World of Warcraft, What????

[JamesL85]

Just curious.....I have a friend at work that plays WoW on his lunch hour, and I've seen him play it SEVERAL times. I have never been fond of the $15/month membership, but the game looks intriguing.....

I've seen it for $60, which initially didn't sound that bad to me, but he said that you have to pay $15 (the standard monthly fee) after you pay $60 for the game to actually play it.....Are the developers on Crack???? You don't get a three month subscription, or even a 15 day subscription with a $60 game????

Please tell me my co-worker is delusional......

James

 

[bodhi]

The game generally retails for about $50, altho that seems to be moving down to the $35-40 range. You get one month paid with the game. Also (at least, when I picked it up), it comes with a separate "guest" 1-week trial membership, which you could give to a friend to try out. The game doesn't do a CD check, so you can install on multiple machines. But each player needs their own account.

After that, you need to pay. $14.99 for one-month recurring, $41.97 for 3-month recurring ($13.99 per month), or $77.94 for 6-month recurring ($12.99 per month) . If you don't have (or don't want to use) a credit card, you can buy pre-paid cards, 60 days for $30 retail.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

EB had a sale where, with coupon, you could get WoW for $29.99.

The guy in the store was perfectly happy to let me use the coupon he had on the counter to buy my copy.

Brad

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Never played a MMORPG have you?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

You get a free month (twice the 15 days you wanted!) with the game, actually.

And yeah, MMORPGs require vast amounts of bandwidth, and what's more, armies of servers to make the game run. All that's in the box you buy is client software used to connect -- the game, as it were, is in Blizzard's server farms around the world.

It simply is not economically possible to run a MMORPG without a monthly fee of some sort.

Having said that, I play a whole lot more WoW than I watch television. By that standard, it's a very good deal. And when you can't find people to play D&D with, there's always a whole world of fantasy adventure waiting for you, 24/7 (or nearly so -- there's a few hours of server maintenance early each Tuesday morning).

Blizzard's also been tops in the industry about giving out credits any time the servers aren't available, although those problems seem to be a thing of the past at this point.

 

[Thanee]

It simply is not economically possible to run a MMORPG without a monthly fee of some sort.

Guild Wars is the first one that tries to go that route, I think. No monthly fee, that is.

Bye
Thanee

 

[JamesL85]

And Guild Wars was made by the three ex-Blizzard employees that branched out on their own IIRC....

I realize the cost involved in running Battle.Net servers, and that wasn't my point.....My point was buying a $60 game that (according to my friend) couldn't be played without spending another $15.....

As long as it comes with a one month subscription, that's fine.....I just thought it odd that you would buy the game and not be able to play it without spending more money....

Just verifying....

James

 

[KenM]

I tryed other MMORPG's. EQ, SWG, City of Heroes. I did not really like them. WoW is the first one I like and play. I understand now why they need a monthy fee. I used to think why pay up to $60 for a game, only to pay a monthly fee just for the right to play a game I already paid for? But whren I see how many people are on the same sever at once, I understand now. What place was selling it for $60? Thats high, unless he bought the collectors edtion when that came out, I think that was $60. But you should be able to get it for $40 now.

 

[Zappo]

Guild Wars is supposed to be supported by regular expansions which you'll have to pay for, though. They say that getting the expansions won't be compulsory, but chances are that most regular players will get all of them anyway. Additionally, all of the combat in GW takes place in instances (areas where only a limited number of players is present), which if programmed well can really help with limiting bandwidth and server resources.

Slightly off-topic - I find it sad that the MMORPG genre has steered away from its original goal of creating a virtual world and is now largely stuck in creating constantly improving Diablo clones.

 

[Greatwyrm]

EB had a sale where, with coupon, you could get WoW for $29.99.

The guy in the store was perfectly happy to let me use the coupon he had on the counter to buy my copy.

Brad

Pretty much exactly my experience, too. Except I had to wait another two weeks before I could have it as a birthday present.