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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBreakfast Topic: Is the game being dumbed down?
by Mike Schramm 
Jun 24th 2008 at 8:00AM
We worried about this way back before patch 2.3, but now that almost everyone has gotten a chance to experience all the changes to the UI, we'll check in on what you think: did putting a glow around interactive items -- and in some cases, actual exclamation points above inanimate objects -- dumb the game down?Makabriel thinks so -- a quest in Dustwallow that used to revolve around the player finding hidden clues now has all the clues glowing with exclamation points above them. And I've seen some pretty nutty examples ingame, too -- while, yes, before it was annoying to have to re-search an instance for a little thing to click on, nowadays it seems almost so obvious that there's no game in it at all. Of course, I still do use the various resources online to find out-of-the-way mobs (those still don't glow), but item-finding isn't even a challenge any more.
Of course, this isn't World of Findcraft -- the real game is in fighting creatures and increasing your character's stats and abilities. No one raved about finding little clickable objects in the first reviews, so why shouldn't Blizzard take that part out of the challenge? What do you think: is the game dumbed down too much, or do the glowing clickable items let you focus on finding the real fun in Azeroth?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Walkthroughs, Odds and ends, Blizzard, Breakfast Topics, Quests, NPCs
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 3)
brent Jun 24th 2008 11:10AM
Anyone else feel that due to the so called "dumbing down" of quest and objectives less people actually read the quest and lore?
alot of the story lines are pretty cool especially things like the defias lines, and that dirty jitters. If by that point in game you just accept->find the yellow ?, its not particularly a bad thing just a shame some of that narrative is lost.
I'm glad i got to go over all of it once pre-sparkles.
Kromzul Jun 24th 2008 11:32AM
This kind of "dumbing down" is really no issue whatsoever. You've probably looked up the location of the quest objective on wowhead anyway; who cares if you can spot the little widget on the ground a few seconds earlier?
What's really dumbing down the game is things like flying mounts, that let you just ignore everything in the game world that doesn't particularly suit your fancy!
brent Jun 24th 2008 11:37AM
You missed my point, and flying mounts actually open up more content and are a means of progression, not to ignore anything.
peaglemancer Jun 24th 2008 11:17AM
More games should borrow from the original Wolfenstein 3D or Eye of the Beholder, where you spend your entire game experience strafing down walls clicking till your space-bar ignites!
Kepod Jun 24th 2008 12:17PM
It is true that a handful of quests, espically at lower levels, were made relatively trivial by the UI upgrades. Oh well! Leveling is the means to the end in WoW now.
Tychon Jun 24th 2008 12:38PM
I think it is a good change, esspecially since more people are working on there 3+ 70's, its a pain in the ass to try and remember where it was, and go looking on wowhead or whatever your site maybe.... but at the end of the day I still use wowhead for quests sometimes.
I think thats where the "/w look it up on wowhead nub" comes from, cause I know I say that. If I've done it 100's of times, why can't you? are you going to ask me everytime you have a question about where something is? where to level? all these questions will probably be answered more quickly if you were just to alt tab and look it up on your own.
Bynde Jun 24th 2008 1:54PM
No, it's not 'dumbing it down'. This isn't 'Where's Waldo'. I want items not only sparkling, with exclamation points, but also flashing red and a loud baritone voice coming from my speakers saying "Getting warmer....warmer...a little warmer...you're Red Hot!!!", as my pointer closes in on it's location.
Another thing: I hate any environment/quest or anything else that requires you to jump/run exactly right in order to reach a certain place in the game. Like that infuriating Nest-Egg jump quest thing in Nagrand. I think I used every swear word in the known solar system trying that qwst. If i wanted to play Mario Brothers I'd dust off the NES and play Mario Brothers.
Charlie Jun 24th 2008 4:39PM
Its making the game eazier yes, but those quests weren't fun, they were annoying.
I feel like its the same thing D&D is doing with the 4th edition: It flattened the learnin curve loads, and is alot eazier of a game to play now. Now the emphasis is less on the mechanics, and more on RPing.
Simmilarly, there's less focus on making things hard, and more focus on getting you to do more things. More things = More fun.