The WoW Effect

How World of Warcraft has impacted Warhammer Online

For everyone here who reads my articles you should know one thing; I make a lot of references to World of Warcraft. I’ll be honest when I say there is actually a valid reason why I make reference to WoW so much in my writings, and it’s because I like to make comparisons. Since Warhammer Online has yet to be released there is not a lot of concrete information I can go off of, and I make the general assumption that most of my readers have played or know a bit about the voracious online flesh eating disease known as Warcraft. Does WoW have an impact on the development of Warhammer Online? Anything but ‘yes’ would be a lie.

I’ve been involved with World of Warcraft since before it was launched, and I have to say that I think it’s a game that has become the ‘standard’ for the MMO industry. I may seem a bit naïve in saying this, as WoW was my first real experience with a Massively Multiplayer Online RPG, but since then I have branched off into almost a half dozen other mainstream MMO’s and seen how they play. Honestly every game I seem to play reminds me of WoW in one way or another, which I know full well, is because Warcraft stole many ideas from predating MMO’s. Even the User Interface that WoW uses is a hodgepodge of several other UI’s that were released by past games, and this is not a bad thing in any way shape or form. For example; since the WoW interface is so easy to use it really gives people a good standard to go by when trying other MMO’s.

As a game in its infancy, Warhammer Online will need to draw from existing games to get its own footing in the industry. It would be stupid to think that EA Mythic would not be listening to player opinions about other MMO’s to get an idea of what would be important in designing one. The example that I think comes best to paper is the PvP / RvR system. Warhammer Online is already slated to be a Player Vs. Player intensive game and it will obviously need to draw it’s strength off the weaknesses of other games. Right now World of Warcraft has no ‘strong’ World PvP whereas Warhammer Online seems to be more or less going in that direction. So if Mythic gathers information from WoW players as to what they want to see more of in a PvP environment, they may be able to steal a few of those players.

Being able to seduce players from other games is always important in a market as saturated as the MMO industry (sounds dirty doesn’t it?). I have a friend who I work with that is known as the “MMO Whore” and it’s almost a guarantee that every month he will switch to another MMO that is new or has some special feature that the previous game lacked. This is why I think games like WoW have a direct impact on Warhammer Online; they inevitably lack something that the WAR developers could implement into the game during development. What I’m saying is that Warhammer Online has a good chance to improve off other MMO’s much like any next generation video game could. What I’m also saying in relation to this is that I spent five hours searching for a Nintendo WII today…

It’s important in today’s world to remember the roots of any game that you play. In my case I was always an avid MUD player (text based MMO’s) until I eventually lost interest and started doing real life pen & paper stuff. Because I was a fan of text based MMO’s I have a fairly jaded view on graphics, and am more interested in the teamwork and game play aspects of whatever MMO I am currently on. I know there are players out there, who center on nothing but graphics and think it is the most important part of an MMO, and so it is always a factor but for me it’s not as important. World of Warcraft has such a big piece of the proverbial MMO Pie that it’s hard for newer games to make a dent, but this is because WoW appeals to the masses. There are a lot of players switching from WoW to other MMO’s once they find something that appeals to their own personal tastes, thus making WoW like the gateway drug of MMO’s.

I know that it might seem like Warcraft has a stranglehold on the market right now, but rest assured other games will begin adapting to their success. Right now games like Warhammer Online are learning from the juggernaut of WoW and are developing new concepts that will surely interest new and old players over to their respective games. It is only a matter of time before we start seeing a massive exodus from Warcraft when people start talking about Warhammer Online’s ‘awesome RvR’ or the breath-taking graphics of Star Trek Online. I for one am eagerly waiting to see what improvements WAR has over Warcraft, and what similarities will exist between the two online games. Only time and the continued input of fans will tell!