World of Warcraft Won't Go Free-to-Play, Blizzard Says

[Andy Chalk]

World of Warcraft Won't Go Free-to-Play, Blizzard Says

Despite declining subscriber numbers, Blizzard says World of Warcraft won't be made free-to-play.

Activision revealed earlier this week that World of Warcraft dropped another 100,000 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/129393-World-of-Warcraft-Slows-Losses-As-Activision-Beats-Q3-Outlook] subscribers, which isn't as bad as it sounds in the context of its remaining 7.6 million users and a greatly reduced decline compared to that of the previous quarter. It's still a far cry from the glory days of 12 million users, though, but don't expect Blizzard to hop aboard the popular (and, for many, lucrative) free-to-play train anytime soon.

"We didn't make the game to be free-to-play," World of Warcraft Production Director J. Allen Brack told Eurogamer. "We would have to rework the game pretty significantly in order to make it free-to-play. It's not something we're currently considering."

Brack said he hoped Warlords of Draenor, the WoW expansion revealed yesterday [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/129467-Warlords-of-Draenor-Expansion-Announced-for-World-of-Warcraft] at Blizzcon, would increase subscriber numbers, but added that the development team focuses on creating content, while "business concerns" are left to the publisher.

Despite the declining numbers, World of Warcraft remains the heavyweight champion of subscription MMOs, and the "not currently" qualifier leaves the door open to reconsideration in the future. Which is probably wise: In 2008 Blizzard's Rob Pardo will be implemented [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/81640-Blizzard-VP-Says-No-Micro-Transactions-for-World-of-Warcraft]. Five years is an eternity for a videogame, to be fair, but as they old saying goes, never say never.

Source: Eurogamer [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-11-09-blizzard-rules-out-free-to-play-world-of-warcraft]


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[stormeris]

Don't care.
Unless they added Murlocs as a playable race.

Then i'd fucking throw all my money at them.

But if people still play it, still pay for it, well... Who am i to judge?

 

[spartandude]

Havnt they been talking about mirco transactions recently? Dont tell me they're going to have both a subscription and MTs.

 

[DazZ.]

Havnt they been talking about mirco transactions recently? Dont tell me they're going to have both a subscription and MTs.

I don't play the game anymore but I thought they have been doing that for at least a year now?

 

[Me55enger]

It's certainly a bit of a unqiue genre in terms of lifespan.

I was honestly expecting Blizzard to eventually decommission WoW with it's dignity intact, but if the lines are read between what they didn't say, perhaps not.

 

[mattaui]

They really are raking in so much cash with subscriptions that it would be foolish for them to consider f2p until those subscription numbers are much, much lower. The games that made the switch to f2p were dealing with subscribers in the hundreds of thousands at most.

 

[Grabehn]

I loved playing the game back in Vanilla, and still kind of enjoyed it up until Wrath, making Pugs to take every guy that need it in my guild, or even people that just wanted to do the instances but had no one to help them.

Then Cata came up and it just felt like a dumbed down version of everything, and since then I haven't touched the game and never put any thought into it.

Havnt they been talking about mirco transactions recently? Dont tell me they're going to have both a subscription and MTs.

They've had both for a while now, not including all the payed mounts and pets.

 

[LetalisK]

They really are raking in so much cash with subscriptions that it would be foolish for them to consider f2p until those subscription numbers are much, much lower. The games that made the switch to f2p were dealing with subscribers in the hundreds of thousands at most.

True. But people will still be surprised because WoW is considered to have one foot in the grave, despite its 7.6 million players. :/

 

[Compatriot Block]

The only micro-transactions they have right now are mounts, mini-pets and a few pieces of armor to transmogrify. At least that was true last time I checked.

Their being so lazy as to reuse Garrosh as a villain

To be fair, from how I saw it explained over on the WoW forums, he plays a pretty minor role. I think he escapes imprisonment and gets the plot-ball rolling by dicking with the Dark Portal, but I'm pretty sure they confirmed that he's not going to be the major antagonist.

I'm not sure, but I think Blizzard knows better than to have the exact same enemy from the last expansion again. I refuse to be that cynical until it's more than speculation.

 

[DugMachine]

Their being so lazy as to reuse Garrosh as a villain

They stated he's not the main villain of this expansion. He escapes, and puts plans into motion but he's not the end boss and plays a minor role supposedly. Heck, they even said there won't be a final orc boss so that just puts it to rest.

 

[fix-the-spade]

I was honestly expecting Blizzard to eventually decommission WoW with it's dignity intact, but if the lines are read between what they didn't say, perhaps not.

Remember that Activision is indirectly involved, they don't let anything go until it's a broken, shivering wreck begging to be destroyed to the few left who will listen.

Besides, even if it's lost almost half it's subscribers, 7.6 million still equates to something $1.1billion a year just from the subscriptions, assuming everyone buys the cheapest one. It's not like WoW is anywhere near the desperation levels The Old Republic and Lord of the Rings Online got to when they went free to play.

 

[BooTsPs3]

Isn't there already micro transactions in the form of the digital store to buy pets and mounts and such?

I think blizzard is confusing free to play with pay to win. Seriously, they could practically copy guild wars 2s system of payment and be fine. They already have a store for it. Hell, the guild wars team even went out and said that they wouldn't be having an expansion any time soon, as they are making enough money from the gem store to release frequent updates to the game anyway (every two weeks if i'm correct). Yet wow charges both for expansions and for a sub.

I'm not someone who insists on wow going free. Honestly i don't care too much as i've lost pretty much all interest in the game. But this, this is the biggest piece of bullcrap i've seen in a while. If you want money just say it. Don't make shitty excuses that fall apart at a minor inspection.

 

[Yuuki]

Nobody is asking WoW to go completely free-to-play, but at least reduce the subscription fee...it's been sitting at $15 a month for the last 8 fucking years! Considering all the free/cheaper WoW alternatives that have popped up, it's simply impossible to justify that kind of money nowadays.
Blizzard is making $114 million a month JUST from WoW subscriptions, that's not including all the extra cash they're making from microtransactions, server transfers, etc. Are they seriously implying that more than a tiny fraction of that is going towards content/support/etc? Bullshit.

The ONLY reason Blizzard are still charging $15 is because players are happy to keep paying that with no thought or consideration (i.e. blind sheep syndrome) because the fee is "still worth it" for them.

 

[lancar]

They'll make it F2P when the money situation calls for it, and not a minute earlier. They very likely have all sorts of contingency plans on what to do when that day comes, but until it does they know better than to rock the boat too much.

If subs are still working great for them, then there is absolutely ZERO reason to change it. Simple as that.

 

[Colt47]

I'm still curious where the end game culture is heading in WoW, as the last time I played the game before switching to FFXIV ARR it felt like things were just falling apart. This is back during May/June, though. I really can't go back that easily either given my old computer died on me and took the files with it.

 

[DugMachine]

Nobody is asking WoW to go completely free-to-play, but at least reduce the subscription fee...it's been sitting at $15 a month for the last 8 fucking years! Considering all the free/cheaper WoW alternatives that have popped up, it's simply impossible to justify that kind of money nowadays.
Blizzard is making $114 million a month JUST from WoW subscriptions, that's not including all the extra cash they're making from microtransactions, server transfers, etc. Are they seriously implying that more than a tiny fraction of that is going towards content/support/etc? Bullshit.

The ONLY reason Blizzard are still charging $15 is because players are happy to keep paying that with no thought or consideration (i.e. blind sheep syndrome) because the fee is "still worth it" for them.

Sorry but I've never understood this. What should they reduce the price to? $5? $10? $15 a month is seriously nothing, and I'm not even rich or well off for that matter. Is paying every month for a game lame? Yes. Should it go free? Maybe but a "reduced" price won't change anything.

 

[wulfy42]

F2p would not work for WoW at all right now, it's player base is already too large.

F2p works great if you have a small or medium player base as you'll get flooded with tons of new users, and only a percentage of them will actually put any money into the game.

If you have a 150k player base, and have servers that can handle 2million...then F2p is a GREAT idea. Even if you only get 20% of players to invest in the game, you can end up making significantly more with a F2p setup with low numbers like that.


But...if you have over 7 MILLION people playing your game and blowing $15 a month doing so (less with yearly subs but whatever)....You would need the ability to at least have 5-6x as many players as you have now..in order to actually make more of a profit from F2p. That is especially true depending on how you convert old players to the new system (since you might lose a large % of the current income as well).

WoW has made so much money, over such a long time. I think it will be very hard to make much money from a F2p system..since quite a large portion of the player base has already actually.....played and paid for WoW. What they have now....first 20 levels free....is probably the best solution as it gets new players into the game (letting them try it for free), while still keeping the long term players paying consistently.

Even if their player base halved again to only 3 million...it still would not make sense to go FtP yet. I wouldn't even consider it personally till they dropped under 1-2 million..and then only because it's looking like those numbers will still go down pretty soon, and it's a last ditch effort to keep the game alive.

It's nowhere near that yet though.