Source: A job listing on the Blizzard Entertainment Web site. The official story: "Microsoft does not comment on rumors or speculation."--Microsoft spokesperson; Blizzard Entertainment reps declined requests for comment. What we heard: Part gossip, part geek fantasy, the World of Warcraft Xbox 360...
Source: A job listing on the Blizzard Entertainment Web site.
The official story: "Microsoft does not comment on rumors or speculation."--Microsoft spokesperson; Blizzard Entertainment reps declined requests for comment.
What we heard: Part gossip, part geek fantasy, the World of Warcraft Xbox 360 rumor has been around for a while. Prior to E3 2005 in May, scuttlebutt was rampant that Microsoft would announce that the massively multiplayer role-playing game was coming to its next-gen console at its press conference. The company did indeed announce a 360 MMORPG...problem was it was Final Fantasy XI, which is already available for both the PC and PlayStation 2--hardly a system-selling title.
Were WoW to become available for the 360, though, it would be a much different story. Given World of Warcraft's popularity--it already has over 4.5 million subscribers and has been among the top five top-selling PC games since its 2004 release--many gamers would gladly buy a 360 just to get in on the Azeroth action. Also, the PC hardware required to run the game costs several times the hard drive-enabled 360's $399 sticker price.
Enthusiasm for a 360 WoW was flared up with the recent discovery of several Blizzard job listings for next-generation console positions. The site has positions for next-gen engine programmers, next-gen tools programmers, and next-gen game physics/collision programmers.
So will the Xbox 360 be WoW-ed? It is a possibility. However, a more likely scenario was outlined this past February, when Blizzard sent out a product catalog that announced that Starcraft: Ghost was "coming soon to next-generation consoles." Though a rep said the ad was a misprint and denied the long-delayed console game was in development for next-gen platforms, the game's current release window, Q2 2006, is the same as that of the PlayStation 3. Mere coincidence, perchance?
1up Said:
Looks like Microsoft wants to see Blizzard Entertainment's World of Warcraft appear on Xbox 360, reportsGamesIndustry.biz.
"We've been in contact with Microsoft...," said Paul Sams, vice president of business operations at Blizzard. "World of Warcraft was really built with a focus on PC, and while I think it certainly could get to Xbox, it's not something that at this moment we've decided to do."
The incredible popularity of the developer's first stab into the populated MMO market with World of Warcraft has proved a unanimous success. As next-generation consoles advance online integration, the lack of a console version becomes all the more surprising.
Right now, Blizzard sees the lack of a keyboard and mouse holding back any console renditions of World of WarCraft. "Those are things that are not standard, they're peripherals, and peripherals have historically not done well for any of the console companies unless you're talking about additional controllers or memory cards," said Sams.
Seeing as how Square Enix overcame this problem with Final Fantasy XI on the PlayStation 2, World of Warcraft landing on Xbox 360 seems a question of "when" more than anything else.
So Will we ever see World of Warcraft On consoles? I am not getting my hopes up but there are some hints out there.
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