A Fifth WoW Expansion Already In The Works, Others
The fifth expansion to World of Warcraft is already in the works.
During a visit to Blizzard's HQ to see Mists of Pandaria, CVG spoke with COO Paul Sams about the future of World of Warcraft once the latest expansion goes live. He confirmed that the fifth pack is already in the works, and that the team even knows what additional expansion packs will contain. Other than that, he wouldn't cough up any details as to what these packs will contain.
"I got the pitch from Chris Metzen of what they plan for 6.0 and I'm pretty geeked up about it," he said. "They already know what they're going to be doing for multiple expansions ahead. They have an idea - a general framework. They're these lore creators. They're the ones who drive what the world looks like today and what it'll be like tomorrow and beyond."
"I think the future of World Of Warcraft continues to be bright and I think Mists of Pandaria is going to breathe huge life into what I believe is the best MMO out there," he added. "I think the number of people we have playing and the level of enthusiasm they have for the game suggests that to be the case."
"This is the next of many ways in which we're going to grow and improve and evolve this game," he concluded.
CVG suggests that WoW's roadmap indicates that team members may not be pulled away from development to work on Blizzard's other MMO, Titan. On the contrary, the roadmap indicates that the core lore creators are busily building on the virtual world and capable of sustaining continuation while other members are assigned to the Titan project. Blizzard certainly isn't going to focus on one over the other although right now it's primary focus is WoW given that it's the primary money machine.
News of a fifth expansion pack already in development shouldn't come as a surprise. After Blizzard saw a dip in subscriptions once players quickly devoured the third expansion, Cataclysm, company president Michael Morhaime said they would focus on decreasing time between content releases. "We need to be faster at delivering content to players," he said. "And so that’s one of the reasons that we’re looking to decrease the amount of time in-between expansions."
Currently Blizzard just opened the doors to the Mists of Pandaria beta. Those who got into the program received a confirmation email with instructions on how to download and retrieve the installer from Battle.net. Blizzard did not provide direct links in the email, so beware of fake beta approvals (if they get past your spam filter, that is). The email may or may not look like the image below (as the installer hasn't shown up in the Battle.net account as of this writing):

"Call of duty is the most popular FPS out there"
"Not really, facebook is more popular, it's just not a standard FPS"
derp
I remember when Blizzard said that Activision taking over would not affect the game...
I would rather see blizz just give up on wow after MOP(we have known about this exp. for months btw, this is OLD news), and work harder on titan, whatever that turns out to be, I'd rather see that come out sooner than have blizz drag out wow.
Don't waste your hopes, this is Activision we are talking about.
The sad think about the whole affair is, people keep spreading their cheeks and happily taking it in.
This article isnt about MoP, this article is about the expansion AFTER MoP.
When you lose a couple million people, you can cut your support staff by a few hundred. Their development staff hasnt taken cuts. Also, they have been doing this since WoW has been released. They have one expansion visibly out front, but they are already doing work for the one after it. Nothing has changed.
"Call of duty is the most popular FPS out there"
"Not really, facebook is more popular, it's just not a standard FPS"
derp
Most of WoW's subscribers are actually from China. Not sure if they're mostly gold farmers, but when China got banned from WoW, WoW's population went from 11 million down to 5-6 million.
Enjoying the difficult raid content was some of the best fun I had in my life but eats up too much time to truly get the best raid gear.
The Panda expansion isn't for the USA, or the West. It's to cater to their still growing Chinese market. China is the future.
Stop this "good company" "bad company" bullshit, please.
Blizzard's original plan was to have one expansion per year. Soon it turned into 1 expansion every 2 years. Without any bloody "activision" excuses. Why bother, if your user base is growing anyway.
Now they got hit. Real hard. I'd say they deserve it.
A company that's trying to make money? This seems 100% unprofessional.
While I'd agree that WoW has peaked, it takes a very looong time for a game with millions of subs to die. Everquest is still going at 13 years old.
I agree. Couldn't have said it better myself... Last time I checked, companies exist to make money. Even though WoW is losing subscribers, it still makes money. Why throw that away? 1. Let WoW slowly die while working on Titan, 2. Release that, 3. Profit.
the only way to make a mmo long lasting is content, BIG SHOCK that they are makeing a new expantion after the panda one.
am i the only one who sees a problem?
when i played diablo 1 or 2, i have never even touched pvp, and i can assume most people didnt either. so pushing the game back 8 months for pvp or releasing it in what 1 or 2 months... i think they made the right call
putting an in game real money store, well people do it anyway and you cant stop it no mater what, so why not take advantage of it...
so far i havent seen activision meddling