why does WOW have so many subscriber's

[Kryzantine]

The reason WoW has so many subscribers is because it's easy to get into. I haven't eased into any other MMO like I have WoW, and most of the systems in the game are much easier to handle than most other MMOs. Probably the only other one that could come close is LOTRO in terms of accessibility, and then LOTRO doesn't have as much content. Once you're eased into the game mechanics, something always happens to you. Sometimes it's around level 8, sometimes it's around level 40. No matter what, you'll pair up with some totally random person or group, and they will invite you into their guild because they had a blast with you. And you'll usually find that you have some niche to fill within the guild; you could be the practical joker, the expert tank, the healer that everyone falls in love with. Take my own personal experience, I had a very weird niche. Once, I was co-founder of a particular guild of people that just wanted a good time getting through the NE starting areas. We had a good time, some of us grouped on occasion, but I didn't discover my role in a guild until I met other people. Specifically, I was extremely good at persuasion. Sometimes it was persuading just one person, sometimes a group of people, and sometimes it was whole guilds. I believe I organized 14 mergers with the Azshara guild, keeping our original guild name intact on all of them, and expanding our member base from 35 to 240. This is not common, BTW, for guilds in WoW. It involved a lot of social manipulation that cannot be taught in any other MMO, and it was one of the most satisfying things I could do when I got home.

I guess the words to stress when explaining why WoW is popular are "community" and "accessibility". It's much easier to get a second life in WoW than anywhere else.

 

[Savagezion]

Marketing. It is pretty much the only MMO that gets heavy media attention on all fronts. And that is all it is. WoW's mechanics offer nothing but the classic grindfest auto attack features of the same MMOs that had been out long before WoW's time. Wow brought nothing new in as far as mechanics go. Some can argue they are more "polished" and to some extent it is. But in the end the extent of this polish is debatable at best. The graphiocs are equivalant to PS1. SO you now just have a dated game, as it pull everything it has from system before it. It is a simple clone to the MMOs such as Everquest that had used the EXACT same system for years.

The combat system in these old games were dull. I always await a time to credit City of Heroes (and developer Cryptic) for spicing up MMO combat. In City of Heroes HOW you play your charactor is more important than your build in combat by means of tactics.
As well, CoH has a much better raid system as well. If anyone wants to exclaim that WoW has the best of either of these, they need to play CoH. WoW is the old system which was good back in the late 1990's but to claim it as the best of today is ludicrous and I would guess from a limited perspective and a perspective that is tainted by WoW progress and community attactment.

WoW simply has a strong marketing platform. Many people joined because Blizzard advertised it as "don't be left out and be the ONLY person who doesn't play our game." My own mother who does not play anything other than simulation games was considering buying it due to marketing. It was simply because she saw it everywhere and she honestly thought that everyone else played this game. It is the "farmville" of MMOs.

 

[JourneyThroughHell]

It does everything its target audience needs it to do and it does it pretty damn well.

[edit] if your going to say "lol n00b it juzt pwnZ aZZ" then don't reply also I wonder if the only people replying are WOW lovers and addicts

Well, you know, it's not really fair to ask for a personal opinion, but then prohibit people from supporting this point of view.

 

[tehroc]

Biggest reason is WoW updates end game.Theres always something new to do.In other MMOs i played you hit cap did a couple things and then sat around.

You find running the same one raid over and over is good content. It doesn't help that WOW's current trend is to obsolete old content (as in last patch). Take a look at 3.3, trying to put together a raid for Naxxaramas, it would be an effort in futility, as you can get better gear from the 5 man grind (which requires zero effort and only 15 mins of time).

WOW's endgame is entirely what ruins WOW for me and others. You have two choices raid or pvp. One is tedious and full of artificial progress blocks to keep you stymied for a bit and the other is highly unbalanced and favors certain classes over others.

 

[Assassin Xaero]

I'm going to assume it is really addictive if you like that kind of thing... personally I can't stand elves, trolls, goblins, and all that other fairy bullshit.

 

[Kwaren]

It's virtual crack that's why.

with Modern Warfare as virtual weed

I see it more as heroin. "Hello my name is RAAHG I'M GONNA EAT YOUR FACE"

 

[Rakkana]

Subliminal messaging and Mr T.

[http://dragcave.net/view/Tm5s]

 

[blackdwarf]

first, it is a good MMO. second, it had already a great fanbase due the RTS games. and last, it was one of the first real MMO that was as big as it is. but i have the idea that the new warhammmer 40K MMO (or maybe the star wars version) will kick wow of his throne. if you see the trailer of warhammer, you will see how good it looks. it is almost full HD graphics!

 

[LevelSix]

ICanBreakTheseCuffs is just a hater. WoW gives players what they want. Questing, PVP, groups, replay value, customization, etc.

The game simply does a lot of stuff right, because Blizzard knows how to make games.

 

[Vaccine]

I picked up WoW about 2-3 months ago, after playing various MMOs throughout the last few years.
WoW is by far leagues ahead of anything any other MMO offers, the leveling pace is rather dull, I honestly don't see much point in large amounts of leveling, but hopefully Cata will change that.
I've seen so many bad and decent MMOs ignore glaring issues with older content and just focus on new content to help people overlook old content.
As for the playability of the game, PvP and raiding are both very well thought out, instance locks allow casuals to keep the same pace as hardcore players without as much time dedication to be doing multiple ICC/VoA runs in rapid succession.
Each boss is unique in it's own way to keep you on your toes while doing a raid, you're actively alert instead of just hitting a boss till it dies.
Personally I love art style and lore of other MMOs in some cases, but WoW simply has the best "systems" of how everything works.

 

[WaNNaBJusTLiKeU]

Latter comment is exaggerated and untrue, gear is "obsolete" within a few days, and if i'm honest, if you're getting "top gear" you will also be getting the new gear that is released, you obviously worked hard to get the gear, so you're an avid player who'll enjoy the challenge of getting new gear.

Also your constant use of the word "grind", do you even understand what "grinding" is? Because according to you WoW is "grind grind grind, quest"? Urm i'm pretty sure I did absolutely no grinding until I was maximum level. You're probably making the mistake of thinking questing is a "grind" in which case, MMO's are clearly not for you.


Edit: Zeriah, the posted in question only played Vanilla WoW, therefore he's making comments that refer to the game WoW was 5 years ago.

*Snip*

Latter comment is exaggerated and untrue, gear is "obsolete" within a few days, and if i'm honest, if you're getting "top gear" you will also be getting the new gear that is released, you obviously worked hard to get the gear, so you're an avid player who'll enjoy the challenge of getting new gear.

Also your constant use of the word "grind", do you even understand what "grinding" is? Because according to you WoW is "grind grind grind, quest"? Urm i'm pretty sure I did absolutely no grinding until I was maximum level. You're probably making the mistake of thinking questing is a "grind" in which case, MMO's are clearly not for you.


Edit: Zeriah, the posted in question only played Vanilla WoW, therefore he's making comments that refer to the game WoW was 5 years ago.

Yes it is untrue I'm exaggerating of course. I see most quests as grinds considering they were mostly Just go kill (x) creatures or whatever so I just saw it that way. Some quests were more than grinds and therefore some fun for me. MMos are most definitely not for me I learned that a few years back. Sorry if you saw me as attacking MMOs(if you did) I understand their alot of fun for some people and that's cool, to each his own.[/quote]

Nono, don't worry I didn't mean to come across rude, and i'm really not that fussed about MMORPG's I spend my time trolling the chat channels on WoW until I get sent my beta code.

Of course they are not to everyone's taste, but they've certainly got the interests of many.

 

[Ghostkai]

It gives MMO players exactly what they want, along with constant new content, and MLG PvP.

Yeah, so.... It's good, thats the REAL reason. And the real reason 90% of the anti-WoW crowd depise it.

 

[tautologico]

It is a good game. A very good game really. I have quit wow this year, I'll probably go back to it once Cataclysm hits but I don't see myself playing long term again. I got what I wanted from the game and now I'm kinda bored with it. But this after playing for more than 3 years. I don't think my burnout (or other people being burned out after years and years of play) disqualifies the game, it still is very good in my opinion.

But there's also a lot of luck in the whole history of WoW, of being "the right game at the right time". Of course luck wouldn't have helped a bad game.

One interesting fact is that no one, not even blizzard, even remotely dreamed that WoW would make such a huge success. I wonder if the WoW phenomenon is even repeatable.

I'm looking forward to SW:ToR and will probably buy it, but WoW killer? Let's wait and see.

 

[Ben Jamin]

One of the reasons is the raids. Every fight is unique and some punish you horrifically for a slight error making it an intense experience. And if it gets to easy you can always try for an achievement which in some cases are nigh impossible.

 

[Happychimp]

I've played quite a few MMO's and WOW was the one I stuck with the longest (3months).

 

[Rarhnor]

I didn't like it to be honest. The fact that it has so many subscribers is maybe because it established an MMO standard that differed the MMORPG genre from other RPGs. It stands as a pylon, but in my opinion: A pylon with no soul. Playing the game easily becomes a routine, routines that the common man adabt to and embrace without thought.
From my perspective WoW isn't even that good. Its wide world is flawed with uninteresting terrain (though this have been accounted for in Cataclysm, hence the change of world) and timeconsuming grind quests. It seems more like a game you play to pass time. I found Guild Wards much more compelling to how an MMO should be.

 

[AngryPuppy]

WoW is just as repetitive as any other MMO. Anyone saying otherwise is full of it. I played WoW for a while. If your Gear Score isn't at a certain point and you don't have certain achievements, then you might as well forget about doing any "end game" content. I don't know a single guild that doesn't require those things in order to join and/or participate. WoW stopped being "noob friendly" a long time ago. Grind, grind, grind, that is all WoW is, ever was, and ever will be. The fanboys (as you can see) will try to "convince" you otherwise, but we all know how fanboys are.

Also if you don't want flamed don't ever discuss Religion, Politics, Sexuality or WoW.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

I hope no trolls attack me but I just don't see the difference between WOW and other MMO's
so I had to ask

[edit] if your going to say "lol n00b it juzt pwnZ aZZ" then don't reply also I wonder if the only people replying are WOW lovers and addicts

Had to quote for this but WoW is good because it is the first MMORPG that took the general formula and made it good way back when it started. This made it have a large fanbase. Then it came to and continues at this point right now where it has a large fanbase because the fanbase is large.

 

[Embz]

Usually something is popular because its good and gives people some kind of enjoyment?
That pretty much sums it up for me

 

[masterjiji]

WWO has so many subscribers because it is the one MMO out there that can claim the title of "sucks you in the hardest." It doesn't have to eat your life, it can easily just become a part of your daily routine and have no negative effect on your real-world self, other than the occasional word like "pwn" and "hax" being dropped in certain scenarios that deserve slightly more dignified language. Well, no, I guess "hax" is more of an FPS word.