Backlash against WoW cross-realm dungeon finder

18 May 2011 at 02:17:42 by Paul Younger

Blizzard reveals a new feature for World of Warcraft players but you're going to have to pay for it.

In an update by the Blizzard community team this evening, they revealed that they are working on what they are calling the Cross-Realm Dungeon Finder. This new feature will enable players to group up with real-life friends who play on other realms to take on instances together via RealID. All sounds like a great plan.

There is however a snag, and this is something that has upset much of the World of Warcraft community. Blizzard wants to charge players an additional fee to use the new feature as part of what they are calling a 'premium based service'. This is on top of the monthly subscription.

So far the community has been highly vocal on this issue which is almost reminiscent of the RealID protests when Blizzard attempted to force the use of RealID on the community. 

In recent weeks Blizzard revealed a decline in subscriptions and this announcement appears to indicate that Blizzard could be looking at other ways to charge World of Warcraft players for future features. Blizzard already charge players for features such as character transfers and the community is now left wondering why a feature, that is essentially a feature that enhances the in-game experience, is being charged for.

The community will of course have the final say by either continuing playing or walking away from the game depending on where Blizzard take the premium service model in the future. Is Blizzard going to alienate their players with what are essentially extra micro-transactions for in-game features? We'll have to wait and see how both the community and Blizzard respond in the coming days.

Blizzard has not revealed any further details on the proposed premium service update.

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