On Four Blizzards - The Pre-Purchase/Level 90 Boost Decision

There's been a lot of chatter about the recent announcement of the Warlords of Dreanor Pre-Purchase which includes a level 90 boost. We talked about it in our post Warlords Of Draenor Release Date: On/Before 12/20/2014, Price: -$10 and discussed it at length with Faid on Episode 089: Another Pooting Incident.

We're not going to rehash what we've already covered but yesterday an email from Blizzard announcing the Pre-Purchase went out and that got people chatting again.

As I was pondering the email I came to a stark realization based on something I'd read earlier that night: There are four (or more) Blizzards! Read on for my thoughts on what went into the Pre-Purchase and Level 90 Boost decision.

Lookin' To Buy?

I read through it the email that Blizzard sent out yesterday (which I've included for posterity at the end of this post) had a very funny feel to it.

It seemed like…honestly it seemed like it was the type of email you would send out the week that Warlords of Draenor was released not something you send 6-9 months before.

Its wording was very much "buy this and get this" with the words "now" almost implied at the end. It mentions new character models (which won't be available for at least 6-9 months) almost as if you could have them today.

As someone who has worked in marketing it occurred to me that this email could only have been written this way if Blizzard's marketing department pre-writes all their promotional emails at least a half a year in advance. (I don't really think that but to read this email it certainly feels that way.)

To put it another way, they could send this same email out in 6-9 months and almost not have to change a word.

That seem odd to anyone else?

I won't stay on the email wording too long. Suffice it to say that thinking about the odd way the email seemed written for a launch much closer than 6-9 months away helped me make the connection with something I had read earlier in the night.

WildStar Y'all!

I've been reading up on WildStar lately after watching Profitz stream it this weekend. I've known about the game since 2006 (I had this piece of concept art as my desktop wallpaper for at least 5 years).

In looking for videos and information about the WildStar economy I somehow stumbled on the post Why is beta changing? Scooter tells us honestly by WildStarReport.

(While I tend not to pay attention to MMOs until they are released (burnout from working in the MMORPG industry and focusing so intensely on every single MMO released for 6 years will do that to you) and tend not to get too invested in games too early, since WildStar finally gave their pre-order date (March 19, 2014) as well as release date (June 3, 2014) I figured it was time to give it a look.)

This blog post relates some changes that Carbine (or its publisher NCSoft) made to the closed beta. While I wasn't familiar with the details of the change before this, the reasoning WildStar Community Lead "Scooter" gives in the forum post (now removed?) speaks volumes about what happens inside large game development projects.

It really is a unique "fly on the wall" perspective and is something I doubt we'd ever get from Blizzard.

Having worked in MMO development I can say that everything in the following forum post can (and very likely does) happen every day.

While Blizzard and Carbine are two different companies I'm sure they both face many of the same challenges related to developing and releasing quality games.

The Four Carbines

Below is the forum post by Scooter as quoted by WildStarReport (again, it appears the original forum post is no longer available). (Emphasis is ours.)

"Okay, here’s the deal. We’re always talking about how we fully support transparency at Carbine, so I’m going to dive into the details behind the reasoning so everyone understands a little better how we came to the program we’re at today. 

We know how much you guys want to play and help test, and we’re sorry we can’t give you any additional time to do so before launch. The reasons why are due to the four primary parties this decision had ramifications for: 

• The executives - These guys hold the money and have the most experience knowing what’s healthiest for a game’s success.
• The Sales/Marketing teams - These guys’ core purpose is to make sure the sales of our game are as high as possible. This is crucial because without sales… we as a company can no longer exist and you guys don’t get to play WildStar.
• The Live and Operations teams - These guys need to make sure the servers are launch-ready.
• The Dev team - These guys want to get as much feedback as possible before launch.

All four sat down and met and debated the possible programs we could go with for weeks… I was in some of those meetings, people like Cougar were in other meetings. In the end, we knew we’d have to come to a compromise between all parties, because any single path we took would likely screw up another team’s plans and needs. The needs everyone had were pretty straightforward, though conflicting: 

• Dev’s priority was ensuring we still got high-level testing, since that’s the content that’s had the least amount of exposure in beta so far.
• Sales and Marketing didn’t want too many people playing the game before launch so that we could make sure people weren’t getting a “free ride” through the game’s content and then canceling their pre-orders.
• Execs didn’t want players burning out through beta and thus being uninterested in playing post-launch. Burnout generally happens because people don’t want to commit to characters that are going to get wiped and don’t generally “play” the exact way they’d play their actual characters. Burnout’s extremely common and quantifiable… it’s usually about 4 weeks in MMO betas and that’s been holding true for WildStar as well, so the higher-ups want to make sure we don’t lose players before they even get a chance to play the “final” game.
• Live and Operations were focused on continuing to work on their processes and procedures, and need all types of testing and deployments to occur. The more we go up and down, the more problems we resolve, the more stability we achieve, the more prepared the Live and Operations Teams becomes for launch.

So the compromise you see today is what we ended up with: 

• Beta goes from 24/6 to weekend testing to support Sales’ needs.
• Pre-order players are limited to level 17 to support the Exec’s needs.
• Current beta testers will be allowed to play beyond level 17 if they pre-order, or level 32+ players can continue playing without a pre-order, in order to facilitate high-level testing, to support Dev’s needs.
• Live gets tons of people playing in a condensed amount of time to drive server concurrency up and push the servers to their limits. 

As the saying goes, you only have a good compromise if no one leaves the table satisfied. I’ll admit we’re not completely happy with how this program ended up, but it’s the best we could make out of the restrictions we were given. 

This post is now way too long, so I’m just going to wrap up by saying: The most important thing you can do to help WildStar at the moment is help us get the word out. Tell your friends, tell your family, tell anyone who will listen about us. We’re a studio that’s just barely on the radar of the non-enthusiast gamers, and we’re up against the titans of industry this year. If you really believe in the product and the direction we’re taking it, help us get this game out the door and be a massive success so we can do everything we’ve ever dreamed of with it. 

-David"

Re-Read It

I hope you really too the time to read what the Scooter was saying it the post above. If not go back and re-read it because it lays bare a truth about game development: it's not just the "developers" (as in the people actually developing the game) who make important decisions.

It's not just the people we generally think of as "Blizzard" (the actual game developers) choice as to what happens with important decisions. Things like, in WildStar's case, how, when, how long, and even what level beta testers can play up to.

I can just see the meetings that went on inside Carbine trying to hammer out a compromise about how the beta was to be run.

I'm sure haggling, begging, and horse-trading were all employed.

I can also see similar types of situations happening inside Blizzard as they set about nailing down what they were going to do about things like the pre-purchase and level 90 boosts.

The Four Blizzards

In the case of Carbine's situation as related by Scooter above there were four distinct sets of people who had a vested interest in how the WildStar beta was structured:

• The Executives
• Sales and Marketing
• Live and Operations
• The Game Developers

I Can't Get No…

Satisfaction. That's not a word that some are using when describing their feelings about the Warlords of Draenor pre-purchase and level 90 boosts.

They don't seem to be satisfied with the way it was handled or the structure of the promotion in general and (if we believe there is wisdom in the saying Scooter used) means they may have struck just the right balance.

In other words, the fact you're not 100% satisfied is a sign they are making good compromises to ensure the product (and company as a whole) is healthy.

My guess is that people who aren't satisfied are a vocal minority.

I think the the majority of World of Warrcraft players are happy with their pre-purchases and level 90 boosts.

But that's ultimately beside the point of this post. This post was meant to help you better understand that Blizzard is not some monolithic thing. It's not some aircraft carrier with the game developers all alone at the steering wheel.

Blizzard is a business. Blizzard is a huge corporation. A very profitable corporation. They make some of the most popular games the industry has ever known. They've maintained a track record of some of the most consistently well received and financially successful game franchises in gaming history.

Do you really think they got this far by accident? No one gets to where Blizzard is by accident.

Do you really think you know how to run a game development business better then Blizzard does? I doubt there are very many people in the world who could pull off what Blizzard does.

(Lord knows the numerous carcasses of past MMOs that have fallen by the side of the road trying to replicate even a fraction of World of Warcraft's success.)

Conclusion

I hope that the story related by Scooter sticks with you. It's a story about what really happens in large game development companies when a large and very important decision has to be made.

I hope you understand a bit better (as I hopefully do) that there are many more "cooks in the kitchen" at Blizzard then we might think. There are marketing people and sales people and operations people and executive people (wait, are executives actually people?) and game developer people.

The needs and concerns of all those groups (and likely more) are all wrapped together. When a decisions has to be made, I'd hope it is hashed out in a way that works not only for the company but those it serves.

I doubt Blizzard (all four of them) made the pre-purchase and level 90 boost decision lightly. (I would have loved to be a fly on the wall in those meetings.) I myself going to cut them some slack. and trust they know what they are doing.

I now have a little bit more perspective and I believe the decisions made by Blizzard don't all boil down to "let's suck more money out of these poor suckers" that many may envision Blizzard making while twirling their level 90 mustaches.

It's complicated.

The Email

For posterity here is the Warlords of Draenor pre-purchase promotional email (reformatted a bit to fit the blog) that Blizzard sent out yesterday (3.15.2014). (Emphasis in original.)

Subject: Jim -- Boost Your Character to Level 90 When You Pre-Purchase Warlords of Draenor





Jim

Pre-purchase World of Warcraft®: Warlords of Draenor™ and access exclusive in-game items, including a boost to level 90 for one character and the exclusive Dread Raven mount*. Lead the last defense against the Iron Horde as they ravage the planet of Draenor and edge their war machines ever closer to Azeroth. Order your copy of Warlords of Draenor now!




Level 90 Character Boost 

ARISE A CHAMPION 

Immediately boost one of your characters to level 90! Prepare for the battle to come as you master new skills and abilities in the current end-game content leading up to Garrosh’s exodus to Draenor.




New Character Models

HEROES REBORN 

The classic Warcraft races have had their character models completely revamped with greater detail than ever before. You’ll be able to jump into the action looking better than ever, with significantly increased polygon counts, textures, updated animation and facial expressions!




New Feature: Garrisons 

TAKE COMMAND 

Construct a mighty garrison with farms, stables, armories, workshops and more. Recruit stalwart followers to man your base, send them to loot dungeons, fulfil missions, and craft items, even if you’re offline!




New World: Draenor 

BRAVE A SAVAGE WORLD

Discover Draenor, an untamed world of magma and metal, stone and steam. Seven new zones are waiting to be explored, with new threats to be overcome, quests to be completed and rewards to be reaped.

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