So according to statistics, as of recently it appears WoW has had a decline in new players as well as the fact that many don’t get past lvl 10 and I can almost see what this happens. I know a lot of people who tried the free 10 day trial but got tired really fast because it felt repetitive and I’ll agree that when I started playing, at the beginning I didn’t see what the big deal was, however as the article states if you can get past lvl 10 then a lot opens up to you, such as the first battlefield, plus you can get out of the starting areas and reallly explore the world and usually by level 10 you’ve found yourself a guild. As you pointed out, it’s the social aspect that keeps people coming back.
But there’s no denying the number of new players coming in is shrinking. When I started my first character, a night elf, Darnasuss was full of people running all over the place. I actually had to wait in line to complete this one quest cause so many were gathered around the guy but a few months later I made a new toon and the starting area was barren and for new people starting out can be hard. Sure there’s tons of people wandering around Stormwind and Origimarr but it’s getting harder and harder to find lower level people and the lower level people you do find are usually someone’s 2nd, 3rd or even 4th toons who can have access to better gear because their first toons just mail money to them. I could see this being very frustrating for new WoW players. Hence the market is ripe for a new MMO to get these players. A new MMO means a lot of new people at the same level then again we’ve seen a lot of WoW knockoffs shut down servers after only a year or so (Tabula Rasa anyone?)
Also there’s the lack of new content for lower level players, however it appears that Cataclysm is the right game at the right time. The first two expansions didn’t offer much for lower players. Burning Crusade had two new races with respective starting areas and a couple new quests but most of Litch King’s content was for lvl 60+ but Cataclysm is almost a sequel when you think about it as it’s going to alter ALL of Azeroth so we’ll see if this brings in new players.
Also I’ve talked to a few people who were interested in trying WoW but decided with that new expansion coming out to hold off until it drops so they don’t have to adjust to a whole new setting after getting started so this might be a breif drop while waiting for Cataclysm.
I said earlier how WoW is ready to be gored. However, what will replace WoW is not a MMORPG. What will replace WoW will be smaller *friendship* RPGs.
What is a *friendship* RPG? It is a word I just made up. A *friendship* RPG is a RPG where the people are friends or companions in real life and go through the game. It is not a co-op RPG because that implies meeting someone randomly on the Internet. *Friendship* RPGs is far more personal, something you would play with your house mates or with your buddies or with your girlfriend or wife.
There is a huge lack of ‘couple’ games out there on the market. How many games can you point to and say, “A man and wife can play that together!” or “Friends and I can get together and play that”? Not too many. Oddly enough, the games that do fit this are the best sellers today: Wii Sports, NSMB Wii, and games like World of Warcraft. A couple tends to look for games to play together. You can only play WoW for so long. Then, they ask, “What other games are there for couples?” And then they don’t find any.
Before the Wii came out, there was a high degree of stigma concerning game consoles such as the PS2 (despite how successful there were). There is huge, massive, stigma surrounding WoW, and I believe it is choking off new customers and driving current customers away. A WoW player is someone you feel sorry for today. Everyone looks down on people who play WoW. It has gotten so bad that some businesses will not hire you if you play WoW.
This opens the door for a disruptor of some kind. WoW is ready to be gored. I expect the disurptor to come from the bottom with fewer features and services. But it will be *enough*. And the game won’t be such a time sink as WoW is. I believe the game that will gore WoW will be those *friendship* RPGs. Husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend, house mates, friends, are all currently looking for a game that offers a WoW experience without the WoW, without the stigma and bad things that is WoW.
Why do people play WoW in the first place? Looking at behavior, we find that people play WoW primarily to play a game together with friends. Not too many play the game to meet strangers. So why need a MMORPG at all? Why not do a smaller RPG that has all of those ‘friend’ elements that cause people to play WoW? Sure, you could also include some of the MMORPG elements like the auction house. But the party raids would be primarily with your group of friends in a huge rich world.
So to summarize:
Signs that WoW is ripe to be gored is…
1) Stigma- Prior to the Wii explosion was the heavy stigma on the traditional consoles. Stigma points that something is not going right.
2) Stagnant growth
Why I believe smaller *friendship* RPGs will gore WoW..
1) Matches behavior of most WoW players- Most WoW players don’t run around the world trying to meet people. Everyone tends to hang out with their friends.
2) RPG players already trying to play in a friendship way- The Monster Hunter phenomenon in Japan, for example, is many players getting together to play together.
3) Gamers are gravitating toward ‘friendship’ type of play. The entire Wii explosion was social in nature. NSMB Wii is very much a friendship type of game. And then you have Wii Sports and other games.
I believe most WoW players actually detest the MMORPG. The so-called ‘community’ on WoW is absolutely awful. I can see why people huddle off into their own groups.
People want to play games to connect to one another. WoW is disconnecting people from their real lives. And this is creating the stigma. This is why I think a Social RPG would be welcomed, despite it having less features than a MMORPG, because the game won’t try to take over your life.
King Kotick thinks no one can ever touch WoW because it would cost a fortune to make a *better* game. But what will gore WoW won’t be a *better* product in a traditional sense. It will be a white space around WoW. It will come from the lower end. King Kutaragi thought no one could touch the PS3 for the same reasons.
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