SWTOR has as much chance of killing WoW as Lady Gaga has of winning Best Dressed. Sure, they're both pretty enough in their own way, but it isn't like either one of them will ever care enough about winning to really put forth the effort it takes.
SWTOR has to worry about it's IP. THey can't make it mainstream enough to kill WoW without sacrificing the established storyline. And they can't invent new lore willy-nilly like Blizzard does because the stroy is well established, and we've already seen how badly it gets rejected by fans when someone, even the original author, creates new lore that doesn't jive with established lore. Sure there are enough small points that can be expounded on for SWTOR to add things, but they already lost me with the Sith being playable ("Always two there are: one master and one apprentice"... So what do we do with the other 3 million Sith Warriors over here that will kill the story between Chapters 3 and 4?) Fortunately for BioWare, there are enough fanboys out there with self-insertion fantasies about Star Wars that they can get away with this hugely lore breaking oops, but it's still just the first step down a slippery slope in my book.
Blizzard isn't going to die to any newcomer to the arena, either. GW2 has more chance of killing WoW than SWTOR does. MoP looks like an awesome concept for an expansion, and the extra content aimed at the more casual player will certainly attract people interested in such things. Their only stumblinb block there is the subscription fee itself. Casual content is supposed to be free, and the players who would be interested in the content as new players to WoW aren't going to view the monthly fee with eager anticipation. Still, I don't think its something Blizzard can't overcome.
The game timeline pre-dates the movie series by a couple centuries. Around the time of Revans return from the Dark side to become Jedi again. In the extended universe lore, this is a time of an abundance of force users, both light and dark. It takes place prior to the great purge and systematic destruction of the Jedi (lukes time).
The entire premise of the "The Old Republic" is a time of rebirth for the Sith Empire. Thats like right on the box cover FFS. You don't need to be a Star Wars afficianado to know that. If you ever played any of the Knights of the Old Republic games, you would know this as well.
TOR might not kill WOW, but its certainly putting the hurt on it. Although I think the two can conexist in today's market. One is fanatsy and the other is Space Opera. One is old school theme park and the other is cutting edge next-gen story-driven theme park. Even if TOR does get to 11 million or so subs. It won't matter to the WOW fans cause there Fanatasy fans. Where as TOR fans will celebrate as Star Wars fans and Sc-Fi Space Opera fans.
But even within just the Fanatsy genre, its all relative. WOW is popular, so what. I personally think LOTRO is a better fantasy game, but thats just because I like the books. I'm a media franchise junkie, that why I like TOR as well. To me a good MMO is something I'm familar with and something I would want to live in.
Never been a Warcraft or Blizzard fan, so when I did try WOW. It didn't appeal to me.I even gave it two trys within two 14 day trials. And for the life of me, I don't see how WOW is as popular as it is and that it has lasted this long. I guess its like movies, for some reason some people like paying for crap. Well I've gotten off-topic, so I'll stop here.
I said the same thing months ago; The Old Republic will have less then 500k subscribers 6 months adfter release. It's not a real mmorpg and only a game you play for a few months.Almost all the eggs are in the story and voice acting basket.
And now after finding out only a small percentage is spend playing that story, the rest of the time you will be doing arbitrary boring side quests and finding out the main story is a lot the same for each class in the same faction I wouldn't be surprised if it tanks like WAR or AOC.
Who exactly said ANY of what you just posted? Do tell. No one. You made it up.
I've seen this before, the game is still in its first month, it will take a while for the player base to level out but more than likely it will hover at 2 to 2.5 million players. it still be profitable but not a WOW killer.
I said the same thing months ago; The Old Republic will have less then 500k subscribers 6 months adfter release. It's not a real mmorpg and only a game you play for a few months.Almost all the eggs are in the story and voice acting basket.
And now after finding out only a small percentage is spend playing that story, the rest of the time you will be doing arbitrary boring side quests and finding out the main story is a lot the same for each class in the same faction I wouldn't be surprised if it tanks like WAR or AOC.
Who exactly said ANY of what you just posted? Do tell. No one. You made it up.
Made what up? The part about most of the questing you will be doing are side quests?
Or that part where main story quests are for the most part the same for all classes in the same faction?
Warcraft will always be Warcraft. If you love the game, then it will always be #1. Some of my best gaming memories involved Warcraft during the BC years. I don't think any game that comes out will let me recapture that feeling.
With Rift moving into Asia later on in the year, Aion going F2P in EU, SW:TOR selling like hot cakes, and people salivating over GW2 (I know it's b2p but some people won't have time to dedicate to 2 MMO's, so they may let one go). That is a lot of things to compete with.
I personally feel it is going to be downhill for Warcraft. I can still see them still having 2-3 million NA/EU subs in 2 years with the release of MoP. Warcraft couldn't kill EQ and I don't think anything will kill ever Warcraft.
People need to refrain from using words like killed, slain, death, dying, etc. WoW won't die (0 subscribers) until Blizzard pulls the plug. It may very well be "dethroned" but it won't die. UO still has quite a few subscribers and many playing on private shards.
It's about damn time that WoW gets killed and the genre gets released from it's grasp.
But if WoW gets killed by SWTOR, the genre will be in way more trouble than it already is with WoW being alive. Because we will then find ourselves back at Pong level in a few years.
Also, don't forget that with WoW, copying replaced innovating. So if WoW is getting killed by a shallow and lacking WoW clone, don't be surprised if investors and companies (once again) copy that bad clone. Downward spiral inc.
Actually, that's my fault. I talked with Joe about Operations the other day, and explained them to be raids. But I forgot to remove this sentence. Fixing now!
Look no offense but if the author of the article can't make a factually accurate article then you shouldn't be correcting him, you should just not be posting it.
:-( it seems clear that the stance of this author is a negative one, he had a bad taste in his mouth when he wrote this article and it shows.
Seems VERY unprofessional.
Edit: Its fine to not like something, but to actually know so little about it and yet still be allowed to post an article? Thats just wrong.
Heh looks like half the people posting did not bother to read the OP. :P
Yes WOW is and will remain the "gorilla".
SWTOR is either a chimp or a baby gorilla. Too soon to say yet.
Either way it has done a pretty good launch, on the retention and growth side? Time will tell.
But it still has a huge disadvantage, the same as just about every other MMO to launch.
WOW is so big and seems to stay so big, from the simple fact that it draws huge crowds back into the game with just about each and every expansion it puts out.
If SWTOR can do the same, put out expansions that draw back huge numbers as well as draw in more as it goes along, it will be an exception, as WOW is.
i've been watching the servers i havn't noticed much of a drop if any at all, my servers are still showing full and there are people everywhere all the time.
people seem to think everyone that is going to play swtor is from warcraft which is insane.
i dunno, that sucks for the OP that his friends left but mine is still fully intact and nobody has plans of ever leaving warcraft, neither do i
i may take breaks from it but i'll be there till they shut off the lights.
p.s. i love panda's :P
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand." - Lewis Thomas
If you read the article closely, you'll realize that Joe's actually stating that WoW won't be killed by SWTOR, despite how well BioWare's game may or may not do.
Thanks!
Read the article?! LOL! We're all too busy posting to read anything anyone else writes
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
The Star Wars MMO is here? We had one for 8 years, a better one in fact, that SWTOR killed.
TOR really is WoW with a Star Wars skin on it, no matter how you want to dress it up and defend it as blind fanbois. Yes, I am playing it right now too, but I seriously think it's not going to be a long affair at all.
Played: Asheron's Call(still the best fantasy MMO!), EQ1, EQ2, Vanguard, DAoC, Horizons, City of Heroes/Villians, WoW (crap), LOTORO, D&D Online, Eve, Anarchy Online, and still playing SWG daily.
I dont think SWTOR alone will kill WoW, but I think its time has come. With the release of SWTOR, and GW2(which is non sub) & TSW in the coming months I think WoW will lose a LOT of its numbers
Cluck Cluck, Gibber Gibber, My Old Mans A Mushroom
How can a game with the EXACT SAME identical issues touch the original? These guys really did not try to be all that different. You guys are seriously caught up in the leveling hype.
At lvl 50 the game turns into a carbon copy WoW clone from 2005 before any of the convinience features were put into WoW. You guys go argue with Bioware about how to fix their broken pvp or beg them for dual spec. Talk about crowning a king too soon.
If you read the article closely, you'll realize that Joe's actually stating that WoW won't be killed by SWTOR, despite how well BioWare's game may or may not do.
Thanks!
The "theme" of the article ("will TOR kill WoW") seems to be an excuse to have yet another MMORPG.com piece extoling and hyping TOR itself, to be honest. On the whole, it most definitely reads like a pro-TOR article, written under the pretense of being about WoW.
I mean, starting with the title, the article is filled with statements about all his friends in WoW leaving, a portrait of Deathwing whose caption indicates TOR as the biggest threat to Azeroth... and myriad other similar statements. All basically placing TOR on a pedestal, despite the author claiming to have zero interest in it.
Not 'til the end of the article does he get around to saying "naw, I guess WoW will be around for a while anyway, 'cause people still feel passionately about it".
Well, yeah. Was that ever seriously in question?
I don't think anyone here ("wishful thinkers" notwithstanding) seriously expects TOR to "kill WoW". WoW will continue on for quite a while with a massive playerbase on its momentum alone. That's not even delving in to the myriad other reasons individuals might have to continue playing.
TOR is still the new kid in the room, as flashy and pretty and popular it might be. It has quite the mountain to climb before it comes anywhere near "killing WoW" on any objective or meaningful level.
To me, the article reads more like yet another MMORPG.com TOR hype piece, that uses the whole "will it kill WoW" question as a rhetorical question to base it around. It would be nice to see an article here on MMORPG.com putting it proper perspective, rather than shamelessly drooling and fawning over it as y'all have been.
I'm still waiting for that "other side of the coin" to show up. So far it's been entirely 1-sided.
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
I'm having the best time I've had in an mmo since WoW Vanilla . ToR is a breath of fresh air because it really is putting the RPG back into mmorpg .
It depends what you would call a WoW killer .
a) Is it a game that has to finnish off WoW altogether ? .then no after all theres still no Ultima Online killer is there . WoW will most likly be around is some form and with a lot less people in 10 years time .
b) Is it a game that deal a significant body blow to WoW and steals a heavy number of subs ( say 2-4 million ) then theres a strong possibility ToR could be the WoWkiller .
c) Is it a game that overtakes WoW in terms of the amount of subs it has ? Well ToR could quite easily do that in the west in the coming months . I've heard WoW has something between 4-5 million players in the EU and NA . ( thats only from estimates I've seen in these forums ) when you consider that ToR sold 1.6 million in its first week and analysts are projecting 3 -4 million units sold by March it doesn't seem quite so unfeasable . It would take releases in Russia and China to follow suit .
I've also heard the arguement most people will give up after month 1 . My experiance if thats likly to happen you would see general chat full of complaints about the game but you just don't .
Some people think huge numbers will give up when they've finnished the storyline . Well the storylines are engaging enough for lots of people to want to play through all the classes . Also ToR has what other games have in terms of endgame thats not stopped people subbing to WoW for years has it .
The problem for Blizzard is that it has become very complacent . The people at the top appear to be make some cataclysmic errors of judgement . Panda-gate proved they were out of touch . The game has also been losing subs prior to ToR offering an attractive alternative . Also on top of this there are plenty of other new and interesting mmos in development that may take even more people from WoW .
It probably won't go down without a fight they will most likly move the goal posts and declare levels 1-60 free to play and continue to count the free to play accounts as subscriptions .
Whatever happens expect further and larger loses in 2012 .Personally I don't think ToR will overtake it this year simply because its unlikly to be released in China and Russia till 2013 .
But eventually if you agree option b or c to be a definition of WoWkiller then it has every chance .
Comments
I haven't noticed any drop off on the WoW server I play on. My guild is up and running full swing. And we have members that play both games.
Of course there is a ton of talk in the trade channel about Star Wars but it is always the same people day after day.
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
The game timeline pre-dates the movie series by a couple centuries. Around the time of Revans return from the Dark side to become Jedi again. In the extended universe lore, this is a time of an abundance of force users, both light and dark. It takes place prior to the great purge and systematic destruction of the Jedi (lukes time).
The entire premise of the "The Old Republic" is a time of rebirth for the Sith Empire. Thats like right on the box cover FFS. You don't need to be a Star Wars afficianado to know that. If you ever played any of the Knights of the Old Republic games, you would know this as well.
^^this
Who exactly said ANY of what you just posted? Do tell. No one. You made it up.
I've seen this before, the game is still in its first month, it will take a while for the player base to level out but more than likely it will hover at 2 to 2.5 million players. it still be profitable but not a WOW killer.
Made what up? The part about most of the questing you will be doing are side quests?
Or that part where main story quests are for the most part the same for all classes in the same faction?
Warcraft will always be Warcraft. If you love the game, then it will always be #1. Some of my best gaming memories involved Warcraft during the BC years. I don't think any game that comes out will let me recapture that feeling.
With Rift moving into Asia later on in the year, Aion going F2P in EU, SW:TOR selling like hot cakes, and people salivating over GW2 (I know it's b2p but some people won't have time to dedicate to 2 MMO's, so they may let one go). That is a lot of things to compete with.
I personally feel it is going to be downhill for Warcraft. I can still see them still having 2-3 million NA/EU subs in 2 years with the release of MoP. Warcraft couldn't kill EQ and I don't think anything will kill ever Warcraft.
People need to refrain from using words like killed, slain, death, dying, etc. WoW won't die (0 subscribers) until Blizzard pulls the plug. It may very well be "dethroned" but it won't die. UO still has quite a few subscribers and many playing on private shards.
It's about damn time that WoW gets killed and the genre gets released from it's grasp.
But if WoW gets killed by SWTOR, the genre will be in way more trouble than it already is with WoW being alive. Because we will then find ourselves back at Pong level in a few years.
Also, don't forget that with WoW, copying replaced innovating. So if WoW is getting killed by a shallow and lacking WoW clone, don't be surprised if investors and companies (once again) copy that bad clone. Downward spiral inc.
I would just hope it puts enough preassure on Blizzard to step up thier game and inovate.
Look no offense but if the author of the article can't make a factually accurate article then you shouldn't be correcting him, you should just not be posting it.
:-( it seems clear that the stance of this author is a negative one, he had a bad taste in his mouth when he wrote this article and it shows.
Seems VERY unprofessional.
Edit: Its fine to not like something, but to actually know so little about it and yet still be allowed to post an article? Thats just wrong.
I can't wait until all of this hooplah between these two games is over. I'm tired of it filling up the news section.
Heh looks like half the people posting did not bother to read the OP. :P
Yes WOW is and will remain the "gorilla".
SWTOR is either a chimp or a baby gorilla. Too soon to say yet.
Either way it has done a pretty good launch, on the retention and growth side? Time will tell.
But it still has a huge disadvantage, the same as just about every other MMO to launch.
WOW is so big and seems to stay so big, from the simple fact that it draws huge crowds back into the game with just about each and every expansion it puts out.
If SWTOR can do the same, put out expansions that draw back huge numbers as well as draw in more as it goes along, it will be an exception, as WOW is.
i've been watching the servers i havn't noticed much of a drop if any at all, my servers are still showing full and there are people everywhere all the time.
people seem to think everyone that is going to play swtor is from warcraft which is insane.
i dunno, that sucks for the OP that his friends left but mine is still fully intact and nobody has plans of ever leaving warcraft, neither do i
i may take breaks from it but i'll be there till they shut off the lights.
p.s. i love panda's :P
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand."
- Lewis Thomas
The WoW Factor: Slain by the Sith?
With a plastic light saber?
*goes aways laughting*
To the Author,
Good! Now you know how we felt when WOW hit.
Signed,
Players of Everquest
Read the article?! LOL! We're all too busy posting to read anything anyone else writes
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
The Star Wars MMO is here? We had one for 8 years, a better one in fact, that SWTOR killed.
TOR really is WoW with a Star Wars skin on it, no matter how you want to dress it up and defend it as blind fanbois. Yes, I am playing it right now too, but I seriously think it's not going to be a long affair at all.
Played: Asheron's Call(still the best fantasy MMO!), EQ1, EQ2, Vanguard, DAoC, Horizons, City of Heroes/Villians, WoW (crap), LOTORO, D&D Online, Eve, Anarchy Online, and still playing SWG daily.
Is it now time for WoW to evolve, move away from raids and tab target press 123 mechanics?
It would be pretty damn good if we had NGE for WoW!
I dont think SWTOR alone will kill WoW, but I think its time has come. With the release of SWTOR, and GW2(which is non sub) & TSW in the coming months I think WoW will lose a LOT of its numbers
Cluck Cluck, Gibber Gibber, My Old Mans A Mushroom
Yep, that would certainly kill it
Cluck Cluck, Gibber Gibber, My Old Mans A Mushroom
Most of the said here is bullshit. Not untill BioWare pull out the numbers anything else is just speculation.
Music is the science of manipulating people trough sound.
How can a game with the EXACT SAME identical issues touch the original? These guys really did not try to be all that different. You guys are seriously caught up in the leveling hype.
At lvl 50 the game turns into a carbon copy WoW clone from 2005 before any of the convinience features were put into WoW. You guys go argue with Bioware about how to fix their broken pvp or beg them for dual spec. Talk about crowning a king too soon.
The "theme" of the article ("will TOR kill WoW") seems to be an excuse to have yet another MMORPG.com piece extoling and hyping TOR itself, to be honest. On the whole, it most definitely reads like a pro-TOR article, written under the pretense of being about WoW.
I mean, starting with the title, the article is filled with statements about all his friends in WoW leaving, a portrait of Deathwing whose caption indicates TOR as the biggest threat to Azeroth... and myriad other similar statements. All basically placing TOR on a pedestal, despite the author claiming to have zero interest in it.
Not 'til the end of the article does he get around to saying "naw, I guess WoW will be around for a while anyway, 'cause people still feel passionately about it".
Well, yeah. Was that ever seriously in question?
I don't think anyone here ("wishful thinkers" notwithstanding) seriously expects TOR to "kill WoW". WoW will continue on for quite a while with a massive playerbase on its momentum alone. That's not even delving in to the myriad other reasons individuals might have to continue playing.
TOR is still the new kid in the room, as flashy and pretty and popular it might be. It has quite the mountain to climb before it comes anywhere near "killing WoW" on any objective or meaningful level.
To me, the article reads more like yet another MMORPG.com TOR hype piece, that uses the whole "will it kill WoW" question as a rhetorical question to base it around. It would be nice to see an article here on MMORPG.com putting it proper perspective, rather than shamelessly drooling and fawning over it as y'all have been.
I'm still waiting for that "other side of the coin" to show up. So far it's been entirely 1-sided.
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
I'm having the best time I've had in an mmo since WoW Vanilla . ToR is a breath of fresh air because it really is putting the RPG back into mmorpg .
It depends what you would call a WoW killer .
a) Is it a game that has to finnish off WoW altogether ? .then no after all theres still no Ultima Online killer is there . WoW will most likly be around is some form and with a lot less people in 10 years time .
b) Is it a game that deal a significant body blow to WoW and steals a heavy number of subs ( say 2-4 million ) then theres a strong possibility ToR could be the WoWkiller .
c) Is it a game that overtakes WoW in terms of the amount of subs it has ? Well ToR could quite easily do that in the west in the coming months . I've heard WoW has something between 4-5 million players in the EU and NA . ( thats only from estimates I've seen in these forums ) when you consider that ToR sold 1.6 million in its first week and analysts are projecting 3 -4 million units sold by March it doesn't seem quite so unfeasable . It would take releases in Russia and China to follow suit .
I've also heard the arguement most people will give up after month 1 . My experiance if thats likly to happen you would see general chat full of complaints about the game but you just don't .
Some people think huge numbers will give up when they've finnished the storyline . Well the storylines are engaging enough for lots of people to want to play through all the classes . Also ToR has what other games have in terms of endgame thats not stopped people subbing to WoW for years has it .
The problem for Blizzard is that it has become very complacent . The people at the top appear to be make some cataclysmic errors of judgement . Panda-gate proved they were out of touch . The game has also been losing subs prior to ToR offering an attractive alternative . Also on top of this there are plenty of other new and interesting mmos in development that may take even more people from WoW .
It probably won't go down without a fight they will most likly move the goal posts and declare levels 1-60 free to play and continue to count the free to play accounts as subscriptions .
Whatever happens expect further and larger loses in 2012 .Personally I don't think ToR will overtake it this year simply because its unlikly to be released in China and Russia till 2013 .
But eventually if you agree option b or c to be a definition of WoWkiller then it has every chance .