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Blizzard is kicking off it’s seventh year celebrations by offering players who log in between the 20th of November and the 3rd of December a feat of strength and an item granting bonus to XP and reputations gains. There’s more! You also get a visual-only tabard, and it even shoots off fireworks!
There seems to be a bit of a mixed reception on the forums, ranging from appreciation and praise for World of Warcraft (WOW) having such a great run, to the almost obligatory anger and frustration that Blizzard isn’t giving out a new pet like it has done in the past.
There is a very good reason for Blizzard choosing this form of anniversary reward. Recently, subscription numbers sank, indicating that people are starting to have their fill of the WOW universe, and this reward is a clever way to rope in some more. It doesn’t make them bad people, it makes them a good business.
For every player, the level cap is a defining moment. For some gamers, it’s the end. Apart from perhaps the occasional 5-man, it’s time to roll another alt or cancel the subscription. For others, it’s just the beginning. Levelling was the hard yards, now on to the real stuff. Reputation bars take the place of the experience bar, and if you didn’t know what “gear score” meant before, it will soon become a frequently used part of your vocabulary as raids become a regular past time.
People’s perception of the level of commitment required to raid and be competitive in player versus player (PVP) varies, but I think it’s fair to say you’d want to spend at least one night a week on it. Any less and it becomes hard to practice frequently enough to absorb the experience and progress through content.
Even then, as time goes on, casual guilds that were initially fine with the one night per week players (one-nighters) will also find they have people who are available a few night’s a week (regulars). The regulars will form closer connections, simply by virtue of spending more time together, not to mention the individual players increased knowledge and gear levels. Guess who gets preference when it comes to raid and arena spots?
Even if the one-nighters manages to secure a spot, it’s almost assured they’re at the bottom of the dragon kill point (DKP) barrel, the virtual queue for item drops. The Light help you if you even want to think about tanking, as the guilds primary tank will always get preference on gear. The casual player will have a hard time in even the most casual-friendly guild that wants to raid.
That gap only gets wider between the one-nighters and regulars. The guild that started off with the best intentions has formed a group of core-raiders and PVPers that regularly play together. Soon enough, they’re up to content and rankings that the one-nighters don’t have the gear or knowledge for. The one-nighters begin to realise, in truth, there’s no such thing as casual end-game. You either devote a few nights a week, or you won’t be able to make headway.
Some will make the jump, others will decide they don’t want to invest that much time into WOW. They remember the fun they had levelling, and so try a new class, maybe even with a new race and/or other faction.
However, you can only do this so much before it gets tedious. Levelling is fresh the first few times, but inevitably it gets stale. They eek out a few more months doing drop in battlegrounds, but the ultimate result remains the same; they log out of Azeroth for the last time, feeling like they’ve done everything they can with it.
This is the reason Blizzard is specifically offering an item to level characters faster, which is sadly of little use to their dedicated player base who are already level capped, and a feat of strength. The XP bonus appeals to those casual gamers. They can level those toons even faster now, and it’s been quite awhile since they last played, maybe long enough that levelling content will seem fresh again.
The feat of strength appeals to the achievement hunters. It should be noted that the opportunity to get a feat of strength comes along only once. You miss the chance, it’s gone forever. Like the casual players, they’ve had a good break from the grind, maybe now’s a good time to have another go of it, and get a rare feat of strength to boot.
So they decide to give it another crack, only planning to play for a month or two, so they can get this one-off item. They get themselves one months subscription and start to play. This time though, maybe their life situation has changed. Maybe now they do have the time to invest in raiding, and eventually decide to. If that happens, Blizzard has secured themselves another regular subscriber. If not, they come out with at least another month of subscriptions they otherwise would not have. For Blizzard, it’s win-win.
That’s why there’s no pet this year. Ex-players aren’t really that fussed about them, and it’s a bit of extra coding that is better spent creating something to get more subscribers. For the regular players, in particular those that signed up for the annual subscription to get Diablo III, Blizzard doesn’t need to offer you anything. You are already committed. Even if you are not an annual subscriber, and you voice your frustration at the way they do business, chances are all they need to do is check your subscription history and see you’ve been a loyal subscriber for many years, and know they’ve got you.
Sure, they have to do things to keep you interested, which comes in the form of content packs an expansions. New boss fights! New loot! New arena seasons! More prizes to win! Just keep running this raid. Keep putting your cash in and pulling the lever, maybe this time it’ll come up triple cherries and the boss will drop your class loot, if have the DKP to get it. Put in enough time, and eventually you’ll win, guaranteed. They know you can’t help yourself, they designed it that way.
It’s the casual players they have to catch. They slipped away, but the itch never quite fades. What they hope is you give it just one more try. It starts with just an hour or two after work a couple of nights a week. Very slowly, WOW creeps higher and higher on your priority list. Playing most, if not all, nights of the week becomes normal (barring Tuesdays, damn maintenance!). You join a guild, knowing that you won’t be able to commit to regular raiding, but that’s OK, they’re casual friendly. You drop into raids every now and again. Now it’s 2am, and you’ve got work tomorrow, but your this close to getting the boss down. You promise yourself you’ll catch up on the sleep tomorrow.
You go to work the next day feeling tired. The day drags and finally it’s home time, and all you can think about is an early night. You’ll just quickly check your auctions, then bed. No sooner have you logged in than guild chat lights up. Turns out they’re a few people away from forming a raid. They need you. You don’t want to let your friends down, do you? Even though your exhausted, you agree to go. It shouldn’t take that long anyway, then straight to sleep.
Despite being tired, you have fun. You feel invigorated with each success and from bonding with your guild mates. When you finally log out, your dreading going to work tomorrow…oh wait it actually IS tomorrow, you’ve got to be up in a few hours.
Luckily, it’s Friday. You had plans to go out with some friends, but your exhausted and make an excuse. You somehow make it through the day and head straight home. You don’t even turn on your computer, heading straight to bed. You wake up the next morning, feeling refreshed and log on. Of course, there are raids being organised for the weekend. The guild has come pretty close to downing one of the bosses you know drops a nice item for your class, and even if it doesn’t, you’ll earn some DKP, so you sign up.
You think about going out to catch up with some friends over the weekend, but you’ve had a rough week, it’s easier just to stay in. Besides, your having fun, all in the convenience of your own home. That weekend, time you didn’t spend raiding is spent doing dailies, farming mats or messing around on alts.
What started with you deciding to play WOW for a few hours one or two nights a week has turned into a highly prefered past time, often taking priority over other aspects of your life, with you barely making a conscious choice to do so.
Psychology has put up very strong evidence in the form of the “mere exposure effect” that the more you do something, and become more familiar with it, the more likely your going to become attached to it. From here, it’s a slippery slope from casual player to regular to hardcore, as habits begin to form between your neurons.
Habits are a powerful force, which Blizzard has used to build the most successful MMO of all time. They’re easy to form, but hard to kick, and like most addicting habits, sometimes all it takes is just one more fix…
Of course, this isn’t every WOW players story. Many manage a healthy life and gaming balance. However, I feel this is a story that all players, past and present, can relate to.
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I played WoW for two years, at the end of BC and until a few weeks before 3.4 came out. I stopped playing because my guild had died and I did not have the time to devote to a hardcore raiding guild (and what other kind is there? Honestly?).
A new group of friends started playing so I said, “eh, why not?” Someone Resurrection Scrolled me. I hit 64 within that one week. I then took my new flying mount around Stormwind and I realized something.
I hated this game. I spent about 800 hours playing WoW, and at the end of this time I realized that I hated it. A never ending cycle. Level, gear up, beat content, gear up, beat content, gear up, level, gear up, etc.
The combat had no feeling of impact. The new cut scenes were just annoyances, and I felt like there was nothing I wanted to devote my time to.
There was a reason I was flying around Stormwind. I had logged on to play some, but then thought about what I wanted to do and realized that nothing appealed to me.
Yeah, I was addicted to WoW, but it didn’t end with death, it ended with hatred and boredom. Hatred for all the time I spent playing the game and chasing the green light on the other end of the harbor, and boredom out of finding nothing in the world worth doing.
Actually I played closer to 3+ years. My how time has passed.
I think I came to a similar conclusion. I guess that’s why they call it “grinding”.
I honestly feel it’s this exploitation of micro-rewarding to create addictive behaviour that is rotting away large pieces of the game industry, and perception of the game industry.
I’m pretty sure I’ve linked you to this one before, but… this is an excellent read covering many of the same points you do (but more from an economists perspective) around freemium games: http://insertcredit.com/2011/09/22/who-killed-videogames-a-ghost-story/
I have seen that article, and it’s a fantastic example of applying operant conditioning to get people to play a game. After the player invests some time, provide a reward, and if they neglect it, have some sort of punishment ie. rotting crops.