Writer Says World Of Warcraft Is Killing MMOs

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Writer Says World Of Warcraft Is Killing MMOs

A recent editorial by WarCry’s Dana Massey argues quite convincingly that 2008 will see the end of the pay-to-play MMO model. Massey argues chiefly that the success of World of Warcraft wow gold has all but locked-up the market for pay-to-play MMOs and that the only online titles that can possibly succeed during the era of WoW are those with unorthodox business models; free-to-play, ad-based and virtual item wow power leveling sales-funded titles, for instance. Even games, such as Lord of wow gold the Rings: Online, that are backed by massive IPs and excellent developers see extremely limited success simply because WoW is absorbing all of the available cash and players, Massey claims. Massey closes the piece by saying that while the subscription model is badly in danger, the free-to-play model is becoming wildly successful. It has a way of attracting that elusive casual gamer market that has made the Wii such a shocking triumph wow gold for Nintendo, and similarly the free model is making up for its game’s overall lack of quality with sheer quantity and availability. While the optimistic part of my brain wants desperately for Mr. Massey to be wrong, the more pragmatic parts of me agree with his argument. Unlike the console realm where a player wow gold might play 20 or 30 different games in a year, an MMO player will play one title exclusively for years. When a title like World of Warcraft — whose success is owed largely to its ability to captivate the mainstream audience who had never before played an MMO — absorbs 9 million subscribers (roughly 18 times more players than the prior industry leader Everquest), there simply isn’t anything left of the market for its competitors to fight over. Massey also makes the point that "every major MMORPG to launch since [WoW] has been firmly on the side of a directed experience," meaning that they play wow gold out as a traditional roleplaying game would. With so much similarity, why would a new player (or current WoW player) even need to go play a different game when he or she is already enamored with Blizzard’s title? The piece does manage to provide a glimmer of hope for the market though. The one game, he says, that breaks away from the "directed experience" model is EVE Online. While EVE hasn’t had the same stunning success that WoW has, it has become the sleeper hit of the MMO industry and is the game for someone looking for a massively multiplayer title drastically different from WoW. Then again, maybe both Massey and myself are totally off-base and out of touch with the kids these days. I don’t understand the appeal of pop-punk or Dancing With The Stars, so maybe I’m just as out of touch with the MMO scene. Hence, I put it to you, the reader: is the MMO market going to continue to grow, or will Blizzard simply absorb all cash thrown into the virtual worlds yyqq1001 realm like Galactus with a gigantic vacuum cleaner?
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