"People might ask, why not just stick with single-player games then, like Oblivion or Titan Quest? Why bother with MMOs? Simple answer: I love being in a game world populated by other real people. It makes the world seem that much more real and alive."
-Scott Miller
Me too Scott. Me too.
Scott Miller recently posted about the solo experience in WoW and how it not only fit his playing style but was actual one of the biggest reasons for the success of the game. Thanks Scott because I'd been meaning to delve into this topic since I hit the level cap and found out I couldn't really play anymore.
I like to solo in MMORPGs as well. Ok, maybe not solo, but I like to hang with a few friends and I like to be able to play even if no one else is on. I guess you could say I'm a lone wolf in WWIIOL but that's not true and that's because I look at WWIIOL differently than I do a game like WoW.
WoW was great through lvl 60. I am a quest junkie. I did every quest that ever hit my quest log. I also liked to do dungeons and I did a lot of them. The fun ended though when I reached lvl 60. My guild is an RP guild and has decreased in active membership since the death of large scale terrain based PvP. We were the kings of that and the Battlegrounds just don't cut it. Raids are great, if your guild can manage them, mine isn't big enough. Battlegrounds are repetitive and spending the insane amount of time in one to reap any of the awards is ridiculous. That same amount of ridiculousness is inherent in everything WoW outside of the basic quests. Take for instance a recent addition. The Argent Dawn faction recently decided to make having faction with them have a point. They added some new trinkets you could get from them if they liked you enough. Collect 30 whatsit and you can trade that in for a thingy. When you get 180 thingies you can get a trinket! Woohoo. The breaking point for me was that it takes about 3 hours to collect the whatsits, so yeah if I play for a year maybe I can get a trinket! Great.
This theme carries over to all things post 60. Run a hundred 5 man dungeon runs and you might get a matching set of armor that is ok but not great, otherwise you can look like a clown who got dressed in the dark like everyone else. Get 40 guys together and you can do a raid, don't bother if you only have 30. Play the battlegrounds, it can be fun the first 500 times but gets kinda old after that.
Scott misses what I think is the central conclusion to this whole thing called WoW. Sure, everyone can love it, for a while. Once you hit 60 though, you are either going to be doing repetitive boring camps for faction or you need to have a dedicated hard core guild who uses point systems and DKP to finally get to the uber loot! I'd love to play that game I just can't. And I think a lot of the "Six Million Subscribers" are likely in the same boat as I.
Game Matters: The REAL secret to WoW's success?
