Why WoW is a bad game, reason #8
Lack of content updates
If you've been around World of Warcraft since the early alpha of 2003, you'll know that there haven't really been any major content updates to the game ever since, and that's three years ago. Let's start out to show the most recent addition to the content of World of Warcraft, Ahn'Quiraj.
Inside of the Ahn'Quiraj temple, alpha
Inside of todays Ahn'Quiraj temple, which have looked the same since the release of World of Warcraft
Ahn'Quiraj temple outside. The picture is from alpha, and it looked the same until patch 1.8.0, 10 october 2005
This is the "new" look Ahn'Quiraj got in 1.8.0 and that was later released as a "new" instance in 1.9.0, january 2006.
It was said that alliance and horde would need to cooperate together in a epic world event to open the gates. The epic event turned out to be that both sides would need to gather a insane amount of random resources. Let's take a look at the instance lists for the different versions of World of Warcraft.
Alpha version 5.3
Dec 11 2003
Nov 07 2004
Kalidar
instance from alpha, looks like a battleground
Release version 1.9.3 Feb 07 2006
Blackwing Lair was released july 2005, atleast over three months since its existance. One of the oldest battlegrounds, Azhara Crater (PVPZone02) haven't yet been released due of this date and it has been in the game for 2 years already.
A old map of Azhara Crater
Azhara Crater, as it looks today
Two other battleground like places, found within Kalidar minimap files. They got a resemblance with Arathi Basin and Alterac Valley.
Zul'Gurub, December 2003
The final look for Zul'Gurub, november 2004, but it was released almost a year later in september 2005
Player housing was tested during the alpha of World of Warcraft. It has since then been abandoned and will most likely never be touched again.
World of Warcraft\Data\World\wmo\PlayerHousing\HumanHumanLevelOneTest.wmo.MPQ from the alpha
World of Warcraft\Data\World\wmo\PlayerHousing\HumanHumanLevelThreeTest.wmo.MPQ from the alpha
This house is called GuildHouseA, could it've been intended for player guilds at first and later scrapped? This particular house can be found on GM Island.
GuildHouseB, can be found at Ravenholdt Manner
Ironforge had two elevators that looked like those in the undercity, one leading down to Gnomeregan and the other one leading to Old Ironforge.
Ironforge during alpha, with bridges within the city
Ironforge at the release of World of Warcraft, without the bridges
Westfall lighthouse and it's changes through the early versions of World of Warcraft
This became the final look of the Westfall lighthouse
Designer Island, most probably the prefab for Westfall, were on the same map as Azeroth but far northeast, beyond the edge of the map. Later on they added the Dragon Isles (three Onyxia like caves) and a Naga temple there.
The map of Designer Island during the alpha, and as you can clearly see it's a replica of Westfall
The Naga temple that got added to Designer Island at the release of World of Warcraft
And a updated map of how Designer Island looks like today, with the three Dragons Isles leading out of the left part of the picture
Map of Programmer Island during the alpha
Programmer Island, the prefab for Elwynn Forest, was also once part of Azeroth (northwest outside the map), but got instanced along with Designer Island into the Developer Instance (451) at the retail release of World of Warcraft.
Around patch 1.9.0 they removed "Chow is my love monkey" from Programmer Island, due to reasons unknown
Scholomance, or School of Necromancy as it was named back then, and as with all the unfinished instances during the alpha, the dark portal had to act as a placeholder.
Scholomance as it looks today
A gryphon master during alpha, during the time that the gryphons was still being developed
The entrance to Western Plaguelands from Trisfal Glades, was blocked off by Guardians of Blizzard to prevent players to enter the unfinished zone
Western Plaguelands, as it looked during the alpha
Western Plaguelands as it looks today
Untextured version of Scarlet Monestary during development
Textured version of Scarlet Monestary during alpha
The final look of Scarlet Monestary for the retail version of the game
Another screenshot of Scarlet Monestary during development
And the textured version
Before the game was released, Scarlet Monestary was a single instance, but Blizzard butchered it into three instances instead, just before the game went retail.
Gadgetzan alpha
Gadgetzan retail version
Some goblin laboratories on the two islands south of Tanaris during alpha, these buildings was later removed for the retail version and replaced with pirates instead.
For those who made it past the fatigue area between the islands and Tanaris, there was a bottle with a note buried in the sand, waiting for them at the first island.
The note said "What the heck are you doing here?", but that one got also removed shortly after and the only remains is a circle formed shadow of the bottle in the sand.
Developers playground, southwest of Silithus during the alpha. It got completly removed for the retail version of the game.
A topdown view on developers playground
The outside of Caverns of Time during the alpha
The outside of Caverns of Time in the current version of WoW
A early version of one of the three instances during the alpha, this one was changed later to Hyjal when it was attacked by Archemonde
Durnholde Keep during the alpha
Todays Durnholde Keep
Durnholde Keep in Old Hillsbrad Foothills, through Caverns of Time
A complete map of Old Hillsbrad Foothills, one of the instances in Caverns of Time
Tarren Mill in Old Hillsbrad Foothills
Standard Tarren Mill in Hillsbrad Foothills
Early version of the Nethergarde Keep in the Blasted Lands
The final version of Nethergarde Keep
Karazhan and how it looked during alpha
The new and much smaller tower that came with the release of WoW
Inside of Karazhan, the tower of Medivh, will be released in the expansion The Burning Crusade. Although this actually new content that seems to have gone through alot of work and it's looking really interesting, it requires people to buy a expansion to be able to access this content which I find unreasonalbe.
They have already been paying a monthly fee and they've already bought a version of the game from the store, so why do they need to pay yet again for new content?
Wailing Caverns during alpha
Wailing Caverns at retail release
Booty Bay during alpha
Booty Bay in retail, notice how the Statue of Christ have been changed into a goblin
How World of Warcraft looks today, a map from kaldorei
One of the early maps around retail
A concept of the world map for World of Warcraft
A screenshot of the worldmap during alpha
The Island of Doctor Lapidis only existed during alpha, and was one of the two small islands west of Booty Bay, the other one was Giljim's Island.
Both islands got removed in the retail version of the game, but if you swim far enough, west of Booty Bay, you can still make the zone names appear.
The Island of Doctor Lapidis seems to have been a development area for troll ruins, that could later be found throughout the game.
Giljim's Island
A skeleton of what looks like a panderan transportation turtle on Giljim's Island
The statue of liberty on Jaguero Isle, east of Stranglethorn, like a scene from planet of the apes, and although the island still exist, the statue was removed by the release of WoW. A interesting note is that the statue is actually a titan female.
A underwater dark portal in Azhara during the alpha. As mentioned earlier, these portals were placeholders for instances yet to come, so this brings us the question, was it supposed to be a underwater instance in Azhara?
This place was high up in the air, just east of Teldrassil during the alpha
Moonglade during alpha
Moonglade during retail
Hyjal during alpha
Hyjal today, which have looked the same since retail, and haven't yet been released
Winterspring during alpha
Stormwind during alpha
Stormwind prison, a instance similiar to the Stockades (Stormwind jail), has been around since alpha and hasn't yet been released
The blocked off entrance to Stormwind Prison through the canals
Ashenvale during alpha, with a much more sharp looking graphic than the current one
The same goes for the Darkshore
The entrance to Felwood looked a bit odd during alpha
And I think this is from Teldrassil in a early version of WoW
Some old screenshots from Darnassus
Darkshire during alpha
And Darkshire from the release of WoW, notice how the trees got uglier
Supposedly pre-alpha pictures from Duskwood
Orgrimmar during alpha
Orgrimmar after retail was released
Something in between
Searing Gorge in alpha
Searing Gorge in retail
Stratholme during alpha, with what looks like a untextured version of the black citadel in the sky
Todays Stratholme, with the entrance of Naxxramas Necropolis, which hasn't been released as of yet and there's currently no files within the game package containing any piece of this area... except from Kel'Thuzad in his lich form.
Kel'Thuzad
The Emerald Dream, and how it looked back around the release of World of Warcraft
A small map of the Emerald Dream
Outlands and how it looked like around the release of WoW
A very old screenshot from Outland
A map of Outlands, Draenor, as it currently looks like, but it will most probably change significantly once the expansion is released
So hopefully you've now realized that the game haven't really changed much contentwise since the early alpha 2003, so what have Blizzard been adding to the game each patch?
They've added a few more quests, a few more armors, redone the graphics on some armors, released a few already finished instances, some holiday material and most notoriously, they've done class and talents changes each patch, and even redone some completly.
This, and the standard bug fixes, has been all the changes that have been done to the game since 2-3 years ago, and that's the reason why I say there haven't really been any new content implemented to the game, just reworked some of the old. Releasing instances every second month, that's been finished for years, isn't considered new content.
Scrolls of Lore: Pre-release screenshots
Inside of the Ahn'Quiraj temple, alpha
Inside of todays Ahn'Quiraj temple, which have looked the same since the release of World of Warcraft
Ahn'Quiraj temple outside. The picture is from alpha, and it looked the same until patch 1.8.0, 10 october 2005
This is the "new" look Ahn'Quiraj got in 1.8.0 and that was later released as a "new" instance in 1.9.0, january 2006."Players will have to complete a world event of massive proportions before they can open the Gates of Ahn'Qiraj on their realm."
Alpha version 5.3
Dec 11 2003
- 0, Azeroth
- 1, Kalimdor
- 2, UnderMine
- 13, test (Testing)
- 17, Kalidar
- 25, ScottTest (Scott Test)
- 29, Test (CashTest)
- 30, PVPZone01
- 33, Shadowfang
- 34, StormwindJail
- 35, StormwindPrison
- 36, DeadminesInstance
- 37, PVPZone02
- 42, Collin (Collin's Test)
- 43, WailingCaverns (WailingCavernsInstance)
- 44, Monastery (MonasteryInterior)
- 47, RazorfenKraulInstance (RazorfenKraul)
- 48, Blackfathom (Blackfathom Instance)
- 70, Uldaman (Uldaman Instance)
- 90, GnomeragonInstance
- 109, SunkenTemple (SunkenTempleInstance)
- 129, RazorfenDowns (RazorfenDownsInstance)
Nov 07 2004
- 0, Azeroth (Eastern Kingdoms)
- 1, Kalimdor
- 13, test (Testing)
- 25, ScottTest (Scott Test)
- 29, Test (CashTest)
- 30, PVPZone01
- 33, Shadowfang
- 34, StormwindJail
- 35, StormwindPrison
- 36, DeadminesInstance
- 37, PVPZone02 (Crush the Alliance!)
(Defend yourself from the onslaught of the Horde!) - 42, Collin (Collin's Test)
- 43, WailingCaverns (WailingCavernsInstance)
- 44, Monastery (MonasteryInterior)
- 47, RazorfenKraulInstance (RazorfenKraul)
- 48, Blackfathom (Blackfathom Instance)
- 70, Uldaman (Uldaman Instance)
- 90, GnomeragonInstance (GnomeragonInstance)
- 109, SunkenTemple (SunkenTempleInstance)
- 129, RazorfenDowns (RazorfenDownsInstance)
- 169, EmeraldDream (Emerald Dream)
- 189, MonasteryInstances
- 209, TanarisInstance (Zul'farrak)
- 229, BlackRockSpire (Blackrock Upper Instance)
- 230, BlackrockDepths (Blackrock Lower Instance)
- 249, OnyxiaLairInstance (Onyxias Lair Instance)
- 269, CavernsOfTime (Caverns of Time)
- 289, SchoolofNecromancy (School of Necromancy)
- 309, Zul'gurub
- 329, Stratholme
- 349, Mauradon
- 369, DeeprunTram (Deeprun Tram)
- 389, OrgrimmarInstance
- 409, MoltenCore (Molten Core)
- 429, DireMaul (Dire Maul)
- 449, AlliancePVPBarracks (Alliance PVP Barracks)
- 450, HordePVPBarracks (Horde PVP Barracks)
- 451, development (Development Land)
Kalidarinstance from alpha, looks like a battleground
Release version 1.9.3 Feb 07 2006
- 0, Azeroth (Eastern Kingdoms)
- 1, Kalimdor
- 13, test (Testing)
- 25, ScottTest (Scott Test)
- 29, Test (CashTest)
- 30, PVPZone01 (Alterac Valley)
- 33, Shadowfang
- 34, StormwindJail
- 35, StormwindPrison
- 36, DeadminesInstance
- 37, PVPZone02 (Azshara Crater)
- 42, Collin (Collin's Test)
- 43, WailingCaverns (WailingCavernsInstance)
- 44, Monastery (MonasteryInterior)
- 47, RazorfenKraulInstance (RazorfenKraul)
- 48, Blackfathom (Blackfathom Instance)
- 70, Uldaman (Uldaman Instance)
- 90, GnomeragonInstance (GnomeragonInstance)
- 109, SunkenTemple (SunkenTempleInstance)
- 129, RazorfenDowns (RazorfenDownsInstance)
- 169, EmeraldDream (Emerald Dream)
- 189, MonasteryInstances
- 209, TanarisInstance (Zul'farrak)
- 229, BlackRockSpire (Blackrock Upper Instance)
- 230, BlackrockDepths (Blackrock Lower Instance)
- 249, OnyxiaLairInstance (Onyxias Lair Instance)
- 269, CavernsOfTime (Caverns of Time)
- 289, SchoolofNecromancy (School of Necromancy)
- 309, Zul'gurub
- 329, Stratholme
- 349, Mauradon
- 369, DeeprunTram (Deeprun Tram)
- 389, OrgrimmarInstance
- 409, MoltenCore (Molten Core)
- 429, DireMaul (Dire Maul)
- 449, AlliancePVPBarracks (Alliance PVP Barracks)
- 450, HordePVPBarracks (Horde PVP Barracks)
- 451, development (Development Land)
- 469, BlackwingLair (Blackwing Lair)
- 489, PVPZone03 (Warsong Gulch)
- 509, AhnQiraj (Ahn'Qiraj)
- 529, PVPZone04 (Arathi Basin)
- 531, AhnQirajTemple (Ahn'Qiraj Temple)
Blackwing Lair was released july 2005, atleast over three months since its existance. One of the oldest battlegrounds, Azhara Crater (PVPZone02) haven't yet been released due of this date and it has been in the game for 2 years already.
A old map of Azhara Crater
Azhara Crater, as it looks today
Two other battleground like places, found within Kalidar minimap files. They got a resemblance with Arathi Basin and Alterac Valley.
Zul'Gurub, December 2003
The final look for Zul'Gurub, november 2004, but it was released almost a year later in september 2005
Player housing was tested during the alpha of World of Warcraft. It has since then been abandoned and will most likely never be touched again.
World of Warcraft\Data\World\wmo\PlayerHousing\HumanHumanLevelOneTest.wmo.MPQ from the alpha
World of Warcraft\Data\World\wmo\PlayerHousing\HumanHumanLevelThreeTest.wmo.MPQ from the alpha
This house is called GuildHouseA, could it've been intended for player guilds at first and later scrapped? This particular house can be found on GM Island.
GuildHouseB, can be found at Ravenholdt Manner
Ironforge had two elevators that looked like those in the undercity, one leading down to Gnomeregan and the other one leading to Old Ironforge.
Ironforge during alpha, with bridges within the city
Ironforge at the release of World of Warcraft, without the bridges
Westfall lighthouse and it's changes through the early versions of World of Warcraft
This became the final look of the Westfall lighthouse
Designer Island, most probably the prefab for Westfall, were on the same map as Azeroth but far northeast, beyond the edge of the map. Later on they added the Dragon Isles (three Onyxia like caves) and a Naga temple there.
The map of Designer Island during the alpha, and as you can clearly see it's a replica of Westfall
The Naga temple that got added to Designer Island at the release of World of Warcraft
And a updated map of how Designer Island looks like today, with the three Dragons Isles leading out of the left part of the picture
Map of Programmer Island during the alphaProgrammer Island, the prefab for Elwynn Forest, was also once part of Azeroth (northwest outside the map), but got instanced along with Designer Island into the Developer Instance (451) at the retail release of World of Warcraft.
Around patch 1.9.0 they removed "Chow is my love monkey" from Programmer Island, due to reasons unknown
Scholomance, or School of Necromancy as it was named back then, and as with all the unfinished instances during the alpha, the dark portal had to act as a placeholder.
Scholomance as it looks today
A gryphon master during alpha, during the time that the gryphons was still being developed
The entrance to Western Plaguelands from Trisfal Glades, was blocked off by Guardians of Blizzard to prevent players to enter the unfinished zone
Western Plaguelands, as it looked during the alpha
Western Plaguelands as it looks today
Untextured version of Scarlet Monestary during development
Textured version of Scarlet Monestary during alpha
The final look of Scarlet Monestary for the retail version of the game
Another screenshot of Scarlet Monestary during development
And the textured version
Before the game was released, Scarlet Monestary was a single instance, but Blizzard butchered it into three instances instead, just before the game went retail.
Gadgetzan alpha
Gadgetzan retail version
Some goblin laboratories on the two islands south of Tanaris during alpha, these buildings was later removed for the retail version and replaced with pirates instead.For those who made it past the fatigue area between the islands and Tanaris, there was a bottle with a note buried in the sand, waiting for them at the first island.
The note said "What the heck are you doing here?", but that one got also removed shortly after and the only remains is a circle formed shadow of the bottle in the sand.
Developers playground, southwest of Silithus during the alpha. It got completly removed for the retail version of the game.
A topdown view on developers playground
The outside of Caverns of Time during the alpha
The outside of Caverns of Time in the current version of WoW
A early version of one of the three instances during the alpha, this one was changed later to Hyjal when it was attacked by Archemonde
Durnholde Keep during the alpha
Todays Durnholde Keep
Durnholde Keep in Old Hillsbrad Foothills, through Caverns of Time
A complete map of Old Hillsbrad Foothills, one of the instances in Caverns of Time
Tarren Mill in Old Hillsbrad Foothills
Standard Tarren Mill in Hillsbrad Foothills
The Black Morass, another instance in Caverns of Time that has been in the game since it was released during november 2004. This is the part where players will aid Medivh in the opening of the dark portal, that will eventually corrupt the land surrounding it, resulting in the Blasted Lands.
Early version of the Nethergarde Keep in the Blasted Lands
The final version of Nethergarde Keep
Karazhan and how it looked during alpha
The new and much smaller tower that came with the release of WoW
Inside of Karazhan, the tower of Medivh, will be released in the expansion The Burning Crusade. Although this actually new content that seems to have gone through alot of work and it's looking really interesting, it requires people to buy a expansion to be able to access this content which I find unreasonalbe.They have already been paying a monthly fee and they've already bought a version of the game from the store, so why do they need to pay yet again for new content?
Wailing Caverns during alpha
Wailing Caverns at retail release
Booty Bay during alpha
Booty Bay in retail, notice how the Statue of Christ have been changed into a goblin
How World of Warcraft looks today, a map from kaldorei
One of the early maps around retail
A concept of the world map for World of Warcraft
A screenshot of the worldmap during alpha
The Island of Doctor Lapidis only existed during alpha, and was one of the two small islands west of Booty Bay, the other one was Giljim's Island.Both islands got removed in the retail version of the game, but if you swim far enough, west of Booty Bay, you can still make the zone names appear.
The Island of Doctor Lapidis seems to have been a development area for troll ruins, that could later be found throughout the game.
Giljim's Island
A skeleton of what looks like a panderan transportation turtle on Giljim's Island
The statue of liberty on Jaguero Isle, east of Stranglethorn, like a scene from planet of the apes, and although the island still exist, the statue was removed by the release of WoW. A interesting note is that the statue is actually a titan female.
A underwater dark portal in Azhara during the alpha. As mentioned earlier, these portals were placeholders for instances yet to come, so this brings us the question, was it supposed to be a underwater instance in Azhara?
This place was high up in the air, just east of Teldrassil during the alpha
Moonglade during alpha
Moonglade during retail
Hyjal during alpha
Hyjal today, which have looked the same since retail, and haven't yet been released
Winterspring during alpha
Stormwind during alpha
Stormwind prison, a instance similiar to the Stockades (Stormwind jail), has been around since alpha and hasn't yet been released
The blocked off entrance to Stormwind Prison through the canals
Ashenvale during alpha, with a much more sharp looking graphic than the current one
The same goes for the Darkshore
The entrance to Felwood looked a bit odd during alpha
And I think this is from Teldrassil in a early version of WoW
Some old screenshots from Darnassus
Darkshire during alpha
And Darkshire from the release of WoW, notice how the trees got uglier
Supposedly pre-alpha pictures from Duskwood
Orgrimmar during alpha
Orgrimmar after retail was released
Something in between
Searing Gorge in alpha
Searing Gorge in retail
Stratholme during alpha, with what looks like a untextured version of the black citadel in the sky
Todays Stratholme, with the entrance of Naxxramas Necropolis, which hasn't been released as of yet and there's currently no files within the game package containing any piece of this area... except from Kel'Thuzad in his lich form.
Kel'ThuzadNYTimes: "What can you tell me about Naxxramas?"
Tigole: "Naxxramas is going to be the most difficult thing in the game until the expansion pack comes out. It will be the pinnacle, and it's absolutely massive. You'll see this big necropolis floating above Eastern Plaguelands. It's a 40-man raid zone, and it's bigger than the Undercity [one of the main cities in the game]. Things could change, but we're up to something like 18 bosses in there, and they are really cool, too. But it's going to be hard. Really hard. We're hoping to release it in the spring."
NYTimes: "Will we need to open Naxxramas with a big farming event like Ahn'Qiraj?"
Tigole: "No. Naxxramas will just be open. But we do want to do a world event, which we want to call the Scourge Invasion, or hopefully something cooler than that, that would basically be something for everyone who's not going into Naxxramas. So they would see the impact without having to actually go in. [In other words, get ready for undead to pop up in some unlikely places.]"
Blizzard is hoping to release it in the spring, before the expansion is released, from Jeff Kaplan himself.
The Emerald Dream, and how it looked back around the release of World of Warcraft"The Emerald Dream is shaping up to be extremely cool. We don't want to preview any of that content yet as it is *endgame* and we want some surprises for players.
The zone is massive and beautiful. And once the content team is done with it, it will be exceedingly challenging >=]
Actually, we have some pretty cool stuff planned for druids. They will definitely have a link to the Emerald Dream. There's also a zone on the way to the peak of Mount Hyjal called Moonglade that will be very core to druid characters. Our *master of Warcraft lore*, Chris Metzen, is never short on ideas when it comes to the druid class. I was running around the Emerald Dream last Thursday... you guys are in for a treat. The level designers are doing a killer job."
-Jeff Kaplan, December 06 2003
A small map of the Emerald Dream
Outlands and how it looked like around the release of WoW
A very old screenshot from Outland
A map of Outlands, Draenor, as it currently looks like, but it will most probably change significantly once the expansion is released"Chris Metzen revealed in the Developer Panels that Illidan closed all the Dark Portals of Outland. Nevertheless, MagusRogue, a World of Warcraft RPG Game Designer from White-Wolf revealed the following:
"The portals were shut down by Illidan, actually. However, some of the quests in the Burning Crusade Expansion have you re-opening these and going to new dimensions, fighting the legion in new worlds. Should be awesome."
Tom Chilton: "[Outland is] going to comprise of several new outdoors zones. In a lot of ways, it'll be like crossing from Azeroth to Kalimdor. You'll go through the portal, get your load screen and there you are: Outlands. You'll start off on what we call the Hellfire Peninsula. That's a level 54-60 zone. Everything in Outlands just kind of goes from there. It'll flow like you'd expect from outdoor world zones in WoW, all the way through to the Level 70 content, dungeons, and so on."
So hopefully you've now realized that the game haven't really changed much contentwise since the early alpha 2003, so what have Blizzard been adding to the game each patch?
They've added a few more quests, a few more armors, redone the graphics on some armors, released a few already finished instances, some holiday material and most notoriously, they've done class and talents changes each patch, and even redone some completly.
This, and the standard bug fixes, has been all the changes that have been done to the game since 2-3 years ago, and that's the reason why I say there haven't really been any new content implemented to the game, just reworked some of the old. Releasing instances every second month, that's been finished for years, isn't considered new content.
Scrolls of Lore: Pre-release screenshots
posted by noggaholic at 04:25
82 Comments:
Omg , a picture story!! cool!
BTW , how did u get to the older versions of wow?
I think you're exaggerating. Sure, they haven't added any new instances as far as layout goes. But they did have to add artwork on the walls, trees, houses etc to it, as well as monsters, bosses and quests. And ALL of that has to fit into the very big storyline that's already there. And then all of that has to be tested as well, it won't be magically bugfree.
Why WoW is a bad game, reason #1 - "Everything is looking the same". There isn't much work done on the artwork of the game since it was released :)
Yes, I may exaggerate a bit, but I'm only bringing forward the bad aspects of the game right now.
I may make a new article series with the parts of WoW that is good and how to improve the "bad things" I mention now.
"it won't be magically bugfree.", I never complained about the bugs in the game... heck, I like the bugs they had ^^
I agree with the above anonym poster. Sure much of later patch content was already in the retail version of the game, because this content was supposed to be ingame by retail. - But Blizzard realised that this content couldn't be finished in time and put it into a patches. From my point of view I'd rather have a finished, working dungeon, than a quick, just in time patchwork dungeon. And that's timeconsuming.
And so this content is new content, because a player never played it before. - It's an illusion to think you can create a complete new dungeon every other week + do bugfixes + do events + do class balancing + ...
Have Fun
Robert
Verry cool article, but the title is totaly wrong.
it should be called Why WOW is sutch a great game.
If you know how mutch time it takes to make a game and make it all work as one big major "thing" keeping both the design and the code clean and working you have to spend ALOT of time on one certain area.
If you look at the game just before the expansion pack hits the streets and got 1½ year of content updates i must say that they have gotten pretty far with what the amount of content.
Hey Guys n1 stuff but i want to know where the black morras are in caverns of time? i cant go trough the portals :/ plz answer
ICQ : 267 999 170
I really liked the old tree models back in wow .
Andi think content isnt the issue with wow . I think main problem of wow is pve with pvp balance.Most classes have to give up on pvp a talents for pve or viceversa . Which isa bad thing over all. wow is a big game tough . But i dont see its future very bright indeed ...
Well, I rather liked the entire read. Nice pics and everything. I have worked with graphic design before, it takes a long long time to get things just right. I do find that it is rather disappointing to know that much of the content was completed or nearly completed at the games release and yet it wasn't finished for so long. As my brother always points out, this game has NO Variety. Seen one barracks, you've seen em all, seen 1 cave, you've seen em all (granted there are like different cave sizes from tiny to large, they all look the same). Go to Mount Hyjal and enter the dragon cave up there, its the exact same as Onyxia's lair. You can't base the long wait times on the graphics since once they made the few caves, they dumped em around the world no problem. Giving a zones ground or walls a certain pattern, not hard either. So now that you got the content all looking the same and all the items in there the same, whats keeping the completed content from coming out? Its really disappointing to see that they take their sweet time with these things for us end users but for Blizzard, they wanna get their moneys worth and that means dragging this game along for 5-6 years at least. By giving this kind of sloppy service, its keeping the people who just want more hooked in the down time. For example, you think that when they came up with Battlegrounds they thought server specific? Nobody at the think tank that is blizzard thought about downtime? These are the people that resort to telling you to delete your WDB (We don't bother) and your WTF (what the fuck) files and your UI's at every post you make to them.
This is just one more kick to Blizzards bad reputation imo. Shows you how little they truely care about the end user and how much they care about their income. I loved playing the game though, they got my hat off for that, but not for the service they provide.
By the way, anybody know how many programmers etc. they have working at Blizzard? I mean it really gives me the impression that these zones were crafted from Warcraft3's map editor type deal. Blizzard obviously spent a great deal of time developing an editor for WoW like they do with all games. I would really like to see that editor cause tbh, once you have made the terrain, made the graphics, made the interaction properties, its not that hard to make the world...Truely if anybody can get the editor that blizzard uses, they should torrent it. I would love to get my hands on it.
This is probably the most interesting article about wow i have ever read.
Thanks for it.
I KNEW IT!
Every time I've run stratholme I've gone to the green portal after baron, and I, unlike most others on my server, put 2 and 2 together, Portal Inside an Instance(MC in BRD, BWL in UBRS) and the fact that the portal is GREEN(MC, BWL, AQ20-40, ZG, Onyxia, ALL THE BIG GUYS) Bam! The article is no doubt a masterpiece and Bliz needs to face the facts, we know these instances are there, there are 4 Instances in SW, Deeprun Tram, Stockades, and the instance gate inbetween Old Town and Trade District, and the other barred instance gate on the tower in the canals.
...but but... the zones didn't NEED much content changing from the originals. Seriously this isn't even a flaw.
sjeez you have no idea what developing is like do you?
alot of those beta and alpha shit was for TESTING purposes.
and there's alot more to making an instance or bg then designing it. Coding, removing bugs, talent revamps, balancing out the game, ...
wow has had MAJOR content updates, and its not because there was a portal somewhere in the alpha and some models in the gamefiles that the instance was finished.
your facts are biased. open your eyes and see that a map, models, and screenshots dont prove that there was already a finished island/instance and they just waited to release it. they spent hours on end polishing it, making it bugfree, and released it when it was DONE.
It'd add credability if you actualy showed something else than just the entrences, I mean, I'm sure they premade all the stuff around Azeroth quite early, then did the actualy instances later. Just showing the entrence it self doesn't nessesarily mean the instance behind it was there. You should add some footage from inside them.
I don't know why you're comparing the way the outside of instance A looks before and after alpha and beta testing.
The concept behind alpha and beta testing is to make sure that the current content works. Once you find out it works you don't suddenly change it all before release.
So wailing caverns looks exactly the same now as it does in beta. Why would it have been in beta at all if they didn't intend to put it into release?
Because clearly artwork is the entirety of a MMO.
Your comments also hint at the fact you are a complete MMO noob. "OMG I have to pay for expansion!!!". Before you hold that against them, realise that Blizzard has added far more "free" content then almost any MMO on the market. SOE would have released stuff like BWL and AQ40 as part of a paid expansion, no doubt.
As someone who actually played the game's Alpha in December of 2003, I can say that you have no idea what you're talking about. Sure, the data files and rough layout of SOME of the zones today exsisted then, but even besides the unfinished zones, the finished zones in alpha were almost completely redone from scratch.
And you're just talking about the artwork here - How much do you expect one game's art team to be putting out over the course of two and a half years? Seems like they've done a hell of a job. I've known teams of software devs take a longer amount of time to put out one measely database program, not an entire world that's been shaped and reshaped over that time.
You sir, are a fucking pre-pubescent whiney mongloid. You need to L2P, or go play some Hello Kitty MMO with Kate and her magical Hoof. Wow is a great game, and the best MMO on the market. You appearantly are just too n00b to realize this, and seem to think that Blizzard needs to make an MMO that revolves around your world. Well you know what? Take your mouth off your momma's titties, and man up, and learn that life doesnt always go the way you want it to.
Say what ever you want, you told Blizz to face the facts, and WoW is the most played MMORPG in the world, for that you have the full proof that it ain't a bad game. It's the costumer's choice, not Bltzz's. The game may haven't changed much during the Alpha version, but are there any bad things behind that? I don't think so, the game is growing in people and if peopl choose a game it's because they like it. WoW may be bad in graphics, but it's a game for the whole family, and it's the funniest MMO I've ever seen. I never saw anything that ever made me laugh in a MMORPG like in WoW.
To everyone that says OMG ITS MORE THAN JUST THE ARTWORK NOOB. My friend RUNS an emulated server with a finished Outlands, Hyjal and basically everything in the expansion. Now of course it will most likely look differently when the expansion comes out because Blizzard likes to make things finish them talk about them and then scrap them and start over. Of course yes I am fine that they'll be redoing outlands and such to make it look nicer but the fact is most things have been finished for a long long long long time. By the way, for most areas Blizzard makes they use an editor for most things. You can tell its true because in many cases the bottom of a tree is exposed on cliffs and in some cases they are large enough for a gnome to fit into.Oh and for everyone that says Dopefish knows nothing about scripting coding and such should know he's making a game himself.
Karazhan being held out on until the expansion is a big reason why i cancelled.
I haven't had any new content released for my playstyle since Dire Maul, and even that wasn't too impressive.
It's interesting to note how many of the end game instances will be raids.
They are just trying to squeeze as many people through as little content as possible. Thats why they take your through in 40 man groups, and that's why you have to farm them for months to pull the itmes out of the table.
Obviously, the same people that design textures and maps design content and mob behaviour....
...oh wait.
Every MMO has had data for 'to be released' zones, that doesn't mean they're not complete, or not being worked on.
Also, half your screenshots look like they're the same place just with differing levels of 'max range' on the video card.
Meh. You should find a new game.
First off, most of you need to learn some english. Your grammar and spelling is terrible and quite annoying.
Second, are you blind? You screenshots show the amount of changes. And your only taking into acount artwork, don't even get me started on the amount of scripting they must have added to each of your so-called "Finished Instances." And to you people saying "The game lacks variety", shut up. How much different can you honestly make something look? Cut off a piece of it here, move the rooms around, it's still gonna look pretty much the same. Not to mention the amount of time they would need to alter every single building to be utteryl unique.
And to the person who said Blizzard's reputation is bad, your an idiot, it is a highly respected company, and just because this massive game doesn't have every single drop of what you want, you cry that it sucks and they don't care about you.
If anything the pictures show how much work has been done. Seeing as the game looks today and looking at the alpha screens it is really great stuff.
I really appreciate this.
One misconception is that graphics, models, and instances do make "new content". That's not the case. They're only the surface. Comparing bossfights from Molten Core with bossfights from Blackwing Lair or Ahn'Qiraj shows how much more there is to really new content.
Not to mention new NPCs, quest-lines, equipment, items that are needed for new content. There's much more going on behind the scenes than just a new map with textures and some new mob models.
And even these take a lot of work to look right and fitting...
I'd like to thank all the funny posters above that love WoW so much they can't hear a bad word said!
I like this article - Its well thought out and an interesting read. Its also his OPINION, so dont give him such a hard time (although he is probably laughing as much as me at some of the comments!)
I expect he is right on some of it and wrong on others, from Beta and Alpha it will have been hard to judge the sheer take up of WoW and that has probably ad a big influence on content. Let also not forget that Blizz is a business, they want to make money, if people will keep playing with no huge content updates then, hell! no need for them... Just rake the cash in.
Nice article thanks
interesting site :O
I've got an opinion, you've got an opinion, even he has got an opinion.
Nothing new here.
As he identified all the "flaws" in the game he should go and do it better.
More power to him!
I'm sure all the disgruntled WOW players will flock to his cause and make him rich!
Right?
Right!
Blizzard made a game. And everyone can criticize them for it. He made a website, and everyone can criticize him for it.
Such is life.
You need a girlfriend, nerd.
Just play the fucking game if you like it.
And if you don't like WoW, then play whatever game that gets your nerdy fucking stamp of approval.
:] i do believe all of you are fucking idiots ....... <3
BTW .....
ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO ME!
-Sargeras
your mother sucks cocks in hell
Dont hate, appreciate!
I liked this article. Good pictures as well.
They might not have added too much in the way of level art, but they did have to create a fair few encounters, which needed balancing and itemisation, which takes longer, and is more difficult.
I just post a comment for the sheer fun here... And tbh, the reason I play WoW is not really in the end at all to make raids... Or not even getting epic. I feel like puking when I think of the time it requires, and such a good party too. I play because of the social part. If you can't make friends in WoW, which is one of the world's biggest communities today (yes, it is a communuty), then you can't make friends at all...
And some people I know have played since the beta release, and they still play... Yes, WoW is a sinking ship where it comes to developement. Not much changes.
But on the other hand, they want the money right? Some has stated it earlier, and I do agree that their in-game support via GM isn't that great. They seldom got open tickets and when you get an answer, they just blame it all on addons, etc.
But... I have seen loads of bugs recently, and it makes you wonder. 1.11 has been bugging quite a lot, so I guess something is going on. They must have added something to make something bug right? If the texture etc is still the same and working, there should be no bugs...
But I guess what we all wanted is to see A MAJOR change in a patch, not that they only will revamp a class... As in this case, the rogue talent tree in 1.12.
So you got a lot of complaining there, over developement etc. And I will probably someday get tired of this game... But I enjoy playing with my newfound friends, that's what I think is funny, not to go for epic...
Of course, we all wish they would add more 5-man dungeons instead of building up on 40-man.... And how is that supposed to work out anyway on small and medium servers?
And new class releases would be better than they just added a class to a race... Like they are doing now with the blood elves and the draenei.
But also, your pictures doesn't really say much my friend, I'm afraid. They do add some nice stuff, and some of it is probably right with your argument, but why haven't you posted some new in game pictures like you did to some of the series?
It would add even more to make your statement right, and at least giving a pretty good general picture of it all.
And also tbh, does Blizzard really have to add so many extra quests? I mean, there are quests so there are enough spending a life-time on it... I don't do them all, and I can't imagine the amount of time it would take to do ALL of them. Reputation quests are enough.
I can also agree that some zones (like Darkshore and and Ashenvale) were looking much better in the Alpha and you wonder why they changed the color settings.
But, this is speculations and you got speculations. If you really want to know what's going on inside Blizzard, why not get employed then?
Then you don't have to wonder anymore, and you can do something about their horrible in-game support... I called them once, and I thought the woman I talked to was very nice.
What we all are complaining about now is bits and pieces of the whole Blizzard machinery. I mean, they screwed all other further game developement for WoW only? Because it was so big? Doesn't that tell you something? And I mean, are others MMORPG's so much better? I don't know much, since I don't play others than MMORPG but my old bf was at least playing City of Heroes/Villains when we were together for 6 months ago and something. And they added even less as what I could tell in their expansion... I mean, you could play a villain now, and that was it. I never heard he talk about new quests, dungeons, etc. And by the sheer look I got of the game, it was THAT smaller compared of WoW in so many ways it's not even compareable. Really.
The only thing that really made it stand out was the big character creation part which was so much bigger than WoW's and I would wish they had thought of that too when making WoW. I know they removed that you could decide on your own color of your markings on the night elves...
But nothing has really been removed in February when I hooked on this train. Of course Blizzard probably wants to milk this cow as much as possible, but if some of them ever reads the WoW forum threads at all, I think they know what they have to do and what is needed quite well without you displaying it here. How much they care about it is another question.
You also have to take in consideration that too much changes per tick will only make the player frustrated too... You want to try it all, but can't. I can agree that they are a bit slow now, but all we now can do is to wait for BC and see what happens...
I've played other MMOs and World of Warcraft is by far the most "complete" MMO out there.
You shouldn't forget that there are other things involved in adding content than artwork, eg. scripting encounters and making them bug-free. Even encounters inside MC aren't that simple to script and it must have taken a lot of time to make them work as intended.
There has also been a lot of major content updates from my point of view, eg. instances, battlegrounds, world events, class revamps, new quests, the list goes on... I don't have a problem paying for an expansion if there is enough new content, and to judge from what I've read in previews there should be more than enough new content in the expansion. I don't see a problem here...
PS. The screenshots were nice and the information about not-yet-implemented (possibly never-to-be-implemented) instances was really interesting.
Cheers,
Chris
first off, i think the kalidar thing was area was abit confusing, considering one of the maps showed kalidar being the name of the nightelves' starting place/home... so why would they put a battleground there..?
and what i would ruh-healy like to see is blizzard redoing all of the textures and make the caves and buildings as unique as possible and even making the places bigger. placing more houses around even the smaller towns like south shore, and make the landscape bigger and further to walk... make it shaper, and for example when its night, make it really dark, and have patrols with torches light up the place like the "Supposedly pre-alpha pictures from Duskwood" pictures... make the trees and people cast shadows depending on the placement on the light source etc... i mean, to those who have been to hyjal and souch know how beautiful and big the game is, and if you're like me you were completely gob-smacked by the place... i would like to see more places like that... i kinda want it to look like the elder scroll III: oblivion:P... when you can see far back to the mountains and the clouds slowly moving, see an open field and a forest next to it over the roof tops, while standing on the wall of a castle... that was awesome...:P there was even a sunset!:D and the content of AQ and such... they seemed to have alot the didnt finnish until now, but i believe that may be because they started with alot to begin with, and they have to place the monsters in the right places, and then see how that works and make sure they dont get pinned in one place and starts evading, or go through walls, or maybe theyve placed the monsters too close to eachother and pull to many, or there arent enough monsters in one place, and it would be too easy etc... i havent done anything like making dungeons in games but i think it goes something like this...: "ok, ill place these three here... lets how that goes..." *loading..* "ok, let me shoot them from here and... great, they're too close..." *loading back into the "editor"* "pull and drag this monster... lets try it now" *load into the game again* "... and he fell through the floor...T_T" *loading..* etc...
i dont think they would make as many mistakes but theres also the behavior of the bosses like onyxia and going into phase 2... and maybe the instances werent big enough, or they didnt feel that the texture was right so they had to make a completely new one... and making areas fit together like durotar, barrens and stonetalon... some of the areas mightve been too big compared to the other... and using the darkportal as an instance portal... why not?:P it the alpha anyways...:P
Understand that Azeroth does not revolve around you. That being said, lets deconstruct everything here.
You say there's been no new content. You, sir, are an idiot and a fool. AQ wasn't available in Alpha/Beta. Naxx wasn't available in Alpha/Beta. I don't think Dire Maul was, either. These were brand-new areas for the vast majority of the player base. You're confusing pre-existing place holders with newly-finished content.
The fact that at least 3 new instances have been added, as well as unfinished zones, for free, is a far cry from what most, if not all the other MMO's would do. For the content that we have now, some 3 or 4 pay expansions would have been released by SoE for EQ. Your whining about how they're going to charge for the expansion only because the zones existed before-hand is the dumbest argument one could make. Just because the stupid area is there doesn't mean that it's finished. Not only that, the expansion has released 2 completely new areas that are un-reachable with the current version of WoW. So if you're whining about lack of new content you can cram that in your pie-hole.
Finally, some whiny casual is complaining that they haven't released any new 5 mans or whatever. That all comes down to one statement: suck it up. The money is in the raiding right now. Most players want to do end-game raids. Casual bitches are the extreme minority in WoW. Deal with it. Blizz is going to make their majority player-base happy. It's not easy to make brand-new instances with new bosses, new loot, new strategies, etc. etc. I don't see you doing anything that would give you leverage to slam such an awesome game.
In closing, grow some balls. kk thx bai.
Nice one :D Blizzard should publish your work on their next extras DVD :D
Very in depth work you have made there.
You seem to spend an inordinate amount of time exploring and analyzing a bad game. Wouldn't it be more enjoyable to go play a good game?
I have to agree with the post above. You've spent a lot of time researching a game you apparently don't like. But I fail to see your point. Essentially, what this article has shown is that blizzard has a) made minor cosmetic changes to the game since alpha and b) they include unreleased content in the client files. Well, duh.
Do you realize how much time and effort goes into making new content in a game like this? Its obvious that somewhere, early, early in the design phase, they locked down a large amount of content for the game, knowing that they wouldn't get around to it, and some of it would have to be delayed until expansions.
What I see in these screen shots is a company that not only has a long term and cohesive gameplan for their game universe, but also a company that is dedicated to throughly testing their design and removing any content that becomes questionable in its quality. Sure, some people might not like to the new content, but I guarantee you if Blizzard just dumped tons of new content on the players, it wouldn't work out. Not only do they run the risk of unbalancing the gameplay, but Blizzard, historically, is a company that doesn't put out crap. Every patch they release puts their reputation for quality on the line, and as Star Wars Galaxies has shown, once players feel like they're being handed shit, there's no way to fix it.
I'm sure locked away inside a room at Blizzard's underground secret complex is a pre-production team that is dreaming up content one or two expansions into the future. The real reason this stuff has been inside the game so long is that once the design spec and pre-viz is complete, the development cycle is arduous and long. The nature of companies like Blizzard is that they're going to tweak their content until they're 100% happy with it before they let it out the door. So live with it. I'm having fun with WoW.
Sadly the unfinished content thing was partly why I left WoW. The list of unfinished content left some superb zones to come, and I remember looking around with a mapview and thinking "wow, that'll be cool" - but sadly aside from Medivah's Tower (did I spell that right), they've all turned out to be, or are going to be raids.
Sadly, as an altoholic, not in the "right" type of guild, and not really interested in raids, it left little to look forward to.
The huge difference that the majority of people are not realising, is that WoW wasn't supposed to be a big raiders game when it was released, but that's what it's become (IMO) - the next Everquest.
It will be interesting to see how they rebalance the endgame content in the expansion - probably too late for me, but interesting nontheless.
If had something to say at Blizzard, I would PAY you for this page and everything you do. Your are probably loving the game more than anybody else and I would anything to have somebody like you in my company.
To your pics: I have no clue if they are real or not. I can only say that you are doing a great job and I am gonna be one of the persons who buy your game when it comes out.
HF
don't forget to get a Girlfriend. I know they are anying but later yiu'll regret if you don't get one (or two)^^
and
"Keep the Trance loud"
It's only a game guys, don't take it to seriously lol
Hey ok umm, back to the subject, the caverns of time...i got the coordinates for black morass and old hillsbrad, but..., any coordinates for the third place, that one with the floating rocks?^^
You seem to expect high-quantity and high-quality new (from-scratch) content every other month, and because you're not seeing it, you take the evidence that this content takes a long time to develop and has been thought about extensively to instead be some sort of evidence that Blizzard isn't releasing "new" content.. Honestly, what is wrong with you? You don't seem to think rationally about this at all.
The best comment here by far is just a few above this one. Read the whole thing, but here's the key part in my opinion:
"What I see in these screen shots is a company that not only has a long term and cohesive gameplan for their game universe, but also a company that is dedicated to throughly testing their design and removing any content that becomes questionable in its quality."
Rome wasn't built in a day.
Imagine someone describes to you the layout of a new city based on architectural plans and then months and months later you go to visit the place. Surprise, surprise, it looks very similar to those plans, only not quite complete. You think it's rather nice, look around, then go back home. Months later, the city is about to be opened to the public, so you go take another peek before the crowds arrive. After a careful inspection, you shout out in disgust to whoever is nearby, "But this isn't new! It's almost the same as the plans from years ago! And almost nothing has changed since the last time I was here a few months ago! I must go inform the masses about how lazy this city construction crew must be! Everyone keeps saying this is a 'new' city, but just look at it! It's not 'new' because it's the same city they've been working on for all these months!" ... Do I really need to break down how foolish that outburst would be, and how what you're saying here is essentially the same sort of thing?
Bläöööö -_-
Two posts above me... Just... Brilliant analogy!
For those who seem to have a beef about re-used models and textures, and demanding more unique buildings in every zone and area, and(seemingly) wanting every single piece of armour be unquie in look...
Please tell me where you buy your 10 exebyte hard drives, 'cause I want one.
A person much earlier said he was a graphic designer/has experience with it. You realize it takes a long time to get things right, kudos to you on that.
But tell me... When you made a 3D Model, got a good quality/detail texture on in... How big was the file? A couple of KBs? A mega-byte? Even a low-poly model needs a hell of a lot of information stored for each poly-point, for detials on the surface, etc.
So quite frankly... Yes, a lot of the models etc. are re-used/are in it already. 'cause that actually means it takes up LESS SPACE ON THE CLIENT MACHINE. If everything was one of a kind, then the amount of files, or the size of the compiled graphic libraries... Would be astronomical (This may also be the reason for lightly worse lookin' -lower- poly trees).
And I admit WoW has it's flaws, any game does. And that's my point.
There is NO game in the world that can be picked apart to this degree and survive, let alone come out smelling like roses. If you can find me that game... Well... Then you can take that game, corner the entertianment market, and become the richest person in the world.
Considering that fact, WoW does surive better than most games would.
And in the end... WoW -is- a game... Treat as such.
~Just a random guy (And people... Chill)
Yes most of the things you said are right... blizzard hasent changed the game much but thats because they didnt have to... millions of people play world of warcraft and they like it because they think it is a great game and its fun to them if you have a problem with the game you should just stop playing and possibly just not shovel dirt all over it.. i mean its just a game
Hey Synth this is Vertas from twisting nether :) Good times back in loch modan remember lol. Anyway I just spend a lot of time reading and looking at all your pics and they are all very interesting...Keep doin what you're doin and I'm sorry to hear your account got banned :(
-vert
You know, this propaganda bullshit of yours is ridiculous. You've successfully taken screenshots of places that look somewhat similiar, or better yet, found those screenshots online. I was in the most early of betas when the level cap was at 39, and Ironforge for example has been completely redone. The city was very different earlier and later existed in the game as the 'old Ironforge' you could access by running through a wall.
I have also been to the 'gates of Ahn'Qiraj', the Scarab Wall long before there was even anything in Silithus. All that was there was the huge walls, no 'already finished dungeons' as you claim. There is also much more for them to work on than just the terrain.
And of course content exists before it is released! That's how things are created. They need to polished out and changed for different encounters. Don't be an idiot.
stop complaining and make a better game
Whats truely pathetic is that someone will spend this much time trying to discredit a game that will continue to be played by millions, whether you like it or not. Get a life bro, you're worse then the 7 day a week raiders.
Nogg, you are a fucking joke.
Hehe, the other reasons was pretty good but this one proved the other thing then u said. After looking through this pictures I only thought of how much that it was that was still to be released and how nice it all looked. Kinda of making parody on urself, but thanx for all the pics :D
look I will agree wow has had real crap with content, but also it takes a lot of time to program and code these things. I used to make maps for Battlefield and other games. To make a single map which would be equal to a room in an instance would take me months to finish and perfect, and still there would be bugs. My opinion is that I would rather wait and be bored than have Blizz let content in now and have it be buggy.
LOVED IT! Nice NICE work on the screenshots! Many people think bad of all of this, GO READ OTHER STUFF if you dont want to read disclaimers of wow. Lots of long comments,most probably unread..
-Anyways NIIIICE!
Don't you all see? Nogg is completely right! Really, WoW isn't a good game. It's fun, but i like to think of it more as a chatroom, where you have your own customized profile, and you can actually do stuff in it. But as a game... it fails. It's semi-fun and harshly time consuming. The learning curve is weak, the play style is numb, it doesn't take much skill at all. GOOD players are generally people who know the game enough to know what to do at the right time. And have gear that lets them withstand everything.
Anyone who has seen nogg-aholic the movie knows that he wasn't bashing the game there, but why do you think he is saying it's a bad game? HE is showing the brilliance and beauty innovated into the games design. Anyone notice his note at the end of Nogg-aholic the Movie? He will go on to become a game designer to surpass anything that this world has seen...
I believe he will too.
Nogg man, you are the reason I play. I had known about WoW for about a year or two before I had seen Nogg-aholic the movie. Before then, all I saw in the game was endless running and mindless grinding. But your movie inspired me enough to buy the game. Just recently, my friend who had showed me the movie, and had been playing for about two years, quit. He had hit 70 on his main, and just quit, realizing that the game just wasn't fun anymore. He was upset with the biased PvP system, and the fact that blizz had failed to improve what they already had, which had soo much potential.
So Nogg, as a legend of the game, I salute you, but as a person, I am thankful that you have stepped away from WoW, and pray that you step up- to what you are truly capable of.
Your fan,
Jimarcus of Azgalore, 56 Troll Rogue
Redrum
I just deleted 2 level 70's a 65 and a handful of other toons. I finally grew very tired of dealing with the social experiment that is finding a stable competent group to progress through the game with. The total lack of skill involved in playing the game became a source of boredom. How many times can you kill an area of wandering mobs for "reputation" and silver before you want to fall asleep at your desk?
The game has the "carrot on a stick" factor working in their favor. Yet in the end its just a very long, distracting grind to acquire pixels.
Thats funny that doesnt look like christ to me
So Blizzard didnt actually add new content, they just worked on the new stuff and made it better. If you ask me I really dont care if its been in the game for 2 years but never release, its still just as good as something just made. I mean its still a new experiance to raid when i raid gruuls liar even though its been in since TBC came out. Sure, blizzard is taking it slow but quality is better then quantity. I rather have more balanced game play then more stuff to do.
For the why do we have to pay for the extra content since we play a monthly fee. Its because the monthly fee is to pay for everyone that is constantly workign to make wow better, the patchs are to improve and bring some more content to the game. But when you add 2 new races, a flying mount, 10 more lvls, an entire new world full of quests and fun, tons of new items another lvl in proffesions, a new proffession, 2 new types of raids (10 and 25 man), a good number of new spells, about 10 new instances, another sound track, a new level of instances (heroic), a new pvp system, arena, im sure there are more im forgetting but yeah... That is alot more then say nax, or weather effts.
Though sometimes when theres a no new content for a while it can be dull at times, but its never too long and theres aways something to do.
So yeah it cant get borring at times, but they always work to balance classes and it may not be new content but if no one has done it on a blizz server then thats just as good for me :)
ok I couldn't be bothered to read all thwe dead looong posts and Blizzard do care as in expansion they realised how hard it was to get 40 people to get online at once for the x amount of time and for stuff like MC as they made it so progress is saved guilds could then do it over a weekend or so meaning people would have to be on at z time for x amount of time for y amount of days which becomes ridiculous so they made it all 20-25 man raids in expansion as the 20 man places were getting more raids as people could do it in about 3-4 hours starting around six or seven going on till ten or eleven.
Galvon @ Argent Dawn RP EU server
I think your expectations are overinflated. You don't want to pay for expansions, but you want Blizzard to work even harder and make new things. You've lost sight of how great a game this is, and of just how much content there is to keep up with. You don't seem to care how much work Blizzard has put into keeping their realms up with a staggering degree of success - eight million players is an unfathomably huge playerbase. Their electric bills alone must be gargantuan.
All I see here is someone who doesn't understand what's actually going on behind the scenes complaining because the company hasn't catered to his whim well enough.
Wow. . . that was good stuff.
To all the " WOW has realeased more FREE content than anyone else." people, You all are uneducated morons. I can name 1 game that has had more free content in it by a LONG shot. DAOC. Free frontiers, free housing, multiple free dugeons, the list can go on and on.
Your all WOW Fanboys. Your Blizzard's lap dogs. The game is just a cash cow for Blizzard.
They made a medicore game. They went around and stole ideas from good games and put them together. Sooner or later everyone will realize it's craptasticness and go play a better game. You know, like WARHAMMER ONLINE!!!!!!
WOOOOO BEST GAME EVER!!!!!!
Peace
People are so harsh, nice read poster, I find it funny how defensive people can get over a computer game. Get off your high horse as the auther made a great point that Blizzard are a business in the gaming industry to make money. They are not a Not For Profit Organisation there to give satifaction to its gamers. Besides this could well be some nice viral marketing from SOE =P
Oh wow... that's just HILARIOUS! I love the comment by the guy who thinks that WoW is part of some kind of corporate consipiracy ("Your Blizzard's lap dogs"). He obviously has no understanding of the basics of business management and has been too busy smoking pot and warning people about "the corporations, man!" to care to learn. Oh and there is also that lovely person up above who was practicly praising you as the next messiah.
But more to the point. You seem to understand little to nothing about the development of an MMO. I think an earlier comment said it best "No game could be picked apart this much and come out in one piece". What you have done here is amassed a collection of screenshots that show the early phases of the game compared to the current one. What does this prove? "Oh that the 'new' content isn't new!" Honestly now, I'd like to see how many people who subscribe to WoW actually give a rat's ass.
But let's review another comment here for a moment from the guy who thinks this is all a conspiracy: "To all the " WOW has realeased more FREE content than anyone else." people, You all are uneducated morons. I can name 1 game that has had more free content in it by a LONG shot. DAOC. Free frontiers, free housing, multiple free dugeons, the list can go on and on." Mmhmm, yes this is true. But you overlook one very important fact: DAOC is a HORRIBLE game, let alone MMO. You obviously have been too scared to try any new MMOs, that have been given good reviews, and are stuck in your little corner in the basement still playing the F list games of the 1990s.
And onto another comment that is absolutely ridiculous: "The game has the "carrot on a stick" factor working in their favor. Yet in the end its just a very long, distracting grind to acquire pixels." WAKE UP AND SMELL THE JAVA!!! That's the way ALL games are, you fool! And the sooner you realize this, the sooner you can stop making yourself look like an idiot on the internet! We're sorry, you're arguement was VERY unconvincing. Please log off and try again!
Dear Jimarcus,
You wouldn't know a quality game if it bit off your head and crammed sulfuric acid down your throat. Please stop encouraging this guy, because you are as ignorant as he is (if not more so). I find it extremely laughable that you think somebody who goes to all this effort to make what has been unanimously declared the best MMO of all time look bad could have the skill, let alone the intelligence, to make a game better than this. You both need some serious reality checks.
Love,
Me
To TC: "I'd like to thank all the funny posters above that love WoW so much they can't hear a bad word said!
I like this article - Its well thought out and an interesting read. Its also his OPINION, so dont give him such a hard time (although he is probably laughing as much as me at some of the comments!)" Well then you will understand that the WoW players are expressing THEIR opinions as well and we can be as harsh with him as he is being with this game. Fair is fair. We probably wouldn't be throwing every rebuttle we have at him if it weren't for the fact that he is doing the same to us! Please stop being a hypocrite and, in the future, try commenting in favor of someone on a topic you have SOME knowledge about. Toodles!
To the guy who canceled because of Karazhan: "It's interesting to note how many of the end game instances will be raids. They are just trying to squeeze as many people through as little content as possible. Thats why they take your through in 40 man groups, and that's why you have to farm them for months to pull the itmes out of the table." I guess you aren't aware that there are no more 40 man raids being release. It's all a maximum of 25 now. And they are not trying to "Squeeze as many people into as little content as they can", they are making new dungeons with bosses who are of epic proportions. Do you really think it should only take a 5 man group to kill Kael'Thas? Or perhaps that it only requires 10 people to kill an ancient, full-fledged dragon? Think about it for a bit.
Really though, I have had fun looking at how absolutely foolish this all is. There have been alot more convincing arguements in favor of WoW than there have been against it. I hope you will one day learn how absolutely ridiculous you are and can come to terms with yourself. And that will come soon, I'm sure. I was once your age too and had similar thoughts and opinions. But then I turned 14 and realized I was making an ass of myself, just as you are now. If you have the same problem as I did, you should realize your mistakes in about 8 more years.
Finish elementary school, and come back with something useful to say.
I just have to comment on this:
That wasn't a statue of Christ, there's statues like that all over Azeroth and Christ didn't dress like a WoW mage as far as I know. It's a reference to the statue of Christ in Rio de Janeiro (hence the name of the island, Janeiro's Point) but the statue was never intended to actually be Christ as Christianism doesn't exist in Azeroth and not everyone who plays WoW or made WoW is Christian.
And your grammar is horrible.
Always when I look through these pictures I say to myself : man, its not a lack of content update. They've updated A LOT of things actually. Its quite the contrary what this page is about
DOPEFISH.....I MISS YOU :(
Wow... just wow. If you think the game is horrible just leave. Also how is showing how everything changed a reason for why content isn't updated. I'm trying very hard not to be a hypocrite by saying no one wants to hear your bullshit and some people like the game just fine...damn I said it sorry.
Interesting blog you got here mate. How did you manage to get to Caverns of Time at your alpha version of the game? In mine it's not possible to use the worldport because you need to choose startinglocation before you enter the game...
And for other peoples, check out underwater developer playground. There is an unique barrack there, which is totaly different to anything else. ^^
DOPEFISH COME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!
DOPEFISH COME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!
DOPEFISH COME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!
DOPEFISH COME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!
PLS!!!!^^
i really like the original human female version, the current version is too fat in my very humble opinion.
Hey i relly enjoyed this as many said its a good game aside the buggs i have in hand seen and sat down with 98% of blizzes crew to talk about it they where happy to hear ideas from the public and thanks for the ED items im not working with them to help with overall content as far as ED and some place instances and other things but you relly shouldent care about buggs enjoy the massivly nice and beautiful senery in the game i still may not have 2 levels 70 but i enjoyed the game slowly over the years as i was an alpha tester and ex conspet thinker guy =P but i love this sight please if you find anything tell me so if i havent seen it i caun bug blizz about why i dident see it =)
Jimarcus of Azgalore, 56 Troll Rogue says he isnt Putting the game down, hes saying what is great about it. That is true BUT He is trying to but it down. Otherwise why the fuck would it be called why WoW Is a BAD Game? And Nogg you dipshit, if they released it all at once then People would get bored of no new content and leave
All I see are pansy ass fanboi's that refuse to face the fact that you got strung along for years, with little content update, endless 'revamps' and shit like that without them even giving you the courtesy of dinner and lube before bending you over and taking their moneys worth outta yer ass, while nimbly pocketing the money from the wallet in your back pocket. Grow up, Play a real MMO ;)
god article makes me think twice before starting to play wow
NICE
" You can cut our wings, but you will never stop us from flying. "
This sentence tells us much about the result Blizzard got of World of Warcraft.
Blizzard made World of Warcraft unbelievably amazing, but step by step they fixed the in-game issues. Sometimes it improved the game, other times it made it worse.
I think most of us miss the wallwalking days. The days we could explore...
This article really is great. You're getting a very positive feedback from me on it.
Getting back to my opinion:
I both love and hate this game. Mostly I hate it because I love it so much. When you love something and really believes in it, and it fails, you totally hate it. I think you all recognize that feeling. Both parts are right about WoW.
World of Warcraft will always be my favorite game. Even though Age of Conan and all those other amazing games are coming, the history of Warcraft gives the game a perspective that will never make another game move above it.
Also we have the World of Warcraft Fan items like:
-Movies (PvP / PvE / Exploration / Comedy)
-Pictures
-Music
-Websites
-Guides
-And almost everything else you could possibly think of in media.
5/5 for the article
-NetherFlame
What you said is I thought of .Here is some of new battery fpr your laptop.
The person who wrote this blog is probably the same type of person who pisses on Blizzard's Diablo III development because it looks too "cartoony" despite the massive improvements they make to the game itself.
My god people always have pick something apart to the point where there's nothing left.
so good dude, i love this picture story, the best i have ever read, i wanna play alpha:D
http://noggaholic.10.forumer.com/
is this a fake or probably a hidden new forum or some shit?^^
Karazhan being held out on until the expansion is a big reason why i cancelled.
I haven't had any new content released for my playstyle since Dire Maul, and even that wasn't too impressive.
It's interesting to note how many of the end game instances will be raids.
They are just trying to squeeze as many people through as little content as possible.
hello
good post :)
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