In World of Warcraft, Patch 6.2 was supposed to be the last of the expansion “Warlords of Draenor”. After 7 months, the AddOn is already out of story. At Blizzard, they believe players wanted it this way. Our author Schuhmann sees it differently.
The basis for the column is the recent interview with World of Warcraft’s Cory Stockton: 6.2 the last patch of Warlords of Draenor?
WoW has a content problem
The content droughts in World of Warcraft have been a problem for ages. For 12 months, there may be nothing new when the story of an expansion comes to an end.
That Blizzard can afford something like this as a “pay-to-play MMORPG”, while most others work hard to bring something new every 3 months, is already a peculiarity that can only be justified by the exceptional status of World of Warcraft. Most WoW players seem to know nothing else and expect nothing else.
But it annoys even them when nothing happens for 11 months, except running through Siege of Ogrimmar, Dragon Soul, or ICC for the 400th time until even the last twink has his gear together, which he sells to the crooked-smiling second-hand dealer in the second quest village of the third new zone for 13 gold at the start of the next expansion.
And hey, we don’t even want to get into the story about the Diablo annual pass and the “Buy a year of WoW subscription, and we’ll throw in Diablo III for free. And hey, check out the great pictures from Mists of Pandaria! We won’t say it’s coming in the next few months, but the pictures sure look like it’s almost finished, right?” – and then nothing comes for a year, and Mists of Pandaria only appears when the annual pass has already expired… so we really don’t want to comment on this story.
Blood pressure!
Also, they at Blizzard now somewhat regret it… a little.
Players want shorter content droughts
Thus, the big topic at World of Warcraft and player wish number one for years has been: More new stuff! Shorter content droughts. After the end of an “add-on”, the next one should start sooner. This has been promised for years.
Blizzard now fulfills this wish in the most unfriendly way imaginable to players: By simply significantly shortening the length of an add-on and then saying: Yes, you wished for this!
Instead of developing 3 raid tiers as before and bringing several “big gameplay content patches”, they now say: One patch has to be enough. Well, it may be called “6.2”, but the 6.1 patch was deemed trivial by lead designer Ion Hazzikostas in early June via Twitter, SELFIE, and some new achievements. It was said that it would have been better named Patch 6.05.
The second raid Blackrock Foundry, which still belonged to the first tier, had nothing to do with the patch, but was already finished and was just held back.
Blizzard’s logic: Content droughts end sooner if they start earlier!
The logic behind Blizzard’s new strategy: Yes, if players want new expansions faster, then we obviously have much less time to stay in one expansion and deliver game content there. Makes sense, right?
To that, I say: What?! People only wanted the next expansion because then nothing new came for a long time (in a pay-to-play MMO!). If two other content patches had come between Siege of Ogrimmar and the start of Warlords of Draenor, no one would have complained. By the way, Final Fantasy XIV shows how it’s done, as only three months lay between the last content patch of the base game and the first expansion. And neither the new expansion nor the base game suffered.
WoW players have always demanded “more content” per expansion and shorter breaks between new game content.
Now to say: Yes, the content drought remains, it just starts 7 months after the start of the expansion, not 13 months after it, but then the next add-on will already be finished in a year and a half, not after two. Yeah, hello? What kind of logic is that, and this amateur accounting? You somehow give the players what they want and then collect the next 40 euros for the expansion sooner, or what?
The length of phases without new game content has always been the problem, not the length of the expansions themselves.
But doesn’t that have a good side?
Sure, some hardened players can’t wait for the next 10 levels to be done and the story to move forward again. These are the players who only play for the leveling phase and the quests in a new expansion and who don’t care about the “content patches” in principle.
But who the hell says that it can’t be done within an expansion? What stops Blizzard from saying: With 6.3 we will create a new zone and advance the story properly? This is possible in other games too.
But above all: What stops Blizzard from saying: We know you’re bored for 10 months until the next expansion comes. Here we have assigned another team that made a raid tier out of the ordinary? And surprise: This time it’s not even trolls!
Players here uncritically accept arbitrarily set standards by Blizzard about what constitutes a content patch and what does not. One of the main arguments for a pay model is even that this way, new game content can be delivered faster and better. Exactly for these content patches, the 13 euros per month are there. Not for a team to toil over a new full-price expansion.
Some fans of the add-on are now even happy: Finally Draenor is finished and we can start with the next expansion. Yeah, hello: But you paid for that? That’s like paying 15 euros for a horrible movie and saying at the end: At least it was short! Let’s go to the next one!
The cleaver solution
All these years, they thought: Blizzard would solve the content problem through more content. Not by a somewhat different division.
It’s as if a table of six complaints every Wednesday at “Happy Cow” that the innkeeper only has enough meat for 3 servings of steak, but they want 6. And the innkeeper solves the problem by chopping the 3 servings into 6 and serving them.
Yes, “somehow” the problem is solved, but now everyone only has half on their plate. The guests actually wanted the innkeeper to make more steaks!
The interview we are now talking about:
Conclusion – as always: Blizzard gets away with everything, urgently needs competition
For every little thing in other games, there are agitated players shouting “rip-off! rip-off!” At Blizzard, this will likely not happen.
Nonetheless: An “intentional” misunderstanding of the players in the direction of: We bring content faster by making the expansions shorter. Most other publishers would not get away with that.
It must be said: Blizzard’s World of Warcraft has needed a strong competitor in the MMORPG genre for at least 6 years to motivate them and increase the pace. Competition sharpens business. Being unopposed at the top for such a long time is poison.
For years they have promised, “more game content, larger team, more developers.” Before each add-on, they say: We are so excited about this, it will be amazing, we will go into the future well-equipped.
And at the end of each add-on, there is disappointment: Where is the 50% larger team? What are they doing right now? Why aren’t they making a Patch 6.3 for September that blows us all away and makes us all remember Warlords of Draenor fondly and ensures we happily buy the next add-on?
