Blizzard breaks UK subscriptions

[Andy100]

I found a little stat for Everquest (an older MMORPG with far less subscribers than WoW):

2.5 Q: Where are the EverQuest servers located?

A: The entire EverQuest universe (at present, about 25 separate worlds) is run on approximately 1,000 servers. These are located in an onsite datacenter and at AT&T CERFnet (in San Diego). The Antonius Bayle server is located in the UK. The servers Venril Sathir, Kael Drakkel, and Sebilis are located in Europe.

It's not a case of 1 server = one world. You usually only get 3-4 zones to a server.

With a game like WoW you're talking some pretty huge clusters per World, maybe 30-40 odd servers.

There are few people that would be willing or able to host that without charging subscription.


MMO's are as much about socialising as they are about gameplay. Think of it as a 3D version of MSN where you can hack stuff up at the same time.

 

[Andy100]

And from an Interview with Blizzard:

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/09/06/blizzard-gives-10-rules-for-wow

7) Running a MMORPG is not game development, there is development and the attendant problems, but also many more. You are running a 24/7 IT operation with thousands of servers on three continents. You are also managing a community of fickle people with no lives.

One example of this is that you have a dev team to make and add to the game. If your dev team is fixing problems on the servers, they are not making the next expansion or adding features. Which is more important? Blizzard fixed this by making a dedicated live team that put out fires and patched the immediate problems so the main dev team would not be pulled off for emergencies every few days.

 

[arknor]

If your dev team is fixing problems on the servers, they are not making the next expansion or adding features.

yea lol your paying there wages with your subscription fees and then you are also buying what they were all ready paid for do

blizzard are leechers with there few hundred million profit each year from wow along

if a small iceland dev team can make an mmo and not charge for expansions i dont see why blizzard cant do the same and everyone else

 

[Andy100]

No mmo either big or small is ever bug free, just like no offline game is bug free.

MMO's are far more complex because they're not linear and have a huge amount of content.

As soon as your game becomes remotely popular you have to have hardware and infrastructure to support it. This isn't free so they charge people for it. Or would you rather they brought out an MMO, charged you $40 for it and then 24 months later pulled all the servers so you couldn't play anymore? Cos 24 months is about all the support you'll get for an offline game.

Everquest has been running for 9 years... the $40 it cost to buy wouldn't cover the 9 years you're playing it...

Are Blizzard suddenly a charity? I thought the whole point of them making games was to make money. It's market demand, the sub is a price people are willing to pay which helps cover the costs involved in running it plus a heafty profit.

This is the real world, not some eutopian society where people do everything for the good of their fellow man.

 

[arknor]

im not talking about subscription charges im talking about devs who get paid out of those subscription charges to make new content then when they do make new content its sold to you even though you already paid there wages.

makes no sense atleast one of the mmo devlopers has it right and makes all expansions a free download

 

[Andy100]

Fair enough, can't argue with that one.

 

[Spektor]

If you have over 10 million people clearly willing to throw out an extra £25 every couple of years, then you would be bat**** insane to not take advantage of it.

 

[arknor]

If you have over 10 million people clearly willing to throw out an extra £25 every couple of years, then you would be bat**** insane to not take advantage of it.

or you could reward your fairthul customers loyalty and show them you arent a money grabbing bunch of whores

 

[Spektor]

The constant development of new content is the reward. I don't see the problem here, this all comes down to your choice as a customer, you either like the game and want to play the game on the highest quality servers with an obligated quality of service in which you hand over your money or you don't.

 

[snowdog]

Snowdog:
You really are a cheapskate...I like your style.

I have 2 phones. My trusty Nokia 3100 ( Had more facelifts than Sly Stallone's mum ) and a V3 Razr thats about as reliable as a lada, and I am like you in that I only actualyl put money in to stop me getting kicked off, my last credit I put into the Nokia was a month ago and that was only because a friend kept sending me pictures and I need credit to receive them ( Another con or what? ) but other than that, I put a fiver in, in March. The Motorola had a fiver in September last year and its still got £3 or so in it.

I have a house phone, I only have the Mobiles for my work, so customers can contact me, if I need to phone them, I use the house phone or nothing.... More oftem I email cos its cheaper than the phone.

Yep, I am most of the time except for when there's 3 things:

1: When I'm impatient
2: When I'm lazy
3: When I'm drunk

In those occasions I sometimes spend a bit, well lot more than I should...

1: I'm usually impatient to get junk food, games and hardware, resulting in going to a night shop that charges like 2x as much as a normal supermarket, ordering games too early or for more because I can't wait for the cheaper places to get back in stock, and buying hardware too early, eg. I bought my 8800GTS 512 when it was just out, resulting in me spending 320 euros for it...
2: I usually cba to go to a cheaper place to buy drinks, even at the local snackbar I just get drinks too while the supermarket is just 1 minute away while I could buy a drink there for at least half the price...
3: Mates get the initial beers for me, I end up spending everything I have in my wallet on beers for me and for everyone . Last time I spent 35 euros on just beer in a dance hall . Should have bought 3 big crates instead the day after would have been so much better value . Or them 5l kegs, would have been able to get 3 .

But when I'm not feeling impatient, lazy or when I'm not drunk, I really am a cheapskate and an exploiter . Even picking up stuff like 5 cents if I find it on the street or not willing to pay 10 cents to get a plastic bag when shopping... Always getting the snack that is on offer and that kind of stuff .
And as I said before, always use my parent's phones, even if I need to SMS , I avoid any subscriptions, and will be avoiding in the near future until my parents kick me out or start demanding cash.

 

[Vixen]

im not talking about subscription charges im talking about devs who get paid out of those subscription charges to make new content then when they do make new content its sold to you even though you already paid there wages.

makes no sense atleast one of the mmo devlopers has it right and makes all expansions a free download

That argument is totally flawed. The game is constantly changing, with small patches around once a month and at least 4 big patches a year. When people bought the game just after it came out, they were paying for it as it was at that point. By the time Burning Crusade came out, there was a new 3 part level 60 instance, 5 raid instances, and a pvp system which was added and then totally reworked. Add to that the fact that every single talent tree was changed at least once, drastically enough to reset everyones points, and new quests for every class at level 50.

The game is constantly changing due to feedback from players. You can't possibly say that the developers had everything planned out from the games launch, because even just looking at patch notes you can see that new ideas they've had have been changed to accomodate players. The developers don't just work on the next expansion, they need to be listening to their subscribers and change parts of the game accordingly.

I don't understand why people are so bent out of shape about Blizzard making money. They are a business, and they have a good business model. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter how much Blizzard make, all that matters is that the subscribers have decided that the fee is worth it. Personally, I've saved a lot of money by playing WoW, as I used to buy new games frequently - even one new game a month would mean I'd be spending twice as much, and there's no way I'd get as much play out of anything else within that one month.

As far as I'm concerned, I'm paying for stable servers, constant updates and support. If I didn't think it was worth it, I wouldn't pay.

 

[arknor]

The constant development of new content is the reward. I don't see the problem here,

your all ready suposed to be paying for that new content in the price of the subscription though.

years ago when people had weak internet connections i can understand the need for expansions to be sold in retail shops but these days they should be free as originally intended.

vixen you know half of that content was originally suposed to be in at launch dont you? aswell as siege weapons and there only just coming

 

[Spektor]

No, you're covering their costs in the subscription... the new content would be based upon its success, if they barely have enough to cover the servers the people play on then you wouldn't have seen the game develop as it did. Having vast surplus lets them push out big content patches ever few months... charging for the expansion is just them being pretty sensible in the business dept.

 

[Vixen]

your all ready suposed to be paying for that new content in the price of the subscription though.

years ago when people had weak internet connections i can understand the need for expansions to be sold in retail shops but these days they should be free as originally intended.

vixen you know half of that content was originally suposed to be in at launch dont you? aswell as siege weapons and there only just coming

http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/underdev/implemented/index.html#patch1p2

Have a look at this page and tell me that Blizzard aren't constantly changing the same things. My copy of the game is from the very first batch launched in Feb '05, and it mentions the PVP system which wasn't released until May. I am well aware that Blizzard like to plan things in advance, but they wouldn't plan to release something and then completely change it.

I have been playing the game since March '05 and have seen all of the changes that have been made. A lot of new content is planned years in advance, as is the Blizzard way, but it is changed on the fly depending on feedback from players. It is such a big game that even just working on bugs (which may not be obvious even with a test realm population) must take a lot.

 

[Squink]

I don't understand why people are so bent out of shape about Blizzard making money.

While I don't begrudge my subscription fee, Arknor is raising a reasonable point. Though a lot of my £9 is going for backend support, some of it is paying the developer's wages. What are the developers doing at the moment? Yep, they're designing an expansion that I'm going to pay £25-30 for in 4 or 5 months. There won't be any new content in those few months (perhaps the WotLK talent trees to keep people interested). So I'm paying subscription money for development work that isn't happening. There is definitely a good case to be made that the expansion should either be free or a token amount like a tenner. They'll charge full price for it simply because they can and again I'll state that it doesn't bother me that much.

It also has to be said that even when they aren't working on a new expansion, Blizzard release new content very slowly. Given the amount of money coming in they have plenty of scope to do more. I personally think that it's down to the fact that WoW is effectively propping up Vivendi.

 

[Crimefighter]

While I don't begrudge my subscription fee, Arknor is raising a reasonable point. Though a lot of my £9 is going for backend support, some of it is paying the developer's wages. What are the developers doing at the moment? Yep, they're designing an expansion that I'm going to pay £25-30 for in 4 or 5 months. There won't be any new content in those few months (perhaps the WotLK talent trees to keep people interested). So I'm paying subscription money for development work that isn't happening. There is definitely a good case to be made that the expansion should either be free or a token amount like a tenner. They'll charge full price for it simply because they can and again I'll state that it doesn't bother me that much.

It also has to be said that even when they aren't working on a new expansion, Blizzard release new content very slowly. Given the amount of money coming in they have plenty of scope to do more. I personally think that it's down to the fact that WoW is effectively propping up Vivendi.

Im a self-confessed Blizzard fanboy, but those are all valid observations.

In their defense, I think rolling out bug-free extra content for this type of game is a time consuming process no matter what. When I think about SOE's approach to patching SWG, I shudder, then appreciate Blizzard a bit more.

 

[Broken Hope]

Now, if you stop paying the subscription, and want to start back up in say a years time, does your charactet carry on from where he/she stopped of do you have to start a new character, or can you chop and change at any time or.. what?

Your character will carry on from where you left it, to date Blizzard hasn't deleted a single character on their servers, people have picked up WoW after quitting for a year or more and still have their characters.

 

[arknor]

i dont think any mmos delete your characters these days even after years because they take up so little space on the server.

i think the only mmo thats ever done something like that is FFXI , they dont delete your character but if your gone for i think its 6 months your forced to buy a new copy of the game

 

[FatRakoon]

Been talking with my brother today. His lad plays WOW and I mentioned this thread.
I asked if I could have a play about with it for a bit and so I may be on it over the weekend .

Is there any way to get to play WOW for free? I mean, can I D/L a demo of it and get perhaps a day or a few hours to have a go, without risking in buying any Online time or however you do it?

 

[Spektor]

You can download a trial or if your brother still has his buddy key available use that as I think its a hell of a lot less limited than the trial.