Wow, doesn't feel like Warcraft anymore?

There is the whole matter of humans being lightforged in the Army of the Light. They live for well over one thousand years. Turalyon being over one thousand years old as an example. Humans are like the Legos of Warcraft. You can make almost anything from them.

well he was altered permanently now he technically is immortal the elves originally had a normal lifespan when they were trolls this aspect changed completely changed when they were changed into night elves the well of eternity gave them enhanced strength speed resistances and sense. the lifespan came with the physical changes. however they lost much of the other stuff but things like the blessings of the apsects and the world tree(over the well of eternity) and the sunwell and night well all of which were made with some of the well of eternities energies or water to some degree gave them back some aspects they had to differnt degrees

Unless I’m REALLY mistaken, I seem to recall that a lot of the original WoW staff were EQ players.

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I understand this is a theory being put forward but it’s hard to understand. The people who play video games are video game players.

How does Blizzard make money by changing the product so video game players won’t like it as much? Who are the non video game players that are stepping in to make up the difference by paying to play this video game?

Honestly, when I heard horde and alliance could group together in the upcoming dragonflight expansion I almost didn’t come back. I be just always been horde and always had the zug zug mentality that we’re supposed to hate the alliance. I will say I’m glad I came back and I play with quite a few alliance players now and I’ve lost that mentality, for the most part. The entire “warcraft” mentality tho where it was a war of alliance vs horde kind of started fading towards the end of wrath. By legion the story line is pretty much everyone hold hands, sing kumbyeyah and drink hot cocoa together while we kill the enemy threat. They tried to rein that in a bit with BFA but didn’t really rein it in enough imo. That game is long gone and I don’t know if it’ll ever come back…at least it would be tough to make it make sense.

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Look at the energy, passion and excitement from the staff at earlier blizzcons and then watch some of the dragonflight round table discussions before the expansion came out and you’ll see a marked difference.

It went from dorky white guys with long hair, to young….people on anti-depressants and testosterone blockers, that hate dorky white guys with long hair

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Yes; the people who play video games are, indeed, video game players. And the product hasn’t been changed so video game players won’t like it as much. What has changed, in my opinion, is the motivation and focus of management. When it was Blizzard, the motivation and focus was on producing a game the developers and designers liked and bet that other gamers would like it to. And they were successful because the motivation and focus from top to bottom was to produce a quality video game for gamers. Top down, games for gamers.

When Blizzard became Activation-Blizzard, the motivation and focus at the top became keeping the share prices high and the shareholders happy and well-fed. The game didn’t turn into a less-than-desirable product, as evidenced by the on-going – but dwindling – playerbase. I remember “back in the day” – and you probably do as well – when they had to create MORE realms because the existing realms were getting overloaded. Then what happened? They started linking realms because players were experiencing fewer and fewer players on some realms. That was a good band-aid but the problem persisted to the point that they merged realms to keep populations at acceptable levels.

The game was still playable and satisfying to a lot of players, albeit fewer than the 12 million at Wrath’s peak. It’s still playable and entertaining to a degree for those who remain. (I say “to a degree” because entertaining is an individual thing; what you and I may consider entertaining may be sheer boredom to someone else.) And that is where the game is today … still playable, still entertaining to one degree or another for the players who are still here, but the motivation and focus at the top has changed. And it’s the top that is driving the development and design now, not the developers and designers.

I repeat, however, that this is just one person’s opinion based on my experiences and observations over the years (anecdotal evidence, to be sure). I was in a guild with nearly 100 people and over 200 characters between us, both Horde and Alliance, on 3 realms. Now, besides me, there are only four others still in the game. Not solely because of what I’ve presented, but for myriad reasons. But I feel the change at the top is in the mix there somewhere.

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eh. im ok with the cyborgs, being only partially robotic allows greater flexability for how much robot you want to be. though i do wish we had more options for full robot as they only get one generic silver and gold full robot suit for their heritage armor

I think you are talking about two different things. Yes, player numbers seem to be down and I offer a list from time to time of the numerous theories people have put forward as to why that is true.

But in any business, the way you make more money is to try and get as many people to buy your service or product as possible. I have a hard time understanding the theory that to make more money they are putting less effot into producing a good product. That would seem to be counter productive.

Most successful computer products have a life time curive, growing at first, hitting a peak then fading down to legacy mode. WOW is an old game. It doesn’t play well as a mobile game. The industry has changed out from under what it did best.

But if they want to increase revenue then the way to do that is to increase sales and the way to do that would be to try their best to create a product the customers would want to buy. That’s business 101.

It’s done all the time in the business world. A snip here in expenses, don’t hire a replacement for a vacant position, the “do more with less” business model. All to keep those dividends going to the shareholders. And in Activision-Blizzard’s case, stop publicizing the size of the player base so they don’t have to field questions from the shareholders. Then there’s a little thing called “additional duties” that increases an employee’s workload instead of hiring someone to do those “duties.” Why hire another logistics/supply guy when ol’ Joe in design can take care of that in his “free” time?

None of that, individually, raises a red flag … except to the poor schmucks who have to carry those extra loads. It does have an impact on the folks doing the nuts and bolts daily work to make the product. Management’s priorities DO have impacts down in the trenches. At times it’s a wonder how the product actually maintains some level of acceptance and popularity by the public.

As I stated in my initial response to the subject: Addiction.

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Yeah, gamers rise up!!!

Me angy :rage: :rage:!!!

All these WOMEN with their weak bones and their breasts are ruining my video game! :triumph:

I do agree that WoW doesn’t feel like a Warcraft product and that WoW isn’t as fun as it used to be (we can confirm this now because Classic is a thing), but you have to at least give it to Blizzard for keeping the game alive and well in 2023.

From here I think it’s important to maintain what they have and to bring some of the older fans back. Metzen may be apart of that plan too because who knows old school Warcraft better than him?

…not sure that means what you think it means.

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It means WoW Classic is fun.

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Retail is a thing. So therefore it is also fun

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I will go to my death bed in Minecraft saying that Shadowlands could e been S-tier if they bait and switched the main villain from the Jailer to Daddy D.

The other question is: should it even come back? Like, the advantage that you have by ending the faction conflict is that players can more readily engage in cross faction gameplay which is ultimately more healthy for the game long term then simply having orcs and humans headbutting each other over and over again.

This isn’t to say that I’d be opposed to a return to it at some point, but I’d need a really good reason for it that doesn’t get kicked off with one of the faction leaders going “LETZ DO A WARCRIMEZ WHEEEEE111!!!11!”

I’ve been through 4 guild collapses since SL now. People aren’t just sticking around anymore.

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They’re not doing this though, because WoW doesn’t attract, nor retain new players, so what they’re doing is milking what is left of the player base through microtransactions and token sales.

The last 3-4 expansions have been filled to the brim with systems and design concepts to just pad play time and stretch out what little content the team can put out now.

All the content outside of raids and dungeons just feels so formulaic, even the design of the new dungeons just feels very boring and designed with M+ in mind.

The entire game is just feels extremely stale, and cheaply made.

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Fact is, some times it works and other times it doesn’t. As with so many other things there is a curve.

Too few workers, the work doesn’t get done. Too many workers and you are paying people to spend some of their time playing video games. You want to be at the peak of that curve where people come in, do an honest days work, then go home.

I’ve seen it go both ways. I’ve been in groups that layed off too many people and we just couldn’t get the work done and I’ve been in companies that couldn’t make ends meet because their costs were too high.

But one thing remains the same, if you don’t have a product or service that people like and are willing to buy, no amount of cost cutting or gimmicks is going to help.

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