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The Two Faces of WoW. WTF! I want a divorce!
yippee22
Member Posts: 48
I started with EQ. Hours at the keys, waking up with the keyboard imprinted on my forehead and a feeling of dread that I don’t remember where my corpse is or elation that I am alive! An adventure and immersion unparalleled. 5 years and not one raid. Not one. I "think" I may have done an instance or 2 but not sure. Didn't need to in order to live the alternative experience.
I quit because my wife couldn't play it. Vertigo to a horrible level and as a complete non gamer I needed her to crawl into the genre so fast forward to WoW (after a Diablo run to get her hooked 8) ). WoW was graphically different but no Vertigo for the wife; we were gaming together so I grew to love the graphics. Game play was easier, character control, targeting etc... We were gaming together so I learned to appreciate it. I think the real hook was that even though the game was so obviously a step down in immersion, it was entertaining and I had a partner in game so I was committed. I did my best to appreciate the game for what it was and ended up loving the game. The journey became awesome but I could actually walk away for a day and not have withdrawals like in EQ (literally).
Fast forward 6 years or so, I have filled every character slot i have with level 80 toons. I can have my son call me at work and start to tell me what he is supposed to be doing on a particular quest and I can finish his sentence and walk him threw the quest over the phone like giving a visitor directions to the guest bathroom in my house.
So to the point, the first WoW game is great, Discovery, Exploration, questing etc... Awesome. I could sign on everyday for months and not do the same thing twice. The second WoW game sucks, no semblance of the first game (the Journey to End Game?!?!) and do the same thing every day if you have multiple characters that all get locked to a raid every week?
I have realized that at the core I am pissed off that the game play that I pay for monthly has changed from a very fundamental stand point and that is not right.
I try to make the best of it but lets face it, I bought and played a persistent online game world that has a brick wall at the end. The game play changed, the game I bought is gone, there has been no effort to sustain the game I bought in the first place just a slow and methodical push to change my play style. I have not changed, I am still the same as I was when I committed to this path, I still want the same play you gave me when we first met. I can no longer stomach the thought of the two faced nature of your tactics so I want a divorce!
Alright, not that funny but it's the only way I can attempt to vent my point. Is there anyone else that feels the same? OR/AND Is there anyone who has another game that would play like WoW but does not change at the end?
Comments
You are not alone. By the time Blizzard started rolling out info about Cataclysm, I feel the same way. The hunter I grew with for 5 years is gone. Everything I know about my hunter has been flushed down the drain and Blizzard is forcing me to relearn everything. And I agree, WoW is no longer the game I purchased and I divorced WoW back in June.
Break the chains. Be free.
Ready for GW2!!!
I feel your pain.I started in the last round of closed beta and played up till a bit before BC. I came back a few months after BC to play with my brother and some RL friends whom I wasnt playing with before. I lasted a few more months. I had 7 70.s only 2 80's. I just couldnt bring myself to play anymore. the game I fell inlove with was not the game I was still playing.
the emphasis on gear score was the final straw for me. I was playing a druid. tamnk/heal spec. my brother asked me to fill a melee dps spot on a heroic whatever run. I do so. the tank is horrid. I end up having to take over tanking after 3 fails at the first boss. we make it through the instance without another death.
the next week I get booted from some raid because my GS wasnt high enough. I was in full purple minus a ring. what irked me was this tank, whom I had to replace the week before was MT'ing the run. needless to say it didnt bother me in the least when I hear the same group looking for a tank an hour later.
I'm also jealous you got your wife to play. I've been thinking about how to get my fiance to play when GW2/TOR/Rift release.
Cataclysm is, in reality, WoW's NGE. The only difference is that Blizzard is feeding out the changes in small, sugar-coated bits instead of changing things overnight without warning like Sony did. I'll buy the box, explore the new world with a Forsaken Hunter and then move on when Guild Wars 2 finally releases. I'm at the stage where I'm tired of paying a game company to develop content for other people.
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II
"People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
Sorry, as fast as it was it was NOT overnight or without warning, unless 2 weeks counts as overnight and without warning somewhere.
Apparently stating the truth in my sig is "trolling"
Sig typo fixed thanks to an observant stragen001.
final fantasy 14 is about to come out, it doesnt get much different from wow then that, while also different from eq, doubt it would give the wife vertigo, you cant jump hehe, but then its hard to predict who is going to get that with games, as they are all different,
Ah...WoW. Yeah, I definitely hear ya. The most fun I have ever gotten out of a game...EVER was leveling up in World of Warcraft. Since I'm only nineteen going on twenty, I have to say (sadly) playing WoW for a few years is actually a good portion of my life. Well, I've been off of WoW for about a year now. I came back for a month about two months ago, I got T9 with badges and crap...got my gearscore up to 5k, which is the typical minimum gs level people look for Icecrown 25. But yeah, WoW end game makes me want to hurl, and that's why I quit. I mean...it's the same thing every time I log on. I can go farm, I can find a group for a raid, every now and then I can do Wintergrasp (which doesn't last very long, and on my server my faction always controls it. The Alliance), or I can queue up for a BG or Arena. SUCKS!!!! I know what you mean. I remember logging on not knowing what the crap I was going to do, and now I just get hit with repetitive crap. All I have to really look foward to with WoW is the new expansion, where I'll be able to level up 5 levels, then go back into retirement.
As far as other MMO's...I don't know. There are several coming out that look promising. In order of coolest to not-so-cool I would say look into: Guild Wars 2 (gameplay looks fun and promising, graphics are amazing, full MMO with no sub-fee.), Rift: Planets of Telera, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic MMO (if you like Star Wars), Final Fantasy XIV (If you like Final Fantasy), and possibly Tera Online...I'm not sure about Tera though.
There are also some really fun MMO's already released such as Lord of the Rings Online, Aion, Warhammer (PvP heavy), and I would also suggest Age of Conan for sure...but you need a hell of a computer to run it.and ummm....Well, just read around and see what you might be into. But for real, WoW is still the most played MMO for a reason unfortunately.
Look toward the future though, great things await. I'm currently not playing an MMO, because I can't find one worth subscribing too. 
Argh
My wife was not a gamer, not even card games on the computer. At first I got her to watch me but soon I realized that what I thought was disinterest was in fact her getting deathly ill from vertigo. So I stopped having her watch at all and immediately searched for a game that was more apt to be playable by a Vertigo sensitive and it was diablo, shortly after, diablo 2 then after a long while, wow. Frankly I think that the reason wow became the mega it is, the previously unable to play could play and so the old time gamers brought friends family and everyone they could into the game.
My wife now only has issue with first person view now but because she didnt start playing for the same reason i did, she doesnt know what true immersion is nor does she long for it so wow is just fine for her. I think most wow players are the same. The only reason alot of people play wow is to be able to play a game with friends etc... the first game that nails old timer longing coupled with simplicity for the new gen mmo gamer will do the trick.
Then: "What's your game?" WoW
Now: "What's your new game?" Something other than WoW.
I played many games before WoW (UO,EQ,DAoC,SWG) and I have played many games since WoW, (EQ2, Vang,WAR,AOC,EVE,Aion,Lin2,PWI, ATITD) and I look forward to many games to come. (FFXIV, Tera, GW2, SWTOR, WH40k) WoW isn't the whole world. It was just a stop along the way. And not even the best stop at that.
All die, so die well.
Details, details. Let's just say it felt like overnight then. If indeed it was two weeks (I can't recall), it may just as well have been overnight. What I remember is that Trials of Omy Gosh or whatever had just been released with all sorts of promise of content for my profession (Master Creature Handler) and then NGE hit like the Death Star. Even so, two weeks notice is pretty meager when you consider how long they were working on it while an unsuspecting playerbase continued paying subscription fees. Were you one of the testers on the NGE? Was anyone who was a paying subscriber?
Honestly, people will nitpick about anything!
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II
"People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
After having a couple of level 80 toons and explored everything or almost everything, I am not surprised people want a divorce from WoW. You will hit the wall sooner or later, bro.
Its important to point out the specifics in someones post or someone else is gonna look at that and regurgitate it as fact, despite them not knowing anything about it.
And ya, it was around exactly 2 weeks from when obi wan came out that it was pushed live.
Apparently stating the truth in my sig is "trolling"
Sig typo fixed thanks to an observant stragen001.
I bet you 100 to 1, my hundred, that wow will not go down like SWG. At least not with cata.
With NGE, SWG sub drop, fast.
With cata, WoW sub will go up, not sure for how long, but it will surely pick up.
After SWG, SoE have to refund the copies it sold.
After cata launches, Blizzard has to double order boxset to fill empty shelves, for many months to come.
Come on, lets bet, I wage everything, even my underwear. Just name your stake.
Sorry, but Cataclysm is not WoW's NGE in anyway. All of the changes in Cataclysm are for the better. WoW's subscription will go up when the Cataclysm hits.
Cat will do well but after 5 levels on 5 or 6 different toons, we will be right back where we are, missing the game that we signed up for and being forced to play the second game of wow. They should be putting new areas for further exploration in this game every couple months. They should have been doing that all along. this game changed focus from continuing the original game play to changing game play forcing you to play a game you didnt sign up for in the first place.
Wow lost all its "random player created world fun".
You know the sort of thing; assaults on Stormwind, Lvl 1 forsaken raids to kill hogger, giant Crossroads/Tarren Mill raids, all sorts. Everyone from level 10 through 60 just running about having fun. No prizes, no marks, no points (well, OK some honor) just a repair bill from pulling the Uber Hard Elite guards by getting a bit too ambitious and a load of lag. My main was a Lock, even getting constantly 2 shotted by rogues didn't dull the fun at all... it was great. You really felt part of a big community.
Nowadays... log on, do dailies, maybe do a WIntergrasp, sit about for an hour while your guild sorts the raid out. Do exactly what you did last week, get some marks, every couple of days buy a shiny new hat.
If people would ever just start pissing about and having fun again I might even re-activate my account, but no-one seems to have any fun any more. Not going to bother picking up Cataclysm, too bored.
Ascension - EU Mature, Friendly, Laid Back SW:TOR Guild now recruiting.
Some people just have no idea how drastic the changes were in the NGE and how is showed a company was willing to throw away players, because they thought they would be replaced with a new bigger player base. I understand people are trying to be controvesial, but comments like this are just absurd.
Cataclysm is just more evolution of wow and in reality it is going to be the 3rd expansion based on "more of the same" with some new mechanics and features. I'm sure the new expansion will not remove 2/3 of the classes and change the game into a first person shooter.
I've been separated from my ex (wow) for 7 months so far. Im pretty confidant that im finally clean, I am free. I have beat the system.
I'd give Guild Wars 2 a try when it comes out. Appealing graphics, new inovations, no ganking so your wife won't get frustrated (or you for that matter), HUGE world to explore together, and it offers a casual playstyle so you can play anytime you want.
Not to mention, you don't have to pay $15 a month.
Ah that sense of freedom. I've been off wow for about 6 months myself (and this was a relapse :'( ). My problem is that I'm still checking up on the game, looking at mmo-champ a couple of times a week, and sometimes I get the urge to resub, but I knowIi will regret if after 15 minutes
And at the OP, i completely agree with you, the game you start with is not the game you end up with.
I do plan on trying GW2 I have high hopes...
Yep, I'm with a lot of you that have no interest in the changes being added with Cataclysm. I've said in other forums that it is "like" the NGE in the sense that it is changing too many things that weren't broken, and changing a lot of dynamics of gameplay that just isn't necessary to expand upon what players already enjoy. Maybe it's more akin to expansions like Trials of Atlantis in DAoC where it might not have changed the entire game and removed classes, but it did destroy it for a lot of people. I haven't seen anything I like about Cataclysm, except perhaps the partial destruction of the Barrens. I wonder if Blizzard is any better at listening to it's customers then companies like SOE, Mythic, and EA, that maybe a classic server is in order soon.
edit: although I have to admit, I wouldn't even play again on a classic server lol This mmo just got old for me. I'm very happy with my current MMO
If you have a few L80 toons, you have already spent a lot of time in WOW. Time to take a break. No game lasts forever.
As for Catalysm, i am happy to see a CHANGE in the game. It will be LESS boring to have something new.
Ditto.
And to the OP:
I could have written ALMOST that entire post myself, right down to easing my partner into MMOland, etc. But in February of this year....our entire family left WoW.
We're not going back for Cataclysm.
The game I bought and enjoyed...is long gone. But I'm okay with that, because I'm enjoying EQ2 with my family now (with less obsessive behavior), and....TSW and GW2 are coming eventually. Hope remains.
Thanks for your post.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
When blizz decided that to balance the faction is to give both sides the same type of classes, that's when i knew the game i loved is gone (this is TBC if you missed the que lol).
edit: spelling
Yeah Alliance shamans and Horde paladins....just NO. I agree. That really didn't set well with me either.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club