So, when the NGE push came along, we were asked to reimagine the game.
Not just small changes, but rebuild it.
And it was needed. When we were asked, we were bleeding subscribers.
If I remember correctly, somewhere around 10k a month. LOSING 10,000
subs a month.
Note – I think our subs were closer to 160-180 than 200k. It was a bad financial situation no matter how you look at it.
It was not idyllic. You can remember it as an amazing game, but it wasn’t.
Hell, all of you who recall the grand ole days of launch seem to
conveniently forget that everyone quit shortly afterwards.
Why would BW want to copy a design that even the designer says is bad. What they did with the NGE was pretty much copy WoW to stabilize the game.