Some guy’s opinion: “WoW is Lame”

Don’t look at us: “Some guy’s opinion”, remember? The guy in question’s Chris Dahlen, he writes this opinion article at Slate.com, and it must be Diss WoW Day somewhere in the universe. He criticizes what by now is the essence of World of Warcraft: the grind, the so-basic-it’s-not-deep gameplay, the fact that there’s no story driving the game forward (or vice versa).

Simply put, the same thing over and over again, and more of the same, it can get pretty tiresome, pretty fast. And for him, it’s probably worse because for all this “lameness” of gameplay design, and so forth, WoW‘s not only sitting on top of the MMO charts, it’s also become the business model to emulate. “If Warcraft doesn’t get any better, online games will be nothing but a kill-this, collect-that experience.”

We’d probably disagree with Mr. Dahlen, knowing that the Next Big Thing in MMOs has to break the WoW mold to stand out, and you’ve got a ton of MMORPGs out there trying to innovate in one aspect or the other. But Chris does have one point clear: it would be a BORING MMO world if it were all reduced to kill-this, collect-that. Dare we say, boring.

So Chris offers some (unsolicited) advice to Blizzard: shake things up a bit. Add some personalization options a la Second Life or My Space (somehow, the idea of an entrance soundtrack for PvP sounds appealing). Make players face moral quandaries that’ll make them cry and pull their characters to the dark side just to survive or something. Make a larger storyline, Mr. Dahlen argues, and not leave WoW into the “theme park” it is now.

Of course, being unsolicited advice, Blizzard may or may not be listening. Or they may have ideas of their own, which may or may not be in line with Mr. Darleen’s thoughts. And they might be laughing all the way to the bank right now, singing Jay-X’s “99 Problems” and referencing that one bleeped word to Mr. Unsolicited Advice. But then, it wouldn’t do for Blizzard to sit on its laurels either. If there has to be innovation somewhere, perhaps it’s in the places where Mr. Dahlen points to.

Don’t look at us: “Some guy’s opinion”, remember? The guy in question’s Chris Dahlen, he writes this opinion article at Slate.com, and it must be Diss WoW Day somewhere in the universe. He criticizes what by now is the essence of World of Warcraft: the grind, the so-basic-it’s-not-deep gameplay, the fact that there’s no story driving the game forward (or vice versa).

Simply put, the same thing over and over again, and more of the same, it can get pretty tiresome, pretty fast. And for him, it’s probably worse because for all this “lameness” of gameplay design, and so forth, WoW‘s not only sitting on top of the MMO charts, it’s also become the business model to emulate. “If Warcraft doesn’t get any better, online games will be nothing but a kill-this, collect-that experience.”

We’d probably disagree with Mr. Dahlen, knowing that the Next Big Thing in MMOs has to break the WoW mold to stand out, and you’ve got a ton of MMORPGs out there trying to innovate in one aspect or the other. But Chris does have one point clear: it would be a BORING MMO world if it were all reduced to kill-this, collect-that. Dare we say, boring.

So Chris offers some (unsolicited) advice to Blizzard: shake things up a bit. Add some personalization options a la Second Life or My Space (somehow, the idea of an entrance soundtrack for PvP sounds appealing). Make players face moral quandaries that’ll make them cry and pull their characters to the dark side just to survive or something. Make a larger storyline, Mr. Dahlen argues, and not leave WoW into the “theme park” it is now.

Of course, being unsolicited advice, Blizzard may or may not be listening. Or they may have ideas of their own, which may or may not be in line with Mr. Darleen’s thoughts. And they might be laughing all the way to the bank right now, singing Jay-X’s “99 Problems” and referencing that one bleeped word to Mr. Unsolicited Advice. But then, it wouldn’t do for Blizzard to sit on its laurels either. If there has to be innovation somewhere, perhaps it’s in the places where Mr. Dahlen points to.