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I might just some old boomer who doesn't know anything but my money spends just as well. I'd buy that game.
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World of Warcraft: Current Year
- Thread starter hodj
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Guest, it's time once again for the massively important and exciting FoH Asshat Tournament!
Go here and give us your nominations!Who's been the biggest Asshat in the last year? Give us your worst ones!
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Well based on our office productivity metrics (which is heavily tracked) our productivity has only increased working from home. Took my $4K workstation home and I find myself even working more than I have ever done in office. Shit like weekends and late nights, I would not dream being in office after 9-5 but now im putting in more hours when bored or an idea floats to my head (shower thoughts) so yeah using COVID as an excuse for lacking productivity is some BS.
I take a mid afternoon siesta and sometimes find myself working till midnight some days. And some when I dont feel like it, I dont even work at all. No fucking managers doing the "office walk" behind your back and stupid shit liek that. Basically I feel like an adult now doing shit at my own pace working hard, being lazy, but always getting my shit done, without daddy managers tapping me on the shoulder for having FOH boards up at work.
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jayrebb
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
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BFA launch was actually fun if you quit fast.
You couldn't quit Shadowlands and recoup any fun.
The remaining players kept playing like zombies because they knew SL already was sunk costs, and a BFA style quit was unlikely to give them any satisfaction either-- given the content rollout, loot diets, and time-gates.
The weeklies and time-gating were so bad in Shadowlands it sucked the soul right out of everyone. Zombielands.
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Qhue
Tranny Chaser
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World of Warcraft Patch 9.0.5.0.5
April Fools is just text...not even a single fake screenshot much less a full webpage or animation etc. How lame.
April Fools is just text...not even a single fake screenshot much less a full webpage or animation etc. How lame.
Gutterflesh
Parody Account
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In the beginning I thought these April Fools pranks from Blizzard were cute and fun. I didn't even mind when they mocked the player base, because quite frankly the player base deserved it most the time.
But now...now it's just feels played out. Making false statements on the internet is not an "April Fools". It's just another Thursday.
Falstaff
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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in b4 Boozecube "if these fucking shit eating fucking faggots put half the effort into this as they did the cock sucking fucking game then maybe people would enjoy it more than a crack whore eating out my uncles asshole while I watch" rant
edit: man I put a lot of effort into this one... but the forum edit makes it kind of funny actually...
edit: man I put a lot of effort into this one... but the forum edit makes it kind of funny actually...
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Mist
REEEEeyore
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Key words here. Sure, they've adapted at this point to the best of their ability, but how many months behind did it take for them to get there?
Also, layoffs, etc, are sure to hurt them, like you said, a brain drain.
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lewdie
Trakanon Raider
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all the good men started leaving prior to covid as well. bfa had a lot of the same sub standard refinements and timeline issues.
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TJT
Mr. Poopybutthole
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It's just the grown up version of small studio Blizzard.
If your corporate culture started around "when its ready" and you consistently nailed international smash hits for near 20 years this gets baked in. So you partner up with Activision and maintain this exact same mentality. Then you get huge and still have it. All the while your glacial dev cycle has missed entire console generations. Failed to capitalize on multiple billion dollar franchises developed within your own god damn games (DOTA, Auto Chess) because you move so unbelievably slow to market opportunities. Tanked billions in asset production and development with nothing to show for it. So you slap together Overwatch which was very popular for awhile so you think you still got it. Even then you fail to capitalize on ANOTHER opportunity for big bucks and minimal effort because you don't even bother trying to make a Battle Royale type game with your massive roster of characters that people would absolutely pay for.
Meanwhile the current small studios out there wreck your development with not even 1% of the resources you have (Valheim) and you're just sitting there riding the coattails of those who actually made the company great and are long gone.
But yes, when its ready, deadlines don't matter. Bliz will not change this unless they are absolutely forced to by outside forces.
If your corporate culture started around "when its ready" and you consistently nailed international smash hits for near 20 years this gets baked in. So you partner up with Activision and maintain this exact same mentality. Then you get huge and still have it. All the while your glacial dev cycle has missed entire console generations. Failed to capitalize on multiple billion dollar franchises developed within your own god damn games (DOTA, Auto Chess) because you move so unbelievably slow to market opportunities. Tanked billions in asset production and development with nothing to show for it. So you slap together Overwatch which was very popular for awhile so you think you still got it. Even then you fail to capitalize on ANOTHER opportunity for big bucks and minimal effort because you don't even bother trying to make a Battle Royale type game with your massive roster of characters that people would absolutely pay for.
Meanwhile the current small studios out there wreck your development with not even 1% of the resources you have (Valheim) and you're just sitting there riding the coattails of those who actually made the company great and are long gone.
But yes, when its ready, deadlines don't matter. Bliz will not change this unless they are absolutely forced to by outside forces.
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It's not that Blizzard didn't see the popularity of DOTA, but that they had their hands full with finishing WoW. Mark Kern once told the story that WoW was nearly canceled in the early stages because two team leads (working on WoW and WC III) along with the VP of tech left the company to form ArenaNet (Guild Wars) because they didn't believe in the project. They recruited John Cash from id Software to finish WoW.
This was also the time (around 2003) when Blizzard North imploded. Sadly, the brain drain is real and it looks like Blizzard will most likely implode long-tern because of that. Riot is hiring for their MMO basically next door, and even Mike Morhaime's new company plus studios is in the vicinity.
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Ukerric
Bearded Ape
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And you can be that both Ghostcrawler and Morhaime have contact lists on social/email and are going to jump on the slightest trace of disaffection from the ones who stayed behind.
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jayrebb
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
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They're on a new balance sheet post-2018 as well, which has led to a lot of layoffs.
The pace of development hasn't changed-- so they have to cut jobs and pay to fit the new balance sheets handed down by Activision. "When it's ready" isn't acceptable anymore per Activision, but the response by Blizzard has been to cut jobs and cut pay on rehires. The response by Blizzard to the new balance sheets was supposed to be an improved dev cycle.
They had major staffing problems leading up to the polishing of Shadowland's launch, if you recall. This is likely another symptom of the pay issue. The new balance sheets were designed to incentivize productivity, but all that's happened is they incentivize kicking asses out the door and replacing them with desperate bums.
It's the perfect time for Ghostcrawler and Morhaime to poach the remaining brains. Come get on this vibrant thing, instead of playing with dusty rehires as a result of layoffs and pay cuts.
It sells itself.
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I bet you remember Ghostcrawler as the one proclaiming "heroics are fine" in Cataclysm and then subsequently flip-flopping on the issue. That wasn't Ghostcrawler, that was the decision of the game director at the time. Ghostcrawler was just the only one even talking to the playerbase, and subsequently took the brunt of the shitstorm. This may have contributed to Ghostcrawler's decision to jump ship.
You can't incentivize productivity in a company that has polishing, fine-tuning and "when it's ready" in their DNA. Also, Blizzard always sucked at coming up with ideas and/or IPs and didn't have enough teams/team leads: Blizzard just doesn't scale.
When Project Titan folded they laid off most of the people associated with it (some of them veterans from WoW) instead of having at least two or three other project ideas in the pipeline to ramp up pre-production for.
Big Phoenix
Pronouns: zie/zhem/zer
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Rajaah
Honorable Member
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So what's the verdict on Shadowlands? I've liked every expansion of WoW noticeably less than the one before it, with the exception of Legion which I LOVED. Other than Legion, I can't say I've enjoyed the game since Cataclysm, maybe Mists. BFA was a total chore and the only reason I "finished" it (aka got to max level on both factions and did most of the raids) was because of sunk cost. I'd spent $40 on it and subscribed for a couple months, so it would have been a waste to stop playing.
Had zero intention at all of playing WoW ever again after BFA, but I had someone tell me the other day that Shadowlands is really interesting lorewise and might be on par with Legion in terms of being a big step up from the expac before it. Not sure if this means Shadowlands is actually GOOD or if it just seems decent compared to how dismal BFA was.
Can't lie, after I heard that I got a serious itch to give WoW onnnne more spin. Just asking here before I sink another $40 (and more importantly, another hundred hours) into WoW.
Had zero intention at all of playing WoW ever again after BFA, but I had someone tell me the other day that Shadowlands is really interesting lorewise and might be on par with Legion in terms of being a big step up from the expac before it. Not sure if this means Shadowlands is actually GOOD or if it just seems decent compared to how dismal BFA was.
Can't lie, after I heard that I got a serious itch to give WoW onnnne more spin. Just asking here before I sink another $40 (and more importantly, another hundred hours) into WoW.
Merrith
Golden Baronet of the Realm
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I mean, the lore is original, and it has a little hook to it, if you're really into WoW lore. It gets just as tedious as BFA if not more so pretty quickly, though. There isn't enough content.
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Mist
REEEEeyore
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I'm sincerely asking because I quit during patch 2 Cataclsym and didn't play a single hour of WoW until Season 3 BFA, all I remember is Ghostcrawler being a mod and then suddenly he was a developer.