Its not World of Warcraft

In 2004, Blizzard gave birth to the World of Warcraft which would quite literally change the lives of millions. With World of Warcraft’s, also known as WoW, huge success, other game companies began to produce their own massively multiplayer online games to lure a few million gamers in, each set with their own monthly subscription usually costing you somewhere from ten to fifteen bucks. A few dozen million dollars a month doesn’t sound too shabby eh? Well unfortunately, for some odd reason, none have been able to stand up to the mighty success of WoW.

Why is this? One might ask, and it all lies in what WoW is. WoW defined the genre of MMO’s, and whilst EverQuest and EverQuest 2 were made before it, neither went as mainstream as WoW. So yes, EverQuest was made before WoW so it has a disadvantage right there, but why then are so many of the newly created MMO’s failing to keep their players in the midst of the WoW? Since WoW was the game what made MMO’s popular, it also boasts a strong 11 million subscribers, meaning it holds the majority of the MMO gaming population.

Here lies the main problem, because whenever a new and good looking MMO is created, it will attract a few thousand new players to the world of massive multiplayer gaming, but it will also catch the attention of a large amount of WoW subscribers looking for something new. The only thing stopping the chunk that breaks off from WoW from staying hooked on their new game, is mentality. These gamers will go into this game looking for a new WoW and all the great things that made WoW what it is, what they will find, is a different game. This is the truth about why games like Aion and Warhammer online can never be the successes they are meant to be, and the curse that all new MMO’s such as Final Fantasy 14, The Old Republic, and Guild Wars 2, will have to bear.