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I posted this on a Warhammer 40k messageboard just now, but I felt that this deserved it's own mention here. I single out WOW because the topic was the latest Wrath of the Lich King expansion, but really this goes and applies to any and all MMOs that you have to pay a monthly fee to access.

*****

I played WoW for a little less than a year.. when I saw that there was an opt-in to try the beta of WotLK, I signed up and got accepted, and I think I played it all of three days before getting bored of it.

My getting bored of the WotLK beta, in a way, finally gave me the exact reason I'd stopped playing WoW earlier..

In the beta, everything you do is lost when the full thing comes out; the levels gained with your imported toon, and the progress you've made with the death knight (if you made one).. And that made me finally "see" what it was that bugged me about WoW in general;

Wow is really just a game you rent, you never actually own anything. You pay (canadian prices) 30-40$ for the original, and what works out to 20$/month to play. Then when you reach 60 (happens much faster since they upped the amount of XP earned AND lowered the XP requirements between 20-60 I think) you need to plonk out another 40-50$ for TBC expansion, on top of your constant 20$/month to keep playing.. Now that WotLK came out, that's another 50-60$ to shell out to be able to keep going..

Now, what if you get tired of playing for a bit, or don't have a lot of time to play? You still have to pay just as much monthly to keep your account open, no matter how much/little you use it.. You can't just pick up WOW and see if you feel like playing, like any other console/PC game you might buy.

Yeah, the game is fun, it's well designed, etc etc., but when it's all said and done, WoW is really no different than drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes or doing drugs; it's fun while it lasts, but then you get to look at all the money you've spent with absolutely nothing to show for it.

WoW is just scientology with elves; you have to pay to get in, pay to stay in, then when you reach a certain 'level', you have to pay more to progress, at which point you have to pay to stay in, untill you reach a certain 'level, at which point you have to pay more to progress, repeat, ad nauseam...

Can you imagine if Warhammer 40k was run like WOW?

You've got to pay for your rulebook, codex and miniatures, but you can't take them out of the store, and you have to paint them in the store. Now, going to the store costs you a membership fee of 20$/month. If you don't pay this fee, you can't come into the store to paint/play with your miniatures. And if you stop paying your monthly subscription fee, well, your miniatures (which you bought and payed for) are lost, as you can't ever take them out of the store to enjoy them elsewhere.

Sounds like a hell of a scam to me.