The Secret of WoW
- Thread starter Shamus Young
- Start date
Simply make a game that doesn't revolve around combat. That's why EVE after all these years is still growing. It does this successfully. Don't copy WoW, make something different.
I played a rogue through to level 70 and tried my hand at several other classes. I also tried dozens of other MMOs when I got tired of WoW. Seems I just don't like MMOs that much. But there were parts I did like, and Shamus nailed all of them.
I've seen lots of other MMOs best WoW on a few of these features: City of Heroes and Villians had amazing character and play-style customization; Lord of the Rings had both great graphics and a strong crafting system; Dungeons and Dragons and Warhammer both had great combat systems; Warhammer's RvR and scenarios were fun, exciting, and rewarding.
Unfortunately, as Shamus said, they all focused on a few things and screwed up on the others. Dungeons and Dragons and Lord of the Rings had terrible social interactions -- it was difficult to find people, make groups, and stay in contact with friends. Warhammer's PvE was generally lack-luster, as was its storyline: it was basically just an MMO version of Counterstrike. Warhammer's player customization also left a lot to be desired; they said it was because everybody was supposed to be part of the same army, but I call it a cop-out -- users want customization, canon be damned. It also had the fastest mob repopulation rate I've ever seen, to the point where I regularly died from the same boss that I just finished killing because it respawned before I could leave the room. City of Heroes supposedly had a good storyline, but I never saw it, and the worlds seemed sparsely populated and repetitive. Age of Conan... well, I don't know that it did anything right.
I would actually still play WoW, but there were a few things they could have done better that new games could take advantage of:
1. Faster progression. Most of what people who don't like MMOs complain about is the slow grind to get anywhere, and I agree that they have a point. The first 10-20 levels give you levels, items, and new skills every few hours, but at higher levels it can be days or weeks before anything new and useful is gained. There's only so long you can beat on the same monsters before it gets boring; new stories, areas, monsters, items, and skills need to come often enough to keep things fresh and new, even if that means the player goes through the game's content faster.
2. More emphasis on skill and teamwork than grind and gear. Many people say that WoW doesn't start until the level cap and they're right. Until then, every encounter can be soloed, every monster can be beat with minimal thought, and it's only a matter of grinding long enough until the next level comes. But in the end game, raids demand much more of the player; groups of 5, 10, or 25 people need to work together, plan strategies, balance abilities, and otherwise work hard to make it through an instance. They are also much more rewarding, giving players items that make a difference to their abilities, often unlocking the ability to take on bigger and more difficult instances. This is what makes a game a game: challenge and reward. This shouldn't be left until the end game; this should happen all the way along.
3. Better crafting and customization. WoW allows players to have a lot of control over how their character plays through skill customization, enchanting, gem socketing, glyphs, and a host of other facilities, but where they fall down is in crafting. Most things that can be crafted aren't worth crafting by the time you acquire the ability to do so, and the ones that are useful are only useful to the player to make once. A craft is a creative art, where a person makes something better than usual through their own care and creation. If everybody can make the same stuff you can, it's not a craft, it's a commodity, and to maintain balance, it has to be valued as such, which is what happened in WoW. They managed to fix that somewhat in Wrath of the Lich King, where a player can only have a few of the best recipes, resulting in everybody having a specialty or two that few others have.
For one, crafted items should be worth crafting. They should either be useful to the person crafting it, or should be worth enough to another player that they will pay enough to make it worth it to the crafter. Crafted items should also be more flexible: let the player choose colors, designs, and attributes. There are lots of ways to keep this balanced; for example, give each potential crafted item a point value based on the power of the attributes the crafter wants it to have, then base the material cost, time to craft, and likelihood of success on that point value and the crafter's skill. By allowing the crafter to come up with the combinations, you allow them to make the item they want without having to make hundreds of recipes that are all very similar, and you allow them to express their creativity, which is every craftsman's pride.
Discovery is also fun. A lot of people like to experiment, and crafts based on chemistry, biology, and magic lend themselves nicely to this. Let people try combining random ingredients to see what happens. Sure, somebody will eventually make a website listing all the combinations, but most players never see those sites anyway, just like most players don't read the spoilers to find out the storyline.
4. Better communication. WoW is one of the better ones for this, but it took them a long time to get it even half-ways right. If you are using text chat, it needs to be clearly visible, with enough lines to maintain the context of the conversation, especially when things get heated. It needs to be clear who is speaking, including separating guilds, private messages, game messages, and global chatter. Filtering is also important. Ignore lists are essential and shouldn't be limited in their size.
Better yet, through it all away and use voice chat. For groups working together, nothing is more immediate and personal than voice and it frees the user's hands to play the game. In games without built-in voice chat (all but WoW, which only picked it up within the last couple of years), the best groups will make their own voice chat with programs like Ventrilo and TeamSpeak, but it's inconvenient to be switching between programs. You know your users want it, so build it in, and make it seamless, automatic, and expected.
There are probably other things they could use, but these are the ones that strike me as the most important. If I could find an MMO with the quality of World of Warcraft, but with these improvements, I wouldn't care what theme it was or what company developed it; I would be helplessly lost in the game.
I've seen lots of other MMOs best WoW on a few of these features: City of Heroes and Villians had amazing character and play-style customization; Lord of the Rings had both great graphics and a strong crafting system; Dungeons and Dragons and Warhammer both had great combat systems; Warhammer's RvR and scenarios were fun, exciting, and rewarding.
Unfortunately, as Shamus said, they all focused on a few things and screwed up on the others. Dungeons and Dragons and Lord of the Rings had terrible social interactions -- it was difficult to find people, make groups, and stay in contact with friends. Warhammer's PvE was generally lack-luster, as was its storyline: it was basically just an MMO version of Counterstrike. Warhammer's player customization also left a lot to be desired; they said it was because everybody was supposed to be part of the same army, but I call it a cop-out -- users want customization, canon be damned. It also had the fastest mob repopulation rate I've ever seen, to the point where I regularly died from the same boss that I just finished killing because it respawned before I could leave the room. City of Heroes supposedly had a good storyline, but I never saw it, and the worlds seemed sparsely populated and repetitive. Age of Conan... well, I don't know that it did anything right.
I would actually still play WoW, but there were a few things they could have done better that new games could take advantage of:
1. Faster progression. Most of what people who don't like MMOs complain about is the slow grind to get anywhere, and I agree that they have a point. The first 10-20 levels give you levels, items, and new skills every few hours, but at higher levels it can be days or weeks before anything new and useful is gained. There's only so long you can beat on the same monsters before it gets boring; new stories, areas, monsters, items, and skills need to come often enough to keep things fresh and new, even if that means the player goes through the game's content faster.
2. More emphasis on skill and teamwork than grind and gear. Many people say that WoW doesn't start until the level cap and they're right. Until then, every encounter can be soloed, every monster can be beat with minimal thought, and it's only a matter of grinding long enough until the next level comes. But in the end game, raids demand much more of the player; groups of 5, 10, or 25 people need to work together, plan strategies, balance abilities, and otherwise work hard to make it through an instance. They are also much more rewarding, giving players items that make a difference to their abilities, often unlocking the ability to take on bigger and more difficult instances. This is what makes a game a game: challenge and reward. This shouldn't be left until the end game; this should happen all the way along.
3. Better crafting and customization. WoW allows players to have a lot of control over how their character plays through skill customization, enchanting, gem socketing, glyphs, and a host of other facilities, but where they fall down is in crafting. Most things that can be crafted aren't worth crafting by the time you acquire the ability to do so, and the ones that are useful are only useful to the player to make once. A craft is a creative art, where a person makes something better than usual through their own care and creation. If everybody can make the same stuff you can, it's not a craft, it's a commodity, and to maintain balance, it has to be valued as such, which is what happened in WoW. They managed to fix that somewhat in Wrath of the Lich King, where a player can only have a few of the best recipes, resulting in everybody having a specialty or two that few others have.
For one, crafted items should be worth crafting. They should either be useful to the person crafting it, or should be worth enough to another player that they will pay enough to make it worth it to the crafter. Crafted items should also be more flexible: let the player choose colors, designs, and attributes. There are lots of ways to keep this balanced; for example, give each potential crafted item a point value based on the power of the attributes the crafter wants it to have, then base the material cost, time to craft, and likelihood of success on that point value and the crafter's skill. By allowing the crafter to come up with the combinations, you allow them to make the item they want without having to make hundreds of recipes that are all very similar, and you allow them to express their creativity, which is every craftsman's pride.
Discovery is also fun. A lot of people like to experiment, and crafts based on chemistry, biology, and magic lend themselves nicely to this. Let people try combining random ingredients to see what happens. Sure, somebody will eventually make a website listing all the combinations, but most players never see those sites anyway, just like most players don't read the spoilers to find out the storyline.
4. Better communication. WoW is one of the better ones for this, but it took them a long time to get it even half-ways right. If you are using text chat, it needs to be clearly visible, with enough lines to maintain the context of the conversation, especially when things get heated. It needs to be clear who is speaking, including separating guilds, private messages, game messages, and global chatter. Filtering is also important. Ignore lists are essential and shouldn't be limited in their size.
Better yet, through it all away and use voice chat. For groups working together, nothing is more immediate and personal than voice and it frees the user's hands to play the game. In games without built-in voice chat (all but WoW, which only picked it up within the last couple of years), the best groups will make their own voice chat with programs like Ventrilo and TeamSpeak, but it's inconvenient to be switching between programs. You know your users want it, so build it in, and make it seamless, automatic, and expected.
There are probably other things they could use, but these are the ones that strike me as the most important. If I could find an MMO with the quality of World of Warcraft, but with these improvements, I wouldn't care what theme it was or what company developed it; I would be helplessly lost in the game.
Wow also has a fanbase willing to troll all other MMO's before they come out, in an attempt to convince everyone to hate everything that isn't WOW so they can keep their characters running and community alive.
Something else I have seen that WOW doesn't have is a 2003-2006 Runescape free market economy. In that game you could get whatever you wanted whenever you wanted because entire game worlds had their population caps reached with people solely buying and selling. Course it was a ***** to actually get into a market world but when you did, that epic loot with a one in a million drop chance could be bought off a street corner in five minutes.
That all changed in 2007 when Jagex shut down the economy to stop real world trading.
TL;DR: A free market where you can buy whatever you want without any grind would be needed for a WOW killer.
Something else I have seen that WOW doesn't have is a 2003-2006 Runescape free market economy. In that game you could get whatever you wanted whenever you wanted because entire game worlds had their population caps reached with people solely buying and selling. Course it was a ***** to actually get into a market world but when you did, that epic loot with a one in a million drop chance could be bought off a street corner in five minutes.
That all changed in 2007 when Jagex shut down the economy to stop real world trading.
TL;DR: A free market where you can buy whatever you want without any grind would be needed for a WOW killer.
Hmmm slightly disappointing article. Yes, these are the reasons why wow is a success. One point is missed, is that blizzard has never released a bad game, which meant that WoW was at critical mass very quickly.
What would have been more enlightening instead of just looking at wow as it is, to look how it came to be like this. The development process. I think one of the most crucial things is that blizzard employees as well as the board members, play wow for fun and talk about it for fun.
What would have been more enlightening instead of just looking at wow as it is, to look how it came to be like this. The development process. I think one of the most crucial things is that blizzard employees as well as the board members, play wow for fun and talk about it for fun.
I don't think any gaming company will be able to follow EVERY single guideline that makes WoW great. Because, you see, Warcraft had 3 RTS games based around it before the MMO, and it has a good handful of novels to compliment its lore. You don't get that very often.
Star Wars? Maybe. WoW players may take a break to test out the upcoming MMO but eventually the addiciton to WoW will overthrow it, most of the reasons already stated in this article.
Star Wars? Maybe. WoW players may take a break to test out the upcoming MMO but eventually the addiciton to WoW will overthrow it, most of the reasons already stated in this article.
You clearly didnt play pre-patch 1.9 and post patch 1.9, right up until TBC.Covhunter said:
Paladins were a shit-tastic class until the end of TBC started coming into sight. What they are now is essentially an opposite to that. Besdies, a mage, decent rogue, or lock can own any paladin.
"Here's a sure-fire recipe for creating a WoW-killer."
No, that's how you create a literal clone.
WoW has its genre locked-down. You need someone with buckets of money and ideas that none of us has in order to get into the subscription-based market.
WoW, the Nintendo DS, the Playstation 2. There are certain things that are designed to print money for a company. These take a near-unlimited cheque-book, a unique idea, and (believe it or not) a level of business sense well above the norm.
No, that's how you create a literal clone.
WoW has its genre locked-down. You need someone with buckets of money and ideas that none of us has in order to get into the subscription-based market.
WoW, the Nintendo DS, the Playstation 2. There are certain things that are designed to print money for a company. These take a near-unlimited cheque-book, a unique idea, and (believe it or not) a level of business sense well above the norm.
Couple of important points that were touched upon in this thread, first that Warcraft is a well-liked property which gave Blizzard a great head start in installing a user base at a time when MMOs were at a lull, and second that its PvE, from questing for levels to raiding, is of very high caliber, head and shoulders above anything else we've seen in the genre.
To challenge WoW a developer needs to similarly have a very likable (or at least liked and well-established) IP and a excellent PvE metagame. A big part of the reason for the game's success is that it allowed long-time fans of the series to experience the series' history directly, and it's been done in a very accessible, fun way. At this point, though, the MMO market has expanded probably about as far as it will go, so any successful offering will be taking subscribers from Blizzard. As such, the logical strategy is to have strong offerings where WoW is weakest, and there's two big areas to capitalize on.
First is a separation of PvP and PvE, and furthermore, PvP from the ground up. The biggest problem with PvE in WoW is the PvP metagame and the collateral damage caused by the constant balancing dance that Blizzard has been going through in an effort to do the impossible by balancing ten classes for what is now an eSport. The exponential complexity this adds to the game generates a huge waste of manpower on the development side. Even worse is that PvP as we see it now in WoW was tacked on after development, and the limitations of the core game are glaringly obvious. The last great PvE offering, EverQuest, did not have this holding it back and should another title come along with that magic, it could potentially strip away a lot of the core raiders. Only just very recently has Blizzard even implemented a system that doesn't penalize players for trying both aspects of the game (and even then, there's still much dual-speccing doesn't address).
While improved PvE is something that may only target the raiding community, something that affects nearly every player in WoW is professions. The profession system has been on auto-pilot since classic beta, and it also has been a victim of the battle between PvP and PvE. For the most part, value has been taken away from professions more than has been added due to this. Also, some profession specializations have been all but forgotten, and there's been a distinct lack of variety in the craftables in most professions for quite some time now. Blizzard hasn't been handling this aspect of the game well, and this is probably where it has the most disconnect with its community. A look at the Blizzard representative's post in this thread on the forums [http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=17223065347&sid=1] is very telling of how bad things have become.
If the next big game can meet the minimum requirements, capitalize on Warcraft's failings, and its developer can keep a good relationship with its community and avoid drowning themselves by keeping things simple, I'd say the chances of such a game snowballing into a successful offering are good.
To challenge WoW a developer needs to similarly have a very likable (or at least liked and well-established) IP and a excellent PvE metagame. A big part of the reason for the game's success is that it allowed long-time fans of the series to experience the series' history directly, and it's been done in a very accessible, fun way. At this point, though, the MMO market has expanded probably about as far as it will go, so any successful offering will be taking subscribers from Blizzard. As such, the logical strategy is to have strong offerings where WoW is weakest, and there's two big areas to capitalize on.
First is a separation of PvP and PvE, and furthermore, PvP from the ground up. The biggest problem with PvE in WoW is the PvP metagame and the collateral damage caused by the constant balancing dance that Blizzard has been going through in an effort to do the impossible by balancing ten classes for what is now an eSport. The exponential complexity this adds to the game generates a huge waste of manpower on the development side. Even worse is that PvP as we see it now in WoW was tacked on after development, and the limitations of the core game are glaringly obvious. The last great PvE offering, EverQuest, did not have this holding it back and should another title come along with that magic, it could potentially strip away a lot of the core raiders. Only just very recently has Blizzard even implemented a system that doesn't penalize players for trying both aspects of the game (and even then, there's still much dual-speccing doesn't address).
While improved PvE is something that may only target the raiding community, something that affects nearly every player in WoW is professions. The profession system has been on auto-pilot since classic beta, and it also has been a victim of the battle between PvP and PvE. For the most part, value has been taken away from professions more than has been added due to this. Also, some profession specializations have been all but forgotten, and there's been a distinct lack of variety in the craftables in most professions for quite some time now. Blizzard hasn't been handling this aspect of the game well, and this is probably where it has the most disconnect with its community. A look at the Blizzard representative's post in this thread on the forums [http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=17223065347&sid=1] is very telling of how bad things have become.
If the next big game can meet the minimum requirements, capitalize on Warcraft's failings, and its developer can keep a good relationship with its community and avoid drowning themselves by keeping things simple, I'd say the chances of such a game snowballing into a successful offering are good.
Ding ding ding. See: Age of Conan and Warhammer: Online.
The problem is, is that rather that craft something new, developers are keen on just cloning WoW and trying to steal some of Blizzard's customers. WoW does have some good ideas, and I will fully admit that. It's very streamlined and easy to get into, but much like trying to dive head first into a kiddy pool, you'll find yourself bashing your head on its shallowness very quickly. Now, the catch is, is that a vast majority of the population enjoy that shallowness (please keep your OMG WOW SO DEEP U TROLLIN comments to yourself). The grinding and achievement collection mentality is one that is very addictive to many people so they're very easily capitvated by that. The catch is, is that by catering to that population, they lose out on people that want to go beyond that.
To truly beat WoW you have to skirt a fine line between accessibility and complexity. There is a market for truly diabolically expansive games (see: Eve Online), but it won't bring you the massive piles of money that you're hoping for. Instead, what you have to do is create a game that has the grinding and collection aspects, but make it so that those that yearn for something beyond those basic things have something to do. Warhammer attempted to do that, but failed pretty hard with its PVP since it managed to turn world PVP into just another form of grinding only with even more rage and trolling.
So what ingredients would we need? Grinding PVE? Absolutely, but make the enemies more varied, make the quests more than just whacking 100 monsters to get 10 eyes (seriously Blizzard, what the fuck?). Make it feel like you're actually accomplishing something that's having an impact on the world. Each new character you create should have at least a little variety in what they experience. Branching mission arcs anyone?
Item collection? Yes, but for the love of god allow players to earn their awesome loot in ways beyond just doing the same instance run over and over and over and over hoping for that one rare drop. That may be fun for a lot of people, but for me, I could feel my brain decaying from every repetitive instance grind. Doing some rewards via PVP is ok, but for the people that don't give a fuck about PVP, they're going to be left out in the cold. The item reward system will have to reward items based on common sense and logic.
The basic MMO class system blows with only minor amounts of customization allowed for. Guild Wars is intriguing in how you can alter your character, but the learning curve on not fucking it up makes it a bit iffy. You'd have to allow your average, casual player to be able to enjoy their cookie cutter mage, but let a power user really go nuts with it, or go in the opposite direction and actually do something really bizarre. Oh how I yearn for something along the lines of 3.0 D and D where you can really go crazy with just exactly how you build your character up or just level your guy straight up and not go too far off the beaten path but still be effective. Imagine participating in a huge PVE branching mission arc and finding out you've earned the right via your decisions to a certain prestige class, knowing that if you'd gone the other way, you'd have gotten something else? Far fetched perhaps, but damn awesome? Certainly.
And on I could go, but you get my general point. There's a lack any true attachment to your character in the WoW era of MMOs. You're just another face in the crowd, another tank, another heal bot all grinding the same instances for the same gear. To beat WoW you have break that mold and create a world that you can really immerse yourself in, without going batshit crazy like CCP did with Eve Online (don't get me wrong, I loves me some Eve and have been playing it for three and a half years, but it's definitely a niche game and not for your average person). There is a happy medium between the two extremes of WoW and Eve and if a developer, any developer would actually attempt to straddle that line and craft an accessible, but deep game, they'd find themselves rolling in a cash fountain.
I love it. I adore it. I would cage it, beat it, whip it raw and then sex it up while making it say my name.TOGSolid said:
The concept of branching or reactive classes and storylines has always been potent (WoW's wrathgate anyone? And that didn't even branch!) but here the ideas really spark in my mind. The concept of having no class boundaries but what abilities you choose or stats you level could be an incredible feat of game design and exploration. The only problem is balance. In every class, there is the best option. In ever option, there is the 'best' variant. This will never change, it's set in stone. When you add in a global every-class or the ability to drive your character in a certain direction I fear greatly that no developer can keep such an endeavor balanced to allow players the gift of choice.
The fine line is between finding balance and not homogenizing the game. If you can do that while thinning the line even further by reducing set classes? That, friends, is a WoW killer.
LOL,Anoctris said:
Why didn't you reply to all my other information? Please!
All you use are words, you don't give any evidence, which just proves you are an inexperienced gamer.
Anyone could have edited that picture and removed the Jewish comment and it would have been just putting Tigole with a big noise... Yet you post it anyway? Just proves to me that you don't mind racist comments on your pictures.
And again, I find it ironic that you say I am full of shit, yet you are the one that throws "Elitest assholes with delusions of grandeur" and "little maturity or life experience" with no evidence.
Your hypocrisy is amazing.
And FYI, I was never a raider in Vanilla, I was pretty much a casual who only did stuff like ZG/AQ20/MC later in Vanilla when it was easier, so gratz on generalising who I am... No life experience... You don't even know who I am, how can you throw such a judgement! LOL you are pathetic. Seems like I was spot on with calling you a racist, you throw generalisations at me, and racism is just generalising certain groups of people, you COULD have not posted that picture at all or removed the racism... Yet you chose not too.
Balance is certainly an issue, but I was playing an old game I used to be heavily involved with, The Specialists, and I was mulling over the entire concept of game balance and how devs just try too damn hard to get that perfect balance with their set in stone, rigid systems. Often times they end up completely watering down the experience to get their perfect balance.Ultrajoe said:
Obviously there will always be the power gamers, the people who don't give a rat's ass about the story or the immersion and just want to be the most ubertwinked, e-peen jacking, ego stroker in the game. But I remember fondly in D and D that that was part of the inherent territory of the genre and half the damn fun. There was always a golden rule though, no matter how big of a powerhouse badass you thought you were, there was always another player with a bigger, better, more creative setup that could kick your ass. That's half the fun about the free form class system is that a counter to your FOTM setup is always right around the corner, and the devs don't have to do a damn thing but wait and see what it is (unless of course something is truly broken, and then the fix is easy and apparant).
Sure, you can build a super tank that may appear nigh unstoppable in melee, but then you knew you were always fucked when you ran into a wizard that could stop you dead in your tracks with the right spell (oh the joys of abusing reverse gravity in our occasional level 20 death matches). So now everyone's like 'omg wizards are OP' but then you run into that one player that just absolutely loves giving casters a hard time and has a specifically built an anti-mage rogue, and on the circle of getting owned goes.
By avoiding set classes, you actually fix a lot of balance issues since players will constantly be doing their best to one up each other without being hampered by set in stone variables like in WoW. That leaves Devs with the task of just making minor tweaks here and there to fix stuff that really is glaringly fucked up. Guild Wars is a great proof of concept of how liberating free form classes are. Another would of course be traditional D and D itself, and if you want to think a little outside the box, what about Magic: The Gathering? Players have their cards (abilities), assemble their decks (classes), and no matter how perfect your deck is, there's always some rotten bastard out there that has the trick to shutting you down.
The newest PC Gamer has a rather interesting brief article about Star Trek: Online that has really given me faith in that game, and if it carries through on its promises, we may just end up with a fantastic MMO for those of us craving a little more depth. I highly recommend you go check it out.
And as much as I'd like to keep typing, I think I'm gonna get smacked if I don't get back to work.
Sneak Edit: FFS guys, I'm not exactly a fan of WoW, and even I managed to keep myself from inadvertently slipping some anti-WoW troll bait into my post. This discussion isn't about whether WoW is good or bad, but about how to construct a new MMO that could usurp WoW's dominance. Check the personal attacks at the door and try to keep your posts constructive.
No other MMO has come into WoW's weight class in terms of success and subscribers. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude (as Shamus has) that they are doing it right and your first step to beating them has to be to copy them. If you'd notice, he also pointed out at least one area that new developers could exceed WoW in: crafting - in fact, this has been done, but not in combination with getting everything else right. EVE Online, for example, has a far more robust crafting system than WoW - however, there is less story content, less solo content, less opportunity to escape the PvP experience for those players who don't like it yet want to play around with the rest of the game, less exploration... etc.Playbahnosh said:
Nobody has yet done everything right the way WoW has and one-upped it in any significant way. Close contenders might be Lord of the Rings Online or Warhammer Online, but both of those failed in the one-upsmanship department. The majority of players have now dismissed them as WoW-clones, and gone back to their online home with their leveled characters and known friend-base.
I've never said why is WoW so popular? I just say I've had more fun at the dentist's office. WoW is easily marketable because like Shamus said it's what all the friends are doing and there's this whole need to conform (and the game makes it easy to conform) and it's all very social hierarchy and whatnot. However, I don't really pull any fun out of any MMORPG I have ever played. Personally among it's console or offline brethren they seem very paleolithic and basic. It's like comparing an Etch-A-Sketch to a Game Boy (Old black and white honker.) really. You've got Games like Prototype coming out now and I don't want to play some haul and grind MMORPG, no matter how good they do it. It's too much like pulling teeth for me.
I like this. 
I would like to see an MMO that incorporates all this better. I have never played WoW for one reason... I don't like to pay monthly. Yes it makes more money but, especially for smaller MMO's, it can alienate a significant amount of the potential audience. I know soooo many people who ignore WoW for this reason, and who bought Guild Wars for this reason. I don't mind paying once. The scary thing is, I hold up Runescape as an example of a good combination of MMO elements, minus the combat and classes obviously. But the skills, and gathering aspects are fairly cool. I don't play it (hell no, not for about 6 years) but it has plenty of skills and, if you shell out another MONTHLY fee, there is a lot of updates, quests, a fairly large map.
I would like to see an MMO that incorporates all this better. I have never played WoW for one reason... I don't like to pay monthly. Yes it makes more money but, especially for smaller MMO's, it can alienate a significant amount of the potential audience. I know soooo many people who ignore WoW for this reason, and who bought Guild Wars for this reason. I don't mind paying once. The scary thing is, I hold up Runescape as an example of a good combination of MMO elements, minus the combat and classes obviously. But the skills, and gathering aspects are fairly cool. I don't play it (hell no, not for about 6 years) but it has plenty of skills and, if you shell out another MONTHLY fee, there is a lot of updates, quests, a fairly large map.
This. This is one of the notable downfalls of LotRO: level 20 orcs are visually identical to level 58 orcs (though they change up a little bit when you go from the overworld down into Moria...but a whole expansion before you get some unit differentiation? Minus brownie points, Turbine.). On the upside their models are actually pretty nice - I don't really get tired of looking at them too quickly - but all the same: a wight is a wight is a wight is a wight, and considering the grinding in that game...you notice.pantsoffdanceoff said:
The exploration bit in this article struck me the most. Going from EQ to SWG to WoW, the lack of zone loading times hit me immediately. And I loved it. Looooved it. Wheeeeeee. I'd spend a day now and then just riding around to see the things I missed leveling up (some zones I just hated, quest-wise, so I'd only visit them well after I was beyond their level range) and not needing to load at every zone border is such a boon for the exploration fetish. Always one of my top 3 MMO priorities. (LotRO's setup is good for this geographically, but the means of travel are slower than I'd like, so it gets an above-average-but-not-great score)