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For those thinking of returning
jugface
Member Posts: 41
I recently returned to WoW after a significant absence of perhaps 10 months. I left initially for various reasons including :
- Repetitive gameplay dynamics, lack of inventiveness.
- Lack of character variety, classes pingeon-holed. Little scope for individuality.
- Population significantly infiltrated by feckless morons (Although Im not blaming the game for this per se, that appears to be a global problem.)
- Endgame = Relentless pursuit of loot. Despite obvoious monotony whilst trying to acquire said loot.
However I did initially enjoy the game for these reasons amongst others:
- Lovely World.
- Ability to solo if you wish, also scope to pvp (I enjoyed and have no real problem with instanced battlegrounds within the right context, as imo, WoW does.)
- Community isn't all bad, finding a good guild however is pretty essential to help weed out potential moron encounters.
What I find fascinating is quite how divisive Warcraft is. Clearly its extremly popular, and for good reasons. Clearly there are huge issues with regard to actual aesthetic quality of gaming experience. At this point i'd like to state that the terms fanboy and troll are abhorrant, nauseating and rarely constructive.
With the release of 3.3 and the prospect of cataclysm around the corner, I jumped back in. I enjoyed myself. I pursued loot mostly. Had some fun in arathi. It lasted approx a month and a half. With regard to the changes:
- The new LFG system is both extremly useful and irritatingly vaccuous. It allows quick dungeoning, but any sense of adventure is vapourised. Being able to transport everywhere instantly is really a shame when the actual world, for me, was one of the games boons.
- I cant remember if there were anymore significant changes. Probably not.
As such it still feels the same. The things I like, I still like. However the problems I intiially had when leaving were still there and more:
- Lack of rpg elements in what is supposed to be an rpg.
- Shameless lack of diversity, gameplay mechanics when questing.
- Same old classes, with thousands of people being virtually identical to each other.
- Pursuit of loot as main priority makes me feel hollow. Yes im a hypocrite, because Ive done it, yes i enjoy getting new loot, but come on, its rubbish. We all know it. Save ages, lots of frost emblems, blow of trinket, bit of a dps upgrade, sugarush, what to do now, oh exactly what I was doing before.
Now this isnt a post to hate on WoW. As mentioned previously, ive had a lot of fun from it, and it continues to deliver for millions. Howver if you left, as I did, and any of this seems familiar, then m y advice would be not to bother revisiting. I only did so due to a lack of competition in the marketplace - I like mmos. But right now they dont deliver. For a myriad of reasons explained far better than me.
Peace Homies.
Comments
I don't see how any of the reasons you're mentioning as new are specifically related to WoW, you can say the same about pretty much every MMO.
My post however was in reference to WoW. I have not played every mmo on the market therefore it would be foolish of me to make such claims. I dare say you have? If indeed you are correct, then I wouldn't be particularly suprised, however it would be irrelevent of me to make such empty claims. Therefore rather than try and take on the behemoth that is mmos in general, I thought I'd choose to critique the behemoth that is Wow. Ok? As mentioned in my previous post, this is aimed at those thinking of returning to WoW. If my words are applicable to other mmo's then so be it.
That's fine. So your conclusion is that MMO's in general, due to the way they work, aren't worth it. And that happens to include WoW.
Just making clear your point I guess, since you *did* single out WoW even though your point doesn't seem to be specific to WoW.
Seems you're mostly done with the genre(some exceptions, EvE perhaps). It happens, it's not for everyone.
No my conclusion, is that returning to WoW didn't work out for me, as all the issues I originally had with the game were still there, and as such it wasn't worth returning.
It is not a critique of mmos in general, but of WoW, and if the points apply to other games, then they do so unwittingly.
As such the post is more aimed at those who fell out of love with WoW, and thought they could/can go back. Perhaps some can, but there are those I suspect who will have the same expereince I did.
With regards to being done with the genre, I wouldnt say so, because they have great potential, and perhaps there are mmos out now which are more suited to my tastes than WoW. As such either a better game is out which I need to find quick or there are no better games out there (in a general sense) and WoW is the pinnacle of mmos in which case I hope the industry moves forward quickety quick.
And that's why i said what I said. Given your 'more reasons' for not liking WOW, those reasons are true for nearly every MMO, that's simply what they are.
That's in no way saying that WOW is the pinnacle of MMO's, it's saying that WOW is a MMO, just like most others. In other words, no different in the way you described, or negligible difference.
MMo's are treadmills. A succesful MMO will have you gunning for that imaginary or out of reach carrot, and introduce more carrots as it moves along. Because of the 'mass' aspect of MMO's they tend to be bland and generic overall, meaning there are *few* RPG elements and because thousands of people are playing a handful of classes yes nearly everyone will be the same in the grand scheme of things.
A sad state of affairs at no mistake. Do you play Eve then? You sound somewhat disenchanted with mmos yourself?
I'm actually not playing anything right now and I've never played Eve but I read enough opinions about it to know it's different enough to not fall into the same scheme as most MMO's do.
It's just I've been hanging around MMO forums, reading up on them and talking about them since my early Daoc days and even when I'm not playing a MMO I find it hard to give up the forum habit
I might pick up WoW again when Cata comes out, although I don't think I'll really be able to afford it timewise(which still doesn't mean I won't
), which is also probably what's still keeping me from playing one right now ^^
I think theres lots of people who love to to keep up to date with mmo's even if their not actively playing. It is a good community overall I reckon, with nice diverse opinions. Keeping this about WoW, theres a lot to like about it, along with its massive subscriptions its clear its doing a fair whack correctly. I just wish it gave a bit more. Im off to read some 'how mmos could be better threads' threads, and then write a petition for bioware to team up with blizzard and create it.
Hah, incredibly unlikely to happen unfortunately. Blizzard probably doesn't feel the need and Bioware is part of EA so they wouldn't get near them in a million years
I'm sort of secretly hoping that their(Blizzard's) next MMO is going to be the MMO that tries to take the genre a step forward in some way or another, hopefully taking with them what they've learned in WoW rather than leaving it all behind them again.
It is wishful thinking somewhat, ive played a lot of dragon age this month!
Theres no doubt in my mind that Blizzards next mmo will be staggeringly good, whatever it may be. They'd be morons to depart completly from WoW. I just want it now. I guess a few years down the lne, better tech, faster internet, it'll be easier to convert some of the finesse and immersion of single player into an mmo.
I honestly believe there will be some more considerable commercial competition by then though. So they better getter a move on, and will be interesting to see how they react if such competition rears its head. (admittedly I have not much of a clue what that serious contender could be, although im looking forward to TERA.)