I’ll preface this article by admitting that I am a long-time fan of Blizzard’s games (honestly, who isnt?). I’ve played the crap out of every single noteworthy notch they have on their professional belts. Warcraft? Check. Starcraft? Yes. Diablo? Hell yes. The Lost Vikings? Extra hell yes with a side of fries. I even owned Blackthorne and Battle Chess.

After 3 years of World of Warcraft, however, I now find myself parting ways with Blizzard on less than positive terms.

OK, that’s a little misleading. I actually played World of Warcraft for a little longer than three years, and I quit during the twilight weeks of The Burning Crusade (just prior to the release of Wrath of the Lich King). My reasons were diverse and most go beyond the scope of this article, but chief among them is the fact that I just couldn’t justify spending $15 every month on content that, well, never comes. With the amount of revenue that this behemoth of online gaming rakes in, I can find no other explanation for this lack of updates and content than extreme laziness. Resting on your laurels is one thing, but taking a 6-month nap in your giant money bin is something else entirely.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade was released on January 17th, 2007. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, the follow-up expansion, was just recently released on November 13th, 2008, 22 months later. Let’s consider this single epoch in the game’s development history by examining its patch history and intervals:

The above patch history gives a fair impression of the frequency of updates that Blizzard releases. The exceedingly lengthy intervals between patches, even minor ones, can be partially explained by the developers’ tendency to release large, comprehensive updates rather than smaller, more timely ones. While this is a design philosophy that I feel is wildly flawed, the difference is a matter of opinion more than anything else. What is more concerning is the small number of content updates released during these 22 months of development.

I have taken the liberty to define “new content” as any new zones or instances introduced into the game (or a significant number of new abilities). These are, after all, the bread and butter of World of Warcraft. Likewise, I have classified lesser additions, such as voice chat and UI overhauls as “new features.”

If you examine the contents of each update closely you’ll notice that only four patches over almost 2 years contained new content. That averages out to new content being released every 5.5 months, an abysmal timeline by any metric for a subscription-based game. To make matters worse, patch 2.1.0 consisted of content that arguably should have been in the expansion at release, namely the Black Temple raid instance, which is advertised in all TBC-related materials from the website down to the packaging. And patch 3.0.2 contained mostly content from the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King expansion.

World of Warcraft does an excellent job of scratching the MMO itch that so many gamers feel these days. Boasting a population of over 11 million players worldwide, there is no question that it currently defines the massive multiplayer genre. The subscription-based business model has achieved reasonable, if begrudged, acceptance from PC gamers, but perhaps we should re-evaluate whether or not we’re getting out money’s worth. Many Blizzard fans claim that WoW is the greatest MMO ever made and craft convincing arguments citing the record-shattering and ever-expanding player base but fail to realize that, at some point, popularity has little (and sometimes nothing) to do with quality.

Let me put it this way: consider McDonalds, the largest (ie, most popular) restaurant chain on the planet. They sell the most hamburgers, but does that mean they sell the best hamburgers? I think it’s high time we stop picking from the dollar menu and turn the MMO pyramid upside down.

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