THQ thinks WoW has probably peaked
Filed under: World of Warcraft, MMO industry, New titles, News items
WoW may be severely less of a threat in a couple of years time, but there are plenty of other MMOs that could take its place between now and two years out -- including Blizzard's next MMO. So while WoW may have hit its peak, in a couple of years time THQ could find themselves staring down the barrel of yet another juggernaut title: current or upcoming.
_thumbnail.jpg "Aion Beta: Asmodian Ascension Quest")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Wildhammer said on 5:13PM 4-08-2008
I think this counts more as wishful thinking rather than a well-thought out opinion. Has THQ even ever MADE a video game before? I know work on audio technology but I've never heard of an actual game by them.
Reply
drht said on 2:43AM 4-09-2008
Lots of:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_THQ_games
Sean Riley said on 6:12PM 4-08-2008
THQ are a long-standing videogames company, Wildhammer. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THQ ) I believe you are thinking of TDK.
That said, this is what we call "attempting to sway investors". Right now, no matter how good your game is, if you can't pull a decent number of subscribers from WoW, it's not going to be seen as a success. (This is a silly notion, BTW.) He's trying to lay a cognitive groundwork for the success of his game.
Reply
Green Armadillo said on 6:35PM 4-08-2008
I don't think it's all talk. WoW is continuing to launch in new territories, but I'd be surprised if their North American/European numbers are still growing, and I'd be shocked if those numbers don't come down over time. It's a great game, but it's already 3.5 years old, content is being added at a snail's pace, and stacking more and more expansions onto the pile isn't going to help the game's uptake any.
Two years from now, we're probably going to be looking at the expansion AFTER Wrath (it probably won't quite be out yet, knowing Blizzard's dev cycle), which means a barrier 80 levels high between new players and the game's current content (which is, by and large, its best content). Class balance is going to get messier and messier as you take the current classes and add 20 new talent points and 8-10 new spells each, to say nothing of new classes such as the Deathknight and whatever (if anything) Blizzard rolls out for expansion 3.
The bad news for a company like THQ with a new game in the works is that WoW has probably the largest base of FORMER players in MMORPG history. Those are players who might come back to pay the old stomping grounds a visit when a new expansion comes out, which can be a problem for you if you're aiming your new MMO anywhere near the next WoW expansion.....
Hazard Simpson said on 10:29PM 4-08-2008
It's wishful thinking all around. Other MMOs that were out before WoW proved that stacking expansions is exactly what keeps the subscriber base in place. Regardless, they could lose half of their player base (unlikely for another year+ - I'd guess not until their next MMO comes out...) and still be a juggernaut to contend with.
WoW may have peaked in terms of it's exponential growth, but anyone who fails to realize that WoW is not only a gaming juggernaut, but it's also a cultural icon and social network in and of itself. This negates a lot of the 'class balance' talk by itself. Again, Ultima Online, SWG, EQ -- 'balance' is not the feature that comes to mind with those.
WoW is far more than a game, and if THQ is spending their time talking about Blizzard instead of coming up with the greatest thing EVER, they are wasting their time.
Reply
Zell said on 12:40AM 4-09-2008
Well, I'm a fairly new user of WoW and I can say I like the game prtty much. The biggest flaw is really the level gap there is between new players and old ones as it hasn't much of an appeal to keep many high level players around for 2 long. I say this only because I am part of a guild that every night does the same raid half way through, and the repeat it again the following night. I speak for myself, but this is quite boring after a time, no mater the kind of drops you may get or reputation.
As the PvP content, well its nice and challenging, specially the ganking, where there is no level cap between player to kill each other (although its quite impossible for a player to kill another just 5 levels up, its not completely impossible if they play the cards right, I should know :P). As challenging as this is, this feature can also be demoralizing for new players (that play on PvP servers, as most are) as they get killed quite a lot by higher level players just for fun (as they get no reward for the kill). The PvP matches, now that is the true "sucker" in this game, as Blizzard was able to get several and different PvP stges with different objectives in each one where you have the pure PvP where you simply have to kill around enemies from the opposing faction, to Control of checkpoints with several objectives to be gained as to win). The biggest downside to this is "no population control" politics in the server's population, because (hypothetically) in a population cap of 5000 players, p.e., there could be 4500 Horde with 500 Alliance (and the other way around).
The game is good, its amazing the number of quest one can get along the game on the several different ending, virtually no loading time, and the fee to play is not that much, taken all things into consideration.
I used to play a F2P game (FlyFF, DOMO, etc) and they do gain much from being free, but there comes a time where you have to spend money on things, if not to ease your way levelling, then to "pimp" ur avatar, as they cannot be totally free, someone has too pay the bills for GMs and the servers itself.
Speaking of GMs, one of the other great "binders" of players. GM response. If you have an issue ingame, you can open up a ticket, and a GM briefly replies (the longest I ever had to wait for a GM response was 1 hour and a half, and this was just post a patch). as the game is payed, a "well oiled" team of GMs can be available for the gamer and the game itself. In other games I experienced GM contact was done only by e-mail (no, not even in the forums they replied to ANYTHING) and could take between a week to a moth to even get a reply from your first complaint/doubt/issue, that if you didn't have to report it back when they finally got your rambling about no reply in the game's forums (and yes, but I was just one of many, in several games).
The only thing any of us really have to be watchfull is the time spent in a virtual world and the time spent on our world, other than that, the game might be around for many yeras, s long as Blizzard knows how to do it, and not simply (as many have said around) stack updates and expansions.
Bit long but part of my opinion about WoW and the new/current MMOG is here, and I am a fan and player of Warhammer 40k ^^
Cheers.
Zell
Reply
Ghen said on 1:25PM 4-09-2008
WoW hasn't peaked. It may stay steady over the summer as some leave and some play just for the 3 months.. but once the next expansion hits there will be another influx of thousands of gamers. I predict by january next year Blizzard will be reporting over 11 million subscribers.
Reply
Ultima said on 10:32PM 4-10-2008
WoW hasnt stopped growing, but I do expect for them to lose some of their player base. This especially goes for its North American market. WoW is the best grinder availiable in Asia right now, and Asia likes grinders alot more then America does. I expect for some players to leave for WAR and AoC as well as some of the other games coming out in late 2008 and 2009.
Reply
Toneless said on 1:26PM 4-14-2008
I think this is a safe opinion to say that Wow has peaked. Something can peak and still have new users sign up. It's called growth rate. Even though new subscribers sign up ever hour it is the rate they are doing so is the question.
Once a company offers a "free trial" its saturating the market. Everybody who wanted to play WoW has already tried. They will get a initial surge when the Lich King don't get me wrong. I know its over when a co-worker of mine says "Have you ever checked out this awesome game it's called WoW?" He's been playing Ultima Online for the past 10 years.
Reply