Spurned Chinese Publisher May Create WoW Knockoff

Earlier this year, Chinese game publisher The9 lost the rights to operate World of Warcraft in China. Now, it appears they are trying to solve their financial troubles by making World of Fight, which bears a suspicious resemblance to World of Warcraft. Others have noted similarities between World of Fight and Warhammer Online. Quoting Eurogamer: "According to the China Journal report, Chinese industry observers 'wonder whether The9 is launching a "shanzhai," or knock-off, World of Warcraft in hopes of keeping WOW players,' with iResearch analyst Zhao Xufeng noting that 'with the topic staying in the centre of attention, The9 can easily attract attention by doing this.'"

Comments

Poor ripoffs are nothing new

[andyn]

Oh, come on. We all know the fact that that most MMORPGs are practically clones of each other anyway...

Re:Poor ripoffs are nothing new

[Renraku]

I bet they have some kind of actual code from Blizzard, be it server software, client software, whatever. And they likely have the source to compile on their machines. So whatever game they use will probably be a direct clone of WoW.

I bet their first expansion will be Flaming Crusades, and their second will be Wrath of the Zombie king.

Re:Poor ripoffs are nothing new

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet they have some kind of actual code from Blizzard,

I bet you don't have any proof of your accusations.
You'r no better than SCO....

Re:Poor ripoffs are nothing new

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet their first expansion will be Flaming Crusades, and their second will be Wrath of the Zombie king.

You should have done some research before coming up with the names.

Dethroning WoW

[DreamsAreOkToo]

A lot of people have made the observation that it's basically impossible to raise the capital and perform the beta testing required to dethrone WoW. But all these factors aren't valid in China. Especially with their copyright laws. And the source code of WoW's servers...

Re:Dethroning WoW

[MLS100]

Where'd you get the idea they have the WoW server source code?

Re:Dethroning WoW

[Anonymous Coward]

they did chinese language localization for WoW. they ran WoW servers on chinese hardware. they censored some parts of the story for WoW. they sent chinese programmers to the usa to custom fit parts of the story to chinese audiences. they were paid a shitload of money to partner on WoW. what makes you think they dont ?

Re:Dethroning WoW

[goodmanj]

they did chinese language localization for WoW

Localization that requires source code is bad localization.

they censored some parts of the story for WoW

Censors don't need to see the source.

they sent chinese programmers to the usa to custom fit parts of the story to chinese audiences

Story design that requires source code is bad story design.

Every US corporation that isn't led by total idiots has figured out that if you make your widget in China, six months from now you're going to be competing against the factories you outsourced to. So if you don't want to be shot with your own pistol, you'd best keep your trade secrets out of China.

Either that, or make a product with a 6-month lifetime. Blizzard, as it happens, does both. Paranoid control over IP, *plus* new expansions which render stolen IP obsolete.

Re:Dethroning WoW

[cheetah]

Mainly because you wouldn't need any source code to do any of the localization. Not to say they wouldn't have access to development tools built for WoW or that they wouldn't have a very good idea how the game was put together internally.

They might even be able to take the WoW engine and mod it heavily into a new game... but the core would still but the same under all of those changes. I doubt they could even change game mechanics. But maybe they don't want to... It would look like a new game but have the feel of WoW. Which might be just what they are looking to do.

Re:Dethroning WoW

[Narpak]

A lot of people have made the observation that it's basically impossible to raise the capital and perform the beta testing required to dethrone WoW.

Now Blizzard might have more capital than most; but I wouldn't underestimate the resources of Bioware and their partnership with LucasArts. Given speculating about how good Star wars - Old Republic will be is pure conjecture at this point; though if anyone is going to "dethrone" wow in any near future I reckon Bioware is as likely a candidate as any.

Re:Dethroning WoW

[Yvanhoe]

If the Chinese company is willing to completely disregard IP laws, a good reverse engineering, a good hooking of the various needed libs, even if only in binary form, could provide them with enough tools to make such a game. They probably already have the tools to modify every graphical part, every text part and every story from the game. All they have to do is change some menu screens, some IP addresses and to make "different but oh so similar" models and textures in the inimitable Chinese style.

Re:Dethroning WoW

[mooglez]

This all assumes that the coders:

1. Knew what good design was.
2. Weren't told to ship ASAP and screw 'design'.

We are talking about Blizzard here, not a random software house.

they are famous for shipping late because they weren't happy enough with it yet.

Re:Dethroning WoW

[ildon]

Not to denigrate their programmers' skills, but in Blizzard's case the "shipping late because they're not happy with it" thing generally refers to gameplay, not necessarily to the portability or maintainability or extensibility or whatever of their code.

Granted, not having easily extensible code for an MMO would be pretty stupid, and I'm pretty sure Blizzard is not stupid.

A terrible idea

[ShooterNeo]

This is about the worst idea a Chinese firm could have. It's one thing to knock off a physical good where you have access to the factory that makes the goods, and the manufacturing process is well understood. See knockoff chinese cars, watches, etc.

But, World of Warcraft is a gigantic software application. It probably has as many or more lines of code as any computer game ever created. It's been through years of testing and refinement, and has god knows how many hours invested into the artwork and graphics.

Recreating all that from scratch, even if you have a working example to clone, is a huge financial blunder and a waste of resources.

Note : I don't play WoW. My statements about it's internal complexity are based upon the fact that an MMORPG project is the biggest game project there is, with 5+ million lines of code. And WoW has a stupendously large budget, given the fact that the game charges customers over a billion dollars in subscription fees per year.

That's more money than any Hollywood movie has ever taken in.

One wonders what Blizzard does with it's cut of the revenue : in theory, they could use that money to create a WoW sequel that would be the most technically complex game ever made, with the best graphics and most sophisticated AI ever put in a computer game.

Re:A terrible idea

[magarity]

Remember that Chinese programmers can be hired for less than $400/month. The labor-hours part of your argument becomes worth a lot less after this factor is added in. And it doesn't have to be 100% as good as the real thing to steal a significant part of the customer base if priced accordingly.

Re:A terrible idea

[Anonymous Coward]

One wonders what Blizzard does with it's cut of the revenue : in theory, they could use that money to create a WoW sequel that would be the most technically complex game ever made, with the best graphics and most sophisticated AI ever put in a computer game.

Or they could — and this is entirely blue-sky thinking, mind you — use said revenue to develop a theoretical sequel to StarCraft, an obscure RTS they made a few years back.

And, unbeknown to many, Blizzard, back when they were a plucky, unknown company called "Blizzard Entertainment", put together a charming, though largely forgotten, duo of games under the "Diablo" name. Now, I know there's little chance you've heard of them (not many have), but from what I understand, they were sort of dungeon crawl games with online components. They DO have a small cult following, though, so maybe — just maybe — they could throw their loyal fans a bone and make a third game in the series.

Again, just wild, crazy ideas I've got.

Re:A terrible idea

[Unoti]

What you're saying is true. But do keep in mind that if everyone always did the reasonable, rational thing, we'd not get a lot of the progress we've made over time. For example, I could take what you wrote above, and substitute, say, OS/360 in there:

OS/360 is a gigantic software application. It probably has as many or more lines of code as any computer program ever created. It's been through years of testing and refinement, and has god knows how many hours invested into the [whatever]. Recreating all that from scratch, even if you have a working example to clone, is a huge financial blunder and a waste of resources.

It may be that it's a bad idea or a waste of resources. But just because there's something big and established doesn't automatically make it a bad idea to try to challenge it. There's an ebb and flow to everything, especially computer games. But there's even an ebb and flow to the power of nations. India, China, Russia, other places, are going to see a lot more time in the limelight in the future of technology. They're already having an impact in all kinds of areas that the US dominated exclusively just a decade ago and it seemed hard to imagine they'd be stepping out of the shadow of the US any time in our lifetimes. It's not so hard to imagine, now.

WoW is big and established, but one day it will, it must be, dethroned. It hasn't been that long since it seemed unthinkable that EQ could lose its throne..

Re:A terrible idea

[seifried]

Having a high volume of programmers won't necessarily result in a good product (or indeed any product at all). This isn't like building the 3 Gorges dam where you can overcome poor engineering and construction practices by simply using way more concrete.

Re:A terrible idea

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt that WoW is particularly huge based on lined of code. The quests basically all come from 1 template, the AI is non-existent and the whole thing is based on repetition. When playing, I get the feeling they're aiming at creating as much content as possible with as little coding as possible. Keeps the bugs down and speeds up content creation.

Same goes for the art too, actually. They're using plenty of color swaps and similar recycling methods.

Re:A terrible idea

[Kumiorava]

I don't think WOW has any spectacular code in it, it's all about the game design, story, tools and polish. That's what makes knock offs appealing, the code is cheap compared to other aspects of the game project. Having example ready and being satisfied with minimal changes and feature reductions will make whole thing orders of magnitude easier.

When I was selling the game projects myself it was always hard to explain the customers that source code is not the most valuable asset. We needed to be able to reuse and redevelop the code, no point in making same simple algorithms or patterns over and over again or figure out "appendix" where pre-existing or reusable routines are listed. Game projects are all about the game design, audio, art, and the whole refinement of the project. With many genres we are already in a point where scripting and tools are the main code that is written. Very little engine development needs to be done, unless something differentiating on the engine front is needed.

Of course with WOW there is a lot of code and it's going to be hard to duplicate, but to focus on the code as the main asset is not necessarily true anymore...

Re:A terrible idea

[Anonymous Coward]

"the AI is non-existent"

How about you try programming pathfinding around multiple corners (it's many orders of magnitude harder than simple homing), a threat system capable of handling hundreds of enemies and a half dozen boss abilities? Just because it's not the strategic thinking chess-playing type of AI does not mean it's anywhere near easy.

"World of Fight"

[nomadic]

You know, when you translate phrases from other languages you're allowed to make them grammatically sound. World of Fighting would have, presumably, the same meaning but actually not sound quite as ridiculous in English.

Re:"World of Fight"

[jaxtherat]

What, you mean like Harry Potter and Leopard-Walk-Up-to-Dragon?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter_and_Leopard-Walk-Up-to-Dragon#Unauthorised_Chinese_Harry_Potter_books

The Chinese spot fakes better than anyone

[Praseodymn]

and those kids won't play a fake WoW.

Re:The Chinese spot fakes better than anyone

[Gutboy]

Of course they won't. Who would buy the gold they are farming?

What the...?

[Bottoms]

WOF? World of Fail - "were u cum 2 farm teh gLOLdz"

Ooh!

[Greyfox]

I can't wait to create a character over there to farm and sell glod* all day and night! Time to pop out and buy an English to Not-Quite-Mandarin phrase book!

* The World of Fight currency

How is this news?

[Opportunist]

This just in, yet another MMO mimicking WoW in the making. Film at 11.

OpenOffice.org vs. KC Munchkin

[tepples]

How is cloning software a violation of copyright? or should OO.o developers be sued for violating ms copyright on producing an office suite that works with ms docs?

At least under United States law, there's a difference. Functional software like OpenOffice.org appears to fall cleanly under Lotus v. Borland. For entertainment works, on the other hand, U.S. precedents are mixed: KC Munchkin for Odyssey 2 (clone of Namco's Pac-Man) was ruled infringing, but Data East's Fighter's History (clone of Capcom's Street Fighter II) wasn't. And I expect U.S. law to come into play once The9 tries to attract U.S. customers.

Another 'WoW Killer' in the works?

[Drakkenmensch]

Good luck with that. It's worked so well in the past for everyone whose games I've seen land in the discount clearance bin shortly before the servers shut down for good.