2m Paying to Play Warcraft Online
And there's more to come as China preps to go hot.
World of Warcraft is big, but that's hardly news. What's interesting is how big Blizzard's massively multiplayer online game has become. In the slightly more than six months since the game debuted, the worldwide subscriber base has now topped 2 million users. And it's only going to get bigger.
First, there's expansion within the game itself to consider. Blizzard recently fired up the first player-versus-player regions in the game, where people are able to wage up to 60-man wars in battles lasting hours. This is a feature that has proven popular in other MMO games and it's one that users have been clamouring for for a while.
World of Warcraft is also expanding its worldwide reach, with the game teetering on release in China.
After a thunderous beta period, which saw more than 500,000 players battling simultaneously at times, the game is set for official release in the region later this month. And China is just one of the Asian stops as MMO gamers in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau prepare to lose large portions of their lives to the online world.
Alex Wollenschlaeger
Editor, Kikizo Games