Competition for WOW

No, I’m not saying World of Warcraft is dying, despite their recent announcement of a heavily-restricted-yet-free-to-play 20 levels of content.  I’m just saying that Blizzard’s registering a trademark last week for Mists of Pandaria might be about the point where the folks at Blizzard are throwing anything and everything against the wall to see what sticks.

You don’t get twelve million paid subscribers for a game without being a pretty damn amazing experience, and World of Warcrafthas done a magnificent job of capturing the hearts and the minds of its fanbase.  I myself was a devoted raider through bothBurning Crusade and Rise of the Lich King expansions.  But it has to take an entire room full of writers months to churn out the kind of in-game content that WoW requires and still remain lore heavy and canonically accurate.  There are only so many rabbits this room full of writers can pull out of a hat before they need to start getting…ahem…extra creative.  Goblins on motorcycles?  Bring ‘em on!

So when twelve million players start getting bored and looking at all the other games they’re missing out on, it’s critical for Blizzard to keep waving the shiny bauble in front of their eyes to keep them excited and spending money on your product.  And the shiny bauble in this case is the fan favorite the Pandaren Brewmaster.

In what started as an April Fools’ Joke back in the Warcraft 3 days, every expansion for WoW since the first has been met with fans asking about the lovable drunken fighting panda bears as a playable race in Warcraft. And now it looks like Blizzard is delivering, but is this an admission on their part that they are just running out of steam?

Sure, another expansion shouldn’t be due out for another year to eighteen months, but WoW addicts across the planet are needing new content more and more frequently to get that same satisfying high. When you’re developing more content to keep your addicts happy, where do you go from Pandaria?  You’ve covered just about every major angle of the lore, including the complete destruction and rebirth of Azeroth itself through Cataclysm.  I understand the game is fantasy and the developers can make up any damn thing they’d like, but this seems like the last possible ditch effort to keep fans from wandering off before they just call it a day and announce the game is free-to-play with microtransactions.

In my opinion many people will stay with World of Warcraft including myself, this new game doesn't sound at all intriguing. being a Wow player for several years i don't see myself just hopping off to another game.