Blizzard Entertainment: You think you do, but you don't...

[Byron Carter]

 

[Cygnus A]

Blizzard seems really disconnected from what their fanbase wants.

 

[KaNesDeath]

Blizzard seems really disconnected from what their fanbase wants.

You destroy your product if you make each rendition of it available.

As an Arcane Mage my class would be rendered useless in Vanilla. For we didnt actually become a spec till the content patch for Wrath during BC.

 

[jefferz]

Do you really think 12k people is enough to hire a dedicated team to run the servers, admin, pay for the bandwidth, etc and make it profitable? There's games that have come out that have had to go F2P because they weren't profitable and they had way more subscribers than that.

 

[echohead]

Do you really think 12k people is enough to hire a dedicated team to run the servers, admin, pay for the bandwidth, etc and make it profitable? There's games that have come out that have had to go F2P because they weren't profitable and they had way more subscribers than that.

It isn't so much the thought that a dev doesn't know what is best for the market,. But the fact they time and time again deny that the niche player groups even exist.

 

[jefferz]

It isn't so much the thought that a dev doesn't know what is best for the market,. But the fact they time and time again deny that the niche player groups even exist.

If they want vanilla so bad, why don't they kickfart some money and make their own clone?

 

[blaseblah]

I tried starting a new playthrough of D3 last night. Single player. 20 minutes in it disconnected me.

 

[Thunderflash500]

I tried starting a new playthrough of D3 last night. Single player. 20 minutes in it disconnected me.

D3 is why I'll never buy an always online game, unless it's actually specifically an online game. Sucks getting a day off, launching the game, then seeing it's down.

 

[dAfTiE]

It's really cute how people talk about WOW is dead once it drops below 8 million subs out of one side of their face and wow, look at these 12k people pirating an old version of the game, there's a huge market here! out of the other.
Those people wouldn't pay, not all of them, and it's a TINY population to run a game for. And it cannibalizes their actual product.

Of course, telling a bunch of nerds on the spectrum that they don't want the old unchanged thing is retarded and poor pr, but it's good business.

 

[Byron Carter]

Do you really think 12k people is enough to hire a dedicated team to run the servers, admin, pay for the bandwidth, etc and make it profitable? There's games that have come out that have had to go F2P because they weren't profitable and they had way more subscribers than that.

Nostalrius and Elysium are two different servers.

One with 13k, the other with 30k+ right now... (Assuming 11k online, 20k in queus).

Those are just the big ones, AND just the people presently online. I think its safe to say there are 100k people playing on pirated WoW servers.

 

[jefferz]

Nostalrius and Elysium are two different servers.

One with 13k, the other with 30k+ right now... (Assuming 11k online, 20k in queus).

Those are just the big ones, AND just the people presently online. I think its safe to say there are 100k people playing on pirated WoW servers.

And all 100k will pay for a subscription also.

 

[Byron Carter]

And all 100k will pay for a subscription also.

If only 5% did, that's enough to pay for at least a single server, and the staff required to run it.

And how many of the 8 million subscribers would be willing to play on those servers, if 100,000 people are willing to install programs, modify files, etc just to log on and play?

 

[jefferz]

If only 5% did, that's enough to pay for at least a single server, and the staff required to run it.

And how many of the 8 million subscribers would be willing to play on those servers, if 100,000 people are willing to install programs, modify files, etc just to log on and play?

Do you even understand the technical aspects of what you're asking for? You can't just load vanilla on an old server in the corner and let er buck.

 

[Count Zero]

I'd be shocked to find out that 100k number is anywhere near real.

Not to mention the big appeal of private servers clearly is less "Vanilla !" and more "free !"

 

[blaseblah]

D3 is why I'll never buy an always online game, unless it's actually specifically an online game. Sucks getting a day off, launching the game, then seeing it's down.

Another thing that drives me crazy is it forces you to download patches before you can play. I understand why they put out constant patches, for online balancing. But I'm a single player guy. These patches are useless to me. And I'll come home from a hard day of work, looking forward to settling down with a game only to find out I have to spend two hours downloading a patch and my plans are ruined. I'm a 90s kid. Once the game is installed on my computer I should be able to play anytime I want. Not connect to a server, not download an update, just let me play the damn game.

 

[Bob Gray]

I downloaded and am dicking around in the vanilla version. Its cool as for as a nostalgia trip goes. But paying for it? Fuck that noise. It's grindy as fuck and and doesn't have a whole measure of the quality of life improvements the game has seen since.

 

[Bob Gray]

Blizzard seems really disconnected from what their fanbase wants.

Yeah. They could either continue developing best selling, blockbuster games that garner near unanimous praise from critics, or do what "The Fans" want. That's a tough choice for a profit seeking entity.

 

[Ablis89]

I'd be shocked to find out that 100k number is anywhere near real.

Not to mention the big appeal of private servers clearly is less "Vanilla !" and more "free !"

I've never spoken to a single player in the private server community that plays them cause "it's free". It's mostly people who now have a way to play their favourite iteration of the game again.

If you poke around private servers sub-reddits and forums you'll see the general opinion is that people would gladly pay for official legacy realms. The issue with private servers is the lack of support and quality of the scripting. People would gladly dish out a subscription to have those two things.

 

[Count Zero]

I've never spoken to a single player in the private server community that plays them cause "it's free". It's mostly people who now have a way to play their favourite iteration of the game again.

If you poke around private servers sub-reddits and forums you'll see the general opinion is that people would gladly pay for official legacy realms. The issue with private servers is the lack of support and quality of the scripting. People would gladly dish out a subscription to have those two things.

Well, it's hard to know without objective data. But, just being honest here, I think that despite what they say it's pretty obvious what the main actual appeal is. Maybe they even really think it's more about "Vanilla !" than "free!", but I ... well, again, who knows for sure. I just think it's safe to say Blizzard has looked into it and decided not enough people would actually pay. I don't see a reason to not do it, other than that.

 

[jefferz]

I've never spoken to a single player in the private server community that plays them cause "it's free". It's mostly people who now have a way to play their favourite iteration of the game again.

If you poke around private servers sub-reddits and forums you'll see the general opinion is that people would gladly pay for official legacy realms. The issue with private servers is the lack of support and quality of the scripting. People would gladly dish out a subscription to have those two things.

If Blizzard thought they could make money on it, don't you think they would have done this already?