I’m scared that people think it’s normal that people come back for the expansion and then quit in massive numbers. People do not invest their time and money in a character progression game and plan to quit at the same time. EDIT: yes, I know this happens every expansion and it is normal for some people. But not to this degree.
I NEVER thought I’d be “that” guy posting a title like that… it makes me cringe. But this time, I really am scared that the wheels are coming off.
Well I think that it’s just the hunger for new content and experiences, while as humans we get attached to the old stuff, we like new stuff too.
I hope it does. I love watching arrogant giants fall on their faces.
Turns out when there’s only a tiny dribble of new content released every couple of months there’s no real point in sticking around for the next dribble when you can just save the money and go somewhere else.
The calculation looks something like this:
Played the content
Only have old content left
Do I keep spending the $15 a month to replay stuff I’ve already played a dozen times now or do I unsub, save the $45 and come back in three months when there’s new content again?
MMOs tend to do poorly because of the following reasons:
1: Predatory practices that turn off players, BDO - I’m looking at you.
2: The devs have this stupid idea in their heads that they can beat WoW by copying it.
3: Within a month of coming out, they completely ruin classes and fail to optimize their engine. (SWTOR is a prime example of poor planning on this front.)
4: Existing content is not substantial enough to keep people invested.
Everything about your post is wrong.
It IS normal for people to come back for an expansion and then quit in massive numbers, this has happened every single expansion cycle.
MMOs ARE dying. The entire genre is dying and has been for the last decade.
You’re right that it is normal for some people. It isn’t normal to this degree. It’s abundantly clear that people are leaving in droves because of decisions that Blizzard is making, not because “MMOS are dying”
I suspect Blizz will do some more member berries to get subs back. Or reboot.
Nothing comes close to WoW. Currently the only dog even close to them is final fantasy. Its easier for other companies to chase the current battle royal fad than to try to produce somthing that competes with wow.
Once they decided their playerbase was ‘cyclical’, they began designing FOR a cyclical playerbase. Thus giving reason for even the players who had never been part of that play-unsub until new patch-return cycle to enter it.
We all know Wow has never been fully realized until 6 months to a year into an expansion.
I came back right before 7.3.5 and had a great time. I hear early Legion had only 4 randomly selected legiondaries from a list of 12. Some of which added nothing but gimmicks like triple heroic leap or instant cast gate.
This game is destroyed every new expansion and eventually realizes what it was trying to do from the start.
I personally think blizzard gotten lazy and comfortable, the problem is us really…
If the game is crap unsub, but the majority stay subbed clinging onto the whole “let’s hope it gets better”, but Blizzard still making the money, so why should they change?
If the majority left, I guarantee they would make changes.
In reality, we created Blizzard how they are today, by allowing them to create trash and still stay subbed hoping things will get better next Patch/Expansion.
I’m part of the problem aswell, I absolute despise BFA, worst expansion yet, but I’m subbed… because I spent 14 years of my life in this game and going away would make it like 14 years down the drain.
There is one easy fix that I can think of right off the top of my head that would pose as an antidote to WOW’s current state:
If we can establish honest and open discourse between the game developers and game players we could see some important change to BFA - changes that most of the community and the company could be happy with.
I think Blizzard decided they could live with some people unsubbing (at some point in MoP while developing WoD). But that’s like saying “I can live with being overweight” and then one day the doctor tells you that you are diabetic and have heart disease and high blood pressure and you’re like “Oh . . .maybe I can’t live with it.” I think it is a matter of degree.
And now Blizzard is finding out that they overdid the whole “cyclical” philosophy and people basically leave in a month and don’t buy any of the stuffs, either.
WoW has a lot of self-inflicted conditions now that are seriously hurting the game. If Blizzard wants to they can make the game healthy again BUT they have to commit to turning things around.
Biggest problem with mmorpgs lately is that they try to cook a meal for everyone and then feed it to them on a spoon, instead of letting players cooking for themselves and eating how they want.
The problem is instead of creating an expansion that has so much content you can play it and always have something new to do to keep you playing until the next expansion comes out, Blizzard time-gates content so you get little tiny chunks of something new and then have to re-run dungeons and WQs to fill the time between the next content release.
This is the first expansion I’ve been in on since the beginning. Usually I just subscribe just before a new expansion is due. I can play through all the content in about a month and then unsubscribe and wait for the next expansion to reach its end.
WQs are boring. Once you’ve run a raid or a dungeon it becomes boring too. Grinding for gear is boring since once the new expansion comes out all your hard won gear becomes worthless. The only thing that really makes the game worth playing is the story lines and since the writing is stretched so thin across the course of an expansion the only thing that makes sense is to subscribe just before an expansion is about to expire and then unsub just before the new expansion rolls out.
The devs engaging in honest and open discourse with us; Huehuahahahuehuehua* oh you’re serious?! Let me laugh even harder; HOHAHHUEHAHSHAHAHSHOHAHAH LOLOLOLOLLOL*
But in all seriousness, if Blizzard would put even a modicum of effort into engaging with the players like you say they should, we wouldn’t be in this mess. But Ion will only say that they want to improve communication, and then ignore us for 6 months. We’ve seen it all before, and that pattern’s not going to change any time soon.
I’ve largely given up on trying to get my voice to be heard. I’m just burning out my remaining sub on the forums, because right now that’s far more enjoyable than the game itself, but even the forums aren’t worth $15 a month.
The Blizzard we love is dead. They sold their souls to the shareholders for the glory of the gods of capitalism. Capitalism comes before anything, including good game design, because this part of the world worships money. Don’t believe me? A private bank (The Federal Reserve) has the right to issue money. Not the US government. Accept it, and find a game company that hasn’t sold its soul for money yet. That’s the only way to keep sane in this age of predatory game design.
You can be forgiven by taking the lord into your heart and read and reread the bible for the next 14 years
I learned this in WoD, although it was not by choice. I hit max level and started doing heroics in WoD right before my ISP shut down and was bought by Sprint. Sprint didn’t service my area so I was SOL. Nearly a year later I found an unlimited 4G LTE hotspot and was back playing WoD. I leveled my garrison to level 3, achieved bronze in challenge mode, completed the legendary ring quest, upgraded all items using valor points, obtained most of the level 100-110 heirloom trinkets, found a raiding guild that helped me get AoTC on H-HFC, which allowed me to get the Grove Warden (moose mount). All this, 2-3 months before Legion dropped.
Lesson to be learned here and this is what many of those who unsubbed understand. There is nearly no point to stay subbed until nearly the end of the expansion. If you’re an achievement hunter, then you’ll sub until you get AoTC/Cutting Edge. If you’re into PvP, you’ll get your rating/title/mount. Some players might pop in to see what the new IE or warfront is about. They’ll probably unsub a few weeks or a month after. Otherwise, for the barebones player who doesn’t care about pets, mounts, titles, achievements, transmogs, etc, they’ll remain unsubbed until the very end of the expansion, catch up on the story they missed, and gear out for the next expansion courtesy of their very accommodating guild. Every player is different but there’s a decent community of players who don’t care to collect or achieve anything. They either enjoy the story, or choose to dominate PvP/raiding only once per expansion, or once per patch.
When World of Warcraft stopped being a game created and run by gamers, and became a business commodity, it became about the money to be gained. Cutting costs (spending less time and money by developing less content and time gating to it make the sparse pickings last longer, while pruning the employees once use to create the content you have stopped making) is going to be the top priority for the future.
The old controllers of the game loved gaming. The new controllers love profit. Once the game became big enough to attract the attention of the profit mongers to move in, it was dead as we knew it and would never return in its previous form.
You could tell the old beloved game was gone when the people in control started justifying their decisions with phrases like “we know what’s fun”, “you think you do, but you don’t”, “… is working as intended” when the community is talking about all the bugs and glitches and time gates, etc…
WoW has had a great run. It may well continue for years to come. It will never be the same game it was when gamers made their money by making something that people wanted to bring their friends in and the community grew. Now they are content to make fewer players think they are getting the best the developers have to offer and diversifying to keep the profits flowing regardless of how many in-game customers they lose.