Has everyone noticed what I’m noticing?  World of Warcraft seems to be losing inhabitants.  I am not sure if it is just perception due to long time friendships, or if it is actual fact.  Since month by month numbers are hard to come up with I am going on feel alone. I have had this feeling validated by many other people that feel the same thing.  Since the 3.2 patch and the even from the huge delays getting 3.2 and then 3.3 active it seems like more and more players are either leaving the game, or playing far less.  What I want to discuss this week is will Cataclysm help bring all these players back to Azeroth, or will the prospect of more of the same keep them away?

While there is a laundry list of changes coming in Cataclysm and many of them I am sure are close to someone’s heart, many of them will not play a big role in keeping people interested in the game, at least in my opinion.  These include things like more race/class options, extended progression for professions, the new reforging ability, and even new talents.  While all of these things are required in an expansion, none are really sexy enough or important enough to either lure someone into staying or to drive them away from the game. 

There are a great many items being changed or added to the game though, that Blizzard surely feels are there to keep people playing.  These are the ones I want to talk about and see how they measure up to the Messiah’s opinion and see if they would keep me around. Not that I’m going anywhere, I still LOVE this game, as much as I like to complain about it sometimes! So what are the big items? Let’s look at what I feel are the eight most important, in no particular order.

Goblins + Worgens - Two new races are being added, Goblins for the Horde and Worgen for the Alliance.  Both of these races are very cool looking, have a lot of fans already, some cool racial abilities promised, and some nice classes available to them.

target="_blank"> style="border: 0px solid ; width: 197px;" />While exceptionally cool looking, will Worgen draw in more players?

In addition to all the real perks, Goblins offer a small race to the Horde for players that like small models and staying out of the way.  In addition it offers a cool small race, unlike Gnomes which everyone hates and liked to punt around.  The Worgens offer insanely cool shape shifting abilities, and we all want to be werewolves don’t we?  They are almost as cool as zombies, pirates, or ninjas, just no where near as cool as pirate zombie ninjas, sorry.

The issue with the races though is that they are more of the same.  If you have a high level character, most players do not want to level another just for the look.  They will probably just wait for race transfers to open up for them.  There are a few that will create one to have an alt, but probably not any more than would create any other race.  I think that the new races will not make a difference at all to people sticking around.

Azeroth Reshaped – Blizzard is making a big deal out of the new Azeroth, better quest progression from low levels, more quests, flying, new or reshaped zones, and more. All of this is cool and will probably draw some players back into the game, even if just to see what has changed.  Overall though, zone changes probably don’t make a big deal to the average player.

Guild Advancement – Guilds will now be able to level up, gain abilities, rewards, and achievements.  So far 20 guild levels are planned, and players earn their guild experience by defeating raid bosses, participating in PVP, and professions.  Guilds can then get talents that grant abilities and can spend guild reward points on heirloom like items and raid items and grant them to their players.

I believe this is a huge feature and one that will help keep players in a guild and therefore socializing, participating, and in the long term playing the game longer and more often.  This feature will make guilds far more desirable to many players that never really participated in them before.  For established guilds it gives yet another way to rate yourselves against others, and more forms of competition are always a good thing!  

Simplified Character Stats – For some reason Blizzard thinks this is a huge thing to players, and it may well be, but not to the kind that will stick around.  I am pretty sure that all but the most casual player can figure out the current stats and how they interact.  To the very casual how they do probably doesn’t matter.  Many players that play a lot though are quite upset about the pending changes and I know a few that have left already due to them.  Their opinion was that if the game kept getting dumbed down, they better find a more intelligent game to play.  While I don’t agree 100% with their attitude it is hard to disagree that simplifying will mean less distinction between the smart player and the average player, and that always is a bad thing.

Archeology – This is a new profession that all players can get that will have them exploring all in the game.  It will add cool new perks to characters and promises to involve them more in the game and its lore.  It will also unlock Paths of the Titans, a new character modification system.

I think this will give players a lot of things to do in the game and to get involved with and to feel like part of their character as they explore.  More in-depth involvement with the world and your character will help keep players around.

PvP Changes – Many players PvP a lot, however many don’t like arenas, but want the rewards.  Blizzard has an answer to this dilemma in Cataclysm, rated battlegrounds.  These battlegrounds will allow players to earn arena points while fighting in them.  Also more battle grounds are being added and a whole new PvP zone.

While PvP is not my thing I know a lot of people who love it.  More options, more accessibility, and more rewards will keep a ton of people coming back for more.  Although the arena points for non-arenas may discourage hardcore arena players, we will have to wait and see.

Five more levels – This is a big one, but the 5 levels appears to be a compromise though.  A lot of players do not like the grind to the end game, while some love it.  So, instead of 10 levels we get 5.  Even with that I hear complaints.  I never figured this one out though, as leveling is half the fun and supposed to be at least half the game.  I for one look forward to more levels and leveling content, and think this is a big reason for sticking around.  Personally though I would rather it be 10 levels or even more to stretch it out before you reach the end, that’s just me though.

target="_blank"> style="border: 0px solid ; width: 197px;" />Deathwing will become the new top bad guy

More Raid Content – Blizzard has promised more raid content right from the start than in any other expansion.  This means at least four and possibly more raids right from day one.  This is a huge for raiders and even for casual players since raids have been made so accessible lately.  Raid content is generally what drives the story line in a game and being the hardest and most challenging is what keeps players around the longest. Having as much raid content available as possible right from the start promises to lure many raiders back that have left the game, and ensure that those that are still here, stay right here.

Messiah’s overall take on Cataclysm sparking life into the game

Cataclysm is something that I really hope goes well.  I have played since almost the beginning of WoW with a core group of players, and while I still love the game, many of that core have become disenchanted with the game recently.  They do not dislike it, just complain that it has become too simplified, there is not enough new content to do, no reason to belong to a guild, and more.  In fact probably half of the players I have played with, no longer play.  Therefore with Cataclysm looming I hope that it has enough to draw many of these friends back to the game.

And you know what, I think it does, just from the little we know so far. Guild progression, archeology and multiple raids available on day one all go a long way to keeping a lot of players in the game and to drawing the ones that left back.  I really believe that Cataclysm will restore WoW to big numbers of subscribers.

Even more importantly than pure player numbers is that I think that the guild progression and archeology spark new life in the game by promoting two key things that I believe are missing right now.  The first is guild progression providing a big reason to be in a guild, stay in one, and participate with other players in it.  This should really push the social aspect of the game, which is critical to any MMOG. The second thing is more involvement in the lore of the game.  A game gets significantly better and more important to a player as you get more involved with the back story and lore, as it makes you care more about it and feel more involved with it.

The real question becomes, how quickly after its release can Blizzard follow up with more? If it is as slow with meaningful content updates in Cataclysm as it has been in WotLK will players put up with it? Only time will tell.