In the Trading Card game the chance you will get the card that gives you a mount is low I have seen 1 of the TGC Mounts and it was not a incintive to buy the cards if you want the mount so bad I can pay 500 bucks online for the special code from the rare card, Blizzard gave it as a reward, and None of these items give you a ingame advantage..... not even the horse mount I can get a epic ground mount for 9g Ohhh no! Saying faults with the game is fine but most ppl take it to the point of bashing, Blizzard is bad now or Blizzard makes fail games, Is not criticism its bashing and hate and only someone blind would not see that.
In the Trading Card game the chance you will get the card that gives you a mount is low I have seen 1 of the TGC Mounts and it was not a incintive to buy the cards if you want the mount so bad I can pay 500 bucks online for the special code from the rare card, Blizzard gave it as a reward, and None of these items give you a ingame advantage..... not even the horse mount I can get a epic ground mount for 9g Ohhh no! Saying faults with the game is fine but most ppl take it to the point of bashing, Blizzard is bad now or Blizzard makes fail games, Is not criticism its bashing and hate and only someone blind would not see that.
The mounts, noncombat pets, and other content from TCG are still content.
It may not effect your gameplay to have content in the game restricted from you by out of game limitations.
It does however detract from my gameplay, as an old-school MMO gamer and "achiever", to be locked out of scraps of content unless I pull out my credit card. This degrades my enjoyment of the game and ruins immersion into the gameworld.
"fluff", "aethetics", or whatever other label you want to put on it, does not change the fact that it's still content. Content that is being withheld from us unless we play the "throw money at us" game with Blizzard.
As far as I'm concerned, that fact that Blizzard jumped on board the RMT bandwagon, it makes them just as bad as any other greedy game developer in that regard.
one of the benefits of being Blizzard is we don't have to ship a product until we think it's ready. Our marketing department works with us on the game, but they understand that when the game is ready is ultimately up to the team. We didn't cut it because we ran out of time. We cut it because we didn't think the design we had was fun.
I wish more companies would follow this line of thinking. Maybe while fewer games coming out they would be better quality.
One of the benefits of not being Blizzard is that you can release enough good content to keep players busy and from going to other game forums and demanding content that is like your own until you release the next content driven expansion that will run out at some point too.
Don't you worry guys I'm sure these cut features will be coming to an Item shop near YOU!!
When you think Blizzard is respectable just remind yourself of how they used the make a wish foundation to introduce their item shop. Hey lets create 2 pets and give half of the proceeds to make a wish foundation. People wont complain because its for a good cause. Then they have their way to introduce items in the future. AND THATS HOW THE WOW ITEM SHOP CAME TO BE.
The Original blizzard was great. Current Blizzard is nickle and diming people in all their titles. $2.99 a month for a mobile auction house that could further ruin the economy ingame? Starcraft being released in 3 different box sets. So in the end it costs $180. If they cared about fun why do they ignore unbalanced servers where one faction rules 10 to 1. They cancelled these features because it was going to take more work than planned. Therefore costing them more money.
You talk about all these optional things as if they were forced upon you and you have no choice but to buy them. "Oh golly gee they made an iphone app for the auction house thats is useless to over 95% of the people playings, I sure do hope mommy is home so I can use her credit card to buy this." "Oh noes teh item shop only gives half of the revenues to charity. Those money hungry douchebags should be giving 100%, although I have never before gave a shit about any charity Ima gonna rage and whine till someone listens." This is what I see in your post.
Wow fanatics like you make me laugh. If someone insults your game you always resort to assuming everyone is 10 years old and living off their parents. Ive graduated college and have a great carreer.
The mobile app is also accessable through a web browser on a computer. So its accessable to 100% of people with an internet connection. Creating this and any other cash shop item is time taken away from developing ingame content. Could have possibly been the difference of Path of the Titans and Guild talents being fixed for release.
The charity issue is not the fact that they only gave half of the proceeds. Its the face that they used the charity to introduce their item shop to minimalize the communities outrage. As far as charities go. I've cycled 100 miles to raise money for cancer. Ive participated in several relay for life events and have happily donated to many others.
What I am raging on is Blizzard moving away from what their original ways of doing things, and going against things they stated would never be done. For example Faction change. Destroyed server balance. Blizzard then did nothing to fix this.
Do you feel accomplished as if you really got me and people read your post thinking it was great? Your lack of any sort of response other than a poor attempt to mock me is pathetic.
Have a nice day.
A WoW fanatic. That is something I have never heard before. Counter Strike nut maybe but never that....but I guess thats how it is when someone tries to express their views that are positive towards Blizzard. First of all props to you for making an effort in making the world a better place. But seeing as how you seem to be a great person in real life I am all the more baffled why you have such an exagerated reaction to Blizzs decisions recently. The cash shop is a buisness decision ofcourse no one would argue otherwise, but when it comes to the community outrage I tend to disagree. I disagree simply becouse most people label the forum official or others as the community, but the truth is that forum posters such as us are a minority. Most gamers do not care about forum, hell they dont care about discussing the game they play with strangers. We are a loud, sometimes whiny minority. we may be more involved in the game we play more than the avarage joe but we are not THE community, were just a small part of it. This leads us to the fact that most WoW players simply dont care about the cash shop. I know plenty of WoW players both casual and the more hardcore and to them its a non-issue.
I know people love to critisize companies for making moves clearly to make money but I cant really condemn those companies for doing so because thats their job. Blizzard still remains one of the few devs that listen to their fanbase, but you have to understand that, once again, forum dwellers are only a fraction of this fanbase and we are not more important than the less involved players. This imo is where the issue of those extra services like faction changes comes in. These are things people wanted, people meaning both the more involved and more casual. This once more to many is a non-issue becouse though like you said server balance is gone forever few mmo players would ever choose WoW for a PvP experiance and thats where balance is important. Also I do agree that Blizzard has not found a way to fix this problem. I think they did not expect the service to be so popular becouse of the high price. To me the optional services are expensive as a way to deter from overzelous faction/race/server changes.
As for the personal attack. That is how I decided to answer your post becouse to me its silly pure and simple. You start of with a ridiculous statement containing an unsupported by any proof assumption as to where the cash shop will go. You make this gigantic leap from the store which so far only sells vanity items to something that can be seen as the extreme of cash shops with whole features of the game being avaialable only for cash. Sure I take it this is an exagerated example of what you think will happen, but if you exagerate why shouldnt I?
There is no Blizzard anymore. Since they sold themselves to Vivendi its a way down.
Then they merged with Activision, and there is not much left of old Blizzard. Mr Kotick gives no fuck for games - he is only interested in making money - and making it fast.
A) you are wrong...they only sold 49% of themselves. With 51% of their ownership in themselves they can tell Mr. Kotick to fuck off.
why do people keep spreading this lie...see point A
C) Since they joined Vivendi they made SC1, WC3, and Diablo 2. I would not say they went down in that time.
He's right. Vivendi bought the parent company of Blizzard years ago. It's a wholly owned subsidiary. Then Vivendi merged with Activision with Vivendi being the majority partner. Kotick is the CEO they can't tell him anything. However he has a Board of directors to answer to and Vivendi has a special relationship with Blizzard.The Vivendi board limits what Kotick can do not Blizzard. Very few of the people who founded Blizzard work there any more.
QFT.
I also don't like how much Blizzard has changed from what it was 5-10 years ago and the decisions they've been making the last few years have been underwhelming. Back then they were simply awesome.
But hey, I'm not dependant upon them for my wages nor is Blizzard a sports club I'm part of: if Activision Blizzard has stepped on the slope downwards towards mediocrity, then it's sad and a shame, but there are enough other great companies around that can and will provide great games to play, singleplayer games and MMO's.
On that sidenote: a Rockstar MMO would sound great, maybe a Red Dead Redemption MMO. But for now I'll just be satisfied with a GW2, FFXIV, TSW, ToR, TERA and Rift on the MMO horizon. On a 'wait and see' mode regarding CATA, and will decide after the 1st SC2 if I want to buy the other 2.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I have yet to see a Blizzard product released that was not quality at launch. WoW suffered from minimal bugs, but a lot of lag. What do you expect when millions log in at one time. No one is prepared for that, but with in a month or two they had that worked out. Most games release in a state that would get them sued if they were providing a contracted product to a company.
Ever played Diablo II?
That game was horrendously bugged in every conceivable compass direction when it was released in 2000. To Blizzard's credit, they patched it like madmen early on and it was eventually fine. But that game was a shining example of shipping when the product wasn't ready.
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
one of the benefits of being Blizzard is we don't have to ship a product until we think it's ready. Our marketing department works with us on the game, but they understand that when the game is ready is ultimately up to the team. We didn't cut it because we ran out of time. We cut it because we didn't think the design we had was fun.
I wish more companies would follow this line of thinking. Maybe while fewer games coming out they would be better quality.
I wish Blizzard followed their own line of thinking, even after cutting down promised content all their expansions are filled with bugs, unintended features, poorly thought mechanics and performance problems...however to a much lesser degree than the competence, thats for sure.
anyway bold statements like the one you copied are 99% PR, 1% truth. if you are willing to believe that shit, that says more about your stance regarding Blizzard, than about Blizzard itself.
one of the benefits of being Blizzard is we don't have to ship a product until we think it's ready. Our marketing department works with us on the game, but they understand that when the game is ready is ultimately up to the team. We didn't cut it because we ran out of time. We cut it because we didn't think the design we had was fun.
I wish more companies would follow this line of thinking. Maybe while fewer games coming out they would be better quality.
I wish Blizzard followed their own line of thinking, even after cutting down promised content all their expansions are filled with bugs, unintended features, poorly thought mechanics and performance problems...however to a much lesser degree than the competence, thats for sure.
anyway bold statements like the one you copied are 99% PR, 1% truth. if you are willing to believe that shit, that says more about your stance regarding Blizzard, than about Blizzard itself.
I've seen far worst than Blizzard's starts, honestly, the expensions blizzard made were less buggy and laggy than Alot of other games ( if you compare number of bugs and total population of the game)
one of the benefits of being Blizzard is we don't have to ship a product until we think it's ready. Our marketing department works with us on the game, but they understand that when the game is ready is ultimately up to the team. We didn't cut it because we ran out of time. We cut it because we didn't think the design we had was fun.
I wish more companies would follow this line of thinking. Maybe while fewer games coming out they would be better quality.
I wish Blizzard followed their own line of thinking, even after cutting down promised content all their expansions are filled with bugs, unintended features, poorly thought mechanics and performance problems...however to a much lesser degree than the competence, thats for sure.
anyway bold statements like the one you copied are 99% PR, 1% truth. if you are willing to believe that shit, that says more about your stance regarding Blizzard, than about Blizzard itself.
I've seen far worst than Blizzard's starts, honestly, the expensions blizzard made were less buggy and laggy than Alot of other games ( if you compare number of bugs and total population of the game)
I don't know what the population of a game has to do with bugs....?
It makes me wonder how many people commenting that WoW had a smooth start were actually there . It certainly did'nt . Having said that it was a lot more finnished a game than the likes of Vanguard and Age of Conan when they were released .
As for respecting Blizzard . I repect them just about as much as I respect the BANKS .
I don't respect Blizzard because of their willingness to imo ruin a very successful game in making it forvever easier so as to aim it at the very casual player and younger demographic . ( I won't go as far as saying its dumbed down because I would'nt want to imply the people playing it are stupid ).
I think WoW would have been just as successful or maybe even more so had they a little shown integrity and not changed the game beyond all recognition to what it was 5 years ago in pursuit of the almighty buck .
It is a matter of conjecture but I firmly believe WoW had Blizzard developed the game with a little more care and concideration toward its longer term players that it could have had several more million players than it does today .
Future Blizzard MMOs may be successful amongst the young and very casual mmo crowd but there will be plenty of people that wont touch them with a barge poll because they will remember what happened to WoW .
Of course like any company they are in the buisness of making money but good buisness practice does'nt always mean making as much money as you can as quickly as you can . It is often far better to maintain a reputation for credibilty to reap the benefits in the long term .
Blizzard are certainly not the worst company that have developed an MMO but neither are they deserving of any type of respect in my opinion .
yayitsandy, you probaly never lived in a capitalist country dont you? The all mighty buck as you call it IS the basis of the economy and since Blizzard is a company... well they succeded! The thing is that Blizzard did it without taking off TOO MUCH of content. Cryptic with STO tried too but cutted too much on content, guess what happened... it failed.
You can treat Blizzard as a Bank if you want, but a bank doesnt really want to bankrupt you cuz they need you to live so they will take the maximum they can until they reach limit point, it is the same for Blizzard. So think about it.
Probably something to do with lag, what do you think? a server with 2 people in it wont lag as much as a game with 1000 people.
I don't consider lag a bug. Lag usually occurs on the user end, not the games.
You didnt tried MO on the last days dont you ? Blaming users is easy. But why should we have lag in one game and not in an other? I dont lag in Wow, Eve, GA but i do in STO and MO. Why is that?
Probably something to do with lag, what do you think? a server with 2 people in it wont lag as much as a game with 1000 people.
I don't consider lag a bug. Lag usually occurs on the user end, not the games.
You didnt tried MO on the last days dont you ? Blaming users is easy. But why should we have lag in one game and not in an other? I dont lag in Wow, Eve, GA but i do in STO and MO. Why is that?
I never lagged in STO, which kind of proves my point. I also said "usually" on the user's end. Some people lag in WoW, others don't. It usually depends on different factors. How far away do you live from the server and how good your connection is are two things that contribute to lag. A lot of companies don't consider lag a bug.
Well they should, because i dont lag anymore in STO (they fixed the lag issue) and my computer is 2 times optimal requirements, and got high speed internet last of all i scan daily for spy/malwares weekly for viruses. Cant be from my side.
I have yet to see a Blizzard product released that was not quality at launch. WoW suffered from minimal bugs, but a lot of lag. What do you expect when millions log in at one time. No one is prepared for that, but with in a month or two they had that worked out. Most games release in a state that would get them sued if they were providing a contracted product to a company.
Ever played Diablo II?
That game was horrendously bugged in every conceivable compass direction when it was released in 2000. To Blizzard's credit, they patched it like madmen early on and it was eventually fine. But that game was a shining example of shipping when the product wasn't ready.
To be fair, Diablo 1 and 2 were not done by Blizzard.
They were developed by Blizzard North. It is a completely different studio. They were bought out and had a name change. Blizzard North is no more, for obvious reasons. So it is not accurate to say Diablo 1 or 2 or its expansions (even the one developed by an outside company) is actually from the Blizzard everyone is talking about in this thread.
That said, there is a lot of unjustified Blizzard hate going on. There are two companies I respect in the game industry, not because I am a fan of their games, but rather, their work ethic and ability to produce quality without a Publisher telling them what to do and when to do it. Blizzard is one of them, Valve is the other. They have a lot in common, however Valve dropped the whole "heirarchy" set up found in most dev studios. They have an interesting system, and it works.
I also think its funny when many say that WoW, when it was released back in2004, had anything new to offer. I can be considered a mmorpg vet, and when I had the chance to beta WoW.... I was impressed. What WoW did is really define the RvR or Faction vs Faction pvp. It was done as a core mechanic, not an after thought. Their system of traveling through the world, having the world broken up into zones both for alliance and horde, the world design and layout, everything was fantastic. I have never seen that type of smart level design, world buidling and real core focus in a mmorpg. They do have their claim of innovation, but its probably not what you have in mind. They designed a game so solid, with perfect "flow" (refer to game developers flow chart), and internationally marketable...that it changed how MMORPGs have been seen, and increased the level of money publishers are willing to pump into what they previously considered a small nich market.
I respect Blizzard, and not just as a gamer, but as someone who loves working with game design and design theory.
Hell, did you know Blizzard's animation department is not only larger than Pixars but also better equipped?
There may be some agreements or disagreements on how the WoW Expansions were handled, I personally didnt like some of the changes but I recognize that Blizzard saw the market ...the entire market, and made changes that would reach that market better. This is why they have so many subs at this point, and all while using a p2p model. They know what they are doing.
By claiming that success, not only have they managed to build a new beautiful head quarters in Irvine, but also hire more developers, allow for more independence, increase budget for other games and future investments, and most importantly, be able to do what they want for the long term, which is good for everyone. Some may hate the fact that they impacted the entire gaming industry with just 1 mmorpg, but you have to admit, they made publishers take serious note of the MMORPG, which was previously seen as too risky. They popularized the MMORPG, which was necessary for the Genre to grow.
I think we should all be curious as to what the new Blizzard mmorpg will turn out to be like, since its a new IP designed to be a MMORPG from the ground up (unlike warcraft), and also has all that funding from WoW's success going into it. It could be the mmorpg savior, or the antichrist, but needless to say, it will be epic in one way or another.
I agree, whenever a game client gets released and their spelling errors, flaws, bugs and even a poor interface, then I'll take those red flags seriously.
I was trying out Jade Dynasty and during the first set of items, they put a 7 day lock on the items, meaning you couldn't trade them, on one occision, there was a box with a group of items and said 'close' on the bottom and clicked it, however I realised that the game accepted the items which I didn't want and couldn't get rid of it. I uninstalled the game and never looked back. It's simple little problems like these that make me NOT want to play a game or MMO.
I'm aware that Blizzard had it's own problems in the past (corrupted blood) however those were overlooked and problems, people would have never thought off.
one of the benefits of being Blizzard is we don't have to ship a product until we think it's ready. Our marketing department works with us on the game, but they understand that when the game is ready is ultimately up to the team. We didn't cut it because we ran out of time. We cut it because we didn't think the design we had was fun.
I wish more companies would follow this line of thinking. Maybe while fewer games coming out they would be better quality.
If so, why are Wintergrasp battles in WOW?
It's STILL a lagfest!! Their netcode needs a major fix to solve it.
Love them or hate them so far Blizzard's business model works, and love or hate WoW millions still play it and haven't bailed into other games yet. Given the competition they have had and that WoW graphics wise is becoming dated, the fact is they are still on top and worthy of some respect. They must be doing something right.
How can blizzard cut/changed *PLANNED* (not promised) features to meet a release date when a release date has not been published, it is not even in beta (which is probably last 4 months based on previous beta's).
Starcraft2 is out in 6 weeks so blizzard will be getting a huge influx of cash shortly so no need to cut features to rush Cata out the door.
Blizzard has anounced well before release these features are gone unlike other companies who do so a week before released, such openness should be welcomed.
Features were cut/changed because in play tests they were not fun no conspiracy or agenda here.
How can blizzard cut/changed *PLANNED* (not promised) features to meet a release date when a release date has not been published, it is not even in beta (which is probably last 4 months based on previous beta's).
Starcraft2 is out in 6 weeks so blizzard will be getting a huge influx of cash shortly so no need to cut features to rush Cata out the door.
Blizzard has anounced well before release these features are gone unlike other companies who do so a week before released, such openness should be welcomed.
Features were cut/changed because in play tests they were not fun no conspiracy or agenda here.
Um... removing "planned" features is cutting them, the public release date being known is irrelevant. If they're doing things like 99.9% of other developers do, they have an internal project timeline that lists all of the 'deliverables' (features), their place in the timeline and length to work on, as well as their cost and dependencies on other portions of the project. When they decide to remove something from this timeline, whether due to budget or time constrains (meaning they did not accurately estimate in the planning phase), or alteration of scope, then they cut the deliverable from the project.
Yes, they can change or cut whatever feature they want. It's their game, they're not under contract with us to include certain features. But, the way things are going, Cataclysm is looknig to be a very bland and lackluster expansion.
Comments
Hahahahahahahahaha!
Well shave my back and call me an elf! -- Oghren
The mounts, noncombat pets, and other content from TCG are still content.
It may not effect your gameplay to have content in the game restricted from you by out of game limitations.
It does however detract from my gameplay, as an old-school MMO gamer and "achiever", to be locked out of scraps of content unless I pull out my credit card. This degrades my enjoyment of the game and ruins immersion into the gameworld.
"fluff", "aethetics", or whatever other label you want to put on it, does not change the fact that it's still content. Content that is being withheld from us unless we play the "throw money at us" game with Blizzard.
As far as I'm concerned, that fact that Blizzard jumped on board the RMT bandwagon, it makes them just as bad as any other greedy game developer in that regard.
One of the benefits of not being Blizzard is that you can release enough good content to keep players busy and from going to other game forums and demanding content that is like your own until you release the next content driven expansion that will run out at some point too.
Now say that all in one breath :P
M59, UO, EQ1, WWIIOL, PS, EnB, SL, SWG. MoM, EQ2, AO, SB, CoH, LOTRO, WoW, DDO+ f2p's, Demos & indie alpha's.
A WoW fanatic. That is something I have never heard before. Counter Strike nut maybe but never that....but I guess thats how it is when someone tries to express their views that are positive towards Blizzard. First of all props to you for making an effort in making the world a better place. But seeing as how you seem to be a great person in real life I am all the more baffled why you have such an exagerated reaction to Blizzs decisions recently. The cash shop is a buisness decision ofcourse no one would argue otherwise, but when it comes to the community outrage I tend to disagree. I disagree simply becouse most people label the forum official or others as the community, but the truth is that forum posters such as us are a minority. Most gamers do not care about forum, hell they dont care about discussing the game they play with strangers. We are a loud, sometimes whiny minority. we may be more involved in the game we play more than the avarage joe but we are not THE community, were just a small part of it. This leads us to the fact that most WoW players simply dont care about the cash shop. I know plenty of WoW players both casual and the more hardcore and to them its a non-issue.
I know people love to critisize companies for making moves clearly to make money but I cant really condemn those companies for doing so because thats their job. Blizzard still remains one of the few devs that listen to their fanbase, but you have to understand that, once again, forum dwellers are only a fraction of this fanbase and we are not more important than the less involved players. This imo is where the issue of those extra services like faction changes comes in. These are things people wanted, people meaning both the more involved and more casual. This once more to many is a non-issue becouse though like you said server balance is gone forever few mmo players would ever choose WoW for a PvP experiance and thats where balance is important. Also I do agree that Blizzard has not found a way to fix this problem. I think they did not expect the service to be so popular becouse of the high price. To me the optional services are expensive as a way to deter from overzelous faction/race/server changes.
As for the personal attack. That is how I decided to answer your post becouse to me its silly pure and simple. You start of with a ridiculous statement containing an unsupported by any proof assumption as to where the cash shop will go. You make this gigantic leap from the store which so far only sells vanity items to something that can be seen as the extreme of cash shops with whole features of the game being avaialable only for cash. Sure I take it this is an exagerated example of what you think will happen, but if you exagerate why shouldnt I?
QFT.
I also don't like how much Blizzard has changed from what it was 5-10 years ago and the decisions they've been making the last few years have been underwhelming. Back then they were simply awesome.
But hey, I'm not dependant upon them for my wages nor is Blizzard a sports club I'm part of: if Activision Blizzard has stepped on the slope downwards towards mediocrity, then it's sad and a shame, but there are enough other great companies around that can and will provide great games to play, singleplayer games and MMO's.
On that sidenote: a Rockstar MMO would sound great, maybe a Red Dead Redemption MMO. But for now I'll just be satisfied with a GW2, FFXIV, TSW, ToR, TERA and Rift on the MMO horizon. On a 'wait and see' mode regarding CATA, and will decide after the 1st SC2 if I want to buy the other 2.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Ever played Diablo II?
That game was horrendously bugged in every conceivable compass direction when it was released in 2000. To Blizzard's credit, they patched it like madmen early on and it was eventually fine. But that game was a shining example of shipping when the product wasn't ready.
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
I wish Blizzard followed their own line of thinking, even after cutting down promised content all their expansions are filled with bugs, unintended features, poorly thought mechanics and performance problems...however to a much lesser degree than the competence, thats for sure.
anyway bold statements like the one you copied are 99% PR, 1% truth. if you are willing to believe that shit, that says more about your stance regarding Blizzard, than about Blizzard itself.
I've seen far worst than Blizzard's starts, honestly, the expensions blizzard made were less buggy and laggy than Alot of other games ( if you compare number of bugs and total population of the game)
I don't know what the population of a game has to do with bugs....?
Probably something to do with lag, what do you think? a server with 2 people in it wont lag as much as a game with 1000 people.
It makes me wonder how many people commenting that WoW had a smooth start were actually there . It certainly did'nt . Having said that it was a lot more finnished a game than the likes of Vanguard and Age of Conan when they were released .
As for respecting Blizzard . I repect them just about as much as I respect the BANKS .
I don't respect Blizzard because of their willingness to imo ruin a very successful game in making it forvever easier so as to aim it at the very casual player and younger demographic . ( I won't go as far as saying its dumbed down because I would'nt want to imply the people playing it are stupid ).
I think WoW would have been just as successful or maybe even more so had they a little shown integrity and not changed the game beyond all recognition to what it was 5 years ago in pursuit of the almighty buck .
It is a matter of conjecture but I firmly believe WoW had Blizzard developed the game with a little more care and concideration toward its longer term players that it could have had several more million players than it does today .
Future Blizzard MMOs may be successful amongst the young and very casual mmo crowd but there will be plenty of people that wont touch them with a barge poll because they will remember what happened to WoW .
Of course like any company they are in the buisness of making money but good buisness practice does'nt always mean making as much money as you can as quickly as you can . It is often far better to maintain a reputation for credibilty to reap the benefits in the long term .
Blizzard are certainly not the worst company that have developed an MMO but neither are they deserving of any type of respect in my opinion .
fixed for you.
cutting on content/features is NEVER a good idea, taking some extra time to polish them = ok, leaving them out = not ok!
I don't consider lag a bug. Lag usually occurs on the user end, not the games.
yayitsandy, you probaly never lived in a capitalist country dont you? The all mighty buck as you call it IS the basis of the economy and since Blizzard is a company... well they succeded! The thing is that Blizzard did it without taking off TOO MUCH of content. Cryptic with STO tried too but cutted too much on content, guess what happened... it failed.
You can treat Blizzard as a Bank if you want, but a bank doesnt really want to bankrupt you cuz they need you to live so they will take the maximum they can until they reach limit point, it is the same for Blizzard. So think about it.
You didnt tried MO on the last days dont you ? Blaming users is easy. But why should we have lag in one game and not in an other? I dont lag in Wow, Eve, GA but i do in STO and MO. Why is that?
I never lagged in STO, which kind of proves my point. I also said "usually" on the user's end. Some people lag in WoW, others don't. It usually depends on different factors. How far away do you live from the server and how good your connection is are two things that contribute to lag. A lot of companies don't consider lag a bug.
Well they should, because i dont lag anymore in STO (they fixed the lag issue) and my computer is 2 times optimal requirements, and got high speed internet last of all i scan daily for spy/malwares weekly for viruses. Cant be from my side.
To be fair, Diablo 1 and 2 were not done by Blizzard.
They were developed by Blizzard North. It is a completely different studio. They were bought out and had a name change. Blizzard North is no more, for obvious reasons. So it is not accurate to say Diablo 1 or 2 or its expansions (even the one developed by an outside company) is actually from the Blizzard everyone is talking about in this thread.
That said, there is a lot of unjustified Blizzard hate going on. There are two companies I respect in the game industry, not because I am a fan of their games, but rather, their work ethic and ability to produce quality without a Publisher telling them what to do and when to do it. Blizzard is one of them, Valve is the other. They have a lot in common, however Valve dropped the whole "heirarchy" set up found in most dev studios. They have an interesting system, and it works.
I also think its funny when many say that WoW, when it was released back in2004, had anything new to offer. I can be considered a mmorpg vet, and when I had the chance to beta WoW.... I was impressed. What WoW did is really define the RvR or Faction vs Faction pvp. It was done as a core mechanic, not an after thought. Their system of traveling through the world, having the world broken up into zones both for alliance and horde, the world design and layout, everything was fantastic. I have never seen that type of smart level design, world buidling and real core focus in a mmorpg. They do have their claim of innovation, but its probably not what you have in mind. They designed a game so solid, with perfect "flow" (refer to game developers flow chart), and internationally marketable...that it changed how MMORPGs have been seen, and increased the level of money publishers are willing to pump into what they previously considered a small nich market.
I respect Blizzard, and not just as a gamer, but as someone who loves working with game design and design theory.
Hell, did you know Blizzard's animation department is not only larger than Pixars but also better equipped?
There may be some agreements or disagreements on how the WoW Expansions were handled, I personally didnt like some of the changes but I recognize that Blizzard saw the market ...the entire market, and made changes that would reach that market better. This is why they have so many subs at this point, and all while using a p2p model. They know what they are doing.
By claiming that success, not only have they managed to build a new beautiful head quarters in Irvine, but also hire more developers, allow for more independence, increase budget for other games and future investments, and most importantly, be able to do what they want for the long term, which is good for everyone. Some may hate the fact that they impacted the entire gaming industry with just 1 mmorpg, but you have to admit, they made publishers take serious note of the MMORPG, which was previously seen as too risky. They popularized the MMORPG, which was necessary for the Genre to grow.
I think we should all be curious as to what the new Blizzard mmorpg will turn out to be like, since its a new IP designed to be a MMORPG from the ground up (unlike warcraft), and also has all that funding from WoW's success going into it. It could be the mmorpg savior, or the antichrist, but needless to say, it will be epic in one way or another.
I agree, whenever a game client gets released and their spelling errors, flaws, bugs and even a poor interface, then I'll take those red flags seriously.
I was trying out Jade Dynasty and during the first set of items, they put a 7 day lock on the items, meaning you couldn't trade them, on one occision, there was a box with a group of items and said 'close' on the bottom and clicked it, however I realised that the game accepted the items which I didn't want and couldn't get rid of it. I uninstalled the game and never looked back. It's simple little problems like these that make me NOT want to play a game or MMO.
I'm aware that Blizzard had it's own problems in the past (corrupted blood) however those were overlooked and problems, people would have never thought off.
If so, why are Wintergrasp battles in WOW?
It's STILL a lagfest!! Their netcode needs a major fix to solve it.
Love them or hate them so far Blizzard's business model works, and love or hate WoW millions still play it and haven't bailed into other games yet. Given the competition they have had and that WoW graphics wise is becoming dated, the fact is they are still on top and worthy of some respect. They must be doing something right.
How can blizzard cut/changed *PLANNED* (not promised) features to meet a release date when a release date has not been published, it is not even in beta (which is probably last 4 months based on previous beta's).
Starcraft2 is out in 6 weeks so blizzard will be getting a huge influx of cash shortly so no need to cut features to rush Cata out the door.
Blizzard has anounced well before release these features are gone unlike other companies who do so a week before released, such openness should be welcomed.
Features were cut/changed because in play tests they were not fun no conspiracy or agenda here.
Um... removing "planned" features is cutting them, the public release date being known is irrelevant. If they're doing things like 99.9% of other developers do, they have an internal project timeline that lists all of the 'deliverables' (features), their place in the timeline and length to work on, as well as their cost and dependencies on other portions of the project. When they decide to remove something from this timeline, whether due to budget or time constrains (meaning they did not accurately estimate in the planning phase), or alteration of scope, then they cut the deliverable from the project.
Yes, they can change or cut whatever feature they want. It's their game, they're not under contract with us to include certain features. But, the way things are going, Cataclysm is looknig to be a very bland and lackluster expansion.
Double standards are bad.
"If I'd asked my customers what they wanted, they'd have said a faster horse." - Henry Ford