Why is this relevant to wow? It should affect not only wow but all future blizzard games from here on out. This is their first announcement of a cross play system. They are using this new initiative to lay the groundwork for Diablo 2/3/4 to go on console via cross play as well as any other future Blizzard game.
Consider how Genshin impact was able to make so much money by releasing a game on pc, console and via mobile phone apps. That is actually the future of Blizzard entertainment for some of their upcoming titles.
It will bring players together and thats great but I can see how this is going to be used. I just hope that somewhere in their grand plan we can get a wow mobile pet battle game.
Nope, I made a thread a while back and a blue actually responded. He said something along the likes of controller support added in SL was actually meant to help players with disability or of the kind - it is NOT full adaptation for consoles or anything moving towards allowing console players to cross platform with us. WoW on consoles is not on their list of to do due to the game not having easy targeting system/too many skills and no specialized menu like FF14 for skills layout.
And here’s the quote from an interview confirming it, as well:
“So what we’re doing,” John Hight told me, “is enabling a lot of the things required for our add-on community to build add-ons for controller support. And it isn’t just controllers: we’re looking at a number of different devices. But our focus was not to try and make WoW feel like a console game but rather for players with disabilities to have more accessible input devices.”
This is going to backfire quick for OW… considering that on wow players from US or south america paired with OCE players ends up on skyrocket ms which is a poor experience.
They said it about that update a year ago. Not about this update. Read the article again. Its fairly open to interpretation. Its a whole new thing they did.
“You will be able to make friends anywhere as games published on Battle.net begin to utilize this evolved experience,” says Goolsbey. “We look forward to a future where billions of players worldwide can make friends and play together, regardless of where they are and what device they play on.”
They are developing two WoW mobile things, that was revealed earlier this year. We don’t know what they are yet and I think they’re set for 2022 releases, but they’re definitely expanding more into mobile territory.
I doubt WoW itself will ever go console though. It’s a very different kind of game than Overwatch and Diablo that I don’t know if it’ll really translate well.
Consoles are also very difficult to mod. So you’d be playing WoW with no toys and the default UI. Scary!
They didn’t think of it overnight. That’s been in the works for a long time. Blizz went out of their way to specify last year that controller support in WoW was for disabilities. So WoW itself will most likely not go to console, but the two mobile games they spoke of most likely will take advantage of this new cross play.
imagine thinking players are going to pay twice to play WoW on a console while also being blacklisted by the community for using a controller. imagine trying to join a group with a controller icon next to your name and be declined nonstop.
Have fun being denied groups because you don’t have mods on console. Cross play works fine for games with no mod support, like Overwatch. But once you start talking about games that are heavy into using mods, it starts to become a barrier.
I don’t play OW but I don’t see how crossplay could possibly be fair when some players have a mouse and others have to aim with a controller stick. Anyone who is remotely serious about playing at high skill levels would be forced to go PC.
It works for Hearthstone, though. Input device isn’t a big deal for some types of game – a shooter just isn’t one of them.
