To suggest that World of Warcraft is the be all and end all of the MMORPG genre is a ridiculous statement to make at the best of times. To suggest that a developer must use Blizzard Entertainments song book in order to compete with World of Warcraft is also a ridiculous statement at the best of times.

World of Warcraft is not the be all and end all of the MMORPG genre. It is just another step in an ever-evolving (and fairly young) area of the gaming market and sooner or later, someone will out do World of Warcraft on every level. That isn’t wild speculation based on a hatred for or fears of the Blizzard monster. This is based on how it has happened in the gaming and other industries for many years. There are very few examples of a company holding a monopoly so strong that they suffer no risk of competition. Microsoft for example - a company that has held a monopoly over several areas of the software market for many, many years - has recently realised that competition is strong, now more than ever. The risk of them losing their monopoly is growing, even with their new-found competitiveness. Why would it be any different for Blizzard and World of Warcraft?

World of Warcraft boasts around 5,000,000 North American (NA) subscriptions. This is a fairly big number when you look at it from a distance. Of course, at this stage in the age of MMOs in NA, it IS a big number that dwarfs any that have come before it or any that we have seen since. However, there are around 120,000,000 gamers in NA alone. World of Warcraft subscribers represents around 5% of that number. There are still another 115,000,000 gamers out there who don't play WoW. That is of course working under the assumption that each of those WoW subscriptions represents a single person, which is clearly not the case as fair amounts of people hold multiple subscriptions. However, I'm not going to make wild assumptions simply to reduce the numbers as the numbers are factual and the assumptions are not. Quite clearly, there is room for improvement. World of Warcraft may hold dominance over the current titles in the MMO market but it certainly holds no dominance over the wider gaming market.

So, it's clear that the 5,000,000-subscriber number that WoW touts in NA is not a massive figure when compared to the amount of gamers present in the market. The same story is told in Europe and Asia. In fact, in Asia, World of Warcraft actually holds a pretty insignificant market share when compared to other MMOs but - based on the fact that World of Warcraft fans scream blue murder when you bring up Asia because, "it's not a proper market," - I'm going to leave that one well alone (even if the argument against Asia is founded in complete and total blind idiocy and ignorance). I'm not here to add fuel to the fire... well... I am... but I do not want to overdo it. The point I'm trying to make is that World of Warcraft may well have a huge subscriber base in the West compared to its competitors but there is a vast amount of space for other titles and there is still a vast amount of money to be made. If you know that Blizzard pulls in around $2 billion a year with World of Warcraft and then look at the fact that 95% of NA gamers don't play it, you can see that in the US alone, there is a large amount of money not being made by Blizzard and a larger audience that aren't interested in World of Warcraft (for whatever reason).

Another thing I'd like to point out is that the MMO genre is obviously expanding. World of Warcraft has continued to grow its user base in the West. On top of this, newly released MMOs have found fairly large user bases as well, without hitting on WoW's continued growth. Games like Age of Conan, Warhammer Online, Eve Online and even F2P games continue to find a footing and - in some cases - grow, which implies that there are new gamers being drawn into the MMO genre all the time.

Of course, we mustn't get carried away with diminishing the continued success that Blizzard has with World of Warcraft. It's a massive achievement that no one should take lightly and a step in the evolution of the gaming industry that will be remembered for years to come. World of Warcraft's life span isn't even vaguely near its end and I don't imagine we'll see the so called, "light at the end of the WoW-themed tunnel," for quite a few years yet. Blizzard will do anything they can to keep WoW relevant in an ever growing and ever changing market.

The claim that any and all competitors to WoW must comply with Blizzards so-called songbook isn't a statement that makes any sense either. The reason that WoW is successful isn't because it is identical to EQ or Ultima. Of course, there are things that those previous titles did that Blizzard took and used in WoW but then, that's the same with any genre, right? If a company comes up with an intuitive feature that works well, others are likely to use that feature in the future. Blizzard has done it, its competitors have done it and future developers will do it. That doesn't mean however that the WoW formula must be followed to the letter. Remember: there are 115,000,000 NA gamers who aren't playing WoW for one reason or another. Many of them may not like it or be interested in what WoW has to offer, which suggests to me that there is exponential room for other types of MMO. Why do people who feel that WoW is unbeatable constrain themselves to MMORPGs when the term MMO can prefix pretty much any genre?

Monte Cristo are currently working on one of those other types of MMO in the form of CitiesXL - a city building MMO. There are very few traits that WoW displays that can be translated and incorporated into CitiesXL, which means that most of it isn't singing from Blizzards songbook. This is logical because an RPG and a City Building Sim (CBS) are two very different styles of game. What works in one would not work in the other. Huxley is another example of another type of MMO - an MMOFPS. Again, what works in WoW would probably not be easy to translate to a FPS and - even if it was achieved - it would probably work to the detriment of the title, rather than causing it to excel. Of course, MMORPGs will always look to WoW for examples of mechanics and ideas that work well but again, it is not all about copying those things to the letter. Bioware's SWTOR will no doubt borrow some of the elements that made WoW a success but will also try to add their own take on what a good MMO should be. In SWTORs case, this comes in the form of a much heavier and more focused storyline, something that WoW cannot boast. I imagine that if EA ever decided to look back at the Sims Online and do it again - if done well - it could pose a real risk to World of Warcraft because The Sims is the fastest and best selling PC franchise of all time and it has a much larger player base than WoW. Then of course, you have the console market, which has yet to see a dominant and widely successful MMO, but it will inevitably happen (and the console market reprisents a massive portion of the gaming market).

So, there's room for other MMOs to expand into in the gaming genre and there are more types of MMO than you can shake a stick at. Despite these points, many will still suggest that WoW is unbeatable. At this point, I tend to back out of the argument because, if you have pitched these two very reasonable and factually based arguments and your audience still does not get it, it's becomes a futile effort at best.

One thing that I've always found baffling is the idea of success in the MMO genre. The ways of measuring it are quite numerous. Of course, if we are looking at profitability and subscriber base in the West alone, World of Warcraft wins. If we extend this to the East, World of Warcraft still wins where profits are concerned but it is suddenly dwarfed by the size of some of the MMOs in this market area. If we are talking solely about global subscriber numbers, it certainly doesn't place well. Then of course, if we look at the subscriber base per company, Blizzard isn't winning there either and is dwarfed by some of its competitors. So, World of Warcraft is again proven to be a massive success but certainly not the top dog in all regards.

If we look at the situation rationally, we can clearly see that there is room to expand for MMO developers and a lot of ways in which they can expand that don't require them to either compete directly with WoW or copy Blizzard's formula. Even Blizzard has said that there is more than enough room at the top. If they didn't think this, they wouldn't be developing a new MMO (which they have already said is completely different to WoW and nothing they have done before, which implies something new). They've even said that one day they do see themselves shutting down the WoW servers and this also implies that they see an end to its life span, which certainly wouldn't be a claim to make if you thought your game was unbeatable like some would suggest.

All in all, the argument that WoW is unbeatable is pretty ridiculous and there are many more reasons that I can think of as to why this is the case (but my hands are aching and I have work to do). One day, I believe someone will develop a new MMO that will top WoW because WoW is far from perfect; Blizzard knows this. WoW will continue to be dominant for the time being, I am sure, but in the future it will be presented with a competitor that will outgrow it and will represent the next step in the MMO genre's evolution.

It could happen in a year or it could happen in a decade. However, it will happen.