To the OP. This is the kind of clueless responses you are going to get this question. Just a basic troll. Try to look past these and actually look at those of us who offer an explanation besides "WoW sux"
In my opinion the post you highlighted was an answer to the OP's trolling post which was looking for just such a response.
FINALLY someone just got bold and SAID it. Thank you.
It wouldn't be popular if it wasn't good. And before you try to pull out the McDonalds script, people wouldn't eat there if it didn't taste good.
I beg to differ. Marketing plays a bigger role than you'd think. Ever heard of the coke vs pepsi blind test? where when people didn't know what they were drinking they prefered pepsi but when they saw the brands suddenly coke tasted better.
This said, it is also a matter of taste. To use the culinary analogy sophisticated food is often seen as better but i personally would take a Steak with french fries over such dishes any day.
However to answer the original question: WoW is popular (and thus good , though i'd disagree) because it's polished and accessible. Most MMO's are simply not polished enough which can ruin the game experience even if the ideas and mechanics are much more interesting.
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt. Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
WoW takes some of the good on it predacessors and incorporates it into one polished package. Then it adds accessibillity, turning the game into more of a game and less of a gaming world.
I have never played farmville, but it's really accessible and millions play that as well.
But...
Millions don't play WoW, yet play mmos. <---
WoW intruduced MMO gaming to millions, whereas... There were less mmo players before WoW than there were mmo players that were introduced to mmogaming because of WoW. Fast food made food more accessible and yes, while not as healthy and as quality as some sit-down resturants, it tastes pretty good...and cheaper. So, the WoW = McDonalds comment isn't really too untrue.
But...
The person who has never been to Olive Garden and was brought up first on McDonalds, might end up enjoying McDonalds better. The reason? They aren't a fan of itallian and like American cuizine ie. burgers and fries.
WoW has (some of) the best character feedback. When idling, running, swimming, fighting and more. It feels like you get lost in your character. Both become one. I haven't 'felt' this in any other MMO completely. Aion got closest, for me
I'm sorry I cannot word this in more technical terms.
It's probably the most mentioned reason I read when people "go back to WoW".
Actually one thing WoW still got over other MMORPGs: huge replayability. Especially when you are new to the game, you can spend at least several weeks trying out all the classes and races and see the starting zones, and different areas and ways to level up etcetc.
WoW forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up basic political, social, or religious beliefs and attitudes and to accept contrasting regimented ideas, put it simple WoW brain washes ppl to make them like it.
Once your away from WoW long enough, then you start to wonder why did you ever like it.
give it a try sometime take 1 year off you'll thank me for it. hehe
WoW has had so much time to develop itself. Back when it came out there was limited selection of MMos, allowing it to start to pull ahead. It was no where near amazing, but without the large compition of free games and all like today, it was allowed to thrive. Its since then had so much funding to improve and build on itself that its made itself so popular. Its had the ability to polish itself to levels that other MMos simply don't get. Polishing a game so much really detracts you from the negative aspects. Playing through once you go through and its not bad. Leveling again and suddenly you can spot flaws and realize just how much you were sucked through with content thats pretty much just 'grind'.
Right now, wows biggest pull is pretty much giving out free candy to even the worst of players. People feel so much achievement for getting a purple item that is, frankly, so easy to get that it has no achievement to it at all. Back in the day WoW drew people for its 'end game' and the raid progression. Today it just draws in casuals who play it and just see how polished and get absorbed by it. They can play an actually superior game and yet will come back just cause its the original game they got into and it was 'good' because it had so much time to polish itself. Personally Ragnarok Online is my magical game that I'll play over and over despite what they do.
Its all the ease of getting started, the polish, popularity, a sense of needing to play (having characters you made and feel a 'waste' to let them just disapear). Lets not lie to each other here, WoW is a good game. Is it the best game though? By far no.
WoW was made by Blizzard. All of Blizzard's game are highly addictive and so is WoW.
Inspite of what people say, WoW was years ahead of the competition when it came out. It was damn good and it introduced a lot of ideas/concepts in the genre. They have defined what the MMO market looks like. Most MMOs released since 2005 had been influenced by WoW.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
It wouldn't be popular if it wasn't good. And before you try to pull out the McDonalds script, people wouldn't eat there if it didn't taste good.
I beg to differ. Marketing plays a bigger role than you'd think. Ever heard of the coke vs pepsi blind test? where when people didn't know what they were drinking they prefered pepsi but when they saw the brands suddenly coke tasted better.
This. Powerful branding can play a huge role in how customers perceive products. You can put just one letter of a widely known logo and people will still recognise it. We had a case study about Venezuelan chocolate. It's considered to be one of the finest chocolates in the world but people will not pay premium for it simply because it does not fit with the traditional perceptions of good chocolate - Switzerland, Belgium? Nope, they do not have the best chocolate in the world.
I personally will never confuse Pepsi with a Coke. Pepsi just tastes horrible
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
You confuse "good" with "addictive". You're on a treadmill that never ends trying to get better and better stats and gear. It's a hard treadmill to jump off of.
This sums it up, never found WoW to be a "good" game. It was mediocre and only made bearable by playing with real life friends. Though I suppose having played much better MMORPGs before it helps me to retain the non-starry-eyed look upon boring games such as WoW with ease.
In the first first page someone listed that it's highly populated as a pro, not a con. You can be surrounded by people, but still be alone. Numbers don't insure that you'll be sociable within a gaming environment.
You confuse "good" with "addictive". You're on a treadmill that never ends trying to get better and better stats and gear. It's a hard treadmill to jump off of.
This sums it up, never found WoW to be a "good" game. It was mediocre and only made bearable by playing with real life friends. Though I suppose having played much better MMORPGs before it helps me to retain the non-starry-eyed look upon boring games such as WoW with ease.
Yeah a friend of mine today actually said that to me... "Man WoW would have sucked if I wasn't playing with friends I already knew". The first time I played WoW was with a friend who asked me to play. After he left... I stayed for a week or so and left too lol.
In the first first page someone listed that it's highly populated as a pro, not a con. You can be surrounded by people, but still be alone. Numbers don't insure that you'll be sociable within a gaming environment.
Well.. population drives sociability, but content drives sociability as well. Much of the content was not really social. It wasn't anti-social either, but it wasn't helpful to "social-ness".
It wouldn't be popular if it wasn't good. And before you try to pull out the McDonalds script, people wouldn't eat there if it didn't taste good.
I beg to differ. Marketing plays a bigger role than you'd think. Ever heard of the coke vs pepsi blind test? where when people didn't know what they were drinking they prefered pepsi but when they saw the brands suddenly coke tasted better.
This. Powerful branding can play a huge role in how customers perceive products. You can put just one letter of a widely known logo and people will still recognise it. We had a case study about Venezuelan chocolate. It's considered to be one of the finest chocolates in the world but people will not pay premium for it simply because it does not fit with the traditional perceptions of good chocolate - Switzerland, Belgium? Nope, they do not have the best chocolate in the world.
I personally will never confuse Pepsi with a Coke. Pepsi just tastes horrible
Heh... I once did the blind Pepsi/Coke challenge and passed, correctly identifying the two. I guess some of us have more discerning paletes, same thing with MMO's I guess.
I can tell by the sweetness, Pespi and Diet Pepsi always taste sweeter than their Coke counterparts. Oh yeah, when raising my children I used to always tell them we drank Coke because "Pepsi makes us sick". They still laugh about that..... but prefer Mountain Dew actually.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
WoW WAS good. But then it just got old. New content wasn't any differnt from previous content. But then again I've been, or was playing since right before BC. However, even by today's standards, WoW still has a lot of things that most MMOs now don't have much of. It drew a lot of players whether they sucked or not. Just having that huge non instanced world to explore. Sure at some point you will use flight paths to get where you're going. But walking from one zone right into another was adventurous and exciting for me. Going from Elywyn Forest into Sentinal Hill and Loch Modan to Wetlands. The gameplay was groundbreaking at the time and still is. The selection of gear was vast and a lot better looking than gear from most MMOs these days except for Aion. But that died at WOTLK where the gear you got at lvl 82, 83, and blah, the same as it looked at lvl 80. The lore as someone mentioned is probably the biggest and most in depth towhere books and comics were made. No other MMO has nearly as vast of game lore as WoW. But the graphics are old and the content is bland in comparison to whats out there now. As crappy (in my opinion) as GW was, they're still making a 2 and hopefully has everything an more of what most of us want these days. Having said that, I for one would come back to Blizz for a WoW2. Stop adding expansions on the same old game with the behind the times graphics. Throw in character modeling, better macros setup, a bigger talent tree setup like Rift and maybe use the Crytek engine for some good visuals? Blizz can't run this game forever.
I'm glad you enjoy WoW. Play 'til you've had your fill. But be prepared when Blizz gives us something new and slowly pulls away from WoW.
Comments
popular and good is not the same.
FINALLY someone just got bold and SAID it. Thank you.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
Its because its the one game that easy to pickup after a long time not playing and be stuck in.
Not grinding for weeks to get anywhere like other games.
It wouldn't be popular if it wasn't good. And before you try to pull out the McDonalds script, people wouldn't eat there if it didn't taste good.I beg to differ. Marketing plays a bigger role than you'd think. Ever heard of the coke vs pepsi blind test? where when people didn't know what they were drinking they prefered pepsi but when they saw the brands suddenly coke tasted better.
This said, it is also a matter of taste. To use the culinary analogy sophisticated food is often seen as better but i personally would take a Steak with french fries over such dishes any day.
However to answer the original question: WoW is popular (and thus good , though i'd disagree) because it's polished and accessible. Most MMO's are simply not polished enough which can ruin the game experience even if the ideas and mechanics are much more interesting.
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt.
Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
WoW takes some of the good on it predacessors and incorporates it into one polished package. Then it adds accessibillity, turning the game into more of a game and less of a gaming world.
I have never played farmville, but it's really accessible and millions play that as well.
But...
Millions don't play WoW, yet play mmos. <---
WoW intruduced MMO gaming to millions, whereas... There were less mmo players before WoW than there were mmo players that were introduced to mmogaming because of WoW. Fast food made food more accessible and yes, while not as healthy and as quality as some sit-down resturants, it tastes pretty good...and cheaper. So, the WoW = McDonalds comment isn't really too untrue.
But...
The person who has never been to Olive Garden and was brought up first on McDonalds, might end up enjoying McDonalds better. The reason? They aren't a fan of itallian and like American cuizine ie. burgers and fries.
It's called immersion.
Actually one thing WoW still got over other MMORPGs: huge replayability. Especially when you are new to the game, you can spend at least several weeks trying out all the classes and races and see the starting zones, and different areas and ways to level up etcetc.
Let's play Fallen Earth (blind, 300 episodes)
Let's play Guild Wars 2 (blind, 45 episodes)
WoW forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up basic political, social, or religious beliefs and attitudes and to accept contrasting regimented ideas, put it simple WoW brain washes ppl to make them like it.
Once your away from WoW long enough, then you start to wonder why did you ever like it.
give it a try sometime take 1 year off you'll thank me for it. hehe
WoW has had so much time to develop itself. Back when it came out there was limited selection of MMos, allowing it to start to pull ahead. It was no where near amazing, but without the large compition of free games and all like today, it was allowed to thrive. Its since then had so much funding to improve and build on itself that its made itself so popular. Its had the ability to polish itself to levels that other MMos simply don't get. Polishing a game so much really detracts you from the negative aspects. Playing through once you go through and its not bad. Leveling again and suddenly you can spot flaws and realize just how much you were sucked through with content thats pretty much just 'grind'.
Right now, wows biggest pull is pretty much giving out free candy to even the worst of players. People feel so much achievement for getting a purple item that is, frankly, so easy to get that it has no achievement to it at all. Back in the day WoW drew people for its 'end game' and the raid progression. Today it just draws in casuals who play it and just see how polished and get absorbed by it. They can play an actually superior game and yet will come back just cause its the original game they got into and it was 'good' because it had so much time to polish itself. Personally Ragnarok Online is my magical game that I'll play over and over despite what they do.
Its all the ease of getting started, the polish, popularity, a sense of needing to play (having characters you made and feel a 'waste' to let them just disapear). Lets not lie to each other here, WoW is a good game. Is it the best game though? By far no.
WoW was made by Blizzard. All of Blizzard's game are highly addictive and so is WoW.
Inspite of what people say, WoW was years ahead of the competition when it came out. It was damn good and it introduced a lot of ideas/concepts in the genre. They have defined what the MMO market looks like. Most MMOs released since 2005 had been influenced by WoW.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
This. Powerful branding can play a huge role in how customers perceive products. You can put just one letter of a widely known logo and people will still recognise it. We had a case study about Venezuelan chocolate. It's considered to be one of the finest chocolates in the world but people will not pay premium for it simply because it does not fit with the traditional perceptions of good chocolate - Switzerland, Belgium? Nope, they do not have the best chocolate in the world.
I personally will never confuse Pepsi with a Coke. Pepsi just tastes horrible
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
This sums it up, never found WoW to be a "good" game. It was mediocre and only made bearable by playing with real life friends. Though I suppose having played much better MMORPGs before it helps me to retain the non-starry-eyed look upon boring games such as WoW with ease.
In the first first page someone listed that it's highly populated as a pro, not a con. You can be surrounded by people, but still be alone. Numbers don't insure that you'll be sociable within a gaming environment.
Great coding, steady updates.
That is enough by far compared to most games.
Good timing when it released while EQ was in decline also helped.
Heh... I once did the blind Pepsi/Coke challenge and passed, correctly identifying the two. I guess some of us have more discerning paletes, same thing with MMO's I guess.
I can tell by the sweetness, Pespi and Diet Pepsi always taste sweeter than their Coke counterparts. Oh yeah, when raising my children I used to always tell them we drank Coke because "Pepsi makes us sick". They still laugh about that..... but prefer Mountain Dew actually.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
WoW WAS good. But then it just got old. New content wasn't any differnt from previous content. But then again I've been, or was playing since right before BC. However, even by today's standards, WoW still has a lot of things that most MMOs now don't have much of. It drew a lot of players whether they sucked or not. Just having that huge non instanced world to explore. Sure at some point you will use flight paths to get where you're going. But walking from one zone right into another was adventurous and exciting for me. Going from Elywyn Forest into Sentinal Hill and Loch Modan to Wetlands. The gameplay was groundbreaking at the time and still is. The selection of gear was vast and a lot better looking than gear from most MMOs these days except for Aion. But that died at WOTLK where the gear you got at lvl 82, 83, and blah, the same as it looked at lvl 80. The lore as someone mentioned is probably the biggest and most in depth towhere books and comics were made. No other MMO has nearly as vast of game lore as WoW. But the graphics are old and the content is bland in comparison to whats out there now. As crappy (in my opinion) as GW was, they're still making a 2 and hopefully has everything an more of what most of us want these days. Having said that, I for one would come back to Blizz for a WoW2. Stop adding expansions on the same old game with the behind the times graphics. Throw in character modeling, better macros setup, a bigger talent tree setup like Rift and maybe use the Crytek engine for some good visuals? Blizz can't run this game forever.
I'm glad you enjoy WoW. Play 'til you've had your fill. But be prepared when Blizz gives us something new and slowly pulls away from WoW.
Getting too old for this $&17!