What does World of Warcraft do better than Cox?

[arcanaville]

Will point out that WoW's celebrity endorsements came during a period when WoW was already unparalleled in subscriber count. You can say advertising was responsible for keeping it running near its apex for a long time, but I think it's not an accurate summary of how they got there.

 

How they got there is a question that haunted the industry for years.  No one's been able to repeat WoW's success.  SWTOR probably tried hardest, spending hundreds of millions on story content and copying WoW's combat model more-or-less wholesale, but of course they failed miserably, even despite the platinum Star Wars IP.  At some point not long afterwards, most studios gave up on subscriptions entirely.  If getting a huge subscriber base isn't going to work, then might as well move towards milking a relatively small base of whales, instead. (Free 2 play.)

 

I'm no expert on WoW, having only played it for like two weeks not long after it launched.  The game didn't appeal to me, and of course I was already elbow deep in City of Heroes anyway.

 

That said, I don't think you can give Blizzard full credit for achieving such massive success with WoW.  A lot of credit, sure; whatever their flaws, they do know how to polish a product.  It was a decent IP too, etc etc - but it seems obvious in retrospect that WoW's greatest asset was its timing.  The game arrived at right around the same time that household computers and broadband internet became truly mainstream, yet also well before social media, smartphones and the billion apps and games to follow started contending for the broader populace's attention.  WoW also arrived on the leading edge of a wave of related cultural changes, small and large, ranging from the mainstreaming of so-called "nerd culture" to the wider phenomenon of social atomization that came with all of the above technological shifts (among others).

 

In short, WoW arrived just when playing online games to socialize lost its taboo, and when, for a whole host of reasons, online socializing in general became more attractive.  Again, I have to give Blizzard a lot of credit for how they handled their unprecedented popularity; I'm sure a lesser studio would have faltered, but WoW caught lightning in a bottle.

 

What's my point?  Well I guess there isn't one, except to say that you're right: the marketing blitz largely occurred after WoW blew everyone else out of the water.  Then again, WoW did have probably a disproportionately large amount of buzz for an MMO back when it launched, what with the IP and Blizzard's reputation from games like Diablo.  That buzz, combined with the confluence of happy coincidences described above, propelled the game to unprecedented success. 

 

I doubt we'll ever see anything quite like it again.

 

It is hard to say, look at games like Fortnite come along and surprise everyone.

 

I think people are reluctant to give Blizzard credit for WoW, thinking that it was either being the first or coming along at the right time.  But neither of those things really explains WoW's success.  It is hard to remember in hindsight but WoW wasn't first: City of Heroes beat it by about six months.  Heck, Eve Online beat us both by a year.  EQ2, SWG, Guild Wars, Matrix Online, and Perfect World were all close contemporaries, along with a lot of others I can't even think of at the moment.  They were not the first, and they were not all by themselves in the same time period.

 

I think Blizzard made many small but important decisions that propelled WoW to the front of the pack, and once there momentum took over.  People were looking for something like WoW, and WoW crafted a game experience that was as close to dead center of the bullseye as you can get for the time.  Momentum explains its huge success, but momentum was available to lots of games at the time, none of which achieved a tenth of the success that WoW did. Momentum wasn't about luck, it had to be taken hold of.

 

Will we see its like again?  Maybe we already have.  Candy Crush, Clash of Clans, DOTA, Fortnite.  The game that I think most closely resembles World of Warcraft in terms of both its commercial success and its popular culture success?  Minecraft.

[PaxArcana]

Oh, it's much more than that.  Big Corps provide the basic funds the banks use to create loans.  No big corps, no money bags to get loans from, no loans for start ups to work with.

That's not actually true.

 

Once upon a time, it was actually all the little people saving their nickels and dimes that gave most banks the majority of the assets they could issue loans against.

 

But nowadays, there's this little thing called quantitative easing.  Banks no longer have to have assets in 1:1 ratio to the loans they give out - they are allowed to, in essence, create money out of thin air.

 

And that's why savings accounts pay sh_t interest nowadays.  It used to be, the bank would offer 2% , 3%, sometimes even 4% for a passbook savings account, with maybe fifty dollars in it.  Because they needed hundreds of thousands of people to save a few hundred apiece, so that they could loan Moneybacgs McCEO two million for his latest capital venture.

 

They don't need the small depositors anymore.  So they stopped offering those interest rates as enticements to deposit your savings with THEM instead of the bank down the block.

[Widower]

PSA: politics and such are highly off-topic and can only lead to Bad Things™. Be like Ratio Tile, who does not like to set foot in the politics.

[PaxArcana]

... I hope that wasn't directed at me?  'cause my post was intended to be Economics, not Politics.  :)

[justicebeliever]

[...] many of those shareholders are retirees who would otherwise be left to Soc Sec if the Big Corps weren't provided returns on investment...

 

Where "many" actually translates to "nearly zero".

 

Most retirees do not have investments to draw on.  Even those who do, it's typically through a 401(k) plan or an IRA, which do not have the sort of returns you're implying.

 

...

 

Also, NCSoft is a Korean company.  I'm pretty sure most, perhaps all, of their investors are Korean, or at least, "not American" and so, not on Social Security in any amount.

 

I implied nothing about the quality of returns Pax...and I really would appreciate it if you would take my words at face value.  It seems to be a growing issue on these boards.  50% of Americans, approximately, have some kind of equity investment - all pensions, annuities, most 401K's, and many IRA's all hold corporate equities...So if Grandpa is living on a pension...thank Big Corp, if you are invested in a 401K, that's Big Corp. So many, perhaps not a majority, but it's certainly within the realm of near 50/50 of American's who are living on anything beyond a 2nd job or Soc. Sec., are getting returns through corporate equities...

 

I will say that I am 47, and mostly retired thanks to equity investments and I was flat broke at age 25...

 

And NCSoft was mentioned specifically about how there would likely be no CoH if they hadn't managed and then taken over the game from Cryptic.  Not because I would ever recommend it as an investment opportunity.  However, I have heard rumors that even Koreans like to retire when they get old...

 

I'm an apologist for global economics, which absolutely, 100%, has need of large corporations.  I am not an apologist for any specific company or their actions...If you read my posts after the one you quoted, you'll see that...

[Obitus]

Will we see its like again?  Maybe we already have.  Candy Crush, Clash of Clans, DOTA, Fortnite.  The game that I think most closely resembles World of Warcraft in terms of both its commercial success and its popular culture success?  Minecraft.

 

All of those are extremely successful games, but none of them is a subscription MMO.  Candy Crush, as far as I know, makes its billions (!!!) through semi-exploitative microtransactions, aimed at about 10% of their userbase.  Candy Crush is also another Blizzard game, IIRC.

 

And of course your point is well-taken about WoW not being the first MMO, nor the only MMO to come out at around 2005.  Blizzard clearly did something right to get the momentum going, and perhaps most importantly to avoid screwing up the momentum once it got going - though I think Blizzard also had some name recognition and industry buzz on their side.  My position isn't so much that they succeeded due to dumb luck; rather I'd say that they succeeded beyond anyone's wildest dreams, because the culture was sort of primed for a product like WoW, in that particular moment.

 

CoH and the no-name Cryptic Studios certainly couldn't have ever grabbed 10 million subscribers, no matter how well timed their release, even leaving aside the genre issue, which I genuinely believe to be a handicap, for whatever reason.  Or at least it was a handicap in the MMO space.  With the outrageous success of the Marvel movie franchise, one wonders whether CoH's ideal cultural moment just came 4-5 years too late.

 

But however much credit you want to give Blizzard for making their own luck, once the momentum kicked in it kicked in hard, and every subsequent attempt to recreate their success on a traditional MMO subscription based model has failed, in some cases spectacularly.  I don't think it's selling Blizzard/WoW short to argue that the cultural moment has passed, for games like that.  Perhaps more to the point, the cultural moment for that sort of business model appears to have passed.  Now we live in what some call "the attention economy," where publishers have more or less given up on trying to cultivate a solid base of loyal customers.

 

Instead, they go for a whale-milking F2P model: you create a wide-but-shallow userbase by releasing your game for free, and then you bombard your players with overpriced microtransactions to exploit the much smaller segment of compulsive spenders among them.  This is appealing because it basically sidesteps the stunning amount of competition out there today; you don't have to spend wildly on marketing because the game itself is an advertisement - and your product doesn't need to shine particularly bright because you only need to addict a small percentage of your players.

 

By that I don't mean to condemn all F2P games as egregiously exploitative.  Some F2P games are much better than others, and to the extent that good games, run by a reasonably fair regime, can only survive via F2P, I'm all for it.  Still, the essential premise of the business model remains.

 

I could be wrong.  The worm might turn eventually.  Conventional wisdom, particularly in young industries like online video games, tends to change suddenly and completely.  Maybe some lucky studio in the future will choose exactly the right moment, to release exactly the right product, to cash in on players' growing discontent with the F2P model, but I'm not holding my breath.

 

Speaking of cultural moments, it's pleasantly surreal to be back on a CoH forum debating Arcanaville in 2019 :D

[PaxArcana]

I implied nothing about the quality of returns Pax...and I really would appreciate it if you would take my words at face value.  It seems to be a growing issue on these boards.  50% of Americans, approximately, have some kind of equity investment - all pensions, annuities, most 401K's, and many IRA's all hold corporate equities...So if Grandpa is living on a pension...thank Big Corp, if you are invested in a 401K, that's Big Corp. So many, perhaps not a majority, but it's certainly within the realm of near 50/50 of American's who are living on anything beyond a 2nd job or Soc. Sec., are getting returns through corporate equities...

At least half of any money put into a 401(k), comes from the worker ... not the employer.

 

And ... my mother retired recently.  She has a 401(k).  It contributes 0 to her standard of living - in part because she's treating it like an emergency fund, and in part because she's extremely loathe to pay taxes on any withdrawals (obviously, hers is a tax-deferred 401(k) ...).

 

I will say that I am 47, and mostly retired thanks to equity investments and I was flat broke at age 25...

And in return, I will say that (a) you're extremely lucky, and (b) I daresay your investment experience is significantly atypical.  Most Americans these days not only cannot retire twenty years early ... some of them never feel like they can retire at all, and work right up until they die.  :'(

[justicebeliever]

I will say that I am 47, and mostly retired thanks to equity investments and I was flat broke at age 25...

And in return, I will say that (a) you're extremely lucky, and (b) I daresay your investment experience is significantly atypical.  Most Americans these days not only cannot retire twenty years early ... some of them never feel like they can retire at all, and work right up until they die.  :'(

 

I 100% agree with you.  I was very fortunate and count my blessing ever day.

 

At least half of any money put into a 401(k), comes from the worker ... not the employer.

 

And ... my mother retired recently.  She has a 401(k).  It contributes 0 to her standard of living - in part because she's treating it like an emergency fund, and in part because she's extremely loathe to pay taxes on any withdrawals (obviously, hers is a tax-deferred 401(k) ...).

 

You are talking where the money comes from...that's not what I am referring to...You aren't allow to hold $$ in your 401(k).  It has to be moved into a fund that the 401(k) provides or manages.  And that fund is going to be mostly corporate equities...So you are now the proud owner of several Big Corp stocks...

 

I can't speak to your grandmother...but if she is treating it as an emergency fund, I would imagine she would be very distressed if it just up and disappeared on her...There is a certain peace of mind of knowing emergencies are covered...

 

EDIT:  Just saw Widower's response earlier in this thread...and I had already tried to step away from this topic...My own fault...Respond as you will Pax, but I will remain silent...If you wish to send me a PM, we can continue there...

[Hyperstrike]

 

And ... my mother retired recently.  She has a 401(k).  It contributes 0 to her standard of living - in part because she's treating it like an emergency fund, and in part because she's extremely loathe to pay taxes on any withdrawals (obviously, hers is a tax-deferred 401(k) ...).

 

 

She may want to look into other methods of holding her money if she's truly worried about "emergencies".

 

Cashing out a 401k can take anywhere from two weeks to several months, depending on the vehicle.

In an ACTUAL emergency, this lack of short term liquidity can screw you.

 

Also remember that once mom hits 70-1/2, she's REQUIRED to take out a minimum distribution.  And the penalty is 50% of said distribution if you miss it.

[Nightmarer]

I know we're all probably a tiny bit biased but I really can't think of anything (though that might be because I never got far in wow since I never enjoyed it)

So what does WoW do better than CoX?

 

Since CoH was launched a few months before WoW, I'd say that the problem was, as always, NCSoft. Had they done their job as a publisher, WoW might have become a mere anecdote and all MMO's out there would be trying to be "the CoH killer" but since NCSoft did nothing for the game except getting money from it, WoW's marketing and publicity made it the most famous MMO ever.

[Hyperstrike]

I know we're all probably a tiny bit biased but I really can't think of anything (though that might be because I never got far in wow since I never enjoyed it)

So what does WoW do better than CoX?

 

Since CoH was launched a few months before WoW, I'd say that the problem was, as always, NCSoft. Had they done their job as a publisher, WoW might have become a mere anecdote and all MMO's out there would be trying to be "the CoH killer" but since NCSoft did nothing for the game except getting money from it, WoW's marketing and publicity made it the most famous MMO ever.

 

Yes and no.

 

With Superhero products, there are market penetration problems in Asia for anything without name recognition.

 

On top of that, WOW gave away HUGE numbers of accounts in Asia to kickstart their numbers.

[EggKookoo]

Also, like it or not, superheroes will always be niche compared to sword & sorcery fantasy. In the end, Tolkien wins that fight.

 

Properly marketed, horror would beat both of them. If White Wolf could figure out how to make a competent "World of Darkness Online" it'd be a game changer (no pun intended).

[PaxArcana]

If White Wolf could figure out how to make a competent "World of Darkness Online" [...]

... DROOLIE, DROOLIE!!

 

Seriously, that would be SO hardcore awesome .... if it were done right.  And that one lone qualifier is the rub, isn't it?

[EggKookoo]

Seriously, that would be SO hardcore awesome .... if it were done right.  And that one lone qualifier is the rub, isn't it?

 

Not that alone. As WW found out with the Underworld movies, it's really hard to stake a claim on "vampires" and "werewolves" (or even "vampires and werewolves as traditional enemies"). To capitalize on that, you really have to customize them into something that can be viewed by the legal system as an actual IP. But then that diminishes the universal nature of their appeal. It's a fine line. It might be why WW stopped trying make WoD-based movies and shows.

[Abraxus]

Also, like it or not, superheroes will always be niche compared to sword & sorcery fantasy. In the end, Tolkien wins that fight.

 

Properly marketed, horror would beat both of them. If White Wolf could figure out how to make a competent "World of Darkness Online" it'd be a game changer (no pun intended).

 

Superheroes, niche?  Box office numbers both domestic, and worldwide for the superhero movies would suggest otherwise.  I believe it really does come down to marketing, and reaching those out there who obviously love the genre, but were just unaware that it was a thing.  Even today, I'm sure if word of the game's return were more widespread outside of the typical gaming outlets, population on all of the various CoH servers would likely skyrocket. 

[GritIron]

Wow really hyped up the fan base (whihc was large because previous games made it popular).  And it was engaging with relevant story.

 

And there is no denying they got PVP better than CoH did, which put it in as an after thought.

[EggKookoo]

Superheroes, niche?  Box office numbers both domestic, and worldwide for the superhero movies would suggest otherwise.

 

As compared to sword & sorcery fantasy, yes.

[Hyperstrike]

Superheroes, niche?  Box office numbers both domestic, and worldwide for the superhero movies would suggest otherwise.  I believe it really does come down to marketing, and reaching those out there who obviously love the genre, but were just unaware that it was a thing.  Even today, I'm sure if word of the game's return were more widespread outside of the typical gaming outlets, population on all of the various CoH servers would likely skyrocket.

 

Yep.  Niche.

 

The Marvel/DC movies have BRAND RECOGNITION.

So their draw is wider.

EVERYONE knows who Superman and Batman are.

EVERYONE knows who Spider-Man and Wolverine are.

 

The most common question I get when wearing Statesman's star?

"Ooh!  Captain America?"

 

Remember the Russian-made "Guardians" film?

Made a whopping $15M on a $5.4M budget.

 

Basically CoH's lore has almost zero societal penetration.

 

Whereas the Big Players have had 75 YEARS of exposure.

[PaxArcana]

EVERYONE knows who Superman and Batman are.

 

[...]

 

Whereas the Big Players have had 75 YEARS of exposure.

 

... and yet, even the Big Guys can screw the pooch, and make films that are only mediocre, at best.  :D  (Yes, DC, I'm looking at you ...)

[justicebeliever]

Superheroes, niche?  Box office numbers both domestic, and worldwide for the superhero movies would suggest otherwise.  I believe it really does come down to marketing, and reaching those out there who obviously love the genre, but were just unaware that it was a thing.  Even today, I'm sure if word of the game's return were more widespread outside of the typical gaming outlets, population on all of the various CoH servers would likely skyrocket.

 

Yep.  Niche.

 

The Marvel/DC movies have BRAND RECOGNITION.

So their draw is wider.

EVERYONE knows who Superman and Batman are.

EVERYONE knows who Spider-Man and Wolverine are.

 

The most common question I get when wearing Statesman's star?

"Ooh!  Captain America?"

 

Remember the Russian-made "Guardians" film?

Made a whopping $15M on a $5.4M budget.

 

Basically CoH's lore has almost zero societal penetration.

 

Whereas the Big Players have had 75 YEARS of exposure.

 

I promise I'm not just following you around Hyperstrike...guess we are just interested in the same stuff (although from different view points).

 

Marvel has done a great job expanding Superheroes from a niche into something much bigger...and DC's Arrowverse, and Marvel's now sadly defunct Netflix effort have pushed boundaries as well...So i think it is no longer a niche market.  I think something like CoH could make a strong comeback if a.) it was legally licensed, and had b.) updated graphics and combat engine to appeal to current gamers.  It wouldn't matter that the lore is unknown outside our community, because people have become used to be exposed to characters they barely know and really enjoying them (Shazam, Aquaman, Guardians of the Galaxy, Ms. Marvel, Black Panther, etc).

 

But certainly at the time CoH launched it was a niche market indeed, and Warcraft had a solid gamer base that trusted that World of Warcraft would be something awesome...

[Abraxus]

Yup.  I agree that in 2004 it could justifiably be classified as niche.  But, since 2008, I would say that classification no longer applies.  It might not have the collective following in the gaming arena that the fantasy games have, but I think it qualifies as a bit more than it's being given credit for here.

 

As for the lore being largely unknown, well that's true.  But, that gets us back to the lackluster marketing, where they should have been hyping the ability to create your own hero, and forge your own legend, rather than imitating one that you already knew.  That would have had widespread appeal to anyone remotely interested in superheros.

[EggKookoo]

Yup.  I agree that in 2004 it could justifiably be classified as niche.  But, since 2008, I would say that classification no longer applies.  It might not have the collective following in the gaming arena that the fantasy games have, but I think it qualifies as a bit more than it's being given credit for here.

 

I guess we'll see now that we're arguably at or past "peak MCU." Let's check back in five years.

[Abraxus]

Yup.  I agree that in 2004 it could justifiably be classified as niche.  But, since 2008, I would say that classification no longer applies.  It might not have the collective following in the gaming arena that the fantasy games have, but I think it qualifies as a bit more than it's being given credit for here.

 

I guess we'll see now that we're arguably at or past "peak MCU." Let's check back in five years.

 

Well, the last MCU movie is a mere 6 million away from becoming the all-time global box office champ, taking it away from Avatar (if successful).  If you look at the top 20, more than half are MCU movies, and DCU movies.  So, while they might be at a peak right now, it remains to be seen how they go from here to see if they can maintain the momentum, or if they take in in such new directions that they lose portions of their current following.  I suppose some loss is fairly predictable, but I don't believe you'll see wholesale abandonment of the attraction to the superhero movies, or the genre in general.  Nothing lasts forever, but if it can be maintained a high levels, there will always be more demand for content of all kinds...games included.

 

[EggKookoo]

With Endgame, a lot of the long-running actors' contracts are up. No small part of the MCU's runaway success has been the strength of that talent. Now, the next phase that leverages its new Fox assets -- X-Men in particular -- might be done well enough to catch lightning in that bottle a second time. It might not.

[Abraxus]

Kevin Feige is a pretty smart cookie.  Something tells me there has been a plan that went beyond Endgame.  How that plan manifests in content fans still flock to in droves, and more importantly, how they adjust (as DC had to do, albeit a little late in the game), will be the real factors in determining the future growth, or lack thereof, in the MCU.  There was one change that we saw in Endgame that I didn't care for, but it wasn't a deal breaker.