I see no problem with that at all, I would have that all over the press, it shows good on Blizzard. I mean, duh wow is their money maker, and they want to keep players playing. But they know people will want to play diablo 3, so why not give their brand new game FREE to wow players if they sign up for a year more?
Seriously, it's an awesome idea, and so what?
You know what my problem with it is? It's the fact that Blizzard has shown they have no intention of actually committing to a new generation of games. I was very underwhelmed with SC2 in terms of innovation. It's a great game, but I want Blizzard to start taking some CHANCES again, that's how they got to the top. WoW doesn't have a lot of steam left, and the fact that they keep DESPERATELY begging people to stay with that dying franchise speaks volumes to me about the state of their innovation engine.
I see the exact opposite. A move like this makes those who are teetering on trying anything else then the game they have played for 6 years actually try Blizz's new product. If they like it, they keep playing, and will buy the exp packs to D3, or any of the paid services they will offer on battle net. It's a smart idea.
That's a good point there.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions."
-Thomas Jefferson
World of Warcraft is a major source of revenue for Blizzard; a proven source. Diablo III, while it obviously has a large fan base already, is unproven. It makes a lot of sense that Blizzard is still going to focus on WoW, and to try keep existing players there. Sounds like wise business decisions to me.
So your "wise business plan" is to sacrifice the potential of your next gen of releases in favor of an aged, dying product that is seeing demand plummet? A company that refuses to innovate and take risks is in big trouble. Now, I'm not saying Blizzard is in big trouble, but moves like this make Bliz look weak, and very insecure about their new products and revenue projections.
If players are trying to decide between WoW (at up to $180 a year) and Diablo 3 ($60 one time fee), it is easy to see that it's worth it to give the player Diablo 3 for free if they're going to keep forking over $180 a year.
And I'm sorry dude, but saying D3 will be a 1-time fee of 60 bucks is either purposefully deceptive or extremely ignorant. We will have the RMAH which will bring in non-trivial amounts of money, plus expansions. Come on, get your head in the game.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions."
-Thomas Jefferson
What bothers me is that they're giving the game away like a party favor, and purposefully restricting both the revenue and community potential of D3 by doing so.. Why? Apparently only to keep people ultimately hooked on wow. What does that say about how they view D3 in comparison to WoW? Any perhaps more importantly, what does that say about how they view people? As 'revenue resources' to be manipulated?
Look I know we've been over this topic, but I have not heard one a single argument that puts this past a shrewd money grab to the detriment of gaming ethics.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions."
-Thomas Jefferson
"We talk about, all the time, how we can do something cool for our players that's going to benefit them, benefit us, and that they'll feel is a give-back of sorts," he said. "That's where this started. There's a variety of benefits that come from it. Certainly the players get DIII, which is pretty exciting. That doesn't mean they get the expansion sets, it means that they get DIII, right? So we get people excited about playing that … they get to touch it, feel it, experience it. And then from our perspective, it also is a situation where they aren't necessarily going to leave WoW to play our own game."
In the interview, Sams admitted that the offer was to prevent Diablo III from cannibalizing its World of Warcraft player base.
"We don't want to take players from our universe and shift them over from World of Warcraft. There's a lot of players playing WoW that have huge amounts of friends and family that they play World of Warcraft with, so [giving Annual Pass subscribers Diablo III] says, enjoy both of them. You don't have to pay any more than you already do for WoW."
You know what my problem with it is? It's the fact that Blizzard has shown they have no intention of actually committing to a new generation of games. I was very underwhelmed with SC2 in terms of innovation. It's a great game, but I want Blizzard to start taking some CHANCES again, that's how they got to the top. WoW doesn't have a lot of steam left, and the fact that they keep DESPERATELY begging people to stay with that dying franchise speaks volumes to me about the state of their innovation engine.
That's a good point there.
-Thomas Jefferson
So your "wise business plan" is to sacrifice the potential of your next gen of releases in favor of an aged, dying product that is seeing demand plummet? A company that refuses to innovate and take risks is in big trouble. Now, I'm not saying Blizzard is in big trouble, but moves like this make Bliz look weak, and very insecure about their new products and revenue projections.
And I'm sorry dude, but saying D3 will be a 1-time fee of 60 bucks is either purposefully deceptive or extremely ignorant. We will have the RMAH which will bring in non-trivial amounts of money, plus expansions. Come on, get your head in the game.
-Thomas Jefferson
Look I know we've been over this topic, but I have not heard one a single argument that puts this past a shrewd money grab to the detriment of gaming ethics.
-Thomas Jefferson
"We talk about, all the time, how we can do something cool for our players that's going to benefit them, benefit us, and that they'll feel is a give-back of sorts," he said. "That's where this started. There's a variety of benefits that come from it. Certainly the players get DIII, which is pretty exciting. That doesn't mean they get the expansion sets, it means that they get DIII, right? So we get people excited about playing that … they get to touch it, feel it, experience it. And then from our perspective, it also is a situation where they aren't necessarily going to leave WoW to play our own game."
In the interview, Sams admitted that the offer was to prevent Diablo III from cannibalizing its World of Warcraft player base.
"We don't want to take players from our universe and shift them over from World of Warcraft. There's a lot of players playing WoW that have huge amounts of friends and family that they play World of Warcraft with, so [giving Annual Pass subscribers Diablo III] says, enjoy both of them. You don't have to pay any more than you already do for WoW."
http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/3434/article/blizzard-admits-wow-annual-pass-is-to-prevent-diablo-iii-from-cannibalizing-player-base/
I don't know about you, but if I were COO, I wouldn't be outright saying this to the media...
-Thomas Jefferson