Patch 5.3 interview with Ghostcrawler
Mystery of the Unborn Val'kyr
The latest patch 5.3 news
All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBlizzard remains optimistic about WoW subscriber numbers
by Fox Van Allen 
Aug 30th 2011 at 8:00PM
The company isn't worried that it's all downhill from here, however, according to The Market for Computer & Video Games interview with Blizzard Entertainment's VP and executive MD of internal operations Michael Ryder. Citing the game's impending launch in Brazil, growth in China, and the new free-to-play aspect of WoW (at least, free-to-play up to level 20), Ryder insists that the world's most successful MMORPG has room to become even more successful.
Spin? Perhaps. But still, even if subscriber numbers continue a slow decline, there's no question that WoW will be profitable -- and thus, still around -- for a long time to come.
Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Look at what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back! Filed under: News items
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 8)
moredreadd Aug 31st 2011 11:11AM
@Chromebus and everyone who thinks the same
Let me tell you a secret. It's kind of hard, so may wanna take a seat if you are reading this standing. Ready? Human race has never created anything, all they are capable of is copying and mixing (like copy this, cut that). Everything that is now was before and will be again.
Jack Mynock Aug 31st 2011 5:10PM
@chromebus
What are you talking about? Just because you mash a couple titles together doesn't mean they're similar. While your comparison of Arthas to Darth Vader is fair, Harry Potter and Star Wars are not very similar beyond the 'chosen one' concept, and the similarities between Lord of the Rings and Wizard of Oz end at 'they both involve a group of characters who do a great deal of walking.'
I mean if you're going to go down this road, you might as well do it right. Compare Harry Potter to the comic book 'Books of Magic.' If you want a blatant Star Wars rip off, take a look at Paolini's Inheritance series. The first book, Eragon, is Star Wars with dragonriders instead of jedi. Even the second and third books bear striking resemblances to Empire and Return of the Jedi.
Thomas Higgins Aug 31st 2011 5:21PM
Chromebus, neighbour, every story ever written in high or low fantasy has as its core elements of what Joseph Campbell called the Monomyth or Hero's Journey. That includes the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, The Lord of the Rings, The Belgariad, The Book of the Dead, Spaceballs, Disgaea and Calvin and Hobbes. Amongst others.
Doesn't mean to say the stories told in those works are not addictive, inspiring or indeed brilliant.
Let us indeed tear them up. All of them. And replace them with what?
Jack Mynock Sep 1st 2011 7:02PM
The monomyth as described by Campbell doesn't really have anything to do with the fantasy genre in particular. Those principles can be applied to any story in any genre. Claiming that all these stories came from the monomyth isn't really correct either. The whole point of the monomyth theory is that it is so broad and so ingrained in the human subconscious that we cannot help but write stories that fall into that pattern. An important distinction should be made here: the vast majority of stories fall into these patterns by coincidence--Star Wars was written with the explicit intent of exploiting the theories of comparative mythology. That George Lucas was a slave to the Hero's Journey is why you can point to nearly anything and draw comparisons to Star Wars.
Michael C Aug 30th 2011 8:23PM
I think they need to lower the price for realm transfer it is outrageous for them to charge $25. if not free then i'd say drop it to $10. $25 is a total rip off. anyone with me on that one?
Artificial Aug 30th 2011 8:32PM
Most of their pay services are priced to the point that they probably make a lot less money off of them than they could. I've actually used things like character recustomization on another game I play, but never in WoW, because of the price. That means that other game has actually made money off of it, whereas Blizzard has made zero. Price things too high, and you make much less money than you could otherwise make.
jfofla Aug 30th 2011 8:33PM
How in the world can an optional service, provided for your convenience, be a rip off?
Your thinking is skewed.
Cainicus Aug 30th 2011 8:45PM
Rip off may be a bit harsh, but I think having the price for server change, for example, being as high as it is, when perhaps they could do it lower, is costing them.
I came back to the game to find that almost all of the people I played with had transferred servers, and faction. I didn't want to pay the money so I levelled a new toon with the same class as my main. Levelling is easy now, so I punched it out very quickly, and in turn came to hate that toon. 3 months after returning, I'm already feeling burn out, and have decided to take another extended hiatus.
What I'm trying to say is, even though the service is offered as optional and extra, the fact that the price can make it rather exclusive to some players, while be seen as worthwhile and affordable by others, makes a situation where there'll be players who feel disadvantaged by not having it, and be seen that way by other players. People waiting for their resto druid to hurry up and level when he could've just transferred his old one can easily make this even more the case.
I feel if Blizzard lowered the cost, then it would see a surge in interest in the feature, and perhaps the freedom it would offer would lead to less players feeling what I've come to (I'm sure that I can't be alone in this scenario).
icepyro Aug 30th 2011 8:44PM
Blizz has actually stated that the point of the price is to make the service available but not easy to pay. It's a service they actually don't want to offer, so the price is set for those who are willing. They have a hard enough time keeping up with our data without us making things worse by always wanting to change things around.
Or something.
Revanel Aug 30th 2011 9:40PM
Guess I'll be unpopular.
I'm with you Michael C. I have tons of alts, and given the 10 slot space per server limit that they set I've paid way too much money towards that service.
loop_not_defined Aug 30th 2011 9:54PM
I understand they want to limit use, but with the number of alts many of us have these days, $25 *per character* is essentially making it a non-option. If they had a "mass transfer" feature for $50 or so, I'd be less annoyed with the pricing.
loop_not_defined Aug 30th 2011 9:57PM
It honestly feels like I'm being punished for playing the game too much. With the few RL friends I play with undecided about how or where they want to play, I'm afraid to advance any of my alts because, right now, they aren't worth $25. If I *do* advance them, that's $25 I'm going to have to shell out. So I don't play them at all. I feel being a tad pissed off about the matter is rather justified.
gewalt Aug 30th 2011 10:14PM
The price is not set so blizzard makes the most revenue off of transfers.
The price is set so the fewest people possible will take advantage of it.
Do you have any idea how fast servers die when all transfers are free?
loop_not_defined Aug 30th 2011 10:27PM
I'm thinking a good compromise *might* be $75 for all characters, but only works for characters level 20 or 40 and up. Discourages moving bank alts. The price would be the equivalent of moving three toons, so moving two "mains" wouldn't be worth using it.
jealouspirate Aug 30th 2011 10:33PM
"How in the world can an optional service, provided for your convenience, be a rip off?
Your thinking is skewed."
It can be a ripoff by making it overpriced? I mean, come on. I don't really care about the server change fee, but tons of optional services out there for convenience are ripoffs.
I bought a laptop at Futureshop a few weeks ago, and they offered to do a special "setup" for me so that it was ready for me to start using. It was an optional service for my convenience. It also cost something like $80. All they were going to do was just run the regular startup wizard and maybe install some updates. It was a totally optional, somewhat convenient, ripoff.
loop_not_defined Aug 30th 2011 10:39PM
Yeah...ever since buying a house, our mail box has been stuffed with totally convenient, totally optional house insurance ripoffs.
Your logic is completely flawed. I don't really think this is a "ripoff" still, I just think Blizzard needs to reconsider some of this service's aspects.
loop_not_defined Aug 30th 2011 10:41PM
Uh...just to be clear, my "your logic is flawed" comment is directed at jfofla. Noticed it wasn't really obvious.
Noyou Aug 31st 2011 12:00AM
The only thing I will say is if you want to move multiple toons, you should get some sort of discount. I also think they should have a toon swap. This way you could transfer one toon and your heirlooms. I'd gladly pay $25 for that.
Luis Alluren Aug 31st 2011 4:59AM
im with ya-- then again, I've changed 2 of my chars to a different realm and have another 4x 85s that I'm not really sure I want to move since SWTOR is pre-ordered and I went as far as bootcamp my computer just to play the game (it had to be said)
Pyromelter Aug 31st 2011 2:00AM
They'll probably make it free once they want to start shutting down servers. Worked well with rift, very good model for blizzard to copy. Basically instead of forcibly shutting a server, they make it so that you can transfer for free to certain servers, therefore the population of some of the smaller servers can dwindle to zero and be peaceably shut down.