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World of Warcraft Hits 9 Million Users
Wowzer writes "Blizzard today announced that their MMORPG World of Warcraft is now played by more than 9 million gamers around the world. From the article: 'That's half a million more than the number of monthly players WoW had back in March five months ago. — It's interesting to note that if the World of Warcraft were a nation, CIA's World Factbook says that out of 236 listed countries it would be the 90th most populated country on Earth above Haiti, but behind Sweden.'
Also revealed this week was that DC Comics are creating World of Warcraft Comic Books based on the MMORPG, with the first issue appearing on November 14th. The ongoing monthly series will be written by industry veteran Walter Simonson (Thor, Orion) and feature art by Ludo Lullabi and inker Sandra Hope."
I knew WoW was a HUGE MMORPG and that's about it but if my calculations are correct 9M Active Accounts * $10/monthly subscription fees(that's my guess, I don't know the actual figure) * 12 Months = $1.08 Billion a year! Holy Cow, that's insane!
I would say that the effect you describe is actually much greater than users with multiple accounts. Since your character allotment is vitually limitless, the primary reason someone would want several accounts is for multiboxing. That is, playing two (or more!) characters at once. The only other reason I could think of is if you wanted cross-faction characters on a PvP server.
And its crafting system, which required a ton of grinding out the same crap over and over again for a .1 skill gain (I GMed blacksmithing, bowcrafting and tailoring on several characters over there.) And you still couldn't create an item that was as good as various world drops you could find.
And the constant griefing, from the flock of pickpockets at the bank before the Trammel split to the flock of PKers who kept a stranglehold on the dungeons on the PvP side where the best items dropped.
And the game balance, which was fine right up until EA threw it out the window with the new loot system and artifacts.
Other than that Ultima Online was a pretty good game though.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I would wager that this number is highly inflated...
Personally, I own and maintain 3 accounts and my girlfriend has her own as well, so 2 players, 4 accounts... If you take a look at my guild of 50+ active members you will find an impressive roster of well over 200 characters many of which are on seperate accounts. I know I have at least 15 players with more than one account, and our biggest account holder is sitting around 8.
Take a look at Dual Boxing and evaluate how many multi-account users there are out there... Many claim (and have video proof) of 5, 10, and even 50 boxes running at a time... with one of the contributors to the community boasting over 200 wow accounts on one server...
I figure that without even counting farmers, we have made a significant notch in the 9 million number...
Zanthor
Let us not forget the most kickass-ist of ALL, the original Neverwinter Nights, exclusively available to AOL customers. I spend many a dollars of my parents going past that $9.95/10 hour limit on AOL cuz I was cracked on NWN.
Sure, LoTR and U-something-that-had-whores-and-was-cooler (Usurper?) on dialup BBSes were hellafun, but NwN actually integrated graphics and made it all sexy. for the time.
Ever since I spent a month on UO and Everquest (I'm sorry, but if you were addicted to EQ you should be face stabbed, it SUCKED, even with a kick ass high speed connection) years ago I havent been able to really get into these newfangled bullshit ripoff MMORPGs. I'd much rather devote my time to an open, networked sort of world, but Second Life's interface is total crap, so back to CS and biding my time.
Look at that, brought out the kid in me, I'm talking like an angry 14 year old fan boy now.
Cheers.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
> I get amused by the people that claim WoW is "inferior" because of its friendly environment and no-penalty PvP.
Wow is inferior because it has:
* designers remaining completely _clueless_ about dead-time
* static story (where are all the GM events??)
* no guild banks, homes, or towns
* limited world interaction (blacksmith can't repair his armor, boats on "rails", almost nothing to interact with in the world -- everything is "locked" down.)
* limited crafting (no lumberjacking, you can't make furniture and other house-hold odds and ends, etc.)
* using kludges such as BoP and BoE to try to control an broken economy
* invisible walls (still in 2007!)
The rest of the things it gets right, are the _basics_. It is not revolutionary, but evolutionary.
It is almost impossible to run into "griefers" (aside from occasionaly miners ninja-looting the ore nodes)
THAT is why it is popular. But popularity is no indicator of "quality" -- TV and Drugs are perfect examples of that.
Procrastination -- because good things come to those who wait.
Excellent points, and I agree with everything you wrote. My two cents is that, while WoW is very friendly especially to the casual player (which is why I still play), it can also reach the level of "serious and complicated" that its predecessors attained. It all depends on how much time and effort you are willing to throw at it. For example, my jobless girlfriend, who incidentally got me into the game, plays around 4-8 hours per day, every day. She rattles off end-game instance names, factions, armor sets etc. that mean absolutely nothing to me. She may as well be speaking another language. On the other hand, my highest level character is 61 after two years and change, and the majority of my 20 or so characters are sub-30s. That's because to me, the most fun is had in the leveling and questing aspect. For her, it's the feeling of achieving a lofty goal when she and her raiding buddies take down that boss for a server-first kill. For me, it's being able to play for 1-2 hours a day every few days or so and have fun doing it. Sure, I could do that in a single-player game, but with WoW there is an almost endless supply of class/race/build combinations to tinker with. Us casual players enjoy such things.
We get bored, I think, so that we won't end up in situations like the WoW addicts, endlessly repeating a few short actions. We get bored so that we won't get stuck. It's a protective instinct. However it's done, MMORPGs are excellent at short-circuiting that. You have a quick succession of rewards at the beginning, and an endless series of ever more time-consuming tasks to be performed to achieve the same high that was at first so simple and so easy. I'm sure most addicts didn't start out intending to play for ninety hours a week, just like no one starts drinking with the intent of being an alcoholic.
I liked Warcraft III, and I enjoyed playing it all the way through. But it had an ending. It could be completed, finished, done with. WoW has no ending, and that's why I won't go near it, no matter how much fun it looks like--it's similar to the reason I didn't start smoking when I was younger: loads of cautionary examples walking around hating themselves for their habit.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I think it's more that the average old lady could kick the ass of the average WoW addict. ;-). Meredith is a 6' 2" good looking blonde, and her husband isn't someone you'd like to pick a fight with - he's built pretty well. All of the people I mentioned are also above 30 years old.
While it makes for a good joke, I'm pretty surprised how much the WoW players I've been exposed to DON'T match that steriotype. Quick rundown of the people I know who play WoW. Brandon is 6' 5", and works out a lot (huge arms), owns his own plumbing company, and isn't generally a gamer. My ex-wife (and litterally all of her family) was anything but geeky - she was introduced to WoW by her step father, and got me into the game (I am a gamer though). I own three businesses, generally in ok shape (working my way to 'good' shape now
Most of the people (not all) that I know who play WoW are surprisingly normal people who have interests outside of the game, and it's another fun diversion to play. Very few of them are the obsessive geeky gamers you normally associate with video games.
Of course, this could be saying a lot more about the people I associate with - but based on the spread of people I saw standing in line for the release of Burning Crusade, the 'common gamer' image doesn't seem to match up with reality nearly as much when you start talking about WoW.
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org