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Guest
Guest
The biggest problem in WoW is the same as the biggest problem in Rift and in Conan and in ... every other MMO ever made. It's that whole "same as it ever was" thing. In other words, once you've reached the level cap/gold cap/whatever cap and seen all the zones, played all the quests -- what the heck else is left to do?
With WoW the devs tried to fill that gap by making grinds -- buy a flying mount for a ridiculous amount of gold. And, by the way, you can earn gold by doing this daily quest over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and... until WoW starts to seem like your job, not a game. And then you get that mount (or whatever), and for a little while it's great, you have bragging rights, etc., but then you start to get bored again. Or worse, the devs give in to all the whiners complaining that THEY don't have the same shiny mount, so they change the game and basically just start GIVING it away, so the same thing you slaved six months for can now be had in a day. Turn that around to every damn aspect of the game -- gathering, crafting, gold, achievements, reputation, EVERYTHING -- and you see what WoW becomes "not fun" very quickly.
The payoff -- the addictive "kick" that keeps people coming back -- is new content. When they raise the level cap, you don't want to be left behind as everyone else progresses to 85, or whatever, but then you tear through to 85 and... now what? You've now seen all the NEW content, etc.
So there really are only a few choices for keeping the game alive.
One is just cater to the hardcore base whose life IS WoW; you know, the people who still raid every night after five years, the ones whose entire circle of friends is WoW players. These people will never quit, no matter what, so in one sense, if you keep them happy the game will continue. I mean heck, EverQuest 1 is still going, so why can't WoW?
The only other option -- the ONLY other option -- is more content. EverQuest got that one better than Blizzard, because they released a TON of patches and content updates, and they weren't years apart. Not only that, but the content was drastically different -- this one's the jungles, that one's the moon, this is the icy north. Also, EQ didn't foster the weaker players; when you died, you lost experience, and if you couldn't get back to your body, you could lose EVERYTHING. I'm not 100% sure that's a good design strategy, but it certainly made dying (losing) more risky.
In the end, content is what keeps us coming back to these games. If Blizzard can't release enough new content to keep players interested, WoW will eventually wither and die-- period. Time will tell.
With WoW the devs tried to fill that gap by making grinds -- buy a flying mount for a ridiculous amount of gold. And, by the way, you can earn gold by doing this daily quest over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and... until WoW starts to seem like your job, not a game. And then you get that mount (or whatever), and for a little while it's great, you have bragging rights, etc., but then you start to get bored again. Or worse, the devs give in to all the whiners complaining that THEY don't have the same shiny mount, so they change the game and basically just start GIVING it away, so the same thing you slaved six months for can now be had in a day. Turn that around to every damn aspect of the game -- gathering, crafting, gold, achievements, reputation, EVERYTHING -- and you see what WoW becomes "not fun" very quickly.
The payoff -- the addictive "kick" that keeps people coming back -- is new content. When they raise the level cap, you don't want to be left behind as everyone else progresses to 85, or whatever, but then you tear through to 85 and... now what? You've now seen all the NEW content, etc.
So there really are only a few choices for keeping the game alive.
One is just cater to the hardcore base whose life IS WoW; you know, the people who still raid every night after five years, the ones whose entire circle of friends is WoW players. These people will never quit, no matter what, so in one sense, if you keep them happy the game will continue. I mean heck, EverQuest 1 is still going, so why can't WoW?
The only other option -- the ONLY other option -- is more content. EverQuest got that one better than Blizzard, because they released a TON of patches and content updates, and they weren't years apart. Not only that, but the content was drastically different -- this one's the jungles, that one's the moon, this is the icy north. Also, EQ didn't foster the weaker players; when you died, you lost experience, and if you couldn't get back to your body, you could lose EVERYTHING. I'm not 100% sure that's a good design strategy, but it certainly made dying (losing) more risky.
In the end, content is what keeps us coming back to these games. If Blizzard can't release enough new content to keep players interested, WoW will eventually wither and die-- period. Time will tell.