Don’t get me wrong, I love Bioware – they do some amazing stuff and they are a great at what they can do, but really this is like the up-teenth time that a game has claimed to a “wow-killer” or any variation thereof. Forgive my extreme disbelief.
According to IndustryGamers though, EA is claiming just that … again. As history has apparently taught them nothing about making broad, grandiose and ultimately unsupported claims (I’m look at you, Sony), TOR has effectively thrown down the gauntlet to a Juggernaut who couldn’t be less interested. Claiming that WoW is a silent movie to their Walkie-Talkie (really, that’s the best metaphor you can come up with?), that the voice acting in TOR will draw gamers away from Azeroth. That’s a pretty arrogant metaphor for stylistic choices within WoW.
Call me a cynic, but I doubt anyone is going to say , “Voice acting!! Yes!!! This will totally make the game so much better than WoW!!” Lets be realistic here–true you’ll get a few converts, you’ll get the people claiming “WoW Killer,” as you always do at the launch of every new MMO. But time has shown again and again and again that making foolish claims like taking a huge chunk of the WoW player base just makes you look delusional and out of touch.
People will disagree with me on this, as that is the nature of the internet to be contrarian, but new MMOs, no matter how great, how wonderful and meaningful will not have a significant impact on WoW – because WoW is more than a game — WoW is a cultural phenomenon. Azeroth has a population larger than some countries. Really.
So EA – don’t kid yourselves. Bioware will produce a great game, and it’ll be polished and well done but don’t fool yourself into thinking you’ll take a large portion of anything WoW has right now. Culturally, World of Warcraft is probably the most significant piece of media in the world today.
Via Industry Gamers: WoW to Lose ‘Big Chunk’ of Market Share to Star Wars: Old Republic, says EA
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