WoW Magazine Lure

I am a pretty solid WoW player with interest in both the game, game mechanics, art work, slight interest in the lore, and vast investment in the WoW community. That being said, even being as hardcore WoW bent as I am, I’ve spent some time today thinking of what would compel me to subscribe to the upcoming World of Warcraft magazine. (thanks to @hanapa for the link: http://news.cnet.com/8301-10797_3-10312606-235.html?tag=TOCmoreStories.0)

They’ve definitely taken from the ideas of their own game subscription success and have opted to not feature or rely on any advertisement for revenue. This is definitely a plus. I usually gut my magazines that I get of the ads with an exacto blade so I’m left with just the content anyhow.

The cost is also extremely reasonable. US $40 annually, 35 Euros or 30 pounds. That’s about an additional $3.34 a month I’d be paying on top of my two WoW subscriptions. Reasonably priced but what am I really getting?

Future (the world of warcraft magazine) is promising “stunning artwork, behind-the-scenes looks at ongoing development, deep dives into the game's lore, and perhaps even occasional scoops about new features or other WoW elements". But what I want to know is how is this much different than being IN the game art and reading up on WoW websites and blogs?

Are they just banking on fandom to carry them through? I’m not enough of a fangurl to buy into the hype for sure. I love me some Warcraft but only enough to keep paying for actual crack and not the crack pamphlet. Also, you can not buy individual copies of the magazines, it’s subscription or nothing.

So what’s it going to take to get the average player on board with buying a subscription? I’ve thought a lot about it and I’m thinking I know what their ploy is going to be…..

My guess is that it’s going to involve pets or some in-game reward. That’s how they got the trading cards out there in the market of mainstream with NON-TCG players buying those things up by the boat load. Otherwise, I’m not seeing how they’re going to get us to pay an additional subscription for stuff we can get for free.