WoW Loses 600k Subscribers, Diablo 3 Beta Q3 2011, Arena Passe, Blue Posts

[Deleted]

I agree with these sentiments. I had a lot of fun learning the game and tanking 5 mans on my Paladin in blues. I remember not being good enough to do any but the easiest heroics and yet I had a bloody great time playing the game. I enjoyed wotlk as well, healing so many heroics on my Shaman that eventually I bought a set of tier gear for each spec as well as all the tanking gear I could for soloing level 70 heroics and other old content. There were so many heroics in the rotation that it never felt boring and even though I do have a number of alts, I spent most of my time on my Shaman.

With Cataclysm though, when I got to 85 and opened up the dungeons, I felt like I downgraded my account. Not only was the leveling process boring as hell, apart from a few moments here and there (I liked the Vashjir environment, but the quests were ver...zzzzzz), but there was much less to do at 85. The professions were a blah grindfest (BS/LW), the regions were too linear, no one I knew wanted to even try heroics let alone raid content, while the changes to the world are nifty I am disappointed that they were not more extensive, and the final thing I can think of for this post, lol Deathwing as the "bad guy" - At least Arthas had a history people could understand and connect with, but this Deathwing guy... should I really have laughed out loud at the trailer when the voice over said, "pain, agony" in the most retarded sounding voice? No, probably not, but that is the response it invoked and in many ways that's how the whole xpac feels to me, like it's a great big joke. Cataclysm is WoW's NGE.

Amazingly, I actually quit playing WoW in December, even though I was paid up until Feb 2nd. This is just after an expansion was released! It's not supposed to be that way and it certainly was not that way for me in wotlk, where I struggled though heroics in my crafted level 78 blues and quest gear at launched and where I still really enjoyed running them in my full 10 man ICC gear, because my friends and I felt comfortable raiding together as well as pugging into other guilds we knew.

Cataclysm fails because:

1. It's the first expansion that caters to the forum trolls (vocal minority) rather that the actual player base.
2. Far too many class mechanics changes that makes new WoW far, far different that old WoW - this is the majority of the "NGE" sentiment.
3. The leveling process has been dumbed down to the point of sheer stupidity (Raid warnings for quests? Really? 100% Linear questing in every zone? Really?), even though no one really complained about that part of the game. Change for the sake of change is never a good idea.
4. Dungeon content is much less at 85 than it was at 80, so here you have a player base that is used to having a whole whack of options that levels their toons only to find out they actually now have much less to do with them. Not a good design paradigm there.
5. Still no moose.

Ps. I started playing again in May to level two more Shaman, one to lock at level 70 and another to lock at level 80. That ought to give me something to actually do. I very, very, very much loath the WoW design paradigm of "screw all that crap we did before, and enjoy only the new stuff we give you!"...

I just logged in to say, I am one of those that have quit WoW for quite a while now. I'm big a fan of the original WoW, but with every single expansion the changes have been more drastic. I actually really enjoyed TBC and its not like they changed the whole game. WotLK were even more drastic changes, in this era of WoW's lifespan I was getting much more bored with the game. By the time Cataclysm came out my excitement was plummeting. Blizzard changed the game for sake of changing it with this third expansion, not necessarily for the better.

Theres too many things on my mind for why WoW just doesn't cut it anymore for me.
Dumbing down talent trees, simplifying healer playstyles, very poor class changes that were very obviously to me rushed. Musical compositions in zones that are misfit out of lazyness. Many zones have been pissed and pooped over (Water is piss and poop is lava). This is not improvement, its just change for the sake of changing. And therefore in Cataclysm it is not the World of Warcraft I had so much passion for.
Worgens and Goblins just don't cut it for me. I don't recognise the original Warcraft IP in WoW anymore. All that investment, time and energy could have been spent better elsewhere.
Don't remove world drops. Implement positions in specific zones where players can fight over. For example Tyr's Hand used to be a pvp haven and competition for loot and territory. Thats how you create a motive, a reason to do something. All the while mixing pve with pvp.

Just look at the games balance, its been going up and down for three expansions straight. The reason they are doing this is because the community expects change so they have something to look forward to, so Blizzard keeps changing design philosophy. So next time you go to forums complaining that your class hasn't been changed for the past years or whatever. Realize this... its because everything is working as intended.

For every positive change, they compromise 2 additional things that the WoW community used to love. For every step forward, taking two steps back. This is why slowly the original subcriber base is losing interest. In its place being replaced with a younger userbase consisting of new generation kids.

[Deleted]

Among those 600k are pvp players like me, who are being F'd in the A.

[saltshaker]

Among those 600k are pvp players like me, who are being F'd in the A.

^^^^^^ This 100%

[Hogbobson]

Even though I'm a fan of liberty of speech and free press, first amendment (?), ytringsfrihed if you will, I think you should be just a tad more careful with posting topics like the first one, Boubille. It spawns a mass of those horrible, horrible "This is the end of the World ... of Warcraft"-threads.

"Nuh, stop being oblivious to FACTS!"
Puh-lease? C'mon, 5 % ain't no big deal. As someone stated before:
No new raids for a long time
Other MMOs have been thrown out this spring
And it's not even summer.

I think there was a fourth reason too, but I forgot.

[Nitche]

Squuuuuuuueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll!!!!!!


Diablo 3 DDD Eff WoW, YAY DIABLO! <3

[Kiro]

Some people are very-very upset, actually mad here about this news that WoW is losing it's luster, but like I said, it's due largely to Blizzard's decisions as well as the sheeple letting them get away with cutting corners all over the place. Mix in that they basically said, "We're taking our best off this game and putting them on the next-big-thing, because the sheeple will keep the game running for a while alone, and time is money so don't expect quality of work like we did in the past", that's really hurting them.

They didn't think people would blow through the content? Really? How many people said this would happen just by looking at the stats on paper for this? How many beta testers saw and said this? When you allocate a large part of your efforts to content areas where people really DON'T CARE, as in 1-60, what do you really expect? The end game and the "new" content wasn't there, it wasn't polished, it just didn't have enough to keep people occupied. Arena is a mess right now to boot, so there goes another segment. They messed up big time gambling on the easy way out, and cutting back money put back into their golden cow.

This number interests me more knowing that it's not 12m - 600k. The way they represent subs is a big mystery, but many have pieced together that it's a bit different than this. THEN you have to figure in how many more people are leaving their accounts to expire, and most noticeable, people who still have active accounts that just stopped playing, and it's a matter of time now before they cancel as well. Anyone can tell you that much just by observations in game with the amount of people that just stopped playing as Org and such have become ghost towns. I know from my personal experience that I noticed about 1/5th of the people that used to be on.

So 600k is a huge number, one that's probably low-balled at that. There's hundreds of thousands more people that will be in exodus over the following weeks as 4.1 brings nothing to the table with it's redesigned/recycled experience. 4.2 has people worried because it only has 7 new bosses plus 1 lottery boss thus far, so that content is looking weak now as well. Greg Street and gang has really hurt this game with their extremely poor guesses, and it's only going to get worse.

Blizzard has to listen to their fanbase now before it's too late for this game and it dies off sooner than expected. WoW keeps Blizzard alive right now, being one of the largest "single" developers out there, it needs as many subs as possible. They release games too slowly, they can't keep pumping out a new title every year, thus they need WoW to feed the coffers. But, you can tell from the latest interviews that they knew this day was coming, that WoW will die off eventually, it's just happening a lot sooner than they expected as people are fed up with their non-sense.

[Deleted]

I like how a lot of these posters try to calm themselves by saying that its not so bad that 600k left as if their choice of game is much influenced of how popular wow is, why do you give a fuck?

[Necrotica]

^This weekend I deleted my ilevel 365 priest (and all my other characters) that has been my main since TBC, and left the game. My subscription won't technically expire until next month. The game has become mundane over the last year, and life is really too short to chain yourself to a computer for multiple nights in a row when the game is no longer fun. Anyone who finds it fun just hasn't played long enough yet.

Out of curiosity, is this just your way of pulling a Cortés and scuttling your ships so you can't return to the game even if you were tempted?

[Duster505]

"We have to remember that when these numbers were pulled, Cataclysm was in a bit of a lull."


Uh, the community isn't ready for new content, remember? Oh wait, the players were right and always have been.

Exactly - They can not have it both ways...

Right now they are hyping Firelands on PTR so ppl sub to be able to play it. But considering that fire, lava and rock is all ppl will see for up to 8 months... it will not change anything in terms of long term subs.

PPL are quitting right now cause Blizzard has put WOW on the shelf in terms of innavative development work. It has been locked down to the same old and less and less content - while trying to claim they are actually sending it out faster. Nothing is further from the truth. It is purely BLizzard's disission to take the game down this road and move the true development work over to Titan. Ofc ppl will be leaving when they realise WOW as it is now is exactly what we will be getting for the next few years until Titan is out.

PPL are not stupid. But there are those that pay 15$ for newspapers that they dont read. PPL did the same for WOW as long as the game was still evolving. Its not any more. Its stagnant and Blizzard is focusing elsewhere. THen ppl stop paying for it.

[Deleted]

It spawns a mass of those horrible, horrible "This is the end of the World ... of Warcraft"-threads.

Nobody is saying WoW is dying. Just that it doesn't appeal anymore, getting lackluster. Just because Jersey Shore is a bad show doesn't mean the stupidity is stopping the viewers. Same with the players. WoW is a giant amongst the MMO's. Any type of content will keep it afloat, no matter how mediocre.

Not horrible at all, this types of posts promote some discussion of wheter the game is improving or not. Anyone can voice their opinion.

[Nathiest]

I bet 60% of that 5% where all Ret Pally's.

[ro9ue]

I do think WoW has about 10yrs left in it just because well... look at EQ1. Apparently theres still profit to be made almost 20 expansions in for a player base probably under 200k. I don't think WoW will continue to be the MMO titan it is (or was) for much longer.

EQ came out in 1999. For me that was the MMO hook. I played up until maybe 2004, occasionally renewing my subscription as recently as last year. 2004 was when I moved to WoW. The people who played MMOs before WoW know exactly why all of these "WoW Killers" never really did it. They didn't change the genre. If you moved from EQ to WoW, you saw the same base genre elements, but WoW was such a completely different experience and fresh, and that's why it really pulled people away from their last MMO. EQ, DAoC, whatever.

These current games like Aion and Rift are WoW clones. They basically take the same game and overlay their lore and graphics, which an occasional added feature like Public grouping and Rift events. There's no new appeal, most people get their fill of the new elements and move back to WoW because at the end of the day it's still a grind. Rep grinds, currency grinds etc. I thought Rift was well worth the inital $60 and first 2 months, but long term it made no sense to play the same game when you already have so much time invested into WoW. That's the problem with this genre. People build these avatars, for them to break away from them, you really need to make them feel like this new MMO is going to be a better experience.

The next MMO titan will need to take what WoW has done, learn from it, and put their own twist on the genre. Now that WoW is getting stale the market is ripe for new MMO communities to form and I personally forsee GW2 to be my future MMO home. We will see.

[Duster505]

Source ? Would like to see that.

The reason is based on the fact that its very hard to get back into content of a game in middle of expansion. PPL know that when they deside to unsub.

Firelands is fire and molten lava. Thats what WOW is gonna be for the next 8 months. PPL that have been to Molten Bore know how it feels to be in the same exact enviroment for that long. And for 7 bosses.... Its gonna be tuned for few 100 ppl.... So casuals will not be coming back either.

[Deleted]

Really, people cleared raid content faster than they expected? Can't have anything to do with the numerous nerfs

[Ariahna]

Out of curiosity, is this just your way of pulling a Cortés and scuttling your ships so you can't return to the game even if you were tempted?

Exactly. I even destroyed my authenticator so I couldn't log on even if I wanted to, but there is nothing to log on to. Basically I have played the game long enough that I can't see it ever being interesting to me again, nor would I ever want to waste that much of my time on a game like this ever again.

/cheers

[Drakhar]

Yeah, let's have them race the game out so they can be faster than another game, in this case D3. Prime reasoning there matey, you fit right in with the dev team of one of the hundreds of failed MMO's. Also, lol comparing these two games.

Look around bro, there's a huge overlap between the two games (in terms of playerbase and some features). Are you even paying attention to GW2? They have a clear schedule for releasing new information to try to maintain high interest, but it isn't enough to keep it forever. And don't lie to yourself, every Blizzard title since Warcraft 2 dominates headlines and player interest. Nice try, better luck next time.

I love this argument, because it has absolutely no backing. I quit in December, and shall not be playing WoW again until they fix the most obvious, glaring issues with the game. The drop wasn't expected to be this soon, or this obvious. Lots of fanboys will be crying from the hills content lull, harder content, blah blah blah, but the fact of the matter is that Cataclysm simply wasn't up to the standards created by the other expansions. Couple that with some other amazing games coming out within the year, and Blizzard could easily see a larger drop in subscription numbers.

No argument that people will come back, o rly? Why would you bother even looking here (let alone post) if you had no lingering interest in the game? I suppose it could be something else - that after months of no longer playing, people are so pathetically addicted to the point where they can't just let the game go.

[snowcrash512]

Blizzard loses a small percent of its subscribers.. and that percentage is still more than most MMOs ever get... i dont know if thats sad or impressive.

[zeralol]

WoW has just become too easy, that's it. I log on and there is nothing to do, simply nothing.
Give back rep grinding, open pvp and some farming places like Tyrs Hand or Elementalplateu <3


Also, raiding and 5 man Heroics should be in 2nd place (and still harder anyway. at least normal mode).
Server-wide events are much, much funnier. Nowadays everything is instanced and that sucks.

[Duster505]

It is an interesting figure with lots of speculation surrounding this drop in subscriptions. I am sure Blizzard execs will find legitimate reasons for the reduction, at the end of the day someone will need to justify the drop in revenues at a board level. Was the drop due to the lull in content, or because summer is kicking in (certainly in the UK we have had the warmest spring for god knows how long), was is it because content is simply not up to scratch and players are trying out other games on the market.

I would love to see all the subscription figures. I would not be at all surprised if the numbers of players leaving the game wasway more than 600K. But any greater drop in numbers was made up by a growth in new players joining the game. You need to consider with each passing year there are millions of gamers at the age when they want to play an MMO like Warcraft.

But I think the biggest factor has to be down WOW burnout. If you think players who started in TBC, god forbid Vanilla, that is going on 4 years of the same old linear and progressive game style. Kudos to Blizzard for keeping it entertaining for so long, but for me, and apparently many others the appeal is just not there now.

I've been playing Rift, bought myself a new Rig and it plays so sweetly. I was offered a 7 day trial to return to Azeroth and gave in to the temptation and gave it a go. The enviroment is so dated compared to Rift. I can appreciate folks don't tend to buy an MMO because the gfx are sublime, or not, but it felt dated, and very old. Coupled with that I still stand by my belief that the Cataclysm xpac is still 50% under delivered. The latest ZG/ZA patch has gone a little way adding about 5%, re-hashed content (that was imho fantastic in the day but still re-hashed for the masses), Firelands is looking mega but Blizzard surely have to do something special to pull this expac out of the gutter.

I doubt it has anything to do with the weather. And March is not summer. PPL keep paying a sub if they like the content and the route the game is taking. But right now quite a big group is not happy with how BLizzard has treated WOW in terms of development and those ppl will not keep paying for that.

WOW is getting very dated yes. RIFT showed many what CATA should have been. And BLizzard has now formally put WOW on a shelf in terms of real innovative develpment work. PPL will not continue to pay for that.

What stands out for me is that many of the loyal long term players are leaving. And the newcomers are not filling the gap. Considering they are forced to buy the orginal game + 3 expansions... + sub.. thats really not hard to figure out.

But this is the BUISNESS model Blizzard is going for. Who cares about the game....

[moocowfrakmilk]

Also, 5% is nothing, second place for a sub based MMO is what, 3 million?

5% may seem like nothing to an uninterested bystander, but not from a business perspective. Losing 5% of your customer base over a single quarter is cause for serious concern for any company, especially since shareholders are a particularly fickle and panic-prone bunch. Considered in context, posting a net loss immediately after uninterrupted growth (12 million), expanding in a new market (China), and releasing a massive update (Cata), is very scary news.

This doesn't mean WoW is dying, but it is a first warning that somewhere along the way Blizzard has lost the intrest of a significant portion of it's user base. This is nothing new: every company missteps occasionally. What matters now is what they do with this knowledge. They're response will determine whether WoW (to use a crude analogy) continues on like Windows, or ends up like Myspace.