FFXIV, Aion, Star Trek Online and Star Wars: The Old Republic won't kill WoW. Blizzard will.
Yeah basically, to summarise, I'm sick of hearing which MMO next year will kill WoW, none of them will. The only thing that will kill WoW is Blizz. Now I think they started to kill WoW the second the expanded it, see my review on TBC to get my idea.
Let's start with the biggest problem I find with WoW. It's a total rush to the level cap. Now I suppose you could say with any MMO this happens after its been out a few years, but with WoW I really find it ridiculous. It's far too quick to level to 80 now, I mentioned this in TBC when they released a patch which made levelling 1-60 faster. They keep making WoW easier and easier too, they make mounts purchasable at lower and lower levels, and I'm just waiting for them to give us mounts with our level 1 characters tbh. On the subject of levels: The lower levels are just no fun anymore. You do them on your own, as to be honest you don't even need groups anymore. Theres no need for doing the old instances as the gear drops you get will be obsolete in a few hours when you level up a few levels again. Even most group quests before Outland are soloable, as the mobs have either been made non-elite or even as an elite:- piss easy. I think that's a shame really. I mean, an MMO means massively multiplayer online game. Whats the point in it being multiplayer if you play alone? You may as well be playing a game on your [insert console of choice here]. Also it means new players don't have as much a chance of meeting people and making friends, WoW is a lonely game for the first 70 levels.
Now end game...let's see. Anything new? Well. PVP and PVE. Oh yeah! You can also PVP or PVE! If that gets boring, PVE and PVP! ...
Wewt.
Now, I have some issues with end game I gotta say. It's the one part of WoW that you actually get a feeling of accomplishment from, and you get that feeling from obtaining your end game gear. Namely the raid gear IMO. (I can't say much about PVP as I chosen to try PVE this time, TBC I went PVP) A few months back, when I finally got and won a roll, on the Valorous Frostfire Gloves, I got that feeling. I was over the god damn moon!! I'd be after those gloves for months and I finally had them! Hard work pays off eh? Wrong.
I was removed from group so the leader and master looter could give the gloves to the mage in his guild. (No it wasn't a full guild run, he and the mage were the only 2 in his guild in group.) Thats right, I was a ninja victim. Now it's never happened to me before, so I went spare hehe. The rogue I had in the raid was also pissed as the raid leader did the same thing to him, and ninjaed a rogue item for himself instead of giving it to the winning roller. That is something seriously wrong with WoW, the loot system. But I'm glad it happened, it got me thinking. It made me angry. Why am I playing a game that makes me angry. It should be making me have fun. Also, I got to thinking: Why have I been spending months trying to get this gear. Whats the point. What will it be used for. The answer: More raids! Which I've been doing week after week to get the gear in the first place. Either that or PVP right? Something which again becomes incredibly repeatable. The gear will only become obsolete with the next expansion too, so why bother. Not to mention how damn annoying it is finding groups for those raids. If you arn't in a raid guild and don't have the achievement, get ready for the most tedious LFG of your life. How do people expect you to get the achievement anyway if you never get invites for not having it? Again, stupid. Having an achievement doesn't gage the players skill. You may be thinking, why not join a raid guild then? The reason, it makes the game work. You have to be online at certain times on certain days of the week, who the hell schedules a game, common. If you don't make said raids, you get the boot too, huzzah! Even if you can't make one cuz its your sons birthday...wow new low. (A friend of mine was actually kicked from his raid guild for that reason.)
I'm sick of how often talents are refunded because they have made yet more changes to the classes too. Its good that they do that don't get me wrong, I'd be pissed if I had to pay for a crazy powerful talent cuz they only chose to add it recently. But the fact that they have to keep nerfing and making classes more powerful only tells me one thing: classes are incredibly imbalanced and they always will be, if they got it right then they would never have to be changed. In a way I think part of Blizz's problem is the second a, lets say mage, **** on the forums that they can't kill, say, a Warrior, Blizz will change those classes so they can. Its silly really.
Lets move onto new content shall we. Mounted combat and vehicles. They are ok to be fair. I enjoyed them alot when I first tried them, heck I loved em. Then theres achievements, they are ok too. I find them a bit worthless though, other than the ones which give you rewards like a title or a kick ass mount. I dunno if they are planning on making achievement points spendable or what but I want a reason for going out and doing all the old game content other then to just say 'i haff teh achieve i r uber l33t'.
The community in WoW is greatly flawed too, you know your playing with a bunch of under 10s when you see people linking anal [penetration] etc... in trade chat and people lol-ing at it. Oh noes.
In short I think WoW is old I guess. New players will find it hard to find friends and guilds. Old players will have to schedule their gameplay for raids, or endure repeatable PVP. (Well even if you do raids they become repeatable.)
Roll on WoW2 I say. Try again. Or give up.