World of Warcraft subscriptions continue a downward trend

@Dril

I see people say this all the time but I never see them provide any substantial proof to back it up.

The fact is that WoW is more balanced and polished now than ever before. Anyone saying otherwise is simply deluding themselves either because they dislike the game or have played it for so long they've grown cynical.

@WollyOT

Tom Chilton.

There's your proof.

@WollyOT

Let me help you then. As a friend of mine who plays WoW has told me, he's had some very serious problems with grouping in the game, and the grouping mechanics. Especially when he's trying to get daily points for finishing certain raids. They tend to kick him at the final boss, likely inviting one of their friends in in his place so they can charge in and get the points themselves.

The community seems quite trashy, and focused entirely on "perfect parties", allowing little to no wiggle room than strict, by the book builds. This somewhat reminds me of what Guild Wars has going with it's Abyss runs. Honestly, I'm all for challenge, but it seems that it plays entirely to hardcore nerd pride alone, rather than a fun, exciting experience.

Besides, once those hardcore people finish said boss, they quit. The challenge has been overcome. The faithful that stay instead have to pick up the slack, and quit because it's not user friendly at all.

@ShivanSwordsman

You see, i dont think WoW, the game, have too many problems itself. It just the community is complete d-bag kiddies, or adults acting and behavioring LIKE kiddies.

I miss the early MMOs not because of the game but because of the mature community (most old skool MMOs are outdated, and frankly a little sucky, in comparison to modern MMOs, but im not here to start a flamewar). The credit card was the best barrier-to-entry into the MMO genre! Parents use to never approve their kids using their CC to pay a monthly subscription for a game! The game was reserved for a more mature crowd that can support themselves and play the game. Oh how that have change with kids spoiled by their parents, and the dreaded gaming card :P

@sohcahtoa If only underage players were really the problem. Nearly every problem I ever had with dick players in guilds or in raids were adults, sometimes even parents of kids who were in the guild. Their kids were fine, the parents were the jerks. The short answer is that out of millions of people, there are thousands of problem children, even if those problem children are 40 years old.

@WollyOT

Trivializing gear (working on a set...only to replace that set 2 months later), attempting to balance both pvp and pve at the same time, instant travel, lobbied instances, mind-numbing daily quests, currency becoming readily available to everyone which inflates the economy, flying mounts, world is a barren wasteland of npcs with very few player interaction, no world pvp, crafting is almost useless, LOLore re-writes, the continuing immature community, homogenization of classes (no uniqueness to the classes anymore), deathknights, no WAR, coddled gameplay........

I can come up with more if you'd like

@WollyOT
"I see people say this all the time but I never see them provide any substantial proof to back it up. "

I'd say a drop of a million subscribers since the release of the last expansion is pretty substantial proof.

I wonder if they will be making any more bullish statements about 'all those players will soon be back' like they did last time.

@ShivanSwordsman

Yeah. I used to expect MMOs to be a pick up and play experience, but once you play for a while, you realize MMOs are about the people you're playing with as much as the game itself. There are things in WoW that I loved and things I've hated, but besides the nickle and diming, one of the weakest points of WoW is the player anonymity and lack of guild features.

Some of that has been rectified over time, but guilds are still a loose formation of loot whores in many cases. That feeds bad habits and creates a very weak community. That's also by design because the only way to distinguish your character from the next is to grind out gear that no one else has and in turn feeds the problem.

While I only played Rift through the first raid tier, it's the small things like guild quests, perks and armor dyes that really helped create interesting characters and more cohesive guilds. Now, player anonymity, a generic story and flat characters didn't really inspire me to keep playing for long though.

In terms of WoW, it was good, but never great. The subscription numbers growth has also long been a result of geographic expansion and not organic expansion within the more mature markets like NA and EU, which many people tend to forget when they write these articles. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think either NA or EU ever got over 1.2 - 1.5 million subscriptions in those regions. Still a lot of people, but it's a relatively small portion of the total.

@Dril

I have to agree the game has really changed since the level 60 days. I still play WoW, but the hardcore has changed to casual. The talent system is not nearly as complex and mobs have been dumbed down. The only challenge left is leveling 10 characters up to 85 before your subscription is up. They should have an achievement for that.

@(Unverified)

I hardly see how lobbied instances are a bad thing. Try waiting around for an hour trying to get a group together like it used to be set up and you'd likely want the instance queues back again. As for your other points, I feel your exaggerating, or making a problem out of something that isn't really there.

Replacing gear is a staple of RPGs, that's the model WoW was built around. It's been like this since launch and I would argue that more gear options is a pro rather than a con. World PvP is also very much alive, the previous patch proved that (to my dismay), but then again some people prefer that while others don't, so that's really a mater of opinion.

In fact, much of what you listed is just your opinion. Coddled gameplay? Should they really only tune dungeons for 10% of the population again? Who actually wants to pay for that? Class homogenization? Since when did playing a mage feel radically different than playing a warlock? You were still reacting to the same things, the only thing that's changed now is that more talent specs are viable than were before.

The only legitimate concern I see in any of this is the emptiness of the world. This is true, but it was also like this long before Cataclysm, which sought to rectify the problem significantly. The truth is that most players don't want to wait around for a group to form to quest and level. It's not a perfect system, but it seems to be the trend most MMOs are following. GW2 and SWToR are focusing on a levelling system that is largely solo friendly, with dungeons and raids as the focus for groups.

@ShivanSwordsman

I can't say I've had this problem, but I tend to run with people who I know in game. But then again, this is a risk you take when you play a social game; there's always the potential that you'll be playing with jerks. In fact, this can be applied to the internet as a whole.

Aside from that, this is really just a social problem rather than a design flaw. When you're playing a social game you have to take into account the fact that you're playing with other people who may or may not appreciate what you bring to the group. I can't really see how any developer would hope to address what is essentially a human issue.

@(Unverified)
that pretty much summed it up for me. Oh and how gearscore finally completely replaced player competency/skill.

I played one of the best tanks on my server, but becuase I fell behind the gearscore curve due to Real life I was suddenly a second class citizen, despite my ability as a player to outperform people a full tier ahead of me in gear.
That along was enough for me to unsubscribe.

@(Unverified) Something not an asinine opinion would be helpful. All you wrote was the same crap every other tool has.

@(Unverified)

Well let's be honest, even if WoW went and lost 5 million more subs, they would STILL be dominating today's MMO market. =p

@(Unverified)

they have a long way to go until they are no longer dominating.

they could dump off half of their current subscribers, and still dominate the subscription MMO market by a landslide.

@jslim419

o Silly, havent you heard of inertia? Once its broken, the slide will prove to be a train can only speed to a crash.

@(Unverified)

Indeed. It has been the dominating MMO for an unusual long time. The most likely reason for the slight drop in subscriptions is probably old age.

A bit of decline may actually be good for the quality of both WoW and other games. Although I'm sure their stockholders will disagree ;-)

@Faith

I would love to see those 5 Million players distributed among some of the other MMOs. Wow is ancient people should try something new.