NetEase, operators of World of Warcraft China division, have officially announced just an hour or so ago that they have received approval by the General Administration of Press and Publication (GAPP), to run World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, for publication in China. World of Warcraft has been fighting for survival in China not out of subscription numbers, but because of a war of authority between two of China’s governmental ministries, one being the GAPP.
This news will certainly delight those who have been observing WoW going through various stages of approved, banned, shut down, on hiatus, and in “demo mode” to new subscribers. Hopefully this will be the end to the World of Warcraft: China saga, although considering the fact that GAPP and its rival ministry have yet to settle their differences, I think we’ll be seeing WoW back in the news once again in due time.
The celebration at the end of Return of the Jedi likely can’t compare to the fanfare being celebrated by practically every gamer who has ever uttered the phrase “World of Warcraft sucks.” Earlier today we learned from the big boss man himself, Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime, that World of Warcraft has been stagnant for two years: Keeping stable at the 11.5 million mark. According to Morhaime, who was responding to an investor’s call, a third of new players quit before level ten I need to go back to remedial math. It was one third of players stay after level 10, not the other way around. Two thirds quit by level 10.
World of Warcraft has been stuck in a power struggle between two government agencies fighting for authority over the games market in China, where the game and half of the worldwide subscribers have been stuck in a period of limbo between online, offline, and NetEase occasionally losing the ability to sign up new customers. Earlier this week, Netease was forced to suspend registrations for a week after it was found that they are still not operating World of Warcraft with a license.
Despite issues in China, what this boils down to in many gamers is the mythical peak many have spoken of for years: The day World of Warcraft stopped growing. For those of you keeping track, this peak actually happened two years ago, December 2008, when Blizzard first reported 11.5 million subscribers.
I don’t think I need to remind the Blizzard Trolls out there that stagnant or not, Blizzard still has 11.5 million subscribers. Let’s not try and count the chickens before they’ve evolved from primordial soup, Blizzard could lose millions of their customers tonight and still have more paying customers than a great portion of the other big name MMOs in the market, combined.
Considering World of Warcraft, and each of its expansions, has dominated the PC market for five years running, it seems reasonable to chalk this up to the ratio of people who have not purchased WoW is going down to those who have purchased WoW. I myself have a copy of World of Warcraft and the Burning Crusade in my PC library (I have 68 hours clocked in on Xfire). Essentially, we’ve reached the point where the number of people coming in is matching or just barely exceeding the number of people leaving.
Blizzard is expecting a spike in returning users when Cataclysm releases, but one truth holds firm: World of Warcraft will begin the decline one day. It may not be this year, it may not even be the next two years, but it will decline. The only thing that can kill WoW is WoW itself, or another Blizzard MMO. For the moment, however, Blizzard is doing just fine for themselves, and unlike Arthas this king will not be going anywhere any time soon. So put the noise-maker away, World of Warcraft may be old enough in MMO terms to start having its midlife crisis and run around town naked, but it can still make you squeal like a pig with one hand tied behind its back.
Because you didn't look enough like a nerd before.
Ask someone who strays away from MMOs what their biggest fear about the genre is, and chances are one of those answers will be along the lines of “looking like a nerd.” Despite World of Warcraft, among other games, bringing MMOs into the mainstream audience, many MMOers (alongside video games as a whole) still fear the age old stereotype that we are all basement dwelling nerds with pale skin who live with our parents at the age of 30, dress up as female characters, and participate in LARPing. Now, I may not have a basement, and my Irish/Croatian/German mixture does leave me with mayonnaise-esque skin, and I am under all consideration a nerd, however I am at least ten years off of 30, and still in college.
But I’m getting off track here. Blizzard’s recent update (as with all updates) is causing quite an outrage among privacy advocates. The update to the Armory now broadcasts all of the player’s feats in real time, with the option to subscribe via RSS. Players are also unable to opt out of this feed, or keep it protected to friends and family, making it the bane of players who either shouldn’t be playing World of Warcraft, or those who happen to boot the game up at work.
Now, these players may just be wearing their +10 armor tinfoil hat, but there is something to be said about not wanting your activities broadcast for all to see. Chances are, most of you have had marathons that you wouldn’t want broadcast, staying up that extra half hour that turned into a 3am raid, and by the time you got to sleep the sun was coming back up. But I digress.
One of the MMO Fallout Scouters in WoW reported that this is in fact a useful tool to guilds. Using the RSS feed for raids, Guild Leaders could consolidate the members of the raid to a feed, where they could monitor what the players are looting to ensure that no one is breaking the guild’s rules secretly.
I’m not going to bother going into the legality that people are bringing up, because the move is legal. Blizzard does still have full ownership over everyone’s account, and this is in the terms of service and EULA. Whether or not Blizzard adds an opt-out for this feature comes down to how many players are willing to vote with their wallets and leave over this. Other than that, this all comes down to player’s prerogative.
Hello, China! Enjoying your World of Warcraft? Between the switch from operators (The9 to Netease), subsequent banning, delay of The Burning Crusade expansion (yes, I said Burning Crusade), reopening under a test phase (no new registrations), and subsequent rebanning, it is unlikely anyone in China did much enjoying of World of Warcraft. China’s General Administration of Press and Publication (GAPP) has required that Blizzard and Netease change some content in the game, not specifying what. Certain content already altered in WoW China includes piles of bones being changed to piles of sacks, and the undead showing less bone and more skin. Players do not leave corpses, but leave behind gravestones. Players and monsters also spew green and black blood.
Here in the first world, most of us have the luxury of looking upon $15 dollars as a small fee, hardly enough to buy dinner for two at a restaurant slightly more fashionable than McDonald’s (Actually, you probably won’t get a combo meal for two for $15 at McD’s either). When it comes to MMOs and subscriptions, however, people seem less keen to offer up their hard earned cash.
Which segues into Blizzard and the most popular MMO on earth, World of Warcraft. I think Blizzard would see a massive influx of profit and subscribers if they were to lower the monthly subscription price to $9.99, out of the enormous amount of new and alternate accounts that would be created. It seems like a slight change in price, however to the consumer’s psyche, ten dollars feels like a lot less than fifteen. To put it into perspective, whenever the store I work at has a sale on Vitamin Water, the price drops to 10 for $10, or $1 a bottle. The price, without sale, is $1.02 per bottle. For the fact that it’s a two cent drop in price, the sale (the image “sale”) always generates a massive response that knocks the product out of stock after just a couple of days. Without fail, every time. After about five sales this past year, no one has apparently caught on.
Lowering the subscription rate on World of Warcraft would effectively knock off the numerous players who are sitting on the fence about starting/restarting their Azeroth adventures, and what better time than right before the release of a new expansion? Try the new and improved World of Warcraft, now at a cheaper rate! It is the most popular, now it’s among the cheapest!
This article has nothing to do with T-Mobile's Sidekick
All two of you who visited my message boards will see that I am not a big fan of being explicit with rules. In fact, there are three rules on the Orb Boards; Don’t incite a flame war, keep your account secure, and don’t be a spambot. Apart from those basic rules, I don’t think the rest needs to be explained. What it comes down to is: Anything you wouldn’t do in real life, don’t do here. Unless you make a living out of stealing people’s identities, in which case…still don’t do that here.
I often like to see Game Masters getting intuitive when it comes to removing problems that may not warrant a complete rule, or that may be such a special case that putting a rule would be far too generalizing. Say, for example, the issues Aion had when it launched last month. Players were clogging the servers by going away from keyboard so they could sleep, go to school, etc, without being logged off. Rather than pull out the ban-stick and taking things far over the edge, NCsoft quickly released a patch making such an exploit impossible.
The idea is that you don’t have to issue permabans to get a point across.
More on Aion, World of Warcraft, and more after the break.
In the world of PC MMOs, ten thousand subscribers is around the lines of Asheron’s Call, Pirates of the Caribbean Online, and Planetside. For a large company, the number can mean imminent cancellation of a title, as it no longer becomes profitable to develop for, let alone run the servers. Others wing it, limping on with what they have, determined to please those who have stayed loyal, and possibly turn around the trend.
The question: Can Blizzard capitalize even more on the success of World of Warcraft? The Answer: Of course they can!
World of Warcraft: The Magazine will be sold as a quarterly issue with the option of one or two year subscriptions. The first issue will focus on WoW’s upcoming fifth year anniversary. A panel of journalists will work on the magazine, offering player insights, insider insight, and more.
So when do we start seeing vanity pet codes and other in-game goodies? Look for WoW to be hitting your mailbox possibly later this year.
MMO Fallout 