Why does the fantasy MMO World of Warcraft struggle to maintain its player base? The target audience seems to be exhausted. Now, mainly players who need to be shown how to move with WASD find their way into World of Warcraft.
In a conversation with pcgamesn, Blizzard’s Tom Chilton, the lead designer of WoW, provided a clear answer as to why World of Warcraft is having difficulty maintaining a stable base after ten years. In his response, he focused not on the loss of existing players but on the increasingly sparse influx of new ones.
Simply put, not as many new players are coming in as before. And those who do come in don’t necessarily stay. This was different in the past: In 2004, the so-called “conversion” rate was massive, as it is said. Players who tried World of Warcraft tended to stick around. That is no longer the case today.
World of Warcraft has now reached a point where the vast majority of players interested in an RPG have already tried World of Warcraft. Chilton: “So many players who are likely to enjoy a game like WoW have already played it, often for many years.”
Who even starts fresh with World of Warcraft today?
Many veterans look at an MMO tutorial with furrowed brows. In the first minutes of gameplay, players are familiarized with the basics of an MMO, such as the WASD controls. MMO veterans, with many games under their belts, often think: This is unnecessary; everyone knows that.
However, such a system is essential for Blizzard today. They have found that newcomers need to familiarize themselves with WASD controls first, as Chilton puts it. This is new for them. Because the players who find their way to World of Warcraft are often players without any MMO experience.
