sport and news: Breakfast Topic: Do you find frequent system updates unnerving?

Wednesday, 31 July 2013

Breakfast Topic: Do you find frequent system updates unnerving?

Part of what keeps an MMO like World of Warcraft feeling like a living, breathing world is a constant stream of tweaks and updates, revamps and retooling managed by an active development team. Don't like that one talent or skill? Just wait a bit -- it's sure to be massaged, rendered irrelevant by another talent, or even removed from the game entirely.

But is there at point at which constant change and system updates become annoying, off-putting, or even intimidating? Players who are deep in the throes of a love affair with raiding or competitive PvP or one particular character probably have the easiest time of it. Swallowing a new gameplay system may give them pause, but for these players, it's onward and upward. Casual players who log in less frequently and more sporadically, however, may have a tougher time keeping up with a constant stream of changes, and players with multiple characters will find themselves with a full plate of research to chew through.

Do you always look forward to system updates and new features? At what point do shifting gameplay foundations begin to feel off-putting and perhaps even a little intimidating -- from "Ugh, I'm not sure I'm up to wading through figuring out how these new talents work together tonight -- pizza and a movie instead?" to "This isn't the character I signed up to play; I'm out!"?

Filed under: Breakfast Topics