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WoW patch 3.1, The Secrets of Ulduar
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Screenshot from Massively
I didn't like WoW.
But first, a story. Once upon a time, there was a company that was supposed to be brainstorming for a Brand! New! Game!, but everyone there loved WoW so much that it was deeply coloring their "new ideas."
For the record, I think existing MMOs should be closely studied in terms of interface and communication tools (for reasons I've mentioned before), as well as combat system conventions. And then I think the designers of the "new" game should log off whatever their current brand of crack is, and stay off for the initial design cycle. Otherwise we as players wind up with derivative crap. Copying features never works unless you understand the problem that the feature organically evolved to solve. If the feature doesn't feel like a natural part of the game, the audience correctly identifies it as less than deeply rooted in the game.
We players are totally cool with devs stealing features *if* they improve the experience we're having at the moment. If a feature was copied just so the developer could put it on their box, we inevitably think, well, heck, I might as well go play the game that designed this feature for a reason rather than play a cheap knockoff.
Anyway, enough of my ranting. The point was, at the company to which I refer, it was pretty clear that if you wanted a seat at the idea table, you needed to be in the team leader's WoW guild. That was where everyone was bonding, building their relationships, and drawing all of their plans. Since I was supposed to doing some consulting with that team, I installed the game.
I uninstalled it the same night. It was a highly polished, smooth and easy experience. It was brilliantly executed with a lot of humor and style. Every rough edge had been meticulously sanded off, and for the first time in my life I found myself reading quest text written by someone with a mastery of English grammar and punctuation.
And I felt exactly like I did when I did the "It's A Small World" ride at Disneyland. I felt like a hamster being nudged through a maze with no branching tunnels, just one long piece of orange pipe. I felt like the genre had finally been reduced to the simplest possible Skinner box, and the lore didn't interest me enough to distract me from the pellet bar whacking.
You know what? That's okay! Did you see how I phrased my critiques? All about my feelings and interests. Your mileage may totally vary. The crazy jihad people go on when someone doesn't like their favorite game is just incomprehensible to me.
Anyway. You won't see many WoW pieces from me, but when they do highly notable things, I will always try to link you to someone who does an excellent writeup. Like... this one!
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