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WoW takes china by storm
Posted: 2005-07-21 05:28am
by Tiger Ace
The Inq wrote:
World of Warcraft a big hit in China
44% of the userbase in just a month
By Aaron McKenna: Thursday 21 July 2005, 09:28
TO PUT IT MILDLY, China is a big country in terms of population. It has more people in it than the entire Western world put together and while many of them may still have never seen a computer; quite a few of them are tech savvy and have money to burn.
Blizzard, the people behind MMORPG World of Warcraft, launched a Chinese version of WoW in China and claims to have got 1.5 million paying customers in China just a month after launch. To put this into perspective, WoW has 3.5 million players worldwide – in other words a month after launching into China Blizzard can now count just over 44% of their player base in the one country.
This sends a pretty clear message to the gaming industry as a whole – China is a ripe market. With the increasingly capitalist big cities there's a huge market of computer and internet users with plenty of time on their hands, and if gaming can penetrate the Chinese market as it has done in South Korea, where professional gamers are just as revered as professional footballers are in the UK, then the industry could make a handsome fortune. µ
Thats a fucking big userbase. Most of it actully legal.
Posted: 2005-07-21 05:36am
by DPDarkPrimus
Just so long as they stay on their own goddamn servers. I've run into at least three people where it took me ten minutes to figure out that they couldn't actually understand English.
Posted: 2005-07-21 06:42am
by Companion Cube
DPDarkPrimus wrote:Just so long as they stay on their own goddamn servers. I've run into at least three people where it took me ten minutes to figure out that they couldn't actually understand English.
HOW I MINE FISH?
Re: WoW takes china by storm
Posted: 2005-07-21 10:33am
by Trogdor
The Article wrote: where professional gamers are just as revered as professional footballers are in the UK...
Professional gamers?
How the hell do you go pro in China or South Korea? I mean, I know that they're kind of obsessed with games over there, but have they actually made some kind of pseudo-sports league?
Re: WoW takes china by storm
Posted: 2005-07-21 10:44am
by The Grim Squeaker
Trogdor wrote:The Article wrote: where professional gamers are just as revered as professional footballers are in the UK...
Professional gamers?
How the hell do you go pro in China or South Korea? I mean, I know that they're kind of obsessed with games over there, but have they actually made some kind of pseudo-sports league?
There are proffesional gamers in the us and uk, f0tal1ty is the best pro gamer in the us and makes high digit counts from tournaments and large amounts in prizes (gaming rigs etc...)
Posted: 2005-07-21 10:45am
by Nephtys
Yes, they have professional leagues. And TV channels that show people gaming. And people can be paid to run around and level and collect items for sale.
Posted: 2005-07-21 11:09am
by Captain tycho
44 percent? Eeep. Wonder how many new servers they'll have to put up.
Re: WoW takes china by storm
Posted: 2005-07-21 11:10am
by Mr Bean
Trogdor wrote:The Article wrote: where professional gamers are just as revered as professional footballers are in the UK...
Professional gamers?
How the hell do you go pro in China or South Korea? I mean, I know that they're kind of obsessed with games over there, but have they actually made some kind of pseudo-sports league?
No pseudo about it, its a @$@$ national sport over there, Starcraft is big bucks and they make the real money the same way a basketball player does, endorsements.
They tend to be smaller though, such as XXX resteraunt or I like living in his city.
Trust me in SK its not rare to find a mud-hut(And by mud-hut I mean a hut with no door made out of mud with some grassy roof) that is chock full of computers LAN'd togther with cheap plastic chairs at each highschool style table.
They ARE the most wired nation and video games are huge freken business over there.
Posted: 2005-07-21 12:02pm
by Vympel
Chinese players on English servers are the bane of WoW. I agree, so long as they stay on their own fucking servers, the amount of bullshit and angst they cause is annoying as hell.
Posted: 2005-07-21 12:43pm
by White Haven
Chinese farmers. God, do I hate what they do to the economy on Mannoroth. The bot-farmers are even worse.
Posted: 2005-07-21 12:54pm
by Captain tycho
Vympel wrote:Chinese players on English servers are the bane of WoW. I agree, so long as they stay on their own fucking servers, the amount of bullshit and angst they cause is annoying as hell.
My younger brother had a hilarious encounter with a group of Chinese Horde players (He's a human warrior) that ended up with them screaming and shouting who the hell knows what while they ran at him brandishing swords.
Posted: 2005-07-21 02:06pm
by Ghost Rider
This much extra money flowing in...they should goddamn well be fixing the goddamn stability of their servers.
Class fixing is a process, I know they will never finish with, and really for my mains(a Paladin who I now longer play) and my 60th level warrior that I now use as MT for my Guild....it's not really a problem.
But when entering a once a week instance, to get the feeling of "WTF?!" because the place crashes on you more then a few times. It says something.
Posted: 2005-07-21 04:00pm
by Tiger Ace
1) .303, its Fatality. Simple.
And compared to SK, the western world is not pro, apart from a scant minority(countable on one hand) all the 'pro' gamers have lives.