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Man "Beats" World of Warcraft
Precision pointed out that a Taiwanese man has been named the first ever person to successfully beat World of Warcraft, getting all 986 achievements, completing 5906 quests and /hugging 11 players. Insert joke here. There are many.
I quit WoW several months ago, but I know for a fact there are achievements for "Server First Max Skill XXX" where XXX is some tradeskill. I contend that is impossible for one player to become the server's first max skill leatherworker, blacksmith, alchemist, enchanter, and engineer (plus there's a few more) so there is no possible way he could attain "ALL" the achievements.
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Well, there is EQ2. I don't know if it can be called a "fail", but it was anything but the huge success it should have been according to the logic you present here. EQ was a different generation of MMOs, and, bluntly, I think its success is owed largely to the fact that it was the first (well, the first that got big enough to attract more than a handful followers). EQ was hard and unforgiving. I doubt that it would attract too many people today.
When you look at EQ through the eyes of someone who has been playing WoW, you'd wonder why you could even possible consider playing it. It's confusing and difficult for someone who is used to a game like WoW where you get used to being led through pretty much any obstacle you might face. It's hard and unforgiving and you might lose your gear. You're highly dependent on the aid of others and you better have a good guild that doesn't mind staging a rescue party for your gear. People used to WoW would probably shake their head and wonder how you could possibly enjoy that.
Maybe some day someone will come along and present us a new kind of MMO where we will be looking at WoW and wonder how we could stomach the time sinks and tedium, the boring repetitiveness, etc.
So I doubt that a relaunch is the key to success. The formula does not work out anymore, it will not attract any players away from their current game.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
And unfortunately the "sub games" are variations of "deliver item X to so-and-so" or "kill X amount of monster Z". Yawn.
It's the getting there that makes it fun, not the accomplishment. Last night we had a good run, and we're finally up to the last boss in Ulduar. It's not the highest and it's not the lowest, and the accomplishments were frosting on the cake. And nobody really cared all that much about the gear that dropped.
What did happen was the execution of a carefully planned approach using a refined strategy with a group of ten friends you can depend on to carry out the tactics well. It involved discussion, a couple of wipes, refined approach, then finally success against Thorim. That was hugely fun.
This is not simple carrot and stick. The win took a lot of thought, a lot of communication and some fairly fast and furious in-game action, a few close calls and some very close timing. If you see WoW as nothing but a level/achievement grind, then you're playing it wrong. It's all about the people you play with, not the counters, that make it fun. And an arbitrary challenge is still a challenge, isn't it? Otherwise you'd have to give up on all games and sports. What a dull life that would be.
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