WAR - Some thoughts

I've been wanting to post some thoughts about WAR here for a bit, but wasn't sure how to approach it. Then I found a thread on VN that started with a simple question of someone asking how it compared to DAoC. The thread was filled with a lot of thoughtful comments on where WAR has failed. I was surprised since thoughtful posts are quite rare on VN. I think it was really showing how much hope people had for this game, and how good they want it so badly to be.

But for a lot of people it seems, WAR is not there yet. We want it to be good so badly, but it isn't. I was going to make a short post in this thread, but it turned intoa full fledged blog on my thoughts of how WAR has went. Here is my post:

For a long time Mythic and Mark said, they don't want to BEAT WoW
I took this as "We want to do our own thing, and carve our own niche in the MMO market"

What this really meant was "If you can't beat em, join em"
Mythic made WoW 0.8, and just threw in more WoWish-PvP elements

People say that if they made DAoC2, they wouldn't have the subscriber numbers they have now. I don't agree at all. The MMO player base is much, much bigger now than when DAoC was in its prime. You had many people clamoring for the next big thing, and they wanted to get AWAY from WoW, not go play a misguided attempt to make another WoW. So DAoC fans, plus people who wanted out of WoW (a LOT of people) would make for a very big subscriber base.

If Mythic HAD done its own thing, carved its own niche and created a game for themselves, and not to pander to what they THINK people want, they would have a much more successful MMO, experience-wise. This game does not have the soul to hold the long term, dedicated fan base. There is nothing in WAR to be dedicated to, or be devoted to. It is either going to have a big fan base or crumble into the dust, very very quickly.

Mythic missed their big chance to grab a big audience from WoW. Now, WotLK will be out on Thursday, and people who have tried WAR hoping to find the next big thing will leave and go back to WoW, after they have seen there is nothing to see here. Now, we'll have people leave for WotLK.

AND, even though many people are CLAMORING for Origins on these boards, I think it would be a terrible decision on Mythic's part, for the long term success of WAR. Then you will have DAoC fans leaving to play Origins. And then you are left with the people still hoping WAR will be great. I think eventually those people will realize there is nothing magical about WAR. It has no soul.

WoW has really ruined MMOs for good. It has too many developers seeing $$green$$ and not enough following their own minds for making a good dame.

The game that will "beat" WoW will be absolutely nothing like WoW. Why Mythic didn't see this is beyond me. They made exactly what they said they were NOT doing from the start. They made another WoW, and its not even close to being as good as even WoW.

That's the post. I know this may make some people feel like I don't like WAR at all. That isn't true. I've had a lot of fun pvping with my guild. Having a full guild group working together is a lot of fun in this game. That is what these games should be about, having fun with your friends.
I have been trying to get all of my friends to play this game (dammit JIM). I have really enjoyed playing with my friends that are in there now (especially Meghan!). However, there needs to be something holding the experience together. I can play with my friends in any game. Right now, the game just seems a bit confused. It comes off as not really being sure of what it is. It tries to do so many things at once, and it sounds great on paper that you can DO so many things, but it just ends up not getting any of them fully right.

I have a lot of hope for this game. I think they have a lot of work ahead of them to make it a quality game, but I think it is in there somewhere. I think Mythic just needs to create the game they want to create, and not create a game they think fans want. Fans don't even know what they want, and they will never be happy no matter what. Hopefully WAR will get on track soon, and the people will have something other to play than WoW.