World of Warcraft: Dragon Desperation

[MajorMace]

Oh I think it's just as obvious for RTS and the popularity of Dota, and then MOBAs which went even further into alienating the core RTS mechnics to the point that you can't actually "select units" in any of those games besides Dota. From an RTS for those who don't like RTS, to Dota for those who don't like Dota. Step by step you've just murdered the whole RTS genre, devs being full aware (be them right or not about this) that the market has shifted, and that Dawn of War III had to be what it turned out to be.

AoEIV managed to exist somehow.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

streaming hurt RTS a lot
a large problem with RTS is that it's just a bad genre for spectating because it's difficult to follow unless you've played RTS
most people who have played video games can follow a hero shooter or moba

 

[NIGERundayoHater]

"I don't have enough time to play!" people are the reason the MMO genre is completely dead due to years of developers trying to cater to people who end up not even playing their games.

That is not even remotely exclusive to MMOs. During the later half of 2000s this sort of rationale was the reason for essentially discarding most genres as "dead" or severely retooled into an almost entirely different genre. MMOs are just the most obviously affected because their core design principles were always far more time intensive than say RTS games.

Evolution of gaming happened around that time. 80s to late 90s playerbase is a whole different thing compared to later eras, in which gaming became accepted into mainstream because investors saw "Big $$$" potential.

And truth to be told, WoW was decline in it's inception anyway since it removed the filtering barrier which was the high entrybar of those games. This opened up the flood gates for casuals, unwashed masses and other unwanted elements. You invite those and any sense of proper community dies with that. Wherever crowd goes, the discourse dies and all the sane people leave or mentally isolate themselves from degeneracy, hence why the sense of early vanilla community died out and Turboautists had to adapt by creating "gearchecks" to filter them out, but that opened up the potential for shit like "BOOOOSTING" and other retarded crap that MMOs suffer from today. Someone also said "datamining" as well, which I happen to believe to be a very astute observation. Datamining killed mystery and any sense of discovery, which I personally believe is an important part of gaming.

I personally believe that popularity is a double edged sword. It's nice to stroke epeen knowing that you created something good, but it eventually attracts the mindless masses who end up diluting the product into obscurity. It's actually a very interesting phenomena that applies to societal stratas outside of gaming as well. If people are interested in exploring that subject here are a few examples:

Substitute the "chicks" and "dudebros" with casuals and "I don't have the time" crowd, since it's a different medium.

https://meaningness.com/geeks-mops-sociopaths , it's a bit of a read but worth it for anyone who's interested in this topic.


TL:DR: Gatekeeping is a timetested sacred art and the only way stave off decline.

 

[abija]

If you dont play a lot and set a very low priority when scheduling your gametime maybe an MMO is not the right genre of game for someone in your position, with 25 kids and 15 jobs.

"I don't have enough time to play!" people are the reason the MMO genre is completely dead due to years of developers trying to cater to people who end up not even playing their games.

But there's a lot more of them.

streaming hurt RTS a lot
a large problem with RTS is that it's just a bad genre for spectating because it's difficult to follow unless you've played RTS
most people who have played video games can follow a hero shooter or moba

Nothing to do with spectating. Team based shooters (and even worse the hero ones) are hilariously hard to spectate/follow.
The problem is with playing 1v1 pvp. Most players can't handle 50% loss rate when there's no blame to throw on other people.

 

[MajorMace]

I think it boils down to RTS being more tiring to play than other genres.

 

[Cromwell]

But there's a lot more of them.

thats irrelevant for the point.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

it's an inherent flaw of the subscription model which is one of the reasons it has fallen out of favor to payment models that prioritize people who actually play the game

 

[Sarathiour]

streaming hurt RTS a lot
a large problem with RTS is that it's just a bad genre for spectating because it's difficult to follow unless you've played RTS
most people who have played video games can follow a hero shooter or moba

Meh

Starcraft 2 podcaster were pretty popular back then, and fairly large competitive event where organized with a lot of spectator. It's just that it has been taken over by easier to understand and more popamolike game. Fortnite is quite garbage to watch, and still has a massive audience on twitch.

I guess you mean that you can't both play and comment the game simultaneously for rts, and therefore is ill-adatped to solo streamer.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

streaming hurt RTS a lot
a large problem with RTS is that it's just a bad genre for spectating because it's difficult to follow unless you've played RTS
most people who have played video games can follow a hero shooter or moba

Meh

Starcraft 2 podcaster were pretty popular back then, and fairly large competitive event where organized with a lot of spectator. It's just that it has been taken over by easier to understand and more popamolike game. Fortnite is quite garbage to watch, and still has a massive audience on twitch.

I guess you mean that you can't both play and comment the game simultaneously for rts, and therefore is ill-adatped to solo streamer.

It's far easier to tell if someone is winning or losing when the only thing the person watching has to follow is the player's single unit. It's easy to see "hey, his red bar is going down, he's losing" compared to trying to understand the importance of of hundreds of units across an entire map.
I know people who watch streamers play games they've never played themselves, I doubt it's a rare thing at all. Being able to quickly read a game is a major factor in streaming it.

 

[J1M]

Creating content with multiple difficultly settings was a significant factor in the decline of WoW and gaming in general.

It segments the audience too much instead of creating something to strive for and gives designers an excuse to avoid properly tuning difficulty. Better instead to create a variety of experiences and allow for them to support each other.

There's someone in every guild who would rather be the quartermaster than the DPS king. I don't understand why there aren't non-combat roles in WoW raids. Let the cat lady who spends all day doing alchemy come along for the social experience and spectacle to provide people with top consumables. Just lock out combat abilities for anyone acting as a coach or cheerleader.

 

[Sarathiour]

Let the cat lady who spends all day doing alchemy come along for the social experience and spectacle to provide people with top consumables. Just lock out combat abilities for anyone acting as a coach or cheerleader.

Druid used to be a nice class for those role, at least in vanilla. You're allowed to suck, but you bring innervation and brez to useful people, so you're handy to have around.

 

[Sarathiour]

It's far easier to tell if someone is winning or losing when the only thing the person watching has to follow is the player's single unit. It's easy to see "hey, his red bar is going down, he's losing" compared to trying to understand the importance of of hundreds of units across an entire map.
I know people who watch streamers play games they've never played themselves, I doubt it's a rare thing at all. Being able to quickly read a game is a major factor in streaming it.

For sure, but I don't know how many people you are retaining that way.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Creating content with multiple difficultly settings was a significant factor in the decline of WoW and gaming in general.

It segments the audience too much instead of creating something to strive for and gives designers an excuse to avoid properly tuning difficulty. Better instead to create a variety of experiences and allow for them to support each other.

There's someone in every guild who would rather be the quartermaster than the DPS king. I don't understand why there aren't non-combat roles in WoW raids. Let the cat lady who spends all day doing alchemy come along for the social experience and spectacle to provide people with top consumables. Just lock out combat abilities for anyone acting as a coach or cheerleader.

giving the carrot away was one of the worst mistakes they ever made

Druid used to be a nice class for those role, at least in vanilla. You're allowed to suck, but you bring innervation and brez to useful people, so you're handy to have around.

with 40 man raids you were often just looking for a warm body, people knowing how to play was a bonus

 

[J1M]

To clarify, I am suggesting the game be balanced around X raiders with additional people being allowed to join the instance. The additional people would not participate in combat. (But they could provide buffs and consumables.)

 

[Val the Moofia Boss]

You had people travelling around selling items in games like Ragnarok Online. It could work in WoW if the raids weren't instanced, so a potion seller could ride up to a group of raiders camping outside a boss arena and sell them stuff and then move on.

 

[J1M]

You had people travelling around selling items in games like Ragnarok Online. It could work in WoW if the raids weren't instanced, so a potion seller could ride up to a group of raiders camping outside a boss arena and sell them stuff and then move on.

Sounds lonely and profit-driven. The opposite of what I am talking about.

 

[Kem0sabe]

The casual design to the game is just blizzard chasing the market trends. Look at every major MMO and they are all casual focused, FFXIV handholds you to an extreme and is focused more on cutscenes than actual gameplay, ESO is also extremely focused on story and most of the content is level scales to the point of having zero challenge.

Out of the major MMOs in the market, wow is probably the most hardcore with it's mythic+ system actually requiring skill and coordination.

My main gripe with the game is not the gameplay itself, which continues to be the smoothest in the market, but the actual story and setting decisions by blizzard.

I'm getting dragonflight and paying through it with two characters as I usually do with expansions, a BM hunter to enjoy the world content and probably a healer evoker for group content.

 

[J1M]

I like rated battlegrounds, but to really enjoy it you need the balance gods on your side to find groups. Fortunately, I was a demon hunter tank, which was the most desirable flag runner for the first patch of Shadowlands.

Will take a chance at Evoker this time around, but really wish it had a tank spec.

Solo shuffle arena looks worth a try since it sidesteps the group dynamics.

 

[MajorMace]

Ah yes the challenging pve experience. Quite, quite.

 

[Reever]

They actually cater very little to the "powergaming retards" simply because that part of their game is a monopoly. They might be loud and complain a lot, make angry YT videos, but at the end of the day... there's no other PVE game to "really" flock to.

The problem with catering to "powergaming retards" is that they'll be done with content in a few days unless you create gameplay loops that are extremely easy to design but take very long to complete. Which is why you have repetitive garbage like mythic+ which is just "Dungeon you've already cleared 100 times but now it has 8% more hp and there's a timer" and the best part is that "powergaming retards" just eat it up since they see the numbers get bigger.

 

[Cromwell]

and the best part is that "powergaming retards" just eat it up since they see the numbers get bigger.

thats what broke me. I can go 200 times into the same dungeon for the one piece of loot I want, or to help ingame friends complete an achievment or whatever... But doing the same shit over and over again and getting the same loot just with higher numbers and then doing it again and again because now you have seasons? Fuck off.

Thats not even a gratification wheel, it robs me of any gratification I could feel, instead of finally having the last piece of my t1 set which I didnt even need anymore I now have to go into a harder version of the dungeon to get these items again and again until I have the strongest version and then get even stronger versions of the same thing in subsequent seasons until in 3 years the next expansion drops. I am starting to feel bored and dead inside again just thinking about the time I played shadowlands.

 

[Kem0sabe]

 

[Duraframe300]

Wouldn't even know this is Warcraft if not for the logo.

 

[J1M]

Why is there an S in the thumbnail image?

 

[Tyrr]

Looks like some furry bait game from Larian Studios.