A Case for Sanity: Killing the WoW Killer Meme
Hi, I’m Daniel. You might remember me from such other MMO articles like “It was great except for the Elves with 5 o’clock shadows” and “Tits and Fatalities aside, Age of Conan sucks flaccid donkey genitals”. I’m new here; and bringing you a highly opinionated, wordy rant on the latest of MMO trends: the term “WoW Killer”.
The meme itself isn’t new: the first earliest recorded instance of this meme was by the scribe Pontus Sextus Alphonsus in 300 A.D, writing about the threat of an invasion from far eastern Empires into the vulnerable Roman empire. He referred to these savages as possibly the first “Rome-killer” -Â yeah, ok, I just made all of that up. The term “WoW Killer” has been kicking it around since WoW first became a success back in 2004. Any major MMO release since then has been plagued with this term: “Will this game be the WoW Killer? Will this game gain self-awareness, attack the Blizzard server farm with a targetted nuclear strike, then start searching for Sarah Connor? Does this game have the potential to learn kung-fu?”
No, it doesn’t. The term itself implies that WoW in fact can be killed, which it can’t. Sure, it can lose some subscribers: even for arguments purpose, it’s possible (though not likely) that games like Warhammer Online have more total active subscribers than WoW. Does that mean WoW has, in fact, been killed? No. It would still be the 2nd largest MMO subscriber game, and it would still be the all time biggest MMO in terms of subscribers. Even in this best case scenario, WoW would still have a piss-ton of subscribers by industry standards.
Many people say that the only thing that can kill WoW is WoW itself. I liken this to people watching too many Terminator movies as kids or possible temporal lobe damage from hearing the pre-pubescent screams of Eddie Furlong too many times. WoW can’t kill itself, but it’s supporting staff of humans can perhaps muck things up a bit. A lot of WoW subscribers were alienated or quit after the Burning Crusade expansion: WoW subscriptions were down to around 2 or 3 million actual subscribers and about 17 million chinese gold-farmer accounts. Wrath of the Lich King might do the same thing; and it’s good to theorize that if Warhammer Online provides as good of a PVP experience as everyone hopes it does, it will take a good deal of the “real PVPers” away from WoW (if any still play) - and WoW can be happy in deluding people that the little e-sport Arena games are “real PVP”. At the end of the day, though, there is still a core group of people that love WoW for what it is: whether it’s because it was their first MMO, the majority of their friends play, or even it’s cozy familiarity: people will always stay and play World of Warcraft, and in great numbers.
TL;DR version: WoW has too many loyal fans and addicts to ever be “killed” as a MMO. End of story.
Now that we’ve determined that WoW can’t be killed, it’s time to move on. Even though it can’t be terminated, it can still lose a lot of customers, or better yet, it *is* possible that another MMO has just as big of a following and playerbase as WoW does without stealing their customers. In fact, this latter scenario is the best scenario because it means that players have been gained from outside the genre and the industry has indeed grown. This can’t really happen with titles like Warhammer Online or Age of Conan because it’s still stuck in the same genre (Fantasy) and is really just a rehash of the same thing - and maybe niched to a certain demographic, like PVP/RVR with WAR or Nudity and … well, whatever for AoC.
So what can rival WoW in fanbase and subscribers? A non-fantasy, perhaps “non RPG” based MMO that is rock solid, using a known IP. Whether this is a MMOFPS or MMORTS (or even both) - this is really the only chance that the MMO industry has at ever producing something that rivals the beast of WoW in revenue and following. Using this logic, companies like Mythic, Funcom and 38 Studios actually hurt the MMO industry because they won’t be generating many new players (from outside the genre) and have instead been focusing on stealing other players away from other similar games. Meanwhile, hordes of fantatical FPS and RTS players are uncatered for in our over-saturated Fantasy MMORPG market.
I digress; in conclusion, let’s stop using this tired term “WoW Killer”. The term is just plain inaccurate; we need to be more creative and constructive in representing the MMO industry. So, let’s focus on objective reviews and previews of upcoming releases and advancing and expanding the industry, rather than throwing this lame meme into the mix with every new title that’s about to be released.
Yes, wouldn’t life be more enjoyable if the term “WoW Killer” were magically stricken from our lexicon. <> I agree with you and with others who have made the logical agrument that the MMO industry will not draw substantial subscribers away from WoW unless Blizzard dramatically FUBARs the game. That’s not likely, those guys are too smart; they know there genre, their game, and their audience too well to screw it up. Sure, TBC turned some people off, but more have joined the game, and the same will happen with Wrath - many will leave, many more will join. Net/Net the franchise will continue to grow in the short term. IMHO it will not be a known IP that slices into the WoW cash pie; it will be Blizzard’s own follow-up MMO. They’re advertising for it; developers, programmers, and artists all being hired for this new project. Blizzard, at a time of their own choosing, probably 3-5 years from now will unveil their own “Wow suppressor” with enhanced graphics and probably a brand new IP and gamers will flock to it like rats to the Pied Piper. btw, props on the eddie furlong tag
I am to please.
Wow. And I do mean wow as in shock, surprise, etc. That was actually an intelligent blog. I think it may have caused a paradigm shift in my brain. I have to go lay down now…..
Heh, I think I’ve gotten spoiled by Daedren’s blogs - most of the others on this site are nowhere near as thought provoking or intelligent.
@Daedren: Thank you for posting this. The MMO genre needs to stop focusing on taking down the goliath of the industry and instead focus on making the best games that they can. Instead of rehashing on an overused concept and playstyle, make something new and innovative. Oddly enough, if they finally let go of the concept of being the “WoW killer”, they could possibly make a game that had that very same effect.
I declare this blog post the blog-killer!
But yes, the phrase “WoW-killer” is a rather silly one, because another game will never canabalise WoW’s subscriptions to the point that it’s “dead”. The only thing that can kill wow is the people running the server farms, and even then someone would probably set up emulated servers.
I love a nice, lucid arguement in the turbulent blogoshpere, even if it is obvious to those in the know. We all know that WoW is great for the industry. It sucks in casual gamers who have never played an MMO or even an RPG before and turns them into hard-core gaming addicts that need a better fix. Most of the ‘hard-core’ MMOs have seen an in-flux of subscribers because of this. Would Age of Conan have seen 1+ million in unit sales without the existance of WoW (despite its 18 and older game requirement)? Has it significantly hurt WoW? I would think that AoC has pulled players from all games, not just WoW, which can really hurt the smaller companies. I think Warhammer will create the same statement with its release here in a month.
I will have to disagree with the statement about the fantasy RPG genre, though. Games like Warhammer and Conan will bring in new players from their own fan bases much like WoW did with many of the Warcraft/Starcraft fans that hadn’t picked up an MMO before. On the horizon we have other games such as Star Trek Online, Stargate Worlds, and other IPs that will attract new players from their own fanbase. There have been several non-RPG MMOs developed, but many of them fail (in my opinion, not financially) as solid games due to their microtrans financial models, simplistic web-based interfaces, or complete lack of depth.
*
In the end, there will be cockroaches, fallout, some dust, the Rolling Stones, and WoW.
Nicely written blog. Great style. One could nearly taste and smell the sarcasm and dry humor… nearly prompting them to see if the blog was actually scratch ‘n sniff or not.
Quit your day job and write more. Better yet, do the world another great service. Donate the remainder of your days to providing proper educations to the warped and fragile minds in WoW: Barrens Chat. If ever there were a true WoW Killer… Barrens Chat might be that terrible cancer within the (World of)World of Warcraft. You may very well be the last and only hope… well, you and Chuck Norris, [Dirge], and soccer mom’s.
I love a good semantic argument.
Great post, man. I love your style.
Your Digg link is both a good idea and a hilarious mis-type:
http://digg.com/pc_games/A_Case_for_Sanity_Killing_the_WoW_Killer_Mime
There’s a WoW Killer Mime???
I want to rant too!(no offense)
/on
I hate the idea that the fantasy-MMORPG has reached its peak. That WoW is king and that there isn’t much room for growth, so all you can do is try to be WoW or go a different route like FPS or sci-fi.
I liked WoW, played it about a year and got bored so I stopped. I played lots of other MMOs too, some for much longer. It isn’t the best at everything.
I quit AoC about a month ago and am not playing an MMO right now, and I haven’t found anything that’s available or even in the works that looks interesting to me so far.
My first MMO was EQ and I’ve played many since then. When will there be another fantasy MMO that goes for more of a hardcore gamer approach and primarily focuses on giving the player an immersive challenging world?
And AoC didn’t do that, they didn’t try. They thought about trying, they almost tried, but then they just tried to remake WoW with an R-rating and a goofy combat system.
/not on
Thanks for the positive feedback everyone.
@BlackWatch: While I question the lucrativity of blogging for a living, I wouldn’t be opposed to it. The main obstacle here is that every major site I’ve inquired to about being a writer or correspondant has either ignored or rejected me. The excuse? I’m too “hostile” against the MMO industry.
So much for objective journalism, eh?
@UnSub:
My French spellchecker thought it would be funny to replace “meme” with “mime” because I was missing the accent on “meme”.
I agree that the results were unexpectedly humorous.
I think I’m going to roll with this Mime thing..
well a wow killer is as likely as a ebay killer or a google killer
what i see what can happen is a diversification of the market since a lot of companies want their marketshare of the wow cake
so if they are not wow killers they are wow nibblers
but diversification is good and i believe that in 5years there will be 6-10 AAA class mmos to choose from. i also see that singel player games market share will loose market share because mmo subscription will bring in more money for a company then pirated single player dvds.
[...] with a Mime and you can’t go wrong. Of course I just made that up, and I assure you that the WoW-killing Mime is not yet with us. We’ll leave mimes and memes to rest for a moment, and venture over into [...]
[...] with a Mime and you can’t go wrong. Of course I just made that up, and I assure you that the WoW-killing Mime is not yet with us. We’ll leave mimes and memes to rest for a moment, and venture over into [...]
[...] with a Mime and you can’t go wrong. Of course I just made that up, and I assure you that the WoW-killing Mime is not yet with us. We’ll leave mimes and memes to rest for a moment, and venture over into [...]
[...] with a Mime and you can’t go wrong. Of course I just made that up, and I assure you that the WoW-killing Mime is not yet with us. We’ll leave mimes and memes to rest for a moment, and venture over into [...]
[...] up, and I assure you that the WoW-killing Mime is not yet with us. We’ll [...]
[...] Otherland MMO could be the WOW Killer! Now, while most of my regular readers are familiar with my thoughts on this subject, the fact that this came up 2nd in a Google search for “Otherland MMO” makes me weep for [...]
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