I’m not quite sure how something could have a broader appeal than World of Warcraft, but apparently Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick thinks his company can do it.
Just in case you live under a fucking rock, World of Warcraft is the biggest and most dominant game in the MMO space right now – topping something like 10+ million subscribers. That’s a lot of people playing this fucking game.
To me, that seems about as popular as a game like World of Warcraft could be. Although some things that might be considered more popular, perhaps the subject of Activision’s new game:
That is actually all I can think of right now. Failing a game about blowjobs, I’m thinking that Blizzard might be making a more fast paced and modern MMORPG game. The Massive Multiplayer Online genre itself dates back a little more than a decade or so, and considering the age of the genre, not much has really changed about the gameplay. Most games are cooldown or auto attack based, and character advancement can slow down to a crawl or become tedious after a while. Part of this is that these type of games need to be designed around a range of computer hardware configurations, and part of this is due to somewhat lazy developers trying to copy design elements instead of innovating.
My money is on a massive third person action game, like Mass Effect, perhaps set in modern day or a sci-fi setting. If there is anyone who can pull this off, it’s Blizzard. And frankly, I’m sick of swords and sorcery games. Just give me a fucking railgun.
Blizzcon 2009 is fast approaching, but who needs Blizzcon to start spreading rumors of the next World of Warcraft expansion? Apparently not the “source” over at WoW.com, which has it on “good” authority that the next expansion to Blizzard’s cash cow MMO will be World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. This is likely based on the trademark Blizzard filed a while back for that name. Also of note is the rumor of two new races – Goblins for the Horde and Worgen for the Alliance. If this is true, it dashes my past hopes that if the goblins were ever made playable, you would be able to choose which faction they would join after a Death Knight type of introduction story.
Remember Mountain Dew Game Fuel for Halo 3? It’s back, but for WoW. Apparently it tastes pretty good. The reason I am sharing this with you is that they are giving away a ton of prizes; one every 15 minutes. They range from t-shirts to Alienware laptops. How do you enter… by clicking on the flag above of course. All you have to do is register, it takes like 2 minutes. Allocate your tokens accrued to the contest you want and wait for the loot.
By know you have heard of the kid who absolutely lost his marbles after his parents took away his WoW account. Just in case, here is what happened. Here is what happened after that. What brought on this series of unfortunate but absolutely hysterical events? Watch and judge, my friends. Watch and judge.
World of Warcraft has made another step in it’s conquest to take over Earth. It was announced today that the Wrath of the Lich King Expansion Pack has expanded the WoW subscription base to 11.5 million globally. To help people understand how large that number really is, let’s write it out: Eleven million five hundred-thousand users. Or: 11,500,000. Simply put, that’s quite an accomplishment, and a lot of revenue. Well done, Blizzard.
Blizzard has also done a little song and dance to the fact that WotLK sold 2.8 million copies in 24 hours taking the title of the fastest selling PC game ever. Not stopping there, WotLK continued to sell more than 4 million copies in it’s first month on the shelves, which took the record for most PC game sales in a month from it’s predecessor The Burning Crusade. Trumping yourselves, kudos to you Blizzard.
It is nice to see some firms giving good news around the holidays. The press release even goes so far to say that Blizzard is hiring. Check it out at www.blizzard.com/jobs, there are plenty of jobs available, another bit of uplifting news in time for the holidays.
People say that bravery is 10% balls and 90% insanity. Who else would storm a dungeon all by themselves? Especially with a 33.3% chance of success, repeating of course. You wanted the best, you got the best.
I just had to hear his voice one more time. Ladies and Gentlemen… It’s him.
World of Warcraft players have waited for what it seems like ages for a new expansion pack and finally received it last week when Wrath of the Lich King was released. Gamers figured to be treated to months of new quests, dungeons, raiding, and everything else that WoW players do. Two of the best Guilds in the world united under one banner to be the first to beat the expansion pack. Well, hundreds of hot pockets later and God knows how many cans of Red Bull, they did it. In 4 days. The beat everything. Now, they are not as happy as they thought they would be.
We are proud to declare that all WOTLK PVE raid content has now been cleared. This is both a moment of triumph and a cause for concern. The question in all our minds right now is if we could do this, how soon until the rest of the top guilds in the world clear all the raid content that WOTLK has to offer? Did Blizzard miscalculate in the tuning of these encounters? Or is this Blizzard folding under the weight of a large casual player base that demands to be on equal footing with end-game raiders?
I don’t know guys, maybe Blizzard figured you would not have played for probably 96 straight hours and have every imaginable item, spell, sword, special hat, strap-on, whatever. You guys also did everything in your power to beat the game as fast as possible and are now surprised that you beat the game in 4 fucking days? Its like the gamers who raced through Halo 3 or Gears 2 overnight. I fully understand how much larger WoW is in every aspect, but if the game was tailored to the most hardcore players, the millions of casuals would just say fuck it. It’s called pacing yourselves. If you wanted to be the first, hey, job well done. Very impressive. Just don’t bitch when the ride you sped through is over. Thats called “Tough Shit” in the World of Reality.
This is the next chapter in the very informative and entertaining Warcraft retrospective. This segment will take us to where no one in Blizzard ever thought this would go let alone be this genre defining. It’s the end of the world… of Warcraft.
As a journalist for a gaming website, its almost embarrassing that I know nothing about Warcraft. I know its a phenomenon and it takes a long time to play and South Park made me laugh at it in satire. This is the beginning in what is shaping up to be a great retro look at the series’ beginning, present, and future.
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