The article about the product placement position at Blizzard got me thinking: if anyone could make an MMO that mixes online gameplay and social environments with real-world business, it would probably be Blizzard. Blizzard has experience with crafting Skinner Box reward systems to keep players interested and managing huge social environments to support social interactions.

WoW players will also note that Blizzard is very savvy at making profitable but non-intrusive marketing schemes, such as the WoW trading card game, pet shop, collector's editions, and Blizzcon bonuses. The market also seems ripe for a strong name-brand to come in and break new ground, since the main competitors (Second Life, Playstation Home, etc.) aren't changing enough to draw new users.

So now I'm curious: how many of you would you play such an MMO?

No? I don't even play World of Warcraft.

Until I got banned for making fun of everybody, yes.

No. Blizzard is good in the way you describe. But Second Life is a different beast. It's not a game. If Blizzard did it, it would be a game called World of Warcraft.

In other words, Blizzard already did that, in their own way.

Second Life just needs a faster internet and a facelift. There's not much wrong with it, really. If you want to live there and invest in it, it supports that. If you're just visiting, you can do that too.

Second life is really it's own thing. It is neither an MMO nor a game in any sense so Blizzard would be tackling unknown waters. We know Blizzard can craft amazing RTS's, Themepark MMO's, and Dungeon (loot) crawlers. Not to mention, having played Second Life, I don't want any respectable company diving into that anyway.

No. Not because I don't have faith in Blizzard's ability to make games. I just feel that Blizzard's forums are already what that game might be.

No.... and hell no. Blizzard jumped the Shark long ago and I won't even be purchasing Diablo 3. Torchlight 2 FTW. Activision/Blizzard are dinosaurs.

No and I am highly suspicious of the judgement of anyone who is still playing Warcraft seven or eight years into it. That game was interesting for about six weeks and very long-term players, I'm sorry to say this about them, kind of rub me the same way as people who watch sit-coms. You just kind of wonder what happened in their brain chemistry to make eight years of WoW compelling to them or to make fart-noises and shows bout whacky dumb husbands rehashing shows that other sit-coms did forty years earlier interesting enough to spend half an hour on.

In fact, looking back at it, I'm starting to realize I might not be the adoring Blizzard fan that I always thought I was. I played WoW for about six weeks during the launch and never found a reason to return to it. The Warcraft series hasn't been around for almost a decade. Diablo III will be fun enough, but like the other Diablo games, I'm not going to spend two years playing it; I'll play through it in a few hours. Maybe try a second character and play that in a few hours. At the end of the weekend, uninstall the game and probably never touch it again. And Star Craft... That's the one thing that is still compelling and really great, but I feel I'm nearing on too old of an age to even remotely compete in it. So I'm really only a fan of one Blizzard game anymore (or for the last decade) and, even then, only sort of peripherally.

And here I always thought I thought Blizzard was one of the two greatest developers (maybe in terms of quality and final finish, still).

I want a game, not a social life simulator. Second Life is named so to express its purpose. No thank you.

@Branthog said:

No and I am highly suspicious of the judgement of anyone who is still playing Warcraft seven or eight years into it. That game was interesting for about six weeks and very long-term players, I'm sorry to say this about them, kind of rub me the same way as people who watch sit-coms. You just kind of wonder what happened in their brain chemistry to make eight years of WoW compelling to them or to make fart-noises and shows bout whacky dumb husbands rehashing shows that other sit-coms did forty years earlier interesting enough to spend half an hour on.

In fact, looking back at it, I'm starting to realize I might not be the adoring Blizzard fan that I always thought I was. I played WoW for about six weeks during the launch and never found a reason to return to it. The Warcraft series hasn't been around for almost a decade. Diablo III will be fun enough, but like the other Diablo games, I'm not going to spend two years playing it; I'll play through it in a few hours. Maybe try a second character and play that in a few hours. At the end of the weekend, uninstall the game and probably never touch it again. And Star Craft... That's the one thing that is still compelling and really great, but I feel I'm nearing on too old of an age to even remotely compete in it. So I'm really only a fan of one Blizzard game anymore (or for the last decade) and, even then, only sort of peripherally.

And here I always thought I thought Blizzard was one of the two greatest developers (maybe in terms of quality and final finish, still).

Normally you piss me off, but I'm starting to like you.

@Subjugation said:

I want a game, not a social life simulator. Second Life is named so to express its purpose. No thank you.

Fixed that for you. :D

Considering I played Second Life for a while, yes.

@Branthog said:

@Subjugation said:

I want a game, not a social life simulator. Second Life is named so to express its purpose. No thank you.

Fixed that for you. :D

ಠ_ಠ

Only if I could create swarms of flying penises.

Second Life type games sound really stupid to me, but if it is Blizzard I will try anything.