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Wednesday, August 08, 2007
More on Freezing Jihad
Reading other people's blogs and looking at incoming links, I see that currently I get a lot of kudos for my Freezing Jihad predictions. I don't think they are that close, but the gist of it, that the second expansion is a new continent for levels 70 to 80 certainly describes the actual Wrath of the Lich King well, even if there are no pink orcs. The problem is that this wasn't a prediction, it was a parody. What I really wanted was something completely different. What I got was something resembling my parody far more than it resembles my dream expansion.
But let's not forget that the bar was set very high, maybe it was impossible to make the kind of expansion that would have satisfied everyone. I hear a lot of people being disappointed and saying they won't buy the Wrath of the Lich King. Not me, I'll buy it. Because I'm convinced that the quality of the content in WotLK will be excellent, as usual, at least until you hit the next level cap. I enjoyed leveling to 70 in the Burning Crusade too, there is no reason to assume that this won't be the same in the next expansion. The only problem is one of "too little, too late". As I already stated, I plan to buy it, but I also foresee being through with it after 3 months or so.
The official release date for Wrath of the Lich King is "when it's ready". The unofficial release date is May 29 2008, 16 months after TBC and three-and-a-half years after the initial release. EQ2, which released in the same month as WoW already has three expansions out, with a fourth announced for November 2007. By the time WoW gets out it's second expansion, EQ2 will be close to it's fifth. Blizzard will argue that the quality of their expansions is such that it takes so long to get them out. But I'm argueing that you can't concentrate on quality and totally forget about quantity. The quantity of content in TBC simply wasn't enough for 16 months, and the announcement for WotLK don't sound as if that expansion will be sufficient to keep us occupied until the third expansion comes out end of 2009. For all it's faults, the greater experience of SOE in maintaining their games with expansions really is showing here. Blizzard says that you can't simply hire a bunch of people to create more content, because of management and quality control issues. But I say that then maybe they'll need to streamline their management and quality control systems. If other companies can create enough content for 12 months of the year, I don't see why Blizzard can't do it.
Wrath of the Lich King will be a huge success, and millions of people will buy it. But what kind of a business model is based on resubscriptions, instead of customer retention? If you keep your customers busy only for a part of the year, and let them wander off in the rest of the time, sooner or later the customer is going to find the next big thing and won't be coming back. If this continues we are heading for MMORPG calendar in which clever companies release their games always half a year after the WoW expansions. I haven't got a clue how close Warhammer Online is to completion, but they might want to do their release in Q4 2008 and get double bonus for christmas season and the annual WoW expansion slump.
- posted by Tobold @ 8:00 AM Permanent Link
Comments:
The opinions you see on the forums/blogs (including this comment) are those of the part of the customer base that can be bothered to browse forums/blogs and make comments on them.....What percentage of the 9 million do people like us make up ? Well I dont know, but there must be millions of people who play the game but are totally unaware of the forums/blogs etc
Everyone is in agreement that WoW will continue to rack in mountains of cash for years to come - but I think Wrath will be their peak.
WoW, much like EQ, enjoys an era of almost no real competition. LOTRO is nice but the Tolkien lore places too many restrictions on what Turbine can do with the game. Age of Conan and Warhammer Online will both be pvp centric, and Rome Rising and Tabula Rasa are just putting out too many bad vibes for me to see them as eventual hits.
There is absolutely nothing on the horizon that could possibly challenge WoW. Star Trek Online and Bioware's unannounced mmorpg are literally years away.
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But what kind of a business model is based on resubscriptions, instead of customer retention?
A very successfull one. Blizzard makes very good margins on those boxes, even if every 3rd customer buying the box and subscribes for 3 months, they make a hell of profit on this. We have to get a scale in here. BC still is the single most selling game in 2007. Online game or not, they make big dollars with those boxes alone. Sad truth is, they do not need to keep players at this point.
As for speed of content upgrades, i don't like the comparison with SOE. SOE has 10 years of experience, Blizzard doesn't. EQ2 expansions for the most part, from what i read and hear, are exactly more of the same in a good sense. If Blizzard would adapt the SOE model, we would now play in Zul'Aman as a carbon copy of Zul'Gurub with loots and numbers just scaled up a notch. But they rather choose to offer something new, with the downside of almost unacceptable speed. The art for ZA was finished even before BC launched. From finished art to going live this instance will have a year of development. One year...
I have no clue why they still struggle to speed up the process. My guess is, that their kitchen includes too many chefs and right now they working on too many different meals. It looks like they do not focus their ressources, but handle to many small projects side-by-side and lack the control over the process. Again look what currently is in heavy production: Zul'Aman, unamed 25 and possible unnamed 5-man before Wrath launch and a whole new expansion the same scale as BC. Instead of pushing all forces to finish one thing, they spread out and slow everything down.
Oh and i recommend you to resubscribe for 2.3 when Zul'Aman should launch. I expect this to be the last real casual fun before Wrath. Should be worth its money.
A very successfull one. Blizzard makes very good margins on those boxes, even if every 3rd customer buying the box and subscribes for 3 months, they make a hell of profit on this. We have to get a scale in here. BC still is the single most selling game in 2007. Online game or not, they make big dollars with those boxes alone. Sad truth is, they do not need to keep players at this point.
As for speed of content upgrades, i don't like the comparison with SOE. SOE has 10 years of experience, Blizzard doesn't. EQ2 expansions for the most part, from what i read and hear, are exactly more of the same in a good sense. If Blizzard would adapt the SOE model, we would now play in Zul'Aman as a carbon copy of Zul'Gurub with loots and numbers just scaled up a notch. But they rather choose to offer something new, with the downside of almost unacceptable speed. The art for ZA was finished even before BC launched. From finished art to going live this instance will have a year of development. One year...
I have no clue why they still struggle to speed up the process. My guess is, that their kitchen includes too many chefs and right now they working on too many different meals. It looks like they do not focus their ressources, but handle to many small projects side-by-side and lack the control over the process. Again look what currently is in heavy production: Zul'Aman, unamed 25 and possible unnamed 5-man before Wrath launch and a whole new expansion the same scale as BC. Instead of pushing all forces to finish one thing, they spread out and slow everything down.
Oh and i recommend you to resubscribe for 2.3 when Zul'Aman should launch. I expect this to be the last real casual fun before Wrath. Should be worth its money.
# posted by 
: 8/8/07 10:13
: 8/8/07 10:13
I feel that comparing WoW and EQ2 is (comparable) to Apples and Oranges.
Blizzard with their product (WoW) have released a fairly polished game, then worked on constant content patches.
For example patch 1.12(afaik) with Naxxaramas, was a huge content patch released for the community, same with AQ content patch and those before them. Blizzard is constantly upgrading and updating the game and releases free content patches.
With EQ2, instead of getting these content patches for free you are forced to pay for an expansion pack for new content.
From a customer perspective I prefer the Blizzard release model.
16-20 months between expansion packs is fine, as-long as there are frequent content patches in-between.
My information on EQ2 may in-fact be incorrect, but that was how it was explained to me.
Blizzard with their product (WoW) have released a fairly polished game, then worked on constant content patches.
For example patch 1.12(afaik) with Naxxaramas, was a huge content patch released for the community, same with AQ content patch and those before them. Blizzard is constantly upgrading and updating the game and releases free content patches.
With EQ2, instead of getting these content patches for free you are forced to pay for an expansion pack for new content.
From a customer perspective I prefer the Blizzard release model.
16-20 months between expansion packs is fine, as-long as there are frequent content patches in-between.
My information on EQ2 may in-fact be incorrect, but that was how it was explained to me.
# posted by : 8/8/07 10:51
: 8/8/07 10:51
The WoW content patches are more equivalent to the EQ2 adventure packs. The EQ2 expansions are pretty much equivalent to the WoW expansions, adding completely new continent and more levels to the game, not just one more dungeon.
Besides, your Naxxramas example is probably the content patch that shows Blizzard in the worst light, because so few people have ever seen the place. Tigole is now talking about packing Naxxramas up and tranforming it into a 25-player level 80 raid dungeon for beginning raiders. So your free content is suddenly part of a paid-for expansion.
You are right that the wait between expansions is not that huge if you are a raider, because you can spend a lot of that time in raid content. That doesn't help the vast majority of non-raiders much.
Besides, your Naxxramas example is probably the content patch that shows Blizzard in the worst light, because so few people have ever seen the place. Tigole is now talking about packing Naxxramas up and tranforming it into a 25-player level 80 raid dungeon for beginning raiders. So your free content is suddenly part of a paid-for expansion.
You are right that the wait between expansions is not that huge if you are a raider, because you can spend a lot of that time in raid content. That doesn't help the vast majority of non-raiders much.
Wrath is the tipping point. I'm sure of that. The expansion will be a hit but within 90 days of going live, the long slow decline will begin.
Something else, if occasionally adding a few outdoor zones and a few levels of quest is all WoW is ever going to be, then how is that different from Guild Wars or D+DO?
Essentially, WoW has become World of Instances; connected to the original 1-60 game in name only.
Speaking of Guild Wars, the sequel is clearly moving in a different direct and it's a direction that should have Vivendi bean counters extremely concerned.
Something else, if occasionally adding a few outdoor zones and a few levels of quest is all WoW is ever going to be, then how is that different from Guild Wars or D+DO?
Essentially, WoW has become World of Instances; connected to the original 1-60 game in name only.
Speaking of Guild Wars, the sequel is clearly moving in a different direct and it's a direction that should have Vivendi bean counters extremely concerned.
# posted by : 8/8/07 11:19
: 8/8/07 11:19
Yup, I'm surprised by the timing, too, and I can't see how they're going to sustain it.
I'm pretty much Blizzard's dream player - if I play more than 32 hours a month, it's been a heavy month. I STILL haven't finished - or even gotten half way through - Burning Crusade.
But if we're waiting until May 2008 for the expansion, even I'm going to hit the level cap and run out of things to do - at least things that aren't rep grinds (booooring) or raids (impractical for the same reasons I play so little). I reckon there's a good chance I'll unsub around Feb-March next year.
And if Blizzard can't sustain the interest of someone who plays through content as slowly as I do, how are they going to keep the more hardcore players going?
I'm pretty much Blizzard's dream player - if I play more than 32 hours a month, it's been a heavy month. I STILL haven't finished - or even gotten half way through - Burning Crusade.
But if we're waiting until May 2008 for the expansion, even I'm going to hit the level cap and run out of things to do - at least things that aren't rep grinds (booooring) or raids (impractical for the same reasons I play so little). I reckon there's a good chance I'll unsub around Feb-March next year.
And if Blizzard can't sustain the interest of someone who plays through content as slowly as I do, how are they going to keep the more hardcore players going?
I often find these types of conversation interesting, I am loving TBC, my "casual" guild has just started raids to Karazhan (3 runs so far, we havent even taken Attumen down yet, wish us luck for tonight) so we have plenty of content left, and I don't think we will get to see all the content before the expansion comes out, and the general opinion is that we would prefer LONGER before another expansion
So there's an alternative view...
I'd like to make some other, seemingly forgotten (or perhaps ignored) points
1. Blizzard is a business, it exists to make money, so all the complaing about the "bean counters" for me is silly, of course the accountants are in charge....
2. The general opinion that is around the forums/blogosphere is not necessarily the general opinion of all of wow's customers (and yes I use the word customer rather than player, because that is how I think blizzard as a business will see them)
The opinions you see on the forums/blogs (including this comment) are those of the part of the customer base that can be bothered to browse forums/blogs and make comments on them.....What percentage of the 9 million do people like us make up ? Well I dont know, but there must be millions of people who play the game but are totally unaware of the forums/blogs etc
In my guild, I accept we’re casual, and maybe not representative of the whole of wow, but we have a hard enough time to get members to even go on our own guild forum, let alone be aware of the various websites and forums/blogs that are around...we have around 190 members (90 at level 70), with alts that means around 60 members, and only maybe 20 active members on our own forums (and 5 of those are the officers)
So, in our guild we know that any opinions that come on our forums are from about 30% of our playerbase….is this number perhaps true of the wider forum community/blogosphere ?
Sorry, I’ve gone a bit off topic here
So there's an alternative view...
I'd like to make some other, seemingly forgotten (or perhaps ignored) points
1. Blizzard is a business, it exists to make money, so all the complaing about the "bean counters" for me is silly, of course the accountants are in charge....
2. The general opinion that is around the forums/blogosphere is not necessarily the general opinion of all of wow's customers (and yes I use the word customer rather than player, because that is how I think blizzard as a business will see them)
The opinions you see on the forums/blogs (including this comment) are those of the part of the customer base that can be bothered to browse forums/blogs and make comments on them.....What percentage of the 9 million do people like us make up ? Well I dont know, but there must be millions of people who play the game but are totally unaware of the forums/blogs etc
In my guild, I accept we’re casual, and maybe not representative of the whole of wow, but we have a hard enough time to get members to even go on our own guild forum, let alone be aware of the various websites and forums/blogs that are around...we have around 190 members (90 at level 70), with alts that means around 60 members, and only maybe 20 active members on our own forums (and 5 of those are the officers)
So, in our guild we know that any opinions that come on our forums are from about 30% of our playerbase….is this number perhaps true of the wider forum community/blogosphere ?
Sorry, I’ve gone a bit off topic here
# posted by : 8/8/07 13:55
: 8/8/07 13:55
The opinions you see on the forums/blogs (including this comment) are those of the part of the customer base that can be bothered to browse forums/blogs and make comments on them.....What percentage of the 9 million do people like us make up ? Well I dont know, but there must be millions of people who play the game but are totally unaware of the forums/blogs etc
Agreed, there is a huge, silent majority. But of course we bloggers / forum commenters claim to be the avant garde, being ahead of the pack. If we get bored of WoW it doesn't mean everybody is, but there is a chance that we are expressing things now that many people will feel later.
So you just started Karazhan. The next expansion won't come out for 9 months. What are you doing in these 9 months? Raid Karazhan or whatever step in the raid circuit your guild reaches every night? Farm to pay for repairs and consumables? Farm rep? I would say that once you are in Karazhan, the best part of TBC is behind you, and you only have the more repetitive part ahead of you. If it takes months to get from Karazhan to Mount Hyjal, it isn't because there is so much content, but because you'll be forced to repeat the same content over and over. Many people grow bored of that.
Agreed, there is a huge, silent majority. But of course we bloggers / forum commenters claim to be the avant garde, being ahead of the pack. If we get bored of WoW it doesn't mean everybody is, but there is a chance that we are expressing things now that many people will feel later.
So you just started Karazhan. The next expansion won't come out for 9 months. What are you doing in these 9 months? Raid Karazhan or whatever step in the raid circuit your guild reaches every night? Farm to pay for repairs and consumables? Farm rep? I would say that once you are in Karazhan, the best part of TBC is behind you, and you only have the more repetitive part ahead of you. If it takes months to get from Karazhan to Mount Hyjal, it isn't because there is so much content, but because you'll be forced to repeat the same content over and over. Many people grow bored of that.
The opinions you see on the forums/blogs (including this comment) are those of the part of the customer base that can be bothered to browse forums/blogs and make comments on them.....What percentage of the 9 million do people like us make up ? Well I dont know, but there must be millions of people who play the game but are totally unaware of the forums/blogs etc
Everyone is in agreement that WoW will continue to rack in mountains of cash for years to come - but I think Wrath will be their peak.
WoW, much like EQ, enjoys an era of almost no real competition. LOTRO is nice but the Tolkien lore places too many restrictions on what Turbine can do with the game. Age of Conan and Warhammer Online will both be pvp centric, and Rome Rising and Tabula Rasa are just putting out too many bad vibes for me to see them as eventual hits.
There is absolutely nothing on the horizon that could possibly challenge WoW. Star Trek Online and Bioware's unannounced mmorpg are literally years away.
# posted by : 8/8/07 14:49
: 8/8/07 14:49
From what I understand content wise Blizzard is planning on patching three major items into the game before the next expansion. Go through blog posts of the raid and dungeon panel at Blizzcon for more details.
Zul'Aman
Another 25 man raid
Another 5 man dungeon
I think this should be enough to keep most people entertained until the next expansion. Blizzard developers have stated many times that they want to move to a 12 month timeline for expansions and this would put the release date around February. This might be why the feature list for WotLK looks a little small, they are moving to a quicker production schedule.
Zul'Aman
Another 25 man raid
Another 5 man dungeon
I think this should be enough to keep most people entertained until the next expansion. Blizzard developers have stated many times that they want to move to a 12 month timeline for expansions and this would put the release date around February. This might be why the feature list for WotLK looks a little small, they are moving to a quicker production schedule.
I would say that once you are in Karazhan, the best part of TBC is behind you, and you only have the more repetitive part ahead of you.
I couldn't disagree more with this. It might be true if you spend a lot of time playing the game but have no desire to raid or run heroics, but at least from what I've seen, those people are few and far between.
Once I was in Karazhan, I found that the best part of BC was ahead of me. Leveling up through the new zones was a lot of fun, don't get me wrong, but I enjoyed the raids also.
Once you hit the level cap, it's about raiding or PVP. And I don't think it feels any different overall than the end game of before. It may be repetitive, sure, but what in the game (and most others), wasn't?
I couldn't disagree more with this. It might be true if you spend a lot of time playing the game but have no desire to raid or run heroics, but at least from what I've seen, those people are few and far between.
Once I was in Karazhan, I found that the best part of BC was ahead of me. Leveling up through the new zones was a lot of fun, don't get me wrong, but I enjoyed the raids also.
Once you hit the level cap, it's about raiding or PVP. And I don't think it feels any different overall than the end game of before. It may be repetitive, sure, but what in the game (and most others), wasn't?
"Agreed, there is a huge, silent majority"
LOL, you managed to say in 7 words what took me 3 paragraphs!! I don't half ramble when I get going
"but there is a chance that we are expressing things now that many people will feel later"
I agree with that, but that’s my point....how much later? I think I'm a long way off that point, and I DO read/comment on forums/blogs, so I'm more "avante garde" than a lot of members of my guild
I see the point that we have a good chunk of tbc behind us and we only have the repetitive bits left, and in terms of visual content you’re probably right, but pre-tbc we only ever got as far as 3 bosses dead in ZG, and never even set foot in MC in guild only runs (we've been back at level 70 though)
Granted we didn’t all start playing the day wow first came out, but if the speeed of progression we had then is anything to go by I'd say we easily have plenty to do yet
For example I haven’t yet set foot in a heroic yet...so there’s a whole dimension of the game untapped for me (albeit the “same” content but harder)and my level 70 alt doesnt even have a single heroic key yet, I've got plenty to do
Pre-tbc we had Scholo, Strat and L/UBRS and as the only level 60 non-raid PvE instances, now we have many more options, 4-5 level 70 5 man instances even before heroics, so I seee TBC having much more "end game" content than in the past, so I think it'll take me a lot longer before I get bored in it, and I was never bored pre-tbc (playing 2-3 nights a week for 3-4 hours a time)
Perhaps players like me are only 0.1% of the population, perhaps my guild is the only one that has this speed of progression (which I know will be laughed at for being too slow by some readers) but I somehow doubt it, I suspect there are more of us than people think
LOL, you managed to say in 7 words what took me 3 paragraphs!! I don't half ramble when I get going
"but there is a chance that we are expressing things now that many people will feel later"
I agree with that, but that’s my point....how much later? I think I'm a long way off that point, and I DO read/comment on forums/blogs, so I'm more "avante garde" than a lot of members of my guild
I see the point that we have a good chunk of tbc behind us and we only have the repetitive bits left, and in terms of visual content you’re probably right, but pre-tbc we only ever got as far as 3 bosses dead in ZG, and never even set foot in MC in guild only runs (we've been back at level 70 though)
Granted we didn’t all start playing the day wow first came out, but if the speeed of progression we had then is anything to go by I'd say we easily have plenty to do yet
For example I haven’t yet set foot in a heroic yet...so there’s a whole dimension of the game untapped for me (albeit the “same” content but harder)and my level 70 alt doesnt even have a single heroic key yet, I've got plenty to do
Pre-tbc we had Scholo, Strat and L/UBRS and as the only level 60 non-raid PvE instances, now we have many more options, 4-5 level 70 5 man instances even before heroics, so I seee TBC having much more "end game" content than in the past, so I think it'll take me a lot longer before I get bored in it, and I was never bored pre-tbc (playing 2-3 nights a week for 3-4 hours a time)
Perhaps players like me are only 0.1% of the population, perhaps my guild is the only one that has this speed of progression (which I know will be laughed at for being too slow by some readers) but I somehow doubt it, I suspect there are more of us than people think
# posted by : 8/8/07 17:13
: 8/8/07 17:13
I agree with sean; learning to beat the bosses in Karazhan, one at a time, and building our casual guild into a raiding guild has been much more fun for me than leveling to 70.
I guess I'm a raider now!
Also, collecting arena gear and making fast money through daily quests has also been fun.
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I guess I'm a raider now!
Also, collecting arena gear and making fast money through daily quests has also been fun.
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