Blizzard Announces 4th WoW Expansion: Mists of Pandaria

[TW_Honorius]

When will Kung Fu Panda (Dreamworks) sue Blizzard for this copyright infringement.

 

[Ragnar-Kon]

[citation][nom]rasagul[/nom]I think they should have gone with penguins...[/citation]Alright. I'll admit, I lol'd. And my roommate gave me a funny look because of it.

Anyway, I doubt it'll increase their subscription numbers, because the game IS getting old. Same thing happened to Everquest.

As for myself, I will probably check out the expansion eventually, but my hard-core MMO days are over, so no rush.

 

[Ragnar-Kon]

[citation][nom]wildkitten[/nom]I'm sure their shareholders care.[/citation]
Exactly. I'm sure Blizzard realizes the game is getting old, but because their shareholders care, they're still going to care.

But lets be honest, even with the dwindling subscription numbers, WoW STILL has at least 6-8 times more subscribers than any other MMO out there. And that is impressive.

I'm curious to see how SWTOR will do. Gut feeling says it won't kick WoW off the throne.

 

[wildkitten]

[citation][nom]Ragnar-Kon[/nom]Exactly. I'm sure Blizzard realizes the game is getting old, but because their shareholders care, they're still going to care.But lets be honest, even with the dwindling subscription numbers, WoW STILL has at least 6-8 times more subscribers than any other MMO out there. And that is impressive.I'm curious to see how SWTOR will do. Gut feeling says it won't kick WoW off the throne.[/citation]
It won't kick WoW off the throne, but I have a feeling they are more worried about Guild Wars 2. It seems Blizzard will try to coincide patch 4.3's release with the ST:TOR release, and they won't have anything to release to compete with GW2. And GW2 is done by a lot of former Blizzard people who don't have the restrictions on them the current Blizzard people unfortunately do.

and if the third quarter numbers show another steep decline, one has to wonder how many subs WoW will lose next year when they have no new content. I mean if they lose over a million when they're producing at least some content, you have to think during a year when there is nothing new they will lose a lot more than that.

 

[beayn]

[citation][nom]wildkitten[/nom]and if the third quarter numbers show another steep decline, one has to wonder how many subs WoW will lose next year when they have no new content. I mean if they lose over a million when they're producing at least some content, you have to think during a year when there is nothing new they will lose a lot more than that.[/citation]

Blizzard has never gone a year without releasing content for WoW. They always have content patches every 6 months or so, and major expansions every 2 years. They have recently talked about releasing an expansion every year instead. This new xpac may come out earlier than normal because of that.

 

[wildkitten]

[citation][nom]beayn[/nom]Blizzard has never gone a year without releasing content for WoW. They always have content patches every 6 months or so, and major expansions every 2 years. They have recently talked about releasing an expansion every year instead. This new xpac may come out earlier than normal because of that.[/citation]
You obviously have not played Wrath of the Lich King where ICC was was the last real content update. Was done a year before Cataclysm's release. Yes, there was the Ruby Sanctum, but I have not met anyone who considered that real content as it had nothing to do with the story. Was a 10 minute instance.

And Blizzard has already said that 4.3 will be the last raid for Cataclysm. Yes, there will be a patch 5.0 a couple of weeks before MoP is released, but that will just be the standard pre expansion patch that always gets released before an expansion to bring the game world up to date.

As for coming out with expansions faster, I seriously doubt that. For one thing, D3 has been pushed back till after the first of the year. I still expect it fairly early in the year because the second Starcraft 2 campaign will probably be released in the summer. Summertime will make 2 years since the first SC2 was released and I doubt they want to go longer than that. That puts MoP firmly at a holiday release for 2012, same timeline as every other WoW release. Blizzard will never release 2 titles at the same time or even fairly close.

Most of their fans have traditionsally been fans of Blizzard themselves, meaning they want to play all 3 of Blizzard's franchises, not just fans of one. They never have made people choose between one or the other before for playing something new, and I doubt they would start now. And with Activision losing money and WoW bleeding subscribers, I doubt anyone at Blizz, and especially Bobby Kotick, will want to hurt sales of one title because of self competing release dates.

 

[Guest]

WTF Kung foo Panda rip off?
Blizzard could be in shit hahaha

 

[Onus]

Made me think of a cartoonish rip-off of Cantha.

 

[nbelote]

World of Warcraft: Kung Fu Panda

 

[Icylobster]

People do realize that the Pandaren are nothing new to the Warcraft scene right? It was originally an April Fools joke for Warcraft III that became immensely popular, because of this they adapted it into lore a long time ago. It is in no way related to Kung Foo Panda or anything of the like. It bothers me how people will criticize something when they haven't the slightest clue about it :/

 

[dotaloc]

uh...why does this seem like a SNL pardon? or...pandarody?

 

[wildkitten]

[citation][nom]Icylobster[/nom]People do realize that the Pandaren are nothing new to the Warcraft scene right? It was originally an April Fools joke for Warcraft III that became immensely popular, because of this they adapted it into lore a long time ago. It is in no way related to Kung Foo Panda or anything of the like. It bothers me how people will criticize something when they haven't the slightest clue about it[/citation]
You have to realize, Blizzard has driven off the franchise fan from WoW. When I left WoW in June it seemed like very very few people on the game even knew anything about the lore, and very few even wanted to. All they cared about was "shinies".

 

[chumly]

I thought they weren't going to do pandas cause it offends the Chinese or something.

 

[Lonecontrol]

Wow talk about pandering(lol)! Blizzard understands that their new market will be China and the East. They just took a sharp turn to irrelevance in the US MMO market.

 

[wildkitten]

[citation][nom]chumly[/nom]I thought they weren't going to do pandas cause it offends the Chinese or something.[/citation]
That myth has been debunked so many times and for so long it's not funny.

China's objections had nothing to do with displaying or even killing of panda's. Their objection was based on the orginal Pandarian artwork that had them dressed in Japanese garb. The Chinese government did not what they consider an animal symbol of their nation being portrayed in the clothing of one of their longest running enemies. Once Blizzard changed that (which was years ago) they had no issues with the Pandarians.

 

[wildkitten]

[citation][nom]Lonecontrol[/nom]Wow talk about pandering(lol)! Blizzard understands that their new market will be China and the East. They just took a sharp turn to irrelevance in the US MMO market.[/citation]
Um, that's not a new market. China has always had roughly a third of the WoW subscriber base, with the whole of Asia making up roughly half.

However, I will agree that this does seem to be a bit of pandering (and yes, cute pun). I have thought since they released Cataclysm so fast in China after Wrath's release that it meant Wrath bombed there. I think when the entire transition from The9 to Netease happened and the game was down for months there that there was trouble brewing for WoW in China.

China is the only region that has had server mergers and so forth, so I do believe there is some marketing reasons involved in this choice for the expansion.

 

[Souporsalad]

[citation][nom]hokkdawg[/nom]Kind of stopped playing WoW about 1 week after Cata...[/citation]
so did i
🙁

 

[Guest]

blizzard should think outside the box, (here me out) i wrote a letter to them a few months ago, i explained my idea, call the next expansion WOW: Diablo. and shut down wow slowly, allowing any usership in wow to transfer over when diablo 3 comes out, character for character, and start using the wow servers for diablo 3. so anyone starting wow, can go buy diablo 3 wow.. (instead of grinding out from level 1 up) and start enjoying, and people who are level 85 in wow can start enjoying diable with a equal transfer of a powerful character. I will not be buying this expansion pack, i am done at 85, the game is boring now. same old nonsense. the graphics engine is sub-par with whats out now. as many of you say put the effort into diablo 3 and keep the wow customers by allowing them to transfer over.. i am sure they can put together a great storyline to merge the two over.. my two cents... and NO i have never heard back from blizzard.

 

[Zuesacoatl]

Blizzard is doing what they do best, support games for super long extended periods of time. How long has D2 been out? and they still have been upgrading it, added new items and such, that is what makes Blizzard one of the best game developers in the world. Just because you may not enjoy WoW does not mean others do not, get over yourself, seriously. When i read people saying "omg, Blizzard needs to change cause i dont play wow." all i see are nothing but a bunch of 2 years fighting over transfromers in the sand box. Bizz is a company first and foremost. They need profit to survive, and even if they dropped half of their wow subscribers before MoP hits, they sill have over 5 million copies of an expansion they can sell. MONEY!!! second, they have always supported their games, the day they stop supporting old working titles, is the day i stop buying from Blizz.

And to boot, i seem to recall everyone saying "Rift is going to bring wow to its knees!" It seems that a base of under 1 mil is really making Blizz think twice about not supporting its title. I do not see SWTOR stealing enough of a base from wow to affect blizz. They are two different genres of games. It is like comparing Rainbowbright to Jenna Jamison. I will try it, but in all honesty, i like wow, i like the look and feel of the game, yes, i love classic, i miss it, i miss the days when you log on to your server and everyone knew your name if you were good enough to be known, but i adapted to the new wow.

Either do the same, or get over it. Your whining is not going to make blizz rush a premiere title for you and release a bethesda quality game, they try and ensure the game is golden right out of the gate, it may take longer, but in the end, all you whiners normally change your toon and thank them for the extra effort.

 

[JOSHSKORN]

ANOTHER WoW? This makes me a sad PANDA.

 

[pocketdrummer]

I have a years worth of wow subscriptions sitting on my desk... I just haven't had the urge to even play this game.

Will the world just let WoW die off already so we can have a NEW MMO already? Maybe one that isn't based on swords, axes, and magic?

 

[memadmax]

You guys act as if some a-hole who thinks they know how many people are WoW subscribers is the GOSPEL....

Only blizzard knows, and they don't say $ h i t.......

 

[de5_Roy]

is that panda(in the screenshot) wearing somehting like a bridesmaid's dress?
does it change into a smarmy old martial arts instructor from 'anything goes martial arts school' when you throw cold water on it?
its got a front ponytail too. something new indeed. 😛
i suspect it will have cameo by po and that panda from tekken.

 

[Wish I Was Wealthy]

At least that clip of the pandas was better value to watch than the "fashionpp" post up above mine.

 

[ct001]

Smells like desperation.