with wow, or mmo's in general, is that A) their is a paywall to get back into the game (expansion and sub) and B) They might not be playing because they dont wanna pay $15 a month for something they dont enjoy, but have hope that they might or will come back when the game improves. Most games from even a couple of years ago no longer receive any updates or changes, so there is really no to keep involved with the community, as the game isnt changing anymore.

[Echo of Soul]

I've loved how this game has evolved

I prefer the term mutated

[dacoolist]

funny that people think how much money blizz has made off wow equates to how great it is to people that still play it and still enjoy it..

Wow is about the community, plain and simple: and lately now that most of the crybabies have left: I have enjoyed the game more than I ever have. I hope those baddies never return because I haven’t enjoyed myself in a game this much since Starsiege back in 98

If you enjoy something (legal): go for it, and dont let anyone tell you its wrong

[Stricks]

Of course it is. No question by any way you want to calculate it.

[callipygoustp]

I have very fond memories of the game: no argument from me.

[Swnem]

Not exactly. I think WoW will be remembered as a pioneer of it's time, like Ultima and Everquest, but the one that successfully opened the mass market.
But, if you mean one of the greatest games of all time in terms of quality, then i will have to disagree. I don't think it has aged well at all. It was the lightning in a bottle kind of game. It did the right thing at the right time and managed to explode. But, the right thing and right moment have changed since then and objectively, the game is lacking in comparison with some competitors already.
Nowadays it's judged on it's merits as a game and it's been found lacking.

[Mysterymask]

Not exactly. I think WoW will be remembered as a pioneer of it's time, like Ultima and Everquest, but the one that successfully opened the mass market.
But, if you mean one of the greatest games of all time in terms of quality, then i will have to disagree. I don't think it has aged well at all. It was the lightning in a bottle kind of game. It did the right thing at the right time and managed to explode. But, the right thing and right moment have changed since then.

I mean a game that set a precedent like that should be thought of as that though?

Ocarina of Time aged like Milk in the sun but it's still on a pedestal simply because games like that just didn't exist. FF7 is a blocky ugly mess now but back in 1996 holy shit that was a god damned masterpiece and you know what still should be considered a "best game ever" same can be for Half Life, Tekken 3, Metroid, and Goldeneye games that REALLY don't hold up now but so beautifully done and remembered

[Sluvs]

I agree. There are very few games that have impacted me as deeply as WoW has. And sure, now its not its golden age anymore, but the combination of TBC and WotLK + my life at those times, man... It certainly is one of the best, or at least it was.

[Otimus]

Even in it's prime, WoW was, at best, a very fun time I had with friends. Or a pretty endearing time waster.

I've always felt it's gameplay, and every single MMORPG ever made's gameplay (that I've played, anyways, and I've played a lot of them!) is just creatively bankrupt. Always was and still is. Every other aspect is either okay to decent.

I think people tend to overrate it out of it being their first experience of that type, or just because of a really, really good time they had with specific people. Do people genuinely think the gameplay of WoW is a 10/10 experience, even in it's prime, entirely on it's own? If so... more power to you. I don't get it and never will.

[aceperson]

Idgaf how you feel about this expansion or that expansion. Or what parts of the lore you like or don't like. Even at it's worst patches of its worst expansions WoW was revolutionary and that's why it stood the test of time so far.

i'd agree with you up to bfa. while it wasn't a great expac, i don't think it was terrible. but shadowlands is literally the expac that showed how little innovation the current team does. they try a new form of pve (and pvp in the case of islands) and then immediately give up on it after launching it. shadowlands LACK of innovation is what allowed other games to encroach on the previously untouchable king of mmos.

vanilla was the overall revamp of the mmo genre, tbc was the revamp of how mmos expanded their games, wrath was the revamp of how to make accessible and hard content, cata was a revamp of the entire existing vanilla world, mop was a revamp to the existing class design and end game zones, wod was the revamp to capital design (granted, this one failed hard and caused tons of other issues such as a lack of content but the gameplay of the expac wasn't bad), legion was the revamp of class identity and what it means to be a class, and bfa was the revamp of faction pride (although undermined a good bit by the "mah honor" saurfang story).

shadowlands hasn't done anything to that scale. that is one of the biggest reasons shadowlands is the worst expac of wow. it wasn't innovative and it didn't have enough good content to make it worth while. in many cases, the class identity from legion (and partially bfa) was lost in SL and muddled what was once fun gameplay. like i said, i'd give you every other expac, but shadowlands is by every metric a failure. if shadowlands was the launching of an mmo, it'd be similar to rift in explosive start and then quickly fade away due to bad choices.

[rrayy]

[QUOTE=DeltrusDisc;53873946]While its current iteration is a joke, a stain even, an offense against what it once was, [/'quote]Talk about a massive over exaggeration. It is no anywhere close to that, all said because you don't like the game.

[Linkedblade]

If you're doing a top XX games of all time, it's definitely in the top 100, 50 or 20. Top ten maybe.

It's not that it's the best game ever. It's not the most revolutionary. It's not the highest grossing or has the most players. It may have held some of those titles for some specific period of time. It's one of the greatest because of the insane rise in popularity it once had, combined with a great IP and a massive cult following. It had become so popular that it was known to seemingly everyone and their grandmother. Mr. T, William Shatner, and Ozzy Osbourne commercials? It was just everywhere.

And again there are games now that destroy the metrics that WoW reached; mobile games have destroyed the metrics held by console and PC games. But it's a part of the culture. There's only a handful of games that you could say that almost anyone would recognize. WoW definitely was THE game of the '00s.

[arkanon]

Of course it is. No question by any way you want to calculate it.

Peak players? Many mobile games have hundreds of millions of players. Box sales? Not even close. Longevity? again no, not even within mmos. Give me a single way you calculate it as the greatest - or one of the greatest (i would say that is top 3, maybe top 5 at most).

[Mysterymask]

Peak players? Many mobile games have hundreds of millions of players. Box sales? Not even close. Longevity? again no, not even within mmos. Give me a single way you calculate it as the greatest - or one of the greatest (i would say that is top 3, maybe top 5 at most).

Personally I go by a few things...

Impact on video games as a whole: did people copy it? Are other games inspired by it?
Ie Pokemon wow dark souls and ocarina of time
Technical prowess: did it push it's hardware to places it couldn't before?
IE Final Fantasy 6 and 7
Mainstream success: optional but was it something that people who wouldn't play this sorta game absolutely did?
IE wow, NFL Blitz, Final Fantasy 7, Persona 5
Cult following: may not of blew up when it came out but it's fanbase is devoted
IE: Guilty Gear, Earthbound, Quintet's games, Street Fighter Third Strike


As you can see at least in my catagories wow fills a few blanks by itself. EverQuest and Ultima Online were never gonna have even half the mainstream success wow did and therefore deserves a spot as "greatest game of all time" on those merits alone

[Davryn]

Peak players? Many mobile games have hundreds of millions of players. Box sales? Not even close. Longevity? again no, not even within mmos. Give me a single way you calculate it as the greatest - or one of the greatest (i would say that is top 3, maybe top 5 at most).

Cultural impact and impact on gaming industry

[Lolites]

Mmm, I hate to break it to you, but it's barely in the top twenty.

i hate to break it to you but the list with no sources, which usses estimates AT BEST (some of the games dont even have any number) is pointless, we dont have enough info to calculate how much wow grosed (afaik even investors call dont put WoW data alone)...
but lets just for fun say their numbers are correct, have you actualy read it? it literaly says "Note: games are listed in no particular order."...

just a quick guesstimate: during wrath wow was constantly over 11mplayers, with peaks over 12m, lets count with 11m, 2years so 4x60bucks for sub +40 for expansion, so 11x280= 3080 so over 3bilion guesstimate for wrath ALONE (before collector editions)...
sure the sub numbers went down, but monetization get UP, so i doubt 9b is even close to reality...

[Utrrabbit]

And THIS is my EXACT point - for the reasons i gave. Your first comments about W3 are way off - thats your choice - the game hasnt moved on without you, you have likely just forgotten what you were up to and lost connection with the story. But back to my point - anyone trying to claim wow is one of the "best games of all time" they are not being honest, or at least not understanding the comparison properly. Now, someone saying "this is one of or my absolute favorite game of all time" thats totally fine, no issue at all.

But really, wow wasnt even close to the first mmo, but what it did do is give it a small amount of mainstream publicity and popularity. I just think people confuse "the best of all time" with "my personal favorite". Because i cant think of a single objective measure that would put wow even in the top 10 games of all time.

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CoD, Battlefield etc, all "annual" release games have bigger communities than wow, current and past players. Any other mmo is the same or bigger as well, both past and present players. Fortnite, dayz, rust - those games also have HUGE communities - i know many people who watch rust videos all day at work and have never even installed the game.

People sit in their bubble thinking its the biggest bubble to ever exist, without realizing they are dwarfed by the communities from other games. The big difference with wow, or mmo's in general, is that A) their is a paywall to get back into the game (expansion and sub) and B) They might not be playing because they dont wanna pay $15 a month for something they dont enjoy, but have hope that they might or will come back when the game improves. Most games from even a couple of years ago no longer receive any updates or changes, so there is really no to keep involved with the community, as the game isnt changing anymore.

Ive never heard of 90% of those games.

[Mysterymask]

Ive never heard of 90% of those games.

Then we have the problems with posts like this on this forum where people are so ingrained in their own bubble they never leave it...

[Lolites]

CoD, Battlefield etc, all "annual" release games have bigger communities than wow, current and past players.

more people read tabloids than "serious" newspapers, does that mean tabloids are better?

Any other mmo is the same or bigger as well

just... no... after almost 2decades in genre MAYBE 1-2 are as big as wow, now that is past its prime, thats it...

remember all the "wowkillers"? those were all games that wanted to be like wow but failed terribly... hell even now wow is used as measurement in its genre, if thats not telling you something you are beyond help