OP is obviously a WOW fan who thinks WOW was the be all and end all of mmo's.. wow just copied other MMo's at the time so what difference does it make if wow was around or not?
I want to start off by saying great question. Honestly though i would have to say no. This being completely my opinion and judging by what we deal with today and the way things were going before WoW came out. MMOs that were coming out were not mainstream and themselves were basically a niche product. Regardless of the crowed they catered to, each MMO release before WoW was innovative and full of imagination. They were produced to be different from the other MMOs of that time in order to show why they are different and how much more it offered then what you were currently playing. We had the same issues we have today just not to the extreme extent of simular material we currently deal with.
Now to the point if an MMO that was not WoW came out would we deal with what we are dealing with today. I would still have to say no. Judging by the way the Niche brand of MMOs were going at the time we would have eventually reached a great MMO product. It might not have hailed the subscription numbers WoW holds but at that time no one gave a damn about numbers.
WoW may be a successful money making program for blizzard but it has managed to halt the progress of interactive virtual worlds for pre WoW gamers such as myself. Only time will tell when MMO devs find their balls and make a game worthy of being played again. Once they realize that World of Warcraft brought absolutely nothing to the table maybe they will.
Every now and then we see different games emerge such as Age of Conan, Darkfall, Fallen Earth, and others I'm sure. Some may not be successful and or fun to you but in my eyes I can see games trying to be different and thats the way it should be. I give props to those companies and others for breathing new life into the genre. Keep it innovative.
imo there is no such thing as a wow clone . everquest was released years earlier and all these games borrow from each other as they evolve . the only game i would say has even the slightest element of wow clone is runes of magic simply because its been made to look and play like wow . i could be wrong but i think the thing wow brought to fantasy mmorpgs was faction play . which is something even now other games apart from aion are finding hard to get right .
I don't know if I could ever see a sandbox game every be so high in numbers. SWG started off in the right direction, and it was Star Wars....But to answer the question, if a sandbox game was as popular, OF COURSE THERE WOULD BE A FUSS. Why do people create wow clones? Money. They want to cash in on the cash cow of wow. Except they do it wrong. Gaming companies would be spitting out Sandbox games, and we'd all laugh and make fun of the very few theme park equvilients of Darkfall/Mortal Online.
Anyways, people always bring up the wow has the worst community, yet it can also have the best community. As you bring more and more people into something, more and more personalities, beliefs, feelings, backgrounds, etc, etc, etc come into play. Different age groups, races, blah blah blah. So needless to say, you are going to have some total jerkwads that need to fall off a cliff, but than you are going to have some really great awesome players who would help you and they don't know you.
It's my feelings, that people in wow, act like they do in real life (outside of the whole, I'm so uber in an online game, I could beat you up sort of thing). People want stuff for themselves in real life. It's pretty natural. And instead of saying, "hey, you work in rl all the time so hard for what you do, I'll make you work all the time in this game to get anywhere, blizzard said "Hmm, let's make it much easier for ANY sort of player to have fun in our game, and experience it all." So instead of super elite raids only for 99% of everything, they allow anyone to experience the entire game.
Why is that such a bad thing? Why do people feel that only a select few people experience content in a game is the right thing to do? Because you "worked harder at a game"? I'm sorry. Worked and game just don't mix. The way Wow handles it is pretty great. Anyone can see the raids, and usually accomplish something. The 5mans show the lore if you can't raid. Which is even better. But if you are an elitist jerk, and think you are entitled to whatever you want since you are so great, you can do the "Hard mode" fights and get your special titles and gear
These posters on mmorpg have lost about ALL reality check in gaming. Like I said WOW not only was a blessing for MMORPG investment money and the complete MMORPG industry. It was a MUCH needed boost to support the dying platform of PC gaming as a whole. The big companies NO longer suppported the PC platform to launch their big franchises.
You got confused here, the question wasn't about the PC-gaming but MMORPGs.
What WoW has brought to the genre is the fear of trying anything new or "not selling". Cookie cutter MMOs everywhere and everything that takes time to innovate and code to work dies because of the rush to sell the product.
And, even I'm a long time (2 decades) PC gamer I'm not sure the PC is the best gaming platform. Too many different hardware choises, too many annoying bugs. If you disagree with this, feel free to list all bugridden console games.
I predict, once the console manufacturers get their network functions sorted out and dare to take the giant leap towards networked gaming PC-gaming will diminsh and turn obsolete.
To OP:
I suppose there would be more variation and more evolved games. The market would've stayed as a niche, instead of single monster mutant and a lot's of it's clones.
As the MMORPGs seem to be evolving to the next step (Soul&Blade, Darkfall, any FPS game -style) in combat, the cloning is coming to an end. But no, I don't think UO would've cutted it to the bigger audience.
Originally posted by Zorndorf Just how silly these words look when you focus in on that "... managed to halt the prgress of interactive virtual worlds ...". Just one little example.... So WHICH game exaclty had phasing before WOW (non instanced, non pre loading real time world changes for good or temporarely according to what you do in game ?).
Ultima Online did actually, almost a decade before WoW. Phasing has existed for a long time. It's just rarely used in MMOs because of the negative side effects that come from it when it's overused, which is what WoW has been running into from time to time concerning that mechanic. When it's used properly, it's barely even noticed.
So WHICH game did bring in at least a 20 miilion new MMORPG players into the field all by itself?
Uh, no MMO brought in 20 million "new" MMORPG players. It's arguable that WoW didn't even exceed bringing in 10 million new MMORPD players. Realize that at least half of their "11 million" are 1) unique subs, so not necessarily even unique players, 2) more than half were on the China servers, which many of them had already been playing MMOs despite WoW's existence, 3) at least a million of those were pre-existing MMORPG gamers. SO even if you say it brought in 5 million new MMO gamers, I would argue that this was a bad thing, because the bulk of them make up the dregs of MMO-gamers. They make up most of the whiners, the punks, the griefers, and also the ultra-casual gamers that want everything handed to them while they get hand-held through content.
Your AoC wouldn't even have got development money without the return on investment Blizzard showed.
You really can't say that for certain. For all anyone knows, if WoW never existed, AoC may still have been released, but it might have been developed significantly differently, and possibly even better than it was in it's rushed original release.
Oh and BTW I played already Ultima OFF line 25 years ago, so don't tell me those programs had ANYTHING over WOW in game play value and huge different playing options.
Player housing, a crafting system that doesn't suck, dropping items anywhere, player vendors, dye-able clothing, the list goes on... UO predates WoW by about 10 years and had features that WoW's devs can't manage to do in the 5 years it's been put out. I seem to recall that instanced player housing was going to be released soon... this was at the game's release 5 years ago.
It is NOT because you ran around a closed up fake 2D/3D world with inivisible walls everywhere and ... a mine in it, with a vendor ....you are " in a progress to interactive virtual worlds ...", because of LACK of designer's views back then and LACK of gameplay. It is the same as saying Pong indeed was responsible for Mario and Donky Kong.
Uh, if anything most recently released games lack the depth and features that most PC games from the 90s had. The main advantage games today have is graphics, but all the graphics in the world mean nothing when your game mechanics are shallow, redundant, and just plain boring.
Blizzard is not the exceptional developer you claim them to be. They haven't been a great developer any longer for some time. not have they added anything unique or innovative to the market for a long time. WoW itself is just as rehash of mechanics from MMOs that existed before WoW. Blizzard just got lucky with finding a combination that was able to lure in and keep a lot of people. Even so, WoW success isn't soley grounded in it's mechanics, it is as popular as it is, largely because of the Warcraft franchise and Blizzard brand name backing it and convincing non-MMO B.net games to play their MMO.
What if there was no such thing as WoW and Warcraft,,,,, and UO(or other similar game) was the top selling MMO of all times. And from that, we had tons of UO clones and such. Do you think there Would as much flaming of UO sandbox clones, as there are today when it comes to WoW clones?
What if Dark&Light would of been a hit,would it be at the top of the pile,yes i think so.
One vast 15.000 Sq world with no instances or hidden walls,just everybody on one server.
This game had it all,even though they F==ked up by stealing the actual world,it was a good game even with the bugs.
If hypotheticallly wow wouldnt apear 2 things would happen. 1.A pite of wow pvpiers would join games like uo /sb/aoc. The big pve pite of wow players would rather scater to eq2 /Lotro/ddo. 2.Wow affected due to its sales numbers and success loads of p2p and f2p mmorpgs that came afterwards. So if Uo was the N1 mmorpg out there we would have by now more uo like mmorpgs. Surely the state of mmorpg scene would be diferrent. You would have more niche rpgs than themeparks out there.If you accept the fact that Uo was a game that focused on freedom and loads of choises build houses,unlimited almost progress on your character,exploration,free pvp,achive titles that actually meant something serious in the game,break in other houses steal their staff from their houses if you raised lockpick for example in high lvl,true interactivity and loads of other things Uo had and ont eh other hand see the restricted options wow has well i think gameplay would evolve alot more in mmorpg scenery since there would be made much more niche mmorpg's than there are now. But all these are hypothetically ofc.
Actually no....in my opinion. Reason being, that if WoW, as you put it, "would not appear," there wouldn't BE ENOUGH players of MMORPGs for a "lot" (I assume that's what a "pite" is) of them to go to other games that are out right now. As a matter of fact, some of those games themselves might not exist, had Blizzard not "paved the way" for MMOs to be considered on such a grand scale.
Prior to WoW, Everquest was considered "huge" in player numbers. BUT....it was taking a bit of a bad rap because of the addictive nature of the game, and the highly publicized destroyed marriages, etc., and so on, that were a result of such an absorbing hobby. But there were not NEAR as many very young people playing EQ, and the genre was STILL, by and far, considered "geek fodder." Your average Ma and Pa and grade school "baby" makes three... ALL playing EQ....wasn't a very common scenario.
Futhermore, in the days of UO (I was there), rpgs, and the "new" MMOrpgs, were truly considered a nerdfest type of thing. It didn't make you "kewl" to play rpgs. That was not a measure of your "coolness factor." No one in your grade school class was going to ask you if you played UO and then laugh when you said no. So no....there likely would not have been the ENORMOUS influx of MMOs that we see today....had it NOT been for WoW.
Now whether that is good or bad, long term, for the genre....I think really remains to be seen. What WoW DID do....is bring an awfully lot more people into the hobby of PC gaming. I'm not sure that this is TOTALLY a bad thing. After all.....since game developers now see that PC gaming (of any genre) has become a more socially "acceptable" hobby....they're producing all KINDS of games and a lot OF them...some good, some not so good (or even "clone-ish), but nonetheless....we're getting a lot of games.
Yes I think people would still complain. It's human nature to hate the guy on top..everyone likes to root for the underdog and they want to see him beat up the bigger guy.
I think WoW got really lucky- they came out with a solid game and advertised it well(southpark Mr.T william shattner etc). But I think if WoW didn't become huge then it would have been another game. Maybe Eve Online? And then there would be more space games. And people would whine about all the Eve clones.
Futhermore, in the days of UO (I was there), rpgs, and the "new" MMOrpgs, were truly considered a nerdfest type of thing. It didn't make you "kewl" to play rpgs. That was not a measure of your "coolness factor." No one in your grade school class was going to ask you if you played UO and then laugh when you said no. So no....there likely would not have been the ENORMOUS influx of MMOs that we see today....had it NOT been for WoW.
Now whether that is good or bad, long term, for the genre....I think really remains to be seen. What WoW DID do....is bring an awfully lot more people into the hobby of PC gaming. I'm not sure that this is TOTALLY a bad thing. After all.....since game developers now see that PC gaming (of any genre) has become a more socially "acceptable" hobby....they're producing all KINDS of games and a lot OF them...some good, some not so good (or even "clone-ish), but nonetheless....we're getting a lot of games.
I wanna run with that idea---
I've played the MMO genre since EQ. I started EQ in 4th grade (i'm 20 now). Back in elementary school I was kind of an outcast--no one played MMO's...much less computer games. The big thing was console games. It was this way until WOWcame out in High School- suddenly all of my friends played MMO's and then it was the 'cool' thing to do. I've since become a bit jaded- and a bit irritated that my indulgence was seen as 'nerdy' until WoW came out. I have mixed feelings about it...im happy WoW brought in more players to the genre, but I also want reparations- the WoW community neeeds to know that there were other games (and people who played them) before this one.
I don't think there would be a fuss by people calling CLONE! CLONE! if WoW din't exist. What WoW did was change the MMO player base as a whole. The most important thing to note is that pre-WoW there was almost no in-fighting between the players of different games. We didn't come on to forums and degrade every game we didn't play or try and PROVE to everyone else how OUR game was the best. That attitude came with WoW (your welcome to go back in the forum history 5 years and see it for yourself - I know there are forums out there that have been around that long). And because of this, your original question of 'would people fuss over UO Clones like they do WoW clones?" would be a NO.
As for the people who are in this thread trying to say that without WoW there would be no MMO genre left in the world....please. We are in a social networking world now, WoW didn't create that, the internet did. And unless Al Gore works for Blizzard, then they didn't invent that either. :P There are two main reasons WoW became what it did, and it has nothing to do with how great the game is or not.
First, is Blizzard's business model, they are VERY good are marketing their products. Before WoW there practically was no prime time marketting for an MMORPG PC game. By being the first to REACH the masses as they did they were able to tap into more of the population than any other MMORPG to date. The second reason they were able to gain more people was the growing broadband and internet exposure to the common household. Prior to WoWs release, only those who were dedicated to the prospect of the internet or gaming had any kind of broadband connection to the internet. 2003 marked the start of the broadband market boom and 2004 was the first year to see significant increases in DSL subscribers for the major Telecommunications companies. Blizzard's ability to hop on the bandwagon at the right time, and advertise their product to the prime time masses is what gave it it's massive increase in subsribers over all previous MMOs.
Most of us who have been playing for over a decade, know that before WoW came out, finding an MMO title on the shelf at a local Walmart was near impossible. Blizzard was the one that pushed this trend, and again, one of the reasons it has massed so many players. But, even with all these things working in Blizzard's favor, the truth is that had they not been the ones to take advantage of it, someone else would have. It was a market that was rich to be taken advantage of, and eventually someone would have done so. What that game may have been noone will ever know as the circumstances behind Blizzard's success will not happen again. Chances are though, that whatever it may have been, had its community become so competative and defensive about their game as the WoW community has become today, then yes we would be seeing this for it.
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
IF the sandbox game had the sales/subscription numbers that WoW has, then yes, which ever sandbox game did that would be the one that is seen as the template for clone status.
Just as WoW is not talked of as a "EQ clone" (although you can make a case for that), the theoretical smash hit sandbox game would not be called a "UO clone".
Because what is missing from the entire issue is not what the subgenre of the monster MMO is, it's what made WoW the 800 pound gorilla. WoW just happened to go the EQ levels/class/combat first route. That's not the primary reason for its success.
If a UO clone, if you will, was the monster, then many things would not have happened. For example, the SWG CU and NGE wouldn't have taken place. SWG was already a "UO clone"...so no need to be "like WoW" superficially, which is all the CU and NGE did, because those two efforts didn't capture what made WoW a success. SOE doesn't do polish, doesn't do relatively bug-free.
THAT is the missing element...the one that no one seems to be interested in replicating, instead doing the "ship this if it's ready or not, we're ready for our close up, Mr. DeMille" of the idiots in suits running the gaming companies. Who don't seem to have a clue as to why WoW has done so well.
CH, Jedi, Commando, Smuggler, BH, Scout, Doctor, Chef, BE...yeah, lots of SWG time invested.
IF the sandbox game had the sales/subscription numbers that WoW has, then yes, which ever sandbox game did that would be the one that is seen as the template for clone status. Just as WoW is not talked of as a "EQ clone" (although you can make a case for that), the theoretical smash hit sandbox game would not be called a "UO clone". Because what is missing from the entire issue is not what the subgenre of the monster MMO is, it's what made WoW the 800 pound gorilla. WoW just happened to go the EQ levels/class/combat first route. That's not the primary reason for its success. If a UO clone, if you will, was the monster, then many things would not have happened. For example, the SWG CU and NGE wouldn't have taken place. SWG was already a "UO clone"...so no need to be "like WoW" superficially, which is all the CU and NGE did, because those two efforts didn't capture what made WoW a success. SOE doesn't do polish, doesn't do relatively bug-free. THAT is the missing element...the one that no one seems to be interested in replicating, instead doing the "ship this if it's ready or not, we're ready for our close up, Mr. DeMille" of the idiots in suits running the gaming companies. Who don't seem to have a clue as to why WoW has done so well.
Awesome post and it's good to finally see more who hold the belief that I do about game quality. While many will get on here and villify Blizzard and Turbine for design decisions gamers overlook there greatest value to us and that is the accessibility of the games they release, simply put they work.
Far too often visionary games that claim to expand on the genre or even imitate someone else releases a product unplayable and that is the easiest way to get people not playing.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Futhermore, in the days of UO (I was there), rpgs, and the "new" MMOrpgs, were truly considered a nerdfest type of thing. It didn't make you "kewl" to play rpgs. That was not a measure of your "coolness factor." No one in your grade school class was going to ask you if you played UO and then laugh when you said no. So no....there likely would not have been the ENORMOUS influx of MMOs that we see today....had it NOT been for WoW.
Now whether that is good or bad, long term, for the genre....I think really remains to be seen. What WoW DID do....is bring an awfully lot more people into the hobby of PC gaming. I'm not sure that this is TOTALLY a bad thing. After all.....since game developers now see that PC gaming (of any genre) has become a more socially "acceptable" hobby....they're producing all KINDS of games and a lot OF them...some good, some not so good (or even "clone-ish), but nonetheless....we're getting a lot of games.
I wanna run with that idea---
I've played the MMO genre since EQ. I started EQ in 4th grade (i'm 20 now). Back in elementary school I was kind of an outcast--no one played MMO's...much less computer games. The big thing was console games. It was this way until WOWcame out in High School- suddenly all of my friends played MMO's and then it was the 'cool' thing to do. I've since become a bit jaded- and a bit irritated that my indulgence was seen as 'nerdy' until WoW came out. I have mixed feelings about it...im happy WoW brought in more players to the genre, but I also want reparations- the WoW community neeeds to know that there were other games (and people who played them) before this one.
Amen and amen. I wholeheartedly agree. But it's unlikely that any of them will listen to us now, because they all have learned how to flex their "epeen" and think they are WAY cooler than we "nerds" were "back in the old days."
In THAT way.....WoW has definitely been detrimental (alongside from being bad in some other less personally insulting ways, I'm sure). It did bring more people into PC gaming, however, with more people....comes more people that we don't like and some that are outright douche bags. Win some lose some, I guess.
And yeah, I've always despised how something is only "cool" if millions and millions of people do it. Society, in many respects, hates originality and loves....LEMMINGS. "I was an rpg'er before rpgs were cool." or " I played MMOs long before you even knew what a kobold WAS." We should make t-shirts. lol
if wow hadint come out this site would of probly been shutdown due to only having 20 members
I'm sensing sarcasm, but theirs a hint of seriousness in it. This website was out before WoW, and will continue even after WoW (if it ever dies which i doubt lol).
I think I made my account around the time I quit daoc because i was looking for a new MMO, had nothing to do with Wowcraft.
Comments
OP is obviously a WOW fan who thinks WOW was the be all and end all of mmo's.. wow just copied other MMo's at the time so what difference does it make if wow was around or not?
if wow hadint come out this site would of probly been shutdown due to only having 20 members
ROFL.
FABOI WOW post I see
I want to start off by saying great question. Honestly though i would have to say no. This being completely my opinion and judging by what we deal with today and the way things were going before WoW came out. MMOs that were coming out were not mainstream and themselves were basically a niche product. Regardless of the crowed they catered to, each MMO release before WoW was innovative and full of imagination. They were produced to be different from the other MMOs of that time in order to show why they are different and how much more it offered then what you were currently playing. We had the same issues we have today just not to the extreme extent of simular material we currently deal with.
Now to the point if an MMO that was not WoW came out would we deal with what we are dealing with today. I would still have to say no. Judging by the way the Niche brand of MMOs were going at the time we would have eventually reached a great MMO product. It might not have hailed the subscription numbers WoW holds but at that time no one gave a damn about numbers.
WoW may be a successful money making program for blizzard but it has managed to halt the progress of interactive virtual worlds for pre WoW gamers such as myself. Only time will tell when MMO devs find their balls and make a game worthy of being played again. Once they realize that World of Warcraft brought absolutely nothing to the table maybe they will.
Every now and then we see different games emerge such as Age of Conan, Darkfall, Fallen Earth, and others I'm sure. Some may not be successful and or fun to you but in my eyes I can see games trying to be different and thats the way it should be. I give props to those companies and others for breathing new life into the genre. Keep it innovative.
Interesting question and is always worth pondering "what ifs" for applying yourself.
What your asking depends if you're talking numbers, level of fussing, both, or something I may not be realizing in the question.
If the numbers would've jumped to WoW levels then yes.
If the numbers would've stayed niche then no.
Either way, people would still be talking about what they fill is repetition. The genre was designed for that to maximize supscription money.
In this genre at least, people always want variety and choice. The difference is some want it applied slowly and others faster.
In short, conflict will always occur.
Edit: fill should be feel lol aka grammar
AC2 Player RIP Final Death Jan 31st 2017
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imo there is no such thing as a wow clone . everquest was released years earlier and all these games borrow from each other as they evolve . the only game i would say has even the slightest element of wow clone is runes of magic simply because its been made to look and play like wow . i could be wrong but i think the thing wow brought to fantasy mmorpgs was faction play . which is something even now other games apart from aion are finding hard to get right .
I don't know if I could ever see a sandbox game every be so high in numbers. SWG started off in the right direction, and it was Star Wars....But to answer the question, if a sandbox game was as popular, OF COURSE THERE WOULD BE A FUSS. Why do people create wow clones? Money. They want to cash in on the cash cow of wow. Except they do it wrong. Gaming companies would be spitting out Sandbox games, and we'd all laugh and make fun of the very few theme park equvilients of Darkfall/Mortal Online.
Anyways, people always bring up the wow has the worst community, yet it can also have the best community. As you bring more and more people into something, more and more personalities, beliefs, feelings, backgrounds, etc, etc, etc come into play. Different age groups, races, blah blah blah. So needless to say, you are going to have some total jerkwads that need to fall off a cliff, but than you are going to have some really great awesome players who would help you and they don't know you.
It's my feelings, that people in wow, act like they do in real life (outside of the whole, I'm so uber in an online game, I could beat you up sort of thing). People want stuff for themselves in real life. It's pretty natural. And instead of saying, "hey, you work in rl all the time so hard for what you do, I'll make you work all the time in this game to get anywhere, blizzard said "Hmm, let's make it much easier for ANY sort of player to have fun in our game, and experience it all." So instead of super elite raids only for 99% of everything, they allow anyone to experience the entire game.
Why is that such a bad thing? Why do people feel that only a select few people experience content in a game is the right thing to do? Because you "worked harder at a game"? I'm sorry. Worked and game just don't mix. The way Wow handles it is pretty great. Anyone can see the raids, and usually accomplish something. The 5mans show the lore if you can't raid. Which is even better. But if you are an elitist jerk, and think you are entitled to whatever you want since you are so great, you can do the "Hard mode" fights and get your special titles and gear
You got confused here, the question wasn't about the PC-gaming but MMORPGs.
What WoW has brought to the genre is the fear of trying anything new or "not selling". Cookie cutter MMOs everywhere and everything that takes time to innovate and code to work dies because of the rush to sell the product.
And, even I'm a long time (2 decades) PC gamer I'm not sure the PC is the best gaming platform. Too many different hardware choises, too many annoying bugs. If you disagree with this, feel free to list all bugridden console games.
I predict, once the console manufacturers get their network functions sorted out and dare to take the giant leap towards networked gaming PC-gaming will diminsh and turn obsolete.
To OP:
I suppose there would be more variation and more evolved games. The market would've stayed as a niche, instead of single monster mutant and a lot's of it's clones.
As the MMORPGs seem to be evolving to the next step (Soul&Blade, Darkfall, any FPS game -style) in combat, the cloning is coming to an end. But no, I don't think UO would've cutted it to the bigger audience.
Ultima Online did actually, almost a decade before WoW. Phasing has existed for a long time. It's just rarely used in MMOs because of the negative side effects that come from it when it's overused, which is what WoW has been running into from time to time concerning that mechanic. When it's used properly, it's barely even noticed.
Uh, no MMO brought in 20 million "new" MMORPG players. It's arguable that WoW didn't even exceed bringing in 10 million new MMORPD players. Realize that at least half of their "11 million" are 1) unique subs, so not necessarily even unique players, 2) more than half were on the China servers, which many of them had already been playing MMOs despite WoW's existence, 3) at least a million of those were pre-existing MMORPG gamers. SO even if you say it brought in 5 million new MMO gamers, I would argue that this was a bad thing, because the bulk of them make up the dregs of MMO-gamers. They make up most of the whiners, the punks, the griefers, and also the ultra-casual gamers that want everything handed to them while they get hand-held through content.
You really can't say that for certain. For all anyone knows, if WoW never existed, AoC may still have been released, but it might have been developed significantly differently, and possibly even better than it was in it's rushed original release.
Player housing, a crafting system that doesn't suck, dropping items anywhere, player vendors, dye-able clothing, the list goes on... UO predates WoW by about 10 years and had features that WoW's devs can't manage to do in the 5 years it's been put out. I seem to recall that instanced player housing was going to be released soon... this was at the game's release 5 years ago.
Uh, if anything most recently released games lack the depth and features that most PC games from the 90s had. The main advantage games today have is graphics, but all the graphics in the world mean nothing when your game mechanics are shallow, redundant, and just plain boring.
Blizzard is not the exceptional developer you claim them to be. They haven't been a great developer any longer for some time. not have they added anything unique or innovative to the market for a long time. WoW itself is just as rehash of mechanics from MMOs that existed before WoW. Blizzard just got lucky with finding a combination that was able to lure in and keep a lot of people. Even so, WoW success isn't soley grounded in it's mechanics, it is as popular as it is, largely because of the Warcraft franchise and Blizzard brand name backing it and convincing non-MMO B.net games to play their MMO.
What if Dark&Light would of been a hit,would it be at the top of the pile,yes i think so.
One vast 15.000 Sq world with no instances or hidden walls,just everybody on one server.
This game had it all,even though they F==ked up by stealing the actual world,it was a good game even with the bugs.
www.darkandlight.com/en/
Actually no....in my opinion. Reason being, that if WoW, as you put it, "would not appear," there wouldn't BE ENOUGH players of MMORPGs for a "lot" (I assume that's what a "pite" is) of them to go to other games that are out right now. As a matter of fact, some of those games themselves might not exist, had Blizzard not "paved the way" for MMOs to be considered on such a grand scale.
Prior to WoW, Everquest was considered "huge" in player numbers. BUT....it was taking a bit of a bad rap because of the addictive nature of the game, and the highly publicized destroyed marriages, etc., and so on, that were a result of such an absorbing hobby. But there were not NEAR as many very young people playing EQ, and the genre was STILL, by and far, considered "geek fodder." Your average Ma and Pa and grade school "baby" makes three... ALL playing EQ....wasn't a very common scenario.
Futhermore, in the days of UO (I was there), rpgs, and the "new" MMOrpgs, were truly considered a nerdfest type of thing. It didn't make you "kewl" to play rpgs. That was not a measure of your "coolness factor." No one in your grade school class was going to ask you if you played UO and then laugh when you said no. So no....there likely would not have been the ENORMOUS influx of MMOs that we see today....had it NOT been for WoW.
Now whether that is good or bad, long term, for the genre....I think really remains to be seen. What WoW DID do....is bring an awfully lot more people into the hobby of PC gaming. I'm not sure that this is TOTALLY a bad thing. After all.....since game developers now see that PC gaming (of any genre) has become a more socially "acceptable" hobby....they're producing all KINDS of games and a lot OF them...some good, some not so good (or even "clone-ish), but nonetheless....we're getting a lot of games.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
Yes I think people would still complain. It's human nature to hate the guy on top..everyone likes to root for the underdog and they want to see him beat up the bigger guy.
I think WoW got really lucky- they came out with a solid game and advertised it well(southpark Mr.T william shattner etc). But I think if WoW didn't become huge then it would have been another game. Maybe Eve Online? And then there would be more space games. And people would whine about all the Eve clones.
I wanna run with that idea---
I've played the MMO genre since EQ. I started EQ in 4th grade (i'm 20 now). Back in elementary school I was kind of an outcast--no one played MMO's...much less computer games. The big thing was console games. It was this way until WOWcame out in High School- suddenly all of my friends played MMO's and then it was the 'cool' thing to do. I've since become a bit jaded- and a bit irritated that my indulgence was seen as 'nerdy' until WoW came out. I have mixed feelings about it...im happy WoW brought in more players to the genre, but I also want reparations- the WoW community neeeds to know that there were other games (and people who played them) before this one.
I don't think there would be a fuss by people calling CLONE! CLONE! if WoW din't exist. What WoW did was change the MMO player base as a whole. The most important thing to note is that pre-WoW there was almost no in-fighting between the players of different games. We didn't come on to forums and degrade every game we didn't play or try and PROVE to everyone else how OUR game was the best. That attitude came with WoW (your welcome to go back in the forum history 5 years and see it for yourself - I know there are forums out there that have been around that long). And because of this, your original question of 'would people fuss over UO Clones like they do WoW clones?" would be a NO.
As for the people who are in this thread trying to say that without WoW there would be no MMO genre left in the world....please. We are in a social networking world now, WoW didn't create that, the internet did. And unless Al Gore works for Blizzard, then they didn't invent that either. :P There are two main reasons WoW became what it did, and it has nothing to do with how great the game is or not.
First, is Blizzard's business model, they are VERY good are marketing their products. Before WoW there practically was no prime time marketting for an MMORPG PC game. By being the first to REACH the masses as they did they were able to tap into more of the population than any other MMORPG to date. The second reason they were able to gain more people was the growing broadband and internet exposure to the common household. Prior to WoWs release, only those who were dedicated to the prospect of the internet or gaming had any kind of broadband connection to the internet. 2003 marked the start of the broadband market boom and 2004 was the first year to see significant increases in DSL subscribers for the major Telecommunications companies. Blizzard's ability to hop on the bandwagon at the right time, and advertise their product to the prime time masses is what gave it it's massive increase in subsribers over all previous MMOs.
Most of us who have been playing for over a decade, know that before WoW came out, finding an MMO title on the shelf at a local Walmart was near impossible. Blizzard was the one that pushed this trend, and again, one of the reasons it has massed so many players. But, even with all these things working in Blizzard's favor, the truth is that had they not been the ones to take advantage of it, someone else would have. It was a market that was rich to be taken advantage of, and eventually someone would have done so. What that game may have been noone will ever know as the circumstances behind Blizzard's success will not happen again. Chances are though, that whatever it may have been, had its community become so competative and defensive about their game as the WoW community has become today, then yes we would be seeing this for it.
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
IF the sandbox game had the sales/subscription numbers that WoW has, then yes, which ever sandbox game did that would be the one that is seen as the template for clone status.
Just as WoW is not talked of as a "EQ clone" (although you can make a case for that), the theoretical smash hit sandbox game would not be called a "UO clone".
Because what is missing from the entire issue is not what the subgenre of the monster MMO is, it's what made WoW the 800 pound gorilla. WoW just happened to go the EQ levels/class/combat first route. That's not the primary reason for its success.
If a UO clone, if you will, was the monster, then many things would not have happened. For example, the SWG CU and NGE wouldn't have taken place. SWG was already a "UO clone"...so no need to be "like WoW" superficially, which is all the CU and NGE did, because those two efforts didn't capture what made WoW a success. SOE doesn't do polish, doesn't do relatively bug-free.
THAT is the missing element...the one that no one seems to be interested in replicating, instead doing the "ship this if it's ready or not, we're ready for our close up, Mr. DeMille" of the idiots in suits running the gaming companies. Who don't seem to have a clue as to why WoW has done so well.
CH, Jedi, Commando, Smuggler, BH, Scout, Doctor, Chef, BE...yeah, lots of SWG time invested.
Once a denizen of Ahazi
I'd still be playing Everquest.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Awesome post and it's good to finally see more who hold the belief that I do about game quality. While many will get on here and villify Blizzard and Turbine for design decisions gamers overlook there greatest value to us and that is the accessibility of the games they release, simply put they work.
Far too often visionary games that claim to expand on the genre or even imitate someone else releases a product unplayable and that is the easiest way to get people not playing.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
I wanna run with that idea---
I've played the MMO genre since EQ. I started EQ in 4th grade (i'm 20 now). Back in elementary school I was kind of an outcast--no one played MMO's...much less computer games. The big thing was console games. It was this way until WOWcame out in High School- suddenly all of my friends played MMO's and then it was the 'cool' thing to do. I've since become a bit jaded- and a bit irritated that my indulgence was seen as 'nerdy' until WoW came out. I have mixed feelings about it...im happy WoW brought in more players to the genre, but I also want reparations- the WoW community neeeds to know that there were other games (and people who played them) before this one.
Amen and amen. I wholeheartedly agree. But it's unlikely that any of them will listen to us now, because they all have learned how to flex their "epeen" and think they are WAY cooler than we "nerds" were "back in the old days."
In THAT way.....WoW has definitely been detrimental (alongside from being bad in some other less personally insulting ways, I'm sure). It did bring more people into PC gaming, however, with more people....comes more people that we don't like and some that are outright douche bags. Win some lose some, I guess.
And yeah, I've always despised how something is only "cool" if millions and millions of people do it. Society, in many respects, hates originality and loves....LEMMINGS. "I was an rpg'er before rpgs were cool." or " I played MMOs long before you even knew what a kobold WAS." We should make t-shirts. lol
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
I'm sensing sarcasm, but theirs a hint of seriousness in it. This website was out before WoW, and will continue even after WoW (if it ever dies which i doubt lol).
I think I made my account around the time I quit daoc because i was looking for a new MMO, had nothing to do with Wowcraft.