I really had to LOL when I read this > They apparently were concerned about some violent content
To be honest, I find unfathomable how in a "childrens" game your QUEST is to kill certain human civilians or even kill some humanoids and BRING THEIR EARS as a proof of your deed.
Originally posted by Zorndorf BTW: The chairman of Activision/Blizzard recently stated in a television interview the "pure" Chinese players were 4.5 million, playing on internet cafés.
Do you have any pointers to that interview? Would be very interesting to check out.
Of course.
Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard.
When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services.
(the passage is around the 40% point of the video).
At around the same time, Blizzard announced 11.6 million Wow subscribers worldwide.
So the pure China subs (internet cafés) were 4.5 million out of the 11.6 million known. Chinese on Taiwan servers are not included with these internet room gamers (according to what the CEO clearly stated).
In fact he mentioned the 4.5 M Chinese players in another interview at E3, but I don't find the second reference anymore.
---> As always Zorndorf never discusses things without FACTS )))
Edit: the reopening of the "pure" Chinese servers will start on July 31 btw and open to existent accounts first.
As Wotlk content is "approved" for now, it could roll out fairly fast.
Perhaps that's the reason why Activision/Blizzard will publish its financial report on the 5th ? (just kidding of course).
You know, there are other countries in the East that play WoW. Not sure why you think 11.5 million minus 4.5 million chinese equates to 7 million western gamers? I can pretty much bet that Koreans alone outnumber all of the western players combined. Let alone India, Malaysia, Japan and other players in the Eastern Bloc.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
Originally posted by Vrazule Originally posted by Zorndorf Originally posted by Dreamagram Originally posted by Zorndorf BTW: The chairman of Activision/Blizzard recently stated in a television interview the "pure" Chinese players were 4.5 million, playing on internet cafés.
Do you have any pointers to that interview? Would be very interesting to check out.
Of course. Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard. http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?play=1&video=1154304274&__source=aol|headline|other|video|&par=aol When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services. (the passage is around the 40% point of the video). At around the same time, Blizzard announced 11.6 million Wow subscribers worldwide. So the pure China subs (internet cafés) were 4.5 million out of the 11.6 million known. Chinese on Taiwan servers are not included with these internet room gamers (according to what the CEO clearly stated). In fact he mentioned the 4.5 M Chinese players in another interview at E3, but I don't find the second reference anymore. ---> As always Zorndorf never discusses things without FACTS ))) Edit: the reopening of the "pure" Chinese servers will start on July 31 btw and open to existent accounts first. As Wotlk content is "approved" for now, it could roll out fairly fast. Perhaps that's the reason why Activision/Blizzard will publish its financial report on the 5th ? (just kidding of course).
You know, there are other countries in the East that play WoW. Not sure why you think 11.5 million minus 4.5 million chinese equates to 7 million western gamers? I can pretty much bet that Koreans alone outnumber all of the western players combined. Let alone India, Malaysia, Japan and other players in the Eastern Bloc.
The "West" makes up about 5M subs for WoW. It's also where the vast bulk of their earnings come from. So no, Korea does not blah blah blah.
I'm an American that doesn't really care about universal subscriber numbers to World of Warcraft or any game for that matter.. Of those touted huge numbers the majority are players outside of the United States. 50 million world subscribers doesn't make it a popular game here in America anymore. Granted there are a couple million U.S. players of the game. WoW is an OLD/DATED very successful game that in a sense ruined MMORPG game evolution for the majority. It's like the Sesame Street of MMO's. It's popular, everybody has seen it and most everybody has played it or tried it. Give us veterans a new refreshing innovative gaming addiction please.!
I wouldn't have expected a more thought-out opinion out fo an American. Does being an American give you the right to be ignorant?
*snickers in his diluted sense of European fake-superiority*
Seriously, the reason why WoW is so immensely popular is the US market. I do not see many 'more advanced' or evolved concepts rolling down the assembly line any time soon.
Sorry but I thought I would say that I beleave that WOWs numbers in the US are mostly do to the fact that like my wife, people have just not taken the time to do the next step and canceled there subscriptions. You see my wife stoped playing about 5 months ago.She has told me that the only reason she has not turned it off is because she is thinks that maybe she might start a new character (her 20th) just for something to do.
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.
You just went on a pointless ramble about imaginary sub numbers that didn't even make sense. You didn't even answer my question, will you play Aion? and if not, why?
I already answered it: it is a pure WOW copy.
You can't copy the King in a genre without being considered a copy.
And yes there were dozens of others who played rock and roll before Elvis.
But Elvis took the genre to its billion of dollars and so everyone imitating Elvis was a copy.
I don't play a copy when I already have the (western) original made with MORE means, MORE polish, MORE options (Arena, 6 BG's, LW, level through PvP, mounted tank combat, phasing etc) and of course an excellent gradual Raid difficulty up to Blizzard standards.
Why play a Korean copy with zoned gameplay and limited flying, when I already have 50+ personal flying mounts in the original with at least some Lore we do know (without resorting to translated text boxes).
The next time I want to play a game besides WOW or after WOW is NOT a copy of it. Let alone a Korean copy.
Waste of time.
pure wow copy or what ( and even i think using that word in talking about games means you are abit ding ) everyhting is copy of somehting thats already there.
and who cares about ifits copy or what, its better looking and smoehting new.
Originally posted by Zorndorf BTW: The chairman of Activision/Blizzard recently stated in a television interview the "pure" Chinese players were 4.5 million, playing on internet cafés.
Do you have any pointers to that interview? Would be very interesting to check out.
Of course.
Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard.
When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services.
(the passage is around the 40% point of the video).
Thanks! I'm a sucker for actual numbers, and this one is most interesting when compared to the worldwide numbers. :-)
Seriously, the reason why WoW is so immensely popular is the US market. I do not see many 'more advanced' or evolved concepts rolling down the assembly line any time soon.
Well., in my eyes next year is relatively soon, and 4 "more advanced ane evolved concepts" are due for that timeframe. I'm assuming they'll take around 1m players worldwide, some pay take less or more. There;s also a few generic MMOs, and those always manage to take just a few thousand away from the king of generic MMOs...
Anyways, my point is next year has alot of MMOs due..no one game can kill another off permanently, but multiple superior games can easily cripple the playerbase of a game that uses graphics and concepts from half a decade back. They won't permanently kill the game seeing as ya only need about 10 thousand players to support a small GM staff and decent dev team for a MMO. Heck Lineage 1 is still alive, and its one of the oldest ones out...even UO, the first major MMO is still going. Point is, even once Warcrack has been replaced by the new big things nect year, and then blizzard's new big thing, it won't die unless they decide to actually turn off the servers to use in their "new" MMO, which will likely just be a rehash of WoW with a new storyline, judging by the history of the people who have been confirmed to been moved from WoW's dev team to the new MMO.
Well, that just means they first lost 5-6 million in China due to politics then the ban is now released so the subscriptions are now back. I think the title is a bit misleading, but it is not technically wrong I suppose.
I am not going to get into this WoW argument since it is purely opinions, but I do see alot of misused terms that gave me a good laugh while reading the thread.
About time they brang down the walls against WoW's content..however I do not approve of the way blizzard just bankrupted a company at thier own whim. I'm no fan of the chinese, but from a business standpoint The9 is finished if this news is true. I believe when 2010 rolls around Blizz will be quite happy to be getting a larger percentage of hourly fees from the chinese community though..seeing as Square Enix has a history of disallowing chinese to play their MMOs. Will be fun to see just how low WoW's non-chinese population drops once all the MMOs next year are released..i'm estimating 4m drop, possibly 5 if they don't do something about dk balance, as they have said they are looking into the class in their Q and As. Not to say I hate the game (i have multiple 80s), but the game has been stale for quite some time.
On a side note I would think this approval is only for current content..it is very likely that future patches and/or expansions will wait another year or more for complete approval.
It's pretty ignorant to say that Square-Enix has a history of DISALLOWING Chinese to play their MMOs. One of the most succressful online games in China is "crossgate" by SE which was published in 2002. Even till today, this game still has a fairly large player base. SE has also published a sequel this year called Concerto Gate. By the way, Concerto gate is also out in the US. Not introducing FFXI in China was a strategic mistake by SE and Blizzard and the9 took full advantage of it. I bet Square Enix won't make the same mistake again.
It's also pretty stupid to say that the9 is finished. they are partly owned by EA, and they are now bringing up several games online by EA and other companies. there are over 60 million Chinese MMO players, losing WOW is not critical to the game industry.
TY but Ive tried them all and stopped the ridiculous tries after WAR, as a WH miniatures player I simply knew it HAD to stop. It costed me handful of money to try to play the bad copies. While I have much much more fun playing Wow. And of all my wargame friends ... I am the one with the 500+ games in my attic. ))) So no thank you, I understood it quite well these last 4 years. There is no one even in the neighbourhood of Blizzard at the moment. Next game I'll try is KOTOR, but the rest of the copies I skip ty.
Maybe you should try Aion, or does it scare you too much? open world pvp and all no instance stuff, could you handle that?
Seriously, Aion is the worst that could happen to WOW haters (as in the hating of a game because it is too dominant in the market position).
The only thing I disliked with Aion was the false and non confirmed subs sumbers that were rolling out of websites 2 months ago.
The only official reports of NCSoft were 1.5 million subs with 41 Korean servers and 113 Chinese servers in May 2009.
Where are those official reports?
All the rest (3.5 M to even 7 M) were non confirmed rumours coming out of the same suspect AU source that never were confirmed.
Kilkil2 (a Korean aion player) just stated in these forums aion Korea has around 2M of players. So many sources already pointing at the game being a massive success in Asia.
It is perhaps a tric to launch Korean games by NC Soft (having rumours of millions of players), I don't know,. But the same "tric" was used on GW and L2.
What "tric"?
L2 has around 60K western subs at the moment (so far away from those 4 M announced 2 years ago) and for GW .... sold copies of discs simply don't mean ... players (even for a free to play game).
Link to the announcement, please.
So Aion is pushed already in the same wrong way.
You are not playing that Korean game for its merits, you are playing it to get away from WOW dominance of the market
A perfect illustraton of why all those other dozen MMO's flopped these last 4 years.
What I read about Kotor and to a lesser extent about Star Trek, I think there could be a possibility they don't fall into the WOW copy trap.
We'll see, but there is NO better publicity for WOW than Aion.
You'll see that in 6 months time.
I think you're projecting way too much. Hating on a game because of its success...where have I seen that lately?
Seriously, the reason why WoW is so immensely popular is the US market. I do not see many 'more advanced' or evolved concepts rolling down the assembly line any time soon.
Well., in my eyes next year is relatively soon, and 4 "more advanced ane evolved concepts" are due for that timeframe. I'm assuming they'll take around 1m players worldwide, some pay take less or more. There;s also a few generic MMOs, and those always manage to take just a few thousand away from the king of generic MMOs...
Anyways, my point is next year has alot of MMOs due..no one game can kill another off permanently, but multiple superior games can easily cripple the playerbase of a game that uses graphics and concepts from half a decade back. They won't permanently kill the game seeing as ya only need about 10 thousand players to support a small GM staff and decent dev team for a MMO. Heck Lineage 1 is still alive, and its one of the oldest ones out...even UO, the first major MMO is still going. Point is, even once Warcrack has been replaced by the new big things nect year, and then blizzard's new big thing, it won't die unless they decide to actually turn off the servers to use in their "new" MMO, which will likely just be a rehash of WoW with a new storyline, judging by the history of the people who have been confirmed to been moved from WoW's dev team to the new MMO.
Yeah, there are a few games coming out next year. But there is nothing coming out that compares to Warhammer and AOC last year. Those games had experience, huge development budgets, huge marketing budgets, and they both failed to even dent WOW. WOW grew by almost 10% last year during the launch of two very popular competitors.
The games being released next year are nothing compared to War and AOC. I'm not even sure which 4 you are thinking of because they get so unhyped that you really don't expect much from them. Yes, there is always a chance one of them might start out small and pull an EVE.. but it's more than likely that they will all just fizzle away.
So again, if wow GREW in subscribers while AOC and War were being released, then there is nothing coming up next year that will even give it a scare.
The next scare will be the Bioware Star Wars game, which is a couple years away. Ironically, it will launch probably the same year as the new Blizzard MMORPG.
And my final point. Go to the NPD or the amazon.com best seller lists. WOW battlechest (original wow) continues to be in the top 20 in NA. As long as they are selling new boxes, they can easily replace the 'veterans' who move on.
Yeah, there are a few games coming out next year. But there is nothing coming out that compares to Warhammer and AOC last year. Those games had experience, huge development budgets, huge marketing budgets, and they both failed to even dent WOW. WOW grew by almost 10% last year during the launch of two very popular competitors. The games being released next year are nothing compared to War and AOC. I'm not even sure which 4 you are thinking of because they get so unhyped that you really don't expect much from them. Yes, there is always a chance one of them might start out small and pull an EVE.. but it's more than likely that they will all just fizzle away. So again, if wow GREW in subscribers while AOC and War were being released, then there is nothing coming up next year that will even give it a scare. The next scare will be the Bioware Star Wars game, which is a couple years away. Ironically, it will launch probably the same year as the new Blizzard MMORPG. And my final point. Go to the NPD or the amazon.com best seller lists. WOW battlechest (original wow) continues to be in the top 20 in NA. As long as they are selling new boxes, they can easily replace the 'veterans' who move on.
I won'y deny that subscription numbers are up, though AoC and Warhammer definitely won't die any time soon, either. A casual MMO tends to attract casual gamers who spend a few hours a week on the game, and thats where I see a lot of the subscription base coming from due to Blizzard's marketing genius. The games I was thinking of are FF14, All Points Bulletin, Champions Online, and Aion, which I guess one could count as this year's MMO. Age of Conan and Warhammer made the mistake of pushing the game out early, which definitely turned people off to the game initially. Square Enix definitely won't make the same mistake, but neither will they make the mistake of trying to dethrone the sedentary monarch of the MMO world. From what I see, neither are any of the other MMOs I mentioned, with the possible exception of Aion, which many have described as "Original WoW with Wings." The marketing aquad over at Blizzard is very good at what they do, and until they shift their focus to the next game, WoW will remain on top due to its low specs, low time invested, low skill curve, and affordability; people want to have fun when they play a game, they don't want to actually gain a feeling of accomplishment any more. The people who actually want to "earn" their place in a game are called "hardcores" by many, and apparently the others far outnumber us.
So, for those who don't feel like reading the fence of text, Wow will not die til Blizzard decides they need the server equipment for other endeavors, profit is > quality in their case, and I'm going to go play BlazBlue. Ciao!
Comments
To be honest, I find unfathomable how in a "childrens" game your QUEST is to kill certain human civilians or even kill some humanoids and BRING THEIR EARS as a proof of your deed.
NEW IDEAS that can refresh the STALE state of MMORPGs
Do you have any pointers to that interview? Would be very interesting to check out.
Of course.
Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?play=1&video=1154304274&__source=aol|headline|other|video|&par=aol
When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have 4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services.
(the passage is around the 40% point of the video).
At around the same time, Blizzard announced 11.6 million Wow subscribers worldwide.
So the pure China subs (internet cafés) were 4.5 million out of the 11.6 million known. Chinese on Taiwan servers are not included with these internet room gamers (according to what the CEO clearly stated).
In fact he mentioned the 4.5 M Chinese players in another interview at E3, but I don't find the second reference anymore.
---> As always Zorndorf never discusses things without FACTS
)))
Edit: the reopening of the "pure" Chinese servers will start on July 31 btw and open to existent accounts first.
As Wotlk content is "approved" for now, it could roll out fairly fast.
Perhaps that's the reason why Activision/Blizzard will publish its financial report on the 5th ? (just kidding of course).
You know, there are other countries in the East that play WoW. Not sure why you think 11.5 million minus 4.5 million chinese equates to 7 million western gamers? I can pretty much bet that Koreans alone outnumber all of the western players combined. Let alone India, Malaysia, Japan and other players in the Eastern Bloc.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
Of course.
Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?play=1&video=1154304274&__source=aol|headline|other|video|&par=aol
When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have 4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services.
(the passage is around the 40% point of the video).
At around the same time, Blizzard announced 11.6 million Wow subscribers worldwide.
So the pure China subs (internet cafés) were 4.5 million out of the 11.6 million known. Chinese on Taiwan servers are not included with these internet room gamers (according to what the CEO clearly stated).
In fact he mentioned the 4.5 M Chinese players in another interview at E3, but I don't find the second reference anymore.
---> As always Zorndorf never discusses things without FACTS
Edit: the reopening of the "pure" Chinese servers will start on July 31 btw and open to existent accounts first.
As Wotlk content is "approved" for now, it could roll out fairly fast.
Perhaps that's the reason why Activision/Blizzard will publish its financial report on the 5th ? (just kidding of course).
You know, there are other countries in the East that play WoW. Not sure why you think 11.5 million minus 4.5 million chinese equates to 7 million western gamers? I can pretty much bet that Koreans alone outnumber all of the western players combined. Let alone India, Malaysia, Japan and other players in the Eastern Bloc.
The "West" makes up about 5M subs for WoW. It's also where the vast bulk of their earnings come from. So no, Korea does not blah blah blah.
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why play clones when you can play the king of clones.
His music is the best sold in the world - even today. Fact.
Think Michael Jackson is only on 5th place (and he's very much alive as well in the music industry).
So WOW is and always will be the King of the "first" generation of MMORPG'S. Like it or not.
And Aion is by far not "second" generation. It's the copy of the presumed King who sold the billions of dollars.
I await the next generation ty and in the meantime I have fun in the original rock and roll (as known by the masses).
I don't like the Korean copycat. Like I said: waste of time.
Man, I'm sorry to say stuff like this on-line, but if you're not a Blizzard employee, you need to get a life!
I wouldn't have expected a more thought-out opinion out fo an American. Does being an American give you the right to be ignorant?
*snickers in his diluted sense of European fake-superiority*
Seriously, the reason why WoW is so immensely popular is the US market. I do not see many 'more advanced' or evolved concepts rolling down the assembly line any time soon.
Sorry but I thought I would say that I beleave that WOWs numbers in the US are mostly do to the fact that like my wife, people have just not taken the time to do the next step and canceled there subscriptions. You see my wife stoped playing about 5 months ago.She has told me that the only reason she has not turned it off is because she is thinks that maybe she might start a new character (her 20th) just for something to do.
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.
I already answered it: it is a pure WOW copy.
You can't copy the King in a genre without being considered a copy.
And yes there were dozens of others who played rock and roll before Elvis.
But Elvis took the genre to its billion of dollars and so everyone imitating Elvis was a copy.
I don't play a copy when I already have the (western) original made with MORE means, MORE polish, MORE options (Arena, 6 BG's, LW, level through PvP, mounted tank combat, phasing etc) and of course an excellent gradual Raid difficulty up to Blizzard standards.
Why play a Korean copy with zoned gameplay and limited flying, when I already have 50+ personal flying mounts in the original with at least some Lore we do know (without resorting to translated text boxes).
The next time I want to play a game besides WOW or after WOW is NOT a copy of it. Let alone a Korean copy.
Waste of time.
pure wow copy or what ( and even i think using that word in talking about games means you are abit ding ) everyhting is copy of somehting thats already there.
and who cares about ifits copy or what, its better looking and smoehting new.
Do you have any pointers to that interview? Would be very interesting to check out.
Of course.
Here is the TV interview of CNBC with Bobby Kotick CEO of Actvision/Blizzard.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?play=1&video=1154304274&__source=aol|headline|other|video|&par=aol
When they talked about different forms of subscriptions he cites clearly they have 4.5 million subscribers in China that actually don't buy the game, but only use subscription based services.
(the passage is around the 40% point of the video).
Thanks! I'm a sucker for actual numbers, and this one is most interesting when compared to the worldwide numbers. :-)
Well., in my eyes next year is relatively soon, and 4 "more advanced ane evolved concepts" are due for that timeframe. I'm assuming they'll take around 1m players worldwide, some pay take less or more. There;s also a few generic MMOs, and those always manage to take just a few thousand away from the king of generic MMOs...
Anyways, my point is next year has alot of MMOs due..no one game can kill another off permanently, but multiple superior games can easily cripple the playerbase of a game that uses graphics and concepts from half a decade back. They won't permanently kill the game seeing as ya only need about 10 thousand players to support a small GM staff and decent dev team for a MMO. Heck Lineage 1 is still alive, and its one of the oldest ones out...even UO, the first major MMO is still going. Point is, even once Warcrack has been replaced by the new big things nect year, and then blizzard's new big thing, it won't die unless they decide to actually turn off the servers to use in their "new" MMO, which will likely just be a rehash of WoW with a new storyline, judging by the history of the people who have been confirmed to been moved from WoW's dev team to the new MMO.
Well, that just means they first lost 5-6 million in China due to politics then the ban is now released so the subscriptions are now back. I think the title is a bit misleading, but it is not technically wrong I suppose.
I am not going to get into this WoW argument since it is purely opinions, but I do see alot of misused terms that gave me a good laugh while reading the thread.
Starcraft 2 is banned from ChinaJoy 2009
It's pretty ignorant to say that Square-Enix has a history of DISALLOWING Chinese to play their MMOs. One of the most succressful online games in China is "crossgate" by SE which was published in 2002. Even till today, this game still has a fairly large player base. SE has also published a sequel this year called Concerto Gate. By the way, Concerto gate is also out in the US. Not introducing FFXI in China was a strategic mistake by SE and Blizzard and the9 took full advantage of it. I bet Square Enix won't make the same mistake again.
It's also pretty stupid to say that the9 is finished. they are partly owned by EA, and they are now bringing up several games online by EA and other companies. there are over 60 million Chinese MMO players, losing WOW is not critical to the game industry.
Maybe you should try Aion, or does it scare you too much? open world pvp and all no instance stuff, could you handle that?
Seriously, Aion is the worst that could happen to WOW haters (as in the hating of a game because it is too dominant in the market position).
The only thing I disliked with Aion was the false and non confirmed subs sumbers that were rolling out of websites 2 months ago.
The only official reports of NCSoft were 1.5 million subs with 41 Korean servers and 113 Chinese servers in May 2009.
Where are those official reports?
All the rest (3.5 M to even 7 M) were non confirmed rumours coming out of the same suspect AU source that never were confirmed.
Kilkil2 (a Korean aion player) just stated in these forums aion Korea has around 2M of players. So many sources already pointing at the game being a massive success in Asia.
It is perhaps a tric to launch Korean games by NC Soft (having rumours of millions of players), I don't know,. But the same "tric" was used on GW and L2.
What "tric"?
L2 has around 60K western subs at the moment (so far away from those 4 M announced 2 years ago) and for GW .... sold copies of discs simply don't mean ... players (even for a free to play game).
Link to the announcement, please.
So Aion is pushed already in the same wrong way.
You are not playing that Korean game for its merits, you are playing it to get away from WOW dominance of the market
A perfect illustraton of why all those other dozen MMO's flopped these last 4 years.
What I read about Kotor and to a lesser extent about Star Trek, I think there could be a possibility they don't fall into the WOW copy trap.
We'll see, but there is NO better publicity for WOW than Aion.
You'll see that in 6 months time.
I think you're projecting way too much. Hating on a game because of its success...where have I seen that lately?
Well., in my eyes next year is relatively soon, and 4 "more advanced ane evolved concepts" are due for that timeframe. I'm assuming they'll take around 1m players worldwide, some pay take less or more. There;s also a few generic MMOs, and those always manage to take just a few thousand away from the king of generic MMOs...
Anyways, my point is next year has alot of MMOs due..no one game can kill another off permanently, but multiple superior games can easily cripple the playerbase of a game that uses graphics and concepts from half a decade back. They won't permanently kill the game seeing as ya only need about 10 thousand players to support a small GM staff and decent dev team for a MMO. Heck Lineage 1 is still alive, and its one of the oldest ones out...even UO, the first major MMO is still going. Point is, even once Warcrack has been replaced by the new big things nect year, and then blizzard's new big thing, it won't die unless they decide to actually turn off the servers to use in their "new" MMO, which will likely just be a rehash of WoW with a new storyline, judging by the history of the people who have been confirmed to been moved from WoW's dev team to the new MMO.
Yeah, there are a few games coming out next year. But there is nothing coming out that compares to Warhammer and AOC last year. Those games had experience, huge development budgets, huge marketing budgets, and they both failed to even dent WOW. WOW grew by almost 10% last year during the launch of two very popular competitors.
The games being released next year are nothing compared to War and AOC. I'm not even sure which 4 you are thinking of because they get so unhyped that you really don't expect much from them. Yes, there is always a chance one of them might start out small and pull an EVE.. but it's more than likely that they will all just fizzle away.
So again, if wow GREW in subscribers while AOC and War were being released, then there is nothing coming up next year that will even give it a scare.
The next scare will be the Bioware Star Wars game, which is a couple years away. Ironically, it will launch probably the same year as the new Blizzard MMORPG.
And my final point. Go to the NPD or the amazon.com best seller lists. WOW battlechest (original wow) continues to be in the top 20 in NA. As long as they are selling new boxes, they can easily replace the 'veterans' who move on.
I won'y deny that subscription numbers are up, though AoC and Warhammer definitely won't die any time soon, either. A casual MMO tends to attract casual gamers who spend a few hours a week on the game, and thats where I see a lot of the subscription base coming from due to Blizzard's marketing genius. The games I was thinking of are FF14, All Points Bulletin, Champions Online, and Aion, which I guess one could count as this year's MMO. Age of Conan and Warhammer made the mistake of pushing the game out early, which definitely turned people off to the game initially. Square Enix definitely won't make the same mistake, but neither will they make the mistake of trying to dethrone the sedentary monarch of the MMO world. From what I see, neither are any of the other MMOs I mentioned, with the possible exception of Aion, which many have described as "Original WoW with Wings." The marketing aquad over at Blizzard is very good at what they do, and until they shift their focus to the next game, WoW will remain on top due to its low specs, low time invested, low skill curve, and affordability; people want to have fun when they play a game, they don't want to actually gain a feeling of accomplishment any more. The people who actually want to "earn" their place in a game are called "hardcores" by many, and apparently the others far outnumber us.
So, for those who don't feel like reading the fence of text, Wow will not die til Blizzard decides they need the server equipment for other endeavors, profit is > quality in their case, and I'm going to go play BlazBlue. Ciao!
Initially I didn't hate world of warcraft, I just hate china and china made world of warcraft successful- I hate walmart too because of china