Guild Wars 2 sells 1 million before launch

 @aamir69  You're still implying they have the same audience, which means you're compairing a mmorpg to an hack'n'slash. Which is BS, and you don't know what you're talking about. When WoW lose customers, then a huge chunck of players who left will much likely jump on the next mmorpg train. when Torchlight 2 is released, maybe Diablo 3 will see a traffic decline. But following your logic, Guild Wars 2 may suffer a traffic decline when Borderlands 2 is released. Do you get the inconsistency of your logic now?

 @s4dn3s5 Oh just grow some sense boy, traffic decline is inevitable because GW2 just got released and I just said it will be interesting to know how much is that. Its a business point of view. I compared them as business not as gameplay & graphics and stuff. You don't know what I am talking about.  

 @aamir69  Oh, I can read, you said you're not compairing the quality of both games "all those who have played GW2 knows which one is better" but you're still making a comparison since you talk about traffic decline, implying both games have the same audience, since, still your opinion, D3 players are leaving gor GW2. You don't know what you're talking about, are you?

 @aamir69  @s4dn3s5 

To me the first 2 lines brings in something that is not really relevant....D3 Vs GW2 is not a comparison in any aspect.

At most you can compare the launch (D3 was horrible at launch, with server issues...not sure what is going on nowadays), but other than that I can only be happy that they have nothing else in common ;)

Diablo fans are yet another niche category, please don't let them raise in anger, or we will have a GW2 vs D3 vs WOW scenario LOL

 @Barrakas21 i pay for it by myself since 18 year old now i'm 22 and play wow time to time with my own cash.

 @terminus  I was just trying to be silly ;)

Wow will not die because this game does not compete with it...the fanboy of the game from Blizzard will stay where they are, maybe they will buy this one too and play with GW2 also....who knows.

The whole thing is simple: WOW lives on subs, GW2 does not, so playing one does not exclude the other (except for the aforementioned fanboy that see it as a religion...."WOW is your only MMO, you shall not have any other MMO other than WOW" :D )

There is no reign....this whole thing was just created by fanboys that cannot accept that people may enjoy more than a game....too bad for them, since they are missing a lot of fun MMO :)

 @Barrakas21

 Lol, little boy.

I don't even play WOW anymore, yeah, I have 10 85's, and I do get their expansions and play for 30 days, and that's it, but what WOW has done, was get over a 1000 dollars from me, and keep me interested for years and years and years, and still get their expansions. More then I can say for all of the other MMO's that have come out before and after it. The only MMO that may stand a chance is an MMO by Blizzard themselves, TITAN maybe......or maybe elderscrolls by Bethesda will be something special, we shall see. But it isn't GW2....IMHO.

 @mark1202 

Indeed I didn't got the point, sorry for not catching it :) the "us" had a different meaning for me when I read your comment.

I made the comparison with NWN, but in another context...I was not talking of mechanics, but about the feeling that the game gave me when you start a new game. I felt at home in NW like I felt home when I awoke in tirya as sylvari.

I agree that has been quite a while since we had a pure MMO, of course industry evolve and what was selling 10 years ago is not selling anymore (example: the move to f2p and the inclusion of micro transactions are the standard nowadays).

Mostly you can solo, because in the old days we were lesser, and you could manage the novelty of meeting strangers in game, band together to quest and then even become friends; while today is a fight to avoid the trolling and the profanities, so the developers got the hint that too many people is not always a great thing...hence you can play solo the whole way to end game content (STO is a perfect example of game that you can clear just soloing; while for LOTRO you need others for the fellowship quests and instances/raids, but you can solo all the way trough to max level missing very little content).The persistent world that changes independently from the player is another thing that changed, going from that to  be player centric, we lost the feeling of logging in and see a whole area changed because of some events...some MMO try to give the same feeling, but it happens rarely, and only while doing revamping of areas usually, not because of an in game event.

I like the player centric approach but at the same time if everyone is special and "chosen one", then it is like nobody is :) in some games like STO, you are not the savior of the galaxy, but just a guy that does his/her job and help the faction where they belong (KDF or STF), which is a good way to give the player a story on his own and at the same time, avoid to have millions of special saviors that change the future or save the day ;) 

The population: the more instances and zones you see, the less immersion feeling you have. I am not talking of a specific number, but of the fact that in some cases, 20-50 or 100 toons running around does not make necessarily a populated world; MMO would recreate the feeling of the real world, so it is not feasible that you go to a city and see few people; or when you go in and out instances, you get placed in a queue awaiting to go in the main instance.

I understand that nowadays the number of players is thousands more, so technology gotta clash with the logic of having a single instance.

You bring good points, I am sure that the definition of MMO should be changed at one point, to reflect  the new trend; I am still attached to the old way of seeing things, like in UO or DAOC and EQ...I grew up with these games so it is hard to forget everything that you enjoyed and get used to the new way :)

I am glad that you are enjoying the game; above all this is what matter the most, beside our personal opinions ;)

 @darshie76 I used "us" to make a play on the fact that I feel it is an MMO.  Sorry if it didn't come across that way.

the first GW was definitely a single player game with an online component.  Diablo 3 is another with the same type of gameplay.  Those games are definitely not MMOs, but the gameplay in GW2 is nothing like those games.  Someone in these postings even mentioned GW2 to be more like Neverwinter Nights...this is probably the worse comparison I've read so far.

If you are going to use the three criteria you stated below as the necessary things to make an MMO, then we haven't seen a "real" MMO in years.  You can solo to max level in many recent MMOs...especially if you aren't a raider.  I would even question the persistent world.  Having a load screen between zones is not totally persistent but it's also not game breaking and it doesn't completly remove the immersion or feel of a larger world either.  Nothing the player does has a long term effect on the worlds of MMOs...everything constatly resets in every MMO I've ever played.  The only way to change that is to do phased instancing...which a few MMOs have done over the last few years.  Having a player story line doesn't automatically make it a single player game with an online component...it's a way to help create immersion in the lore that is different than jsut reading quest text.  Server population is open to interpretation as well,  what is considered high population?  If you are in the game and see people in every part of the game you are in then is that not ok?  Do you need thousands in each zone for it to be considered a "real" MMO? 

Questing in the open world and doing a few dungeons along the way if you choose (but not necessary) is the way of the casual gamer in MMO's these days.  The days of the "hardcore" MMO seem to be long gone...for better or worse.  I don't think people should hold onto the strict definition of an MMO that was established years ago and never really has caught up to what MMOs have evolved into.

As you said, it comes down to each individual's opinion.  I personally am having a great time playing GW2...the fact that they are able to provide a great MMO game with no sub makes all the more awesome to me.

 @Deathscyth-Hell  @mark1202 I am referring to the general definition of MMO:

-Persistent world

-High population at the same time in the same instance

-Content that requires players to band together to complete it.

That's what the industry has feed us as MMO; the games that you mentioned are MMO, with the exception of Warhammer online, which as the name imply, it is the online version of warhammer.SWTOR does not even make the cut for me...was hard to ruin SW after SWG, but EA was able to do worst than SWG (in some ways; the game just suffer of a bad design....if they would call it KOTR3 It would be a top game) 

 @darshie76  @mark1202 

Under your logic, EverQuest, Dark age of Camelot, Dark Ages, and Warhammer Online aren't MMOs either. Your definition is too specific to WoW. GW2, imo, is an MMORPG. SWTOR.... is just a mistake.

 @mark1202 When you say "US" do you mean the whole player population? Or it is to make it sound like you have the support of someone else ? You can express your opinions without the need to have backup...as you may understand every person enjoy games in the way that they like, it is like music, so the fact that many people say the same thing doesn't automagically makes it right.For the same reason why millions of flies and insects that sits and eats poop cannot be right :)I believe that GW2 is not a fully fledged MMORPG; same goes for star wars TOR, which is a glorified single player game with online capabilities.The fact that you see other people while you play doesn't make it an MMO, the fact that you craft or that you do raids (technically there are no raids in GW2, but they have something similar when you band together in an event) does not make it an MMO either IMO.Real MMO are built around communities, they are targeting a different kind of player (if you can see 99% of the game playing solo, it is not a MMO); the persistent world is mutating independently from the actions of the player (while GW2 is player centric, same for TOR), it cannot support too many players and needs to divide them in instances...these are limitations that makes pretty clear that GW2 is not a fully fledged MMO.

You may agree or disagree; I am here to make my point, not to be right or wrong.

GW2 is a great step towards the right direction for an MMO, but still there is work to do...but again, they never planned to make an MMO since the beginning, GW is in it's own category.