Like it or not WoW is simply put the best MMO out there right now, and I've tried others like Age Of Conan, and Warhammer Online which had the potential to be better. Truth be told most of the MMOs developed out there are full of promises that never see fruitition, and are rarely polished to the point that they should be.
WoW succeeded and was able to set the standards it did (though interface and such) by having a truely astronomical budget. It was something substantial like sixty million dollars (I think I can't remember exactly) years ago (since prices have gone up) and the producers fronting that money were willing to leave the developers alone and finish it on their own time.
The problem is that nobody succeeds to the same level because noone is really willing to invest that amount of capitol to see the development. What's more even with say one third the budget (with each dollar being worth a little less proportionaly as well) you have the producers also riding the dev team demanding that they want to see returns on their twenty million dollars right bloody now.
A lot of people dislike WoW because it's mainstream and successful, and I can sort of get that, especially seeing as the genere HAS kind of stagnated around it. But that doesn't change the quality of WoW (especially allowing for the time it's existed), or really explain why few games can compete with it, most only having one or two gimmicks, and the fact that they aren't WoW (for the burn outs and people who hate anything mainstream).
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Despite 11 million players, it should be understood WoW is at it's heart an RPG. RPG games aren't for everyone. I mean heck, look at Yahtzee. If the idea of levels, stat driven content, and being able to follow certain formulas to success (playing your role) isn't your cup of tea to begin with, WoW will do *NOTHING* to change that for you.
A shared enviroment has the advantage of being able to meet other RPGers (though not nessicarly RPers), and team up with them for differant objectives. BUT it also has the disadvantage of having to be fairly generic in the content for the most part (ie quests to kill 5 of these, or fetch something and bring it back) since the world doesn't truely revolve around any one character. WoW has tried to make things a little more personally immersive with some clever usage of instancing and the like in it's latest expansion, but such events are relatively uncommon, and come sandwiched inbetween long bouts of the generic game play that enviroments sharded beyond a tiny handfull of people require.
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One thing to also remember (this going mostly towards the MMO veterans out there) is that these games can be downright rough to get started in. Serious MMO players usually get involved in a game from the beginning and come up along with the game. Even if you don't rush to be in the first wave, there were always a lot of other people running around at the same level as you to do things with, and who arguably didn't know anything more than you.
Some guy who logs into an established server rapidly finds himself running through nearly deserted newbie areas that have been abandoned by most of the game play community. Sure they might fine some guy starting a new character, but it's not reliable, and a lot of those guys are going to be twinked to the gills. Even if they aren't impatient with the real newbies, they are just playing an alt part time, and aren't really comitted to doing any of that content so can't be relied on to help the new player.
This is to say nothing of paranoia, since we've all run into lowbies of high level guys running around acting helpless so they can receive gifts "for fun".
The economies also get nuked. I mean in natural progression there is all kinds of stuff for sale around your level at prices you can afford (by their nature). In an established twink economy, a new player starting with no resources is in a rough spot.
The point here being that some guy who "finally tries WoW" without any preconceived notions is NOT nessicarly going to see the same game a lot of those 11 million players saw. Sure, maybe he'll get lucky and run into some established player who will actually teach him how to play and give away enough stuff to balance the wasted economy (at least for the low levels), but then again maybe not.
Understand that for a WoW veteran and perhaps some jaded designers it seems "simple" that a brand new player could login to the game, and then sell overpriced stacks of low-level herbs and ore and such to twinks trying to powerlevel their skills without wanting to go hunt for the stuff themselves. People that oftentimes forget that it might very well have taken them a week of running around cautiously, and not wanting to head to the wrong place by accident, before they even got to the Auction House for the first time.
A lot of rambling, but the point is that I think WoW is misunderstood from all perspectives.
Honestly, if you think you'd like WoW, unless you have RELIABLE friends who are playing, I'd suggest waiting for a new MMO to launch and try and get in on the ground floor. Even if the game is mediocre it will be more approchable and long-term server development won't taint any impressions or confuse the game itself from what the game evolves into.
If you tend not to like RPGs to begin with, and especially the idea of simple quests and 'hunting' a bunch of monsters constantly, then honestly WoW isn't going to change any minds.
WoW succeeded and was able to set the standards it did (though interface and such) by having a truely astronomical budget. It was something substantial like sixty million dollars (I think I can't remember exactly) years ago (since prices have gone up) and the producers fronting that money were willing to leave the developers alone and finish it on their own time.
The problem is that nobody succeeds to the same level because noone is really willing to invest that amount of capitol to see the development. What's more even with say one third the budget (with each dollar being worth a little less proportionaly as well) you have the producers also riding the dev team demanding that they want to see returns on their twenty million dollars right bloody now.
A lot of people dislike WoW because it's mainstream and successful, and I can sort of get that, especially seeing as the genere HAS kind of stagnated around it. But that doesn't change the quality of WoW (especially allowing for the time it's existed), or really explain why few games can compete with it, most only having one or two gimmicks, and the fact that they aren't WoW (for the burn outs and people who hate anything mainstream).
-
Despite 11 million players, it should be understood WoW is at it's heart an RPG. RPG games aren't for everyone. I mean heck, look at Yahtzee. If the idea of levels, stat driven content, and being able to follow certain formulas to success (playing your role) isn't your cup of tea to begin with, WoW will do *NOTHING* to change that for you.
A shared enviroment has the advantage of being able to meet other RPGers (though not nessicarly RPers), and team up with them for differant objectives. BUT it also has the disadvantage of having to be fairly generic in the content for the most part (ie quests to kill 5 of these, or fetch something and bring it back) since the world doesn't truely revolve around any one character. WoW has tried to make things a little more personally immersive with some clever usage of instancing and the like in it's latest expansion, but such events are relatively uncommon, and come sandwiched inbetween long bouts of the generic game play that enviroments sharded beyond a tiny handfull of people require.
-
One thing to also remember (this going mostly towards the MMO veterans out there) is that these games can be downright rough to get started in. Serious MMO players usually get involved in a game from the beginning and come up along with the game. Even if you don't rush to be in the first wave, there were always a lot of other people running around at the same level as you to do things with, and who arguably didn't know anything more than you.
Some guy who logs into an established server rapidly finds himself running through nearly deserted newbie areas that have been abandoned by most of the game play community. Sure they might fine some guy starting a new character, but it's not reliable, and a lot of those guys are going to be twinked to the gills. Even if they aren't impatient with the real newbies, they are just playing an alt part time, and aren't really comitted to doing any of that content so can't be relied on to help the new player.
This is to say nothing of paranoia, since we've all run into lowbies of high level guys running around acting helpless so they can receive gifts "for fun".
The economies also get nuked. I mean in natural progression there is all kinds of stuff for sale around your level at prices you can afford (by their nature). In an established twink economy, a new player starting with no resources is in a rough spot.
The point here being that some guy who "finally tries WoW" without any preconceived notions is NOT nessicarly going to see the same game a lot of those 11 million players saw. Sure, maybe he'll get lucky and run into some established player who will actually teach him how to play and give away enough stuff to balance the wasted economy (at least for the low levels), but then again maybe not.
Understand that for a WoW veteran and perhaps some jaded designers it seems "simple" that a brand new player could login to the game, and then sell overpriced stacks of low-level herbs and ore and such to twinks trying to powerlevel their skills without wanting to go hunt for the stuff themselves. People that oftentimes forget that it might very well have taken them a week of running around cautiously, and not wanting to head to the wrong place by accident, before they even got to the Auction House for the first time.
A lot of rambling, but the point is that I think WoW is misunderstood from all perspectives.
Honestly, if you think you'd like WoW, unless you have RELIABLE friends who are playing, I'd suggest waiting for a new MMO to launch and try and get in on the ground floor. Even if the game is mediocre it will be more approchable and long-term server development won't taint any impressions or confuse the game itself from what the game evolves into.
If you tend not to like RPGs to begin with, and especially the idea of simple quests and 'hunting' a bunch of monsters constantly, then honestly WoW isn't going to change any minds.
