Rift Developer: WoW's Current State is ''Samey''
Trion Worlds' Will Cook says that World of Warcraft's problem is that it really hasn't changed over the years, offering more of the same.
Trion Worlds' Will Cook said that the studio wanted to take credit for the decline in World of Warcraft subscriptions over the last few months, as its own popular fantasy-based MMORPG Rift is getting ready to reach its 1-million-unit-sold milestone. But eventually he admitted that users are probably just tired of the same gamplay, and that Cataclysm didn't do enough to revitalize the social raiding and level grinding.
"Well a lot of people said no game would kill WoW, WoW would sort of kill itself," he said. "And while I know we’d love to take credit for it, and I don't know, I mean it's almost shameful that this giant launch window that we have, nobody is releasing anything. A lot of luck has come our way but I don't think we're sitting idle. We have worked really, really hard to keep the momentum, to keep people playing, and we have a lot of plans for where we will take the game."
Back in May, Activision Blizzard reported during an earnings call that subscriptions to World of Warcraft had fallen to pre-Cataclysm subscriber levels: from 12 million to 11.4 million by the end of March. CEO Mike Morhaime blamed the drop on the fact that players swooped in and consumed Cataclysm faster than any previous expansion, and thus dropped back out of sight. Later on Blizzard said that future expansions may be on a year-to-year basis instead.
But Trion Worlds' David Reid actually believed that Rift was the cause of World of Warcraft's dip in subscribers. "It was a pleasure to see that in the latest Activision Blizzard earnings call, they inquired about Rift when Blizzard announced that their subscriber numbers went from 12 million to 11.4 million. You can do some math... we know very well where those 600,000 people are," he boasted.
While it's possible those gamers have switched over to Rift, Cook blames part of World of Warcraft's decline on the fact that it simply hasn't evolved enough to keep players hooked. "It seems like WoW is these days...not lackluster...but it feels like everybody was worried Cataclysm was going to change too much," he said. "And the feeling I got was that it didn’t change enough. It is the samey kind of thing."
"It's phenomenal, the phasing is great, it's essentially the same game it was six years ago in a lot of ways," he added. "But it's not different enough and most people I know are sort of fading from it. It's still the raiding game and social game that kept me in it for so long, kept me re-upping, but people seem to be fading from that."
Rift launched on March 2, 2011, a fantasy-based MMORPG featuring a dynamic world named Telara. "Rifts" randomly appear across the landscape, portals that bring invading monsters out to conquer the surrounding territory. These invaders consist of six classes – earth, fire, air, water, life and death – which despise each other. The game uses the Gamebryo engine and supports DirectX 11, SLI and Nvidia Vision 3D.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.
-
cburke82 It can be very "samey" that for sure. But it is hard to go elsewhere when you have so much time involved in your characters lol. I did exactly wahat Blizzard is guessing happened. I leveled to toons throught cata and got board and left lol.Reply -
bebangs >>rift - cause of World of Warcraft's dipReply
Wow players does not shift to another subscription game. like cburke82 said, "it is hard to go elsewhere when you have so much time involved in your characters".
But it's easier to shift to another free-no-monthly-subscription game.
Allods, starcraft, fps games, and other new games. -
suture Well WoW is kinda boring right now but, i doubt any FPS clone or MMO clone (cause yeh.. lots of poor clones of FPS and MMOs outhere) can last 7 years.Reply
Lets wait for the "NEW" blizzard MMO (when i say "new" i hope it wont be another clone)
-
pacostrano I left WoW since a 2 years because it's was always the same thing I waiting for Star Wars Old Republic :PReply -
Neverdyne WoW became boring because even though things changed (landscape, story, class spells, etc.) the core gameplay has not. At level 85, the only thing I was doing was flying from roof top to roof top in Stormwind waiting for the queue to pop. It basically felt like I was in a lobby waiting. The only thing that kept me hooked was raiding with my guild, and more specifically it was the people in my guild. Without them the game becomes increadibly boring.Reply
I really wish future MMOs would deviate from the dungeon/battleground end-game and try more open world interaction. The genre needs more fresh meat. -
Kileak WoW is getting old and boring. Took me 6 years to get bored from it.Reply
Took me 2 months to get bored of Rift.
Too much time involved in characters is probably a good enough reason not to get into these kind of games anymore.
-
its amazing how much the rift devs boast about there 600k subs *cough*, might be worth there time to spend less time bragging and more planning on what there going to do to stop hemoraging subs when the next wave of mmo's start getting released, hard to believe there numbers will stay the same when tera, gw2 and swtor are released....and at the end of the day im not really sure what they dont consider "samey" about there game anyways, its just another raid / rep grindfest, and from the ppl ive talked to the servers get thinner and thinner each weekReply
-
nebun this is the real reason why WOW is a dying game: "The game uses the Gamebryo engine and supports DirectX 11, SLI and Nvidia Vision 3D."Reply