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Role Playing (Games)

WoW the Next "Golf"? 243

Posted by CmdrTaco from the can-i-use-my-employees-as-gold-farmers-then dept.
TheGrapeApe writes "1up has an article about the possibility of World of Warcraft becoming the next "Golf": A place where friends, acquaintances, and perhaps even business partners will meet up to "talk shop" and swap stories. Personally, I can't wait until I have my next job interview in the Deadmines. " I demand extra healing and mana pots from all my employees.
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WoW the Next "Golf"? More

WoW the Next "Golf"?

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  • Uh, no (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:31PM (#14681066)
    Sorry.

  • Not Gonna Happen! (Score:5, Funny)

    by ABaumann ( 748617 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:32PM (#14681071)
    golf is good because it's long walk long walk. It's not like people can make business contacts when people are screaming "OMFG! HEALZ!"

    ---

    Hellsing (60 Disc/Holy Priest) on Icecrown

    • Re:Not Gonna Happen! (Score:4, Funny)

      by Frymaster ( 171343 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:42PM (#14681164) Homepage Journal
      golf is good because it's long walk long walk.

      golf is good because you can cheat... or, more importantly, let your boss cheat. it's easy to turn the other way when the vp of sales kicks his titelist back onto the fairway.

      in wow, however, such "curtousies" are hard to pull off.

      remember, golf was invented so that upper management could feel good at something and so that we could have something to screw up deliberately to stroke their egos.

      • Re:Not Gonna Happen! (Score:4, Informative)

        by uigrad_2000 ( 398500 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @06:08PM (#14682117) Homepage Journal
        golf is good because you can cheat... or, more importantly, let your boss cheat. it's easy to turn the other way when the vp of sales kicks his titelist back onto the fairway.

        in wow, however, such "curtousies" are hard to pull off.

        ummm, you haven't done much raiding then. Either that or you've never raided with a foreign guild.

        Let's say you're a warrior. A Hammer designed for warriors drops, but the group gives it to Gary, who is a hunter instead of you. The reason? Because.... he's Gary!

        You mention that management enjoys having their egos stroked. Once you get to 60, new armor pieces are all about stroking egos. The complex social structure in the game doesn't even start until you reach 60, and people start building their armor sets.

        • Anybody who thinks WoW has a complax social structures needs to get into some real social structures.
          sheeesh.

          To answer the question:
          3 level 60's, many others on many servers, and for over a year.
    • You got the quote wrong. Golf is not a "long walk long walk;" it is a pleasant walkd through the park, ruined.
    • Walk with me, talk with me.
    • Golf is a good walk, spoiled.

      -Mark Twain

    • Imagine.. .. (Score:2, Funny)

      by Arwing ( 951573 )
      LeRoy, you are fired!!!!! but i didn't do anything.. ..
    • You haven't played WoW, have you. It's bloody gigantic, and you often spend a lot of time getting around.

      It might as well be called World of Walkcraft.
    • I don't think WoW works as a "golf like" game because (at least the part I've played with other people) involve the long stretches of doing nothing that you need in order to prompt conversation. When you're playing golf, especially if it's with a couple of people, you spend most of your time either walking or standing around, meaning you have lots of opportunities to talk. Plus you might have drinks at the club afterwards, etc etc. I just don't see WoW as being conducive to that.

      The only game/sport I've don

  • new tool for HR (Score:2, Insightful)

    by joejor ( 578266 )
    it would be the perfect way to determine if a prospective hire is a team player or a lone wolf

  • In Related News (Score:4, Funny)

    by Siberwulf ( 921893 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:33PM (#14681090)
    Pepsi stock has taken a harsh beating today, after allegations of "Corpse Camping" by the Coke Guild. When approached for comments, Pepsi replied "AFK bio"

  • Yeah sure (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Crowhead ( 577505 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:34PM (#14681097)
    Gregarious people are surely going to trade face to face time for a game. "Hey, let's go get a beer after we play." "Ok, I'm headed up to my fridge, tell me when you got your beer and we'll have an online toast."

    Bleh.
  • Somehow I can not picture 50 something WASPS sitting around in silly outfits discussing Business and the best Tactics for their next raid .
    "oh my old boy , who gave that Ork membership to our club , I will have to take this up at the Bi-anual meeting"
    Considering Golf clubs for Business men often like to exclude people of Ethnicity's , non Protestants and homosexuals .. I don't think it would work given Blizzards Rules.

  • Undead Stratholme (with your Boss) (Score:5, Funny)

    by the_tsi ( 19767 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:36PM (#14681106)
    One guildie relates this story:

    "My coworkers and I were in a particularly heated meeting recently. Our management team had thrown a ridiculous project our way, and later yelled at us for not completing it to their non-existant specifications. When we met to discuss possible ways to satisfy this lose-lose situation, no one had any plausible ideas. During a break in conversation, I said, 'What we need to do is five-man the Baron'.

    At least four people present laughed, including my boss."

    I know I saw the TeamSpeak icon on a coworker's laptop the other day, and came very close to asking him what game it was for. Boy, it would be disturbing finding out he was on the same server; especially if he were a member of the other faction...
    • I know I saw the TeamSpeak icon on a coworker's laptop the other day, and came very close to asking him what game it was for.

      It's a double edged sword. Few years back someone at work caught me browsing an Everquest site, and immediatley asked where I played and how long I'd been doing it. I'm not incapable of participating in idle chat, but discussing +1 shiny swords within earshot of co-workers is beyond the level of geekiness I can tolerate. I grunted out answers to his questions, feigned interest, and a

    • Re:Undead Stratholme (with your Boss) (Score:5, Funny)

      by John Hurliman ( 152784 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @06:23PM (#14682243) Homepage
      What we need to do is five-man the Baron

      I'm glad I play WoW and can understand that, otherwise the connotations could have been awful.
      • I'm glad I play WoW and can understand that, otherwise the connotations could have been awful.

        Speaking as someone who never has played WoW, let me assure you... they are indeed. ;-)
      • I'm glad I play WoW and can understand that, otherwise the connotations could have been awful.
        Care to enlighten the rest of us who don't feel like shelling out $15 a month for playing 2 hours a week at most?
        • Baron: boss in an early endgame instance. Very easy to kill in a 10-player group, somewhat harder (though still easy to kill with good gear) in a 5-player group. It's actually much harder, imo, to get to him than it is to kill him as a group of five. You don't need to do anything fancy to take him down, just hit him as hard as you can and keep everyone alive.

  • Uhuh (Score:3, Funny)

    by Hogwash McFly ( 678207 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:36PM (#14681109)
    WoW is as much a substitute for a sport as it is for a social life.

    • Re:Uhuh (Score:3, Informative)

      by BaudKarma ( 868193 )
      True, but golf as most weekenders play it isn't much of a sport either. Drive around in a cart drinking beer, get out every couple of minutes to swing a stick and cuss, then get back in the cart and drive off to find your ball.

      I get more exercise taking the elevator at work.
      • You're right, but at least there's fresh air and natural light involved.

        Also, sport is as much about the drinking as it is about the actual exercise element these days. Drinks in the club house and all that. Just ask any university team member. You might not get a response though, as they're likely to be unconscious with vomit dribbling down their chin. ;)

    • yay... at least someone out there considers golf a sport :)
  • Very interesting. Signs indicate, then, that MMORPG's are becoming Role Playing Games for our REAL lives? People play MMORPG's and RPG's to escape, not to role play their own lives... Perhaps we will see two types of MMORPG's: one where you remain 'anonymous' (like the ones nowdays) and ones where its a virtual reprentation of the REAL YOU. In that sense, the latter is basically a VERY fancy virtual chatroom. No different from nowadays. Except maybe instead of *just* chatting you can chat over a friendl
    • What I see more and more of, perhaps just because of the communities I'm involved with, is a lot more "crossover" from online communities to normal face-to-face communities.

      I can't say that I will ever play WoW and I really don't believe that it will be the next "golf" but I can certainly see "Foo" (carried out online) crossover as an activity that any group might engage in while in person.

      So, remove WoW from the equation and insert whatever online community you are involved with and carry on.

  • Stick with Golf (Score:2, Insightful)

    by no_pets ( 881013 )
    I'd suggest sticking with golf if you plan to go into management.

  • Nobody asked me, but... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by squidguy ( 846256 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:38PM (#14681126)
    ...this has to be one of the dumbest and most inane posts I've seen in a long, long time.

  • I used to hang out with an old college buddy... (Score:5, Funny)

    by CaseM ( 746707 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:39PM (#14681139)
    via WoW. Until he met a girl and she kept him from hitting 60. What a loser.
  • It's going to be very annoying when I have to create a character on the boss's server and play it up to his level before we can talk.
  • Wait, does this mean that the guys at perlmonks will try to recreate WoW in as few keystrokes as possible? Or that the people playing it will be oblivious and dress funny? <--- PUNCHLINE HERE ...

  • Gee, I'll bet (Score:3, Insightful)

    by courtarro ( 786894 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:44PM (#14681182) Homepage
    Let me start by saying "yeah right". The next golf? The reason businesspeople play golf is not for the game, but to chat and talk politics (office or government) while having some sort of distraction outdoors. WoW is hardly a decent place to have an office meeting. Face it, most people (will) grow out of video games.

  • $subject (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:45PM (#14681201)
    Is $this the next $that? $publication is running an article that suggests that $this could become the next $that. $this mirrors that because $weak_correlation[0] and $weak_correlation[1]. Futhermore, $fluff_item[0] and $fluff_item[1]. In conclusion, $conclusion[int rand(10)].

  • Far too involved. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HaloZero ( 610207 ) <protodeka@@@gmail...com> on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:47PM (#14681225) Homepage
    World of Warcraft is far too involved, compared to the game of golf. In golf, you can sit back, take the game at your pace, your parties pace. You all are doing roughly the same thing, and can find common ground. A warrior and a mage have no common ground, save for, well... literal space sharing. WoW is far too fast-paced in comparison.

    It's also an effing cartoon, for those nubs who haven't yet realised.

    So... No. Not happening.

    *silence...*

    Next question, please.

    • I don't know how many times I've seen players sitting in the empty (ie no trainers/vendors, etc) rooms/houses in major cities just chatting about whatever. For all I know, one of them could have been an interview (if it was, it would have been streaking time!) for a job, guild, whatever.

      I can see this happening, but I doubt it will ever really take off. I mean how serious could a job interview be when you have a naked female night elf run in and start dancing seductively? 'Whaaa.... err.... oooh... yer hire
    • I'm sitting here with several of my coworkers in Tarren Mills tavern and we're having a dry raspy chuckle about your post.

    • Re:Far too involved. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by DdJ ( 10790 )

      World of Warcraft is far too involved, compared to the game of golf. In golf, you can sit back, take the game at your pace, your parties pace.

      Ever been on a Molten Core raid? Often, people spend half the time AFK, and when they're not, half of them can get away with just hitting a few keys over and over. (This is not true of the front-line melee types, and for a few boss fights it's not true of some other classes either -- eg. hunters vs. Magmadar.)

      And that's a high-end raid.

      Exploring the countryside, h

    • I kind of agree with you in that aspect, but what I think is mor important is that in business talks (and all other high-stakes talks) non-verbal forms of communication play a huge role.

      Tone of voice, posture, the way the eyes move and all sort of tiny little details about the way a person talks, that you unconsciously recognize are missing in WoW (and in most types of electronic communication).

      It's already difficult to assess the state of mind of other people in meat-space, in an on-line game where your 'p

  • u bai... (Score:2, Funny)

    by daeg ( 828071 )
    WTS [Foreign Worker][Foreign Worker][Foreign Worker] 20g OK?

  • This is a Joke Right? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by sielwolf ( 246764 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:48PM (#14681244) Homepage Journal
    Golf is standard issue for the managerial class: folks who being extroverts is a job requirement. For peons/techs/engineers there's still the time honored Afterwork Beer. Getting excited to run off into isolation and talk to people through magical cat-5 ain't the same. It implies a discomfort with being in the proximity of other meat popcicles and people notice that. Most people live out there in the Big Blue Box.
    • Yeah, mostly what this story demonstrates is why salespeople with the ability to directly interact with human beings continue to make more money than dysfunctional nerds, despite the latter being so much smarterer than the former.

  • No freaking way. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by JGBPhilly ( 825475 )
    The movers and shakers in the real world with real money and power don't have hours of spare time to spend on MMORPG games. Maybe peon deals can be cut in such a format, but to compare this with the kind of money that revolves around golf is ridiculous.
  • More like "off broadway musicals" [slashdot.org]. ;P

  • differences (Score:3, Insightful)

    by [cx] ( 181186 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:50PM (#14681263)
    The biggest difference is golf is actually a sport, and you communicate face to face. WoW is a niche so small it makes lawn bowling look like a national sport.

    As to say its the next way people are going to get together and hang out and schmooze it up is ridiculous, because nobody that is a real businessman wants to be dealing with people in a virtual game. If you cant look someone in the eye, why would you discuss anything serious with them?

    I doubt anyone over the age of 20 even thinks this is an intelligent assumption.

    WoW is the next everquest, not the next golf.

    I'm sure a Diablo MMORPG will drop in 07-08 and we will all be like "Diablo is the next Golf" lolzz

  • Never work (Score:3, Insightful)

    by nickgrieve ( 87668 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:50PM (#14681266) Journal
    In golf, you can display your wealth and not be any good at golf, and thats fine. They can see your a man of power becasue of the car you arrived in, the dimond tiped golf shoes and the caddie with a mobile drinks bar.

    But in WoW if your new to the sport, or suck at it, you'll probably find that others who have less wealth and power in the real world can and probably will, have more in the World of Warcraft... egos don't like that
    • I think it works both ways. Those who have no real money or power in the real world also use WOW in order to help themselves feel better. After all, who cares about the real world when you are the #1 warrior on a server.

      I cant tell you how many of my friends spend more time on WOW than they do their own careers.

    • In golf, you can display your wealth and not be any good at golf, and thats fine. They can see your a man of power becasue of the car you arrived in, the dimond tiped golf shoes and the caddie with a mobile drinks bar.

      But in WoW if your new to the sport, or suck at it, you'll probably find that others who have less wealth and power in the real world can and probably will, have more in the World of Warcraft... egos don't like that

      I thought that's what guild farmers were for. To let you turn real world weal

    • You can pay people real money to farm stuff for you... even if they know you bought it, it's not different from showing up in a nice car and playing like a duffer.

  • Can someone explain this...? (Score:3, Funny)

    by AdamTrace ( 255409 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:53PM (#14681300)
    From TFA:

    "Warcraft is like a really, really well-designed UI for real-time, ad-hoc group collaboration and management of tons of people."

    What exactly is he referring to, here? The guild/party window? Guild chat? Are those "really, really well designed"?

    Am I missing something?

  • But, you get to play golf with these guys... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Gruneun ( 261463 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:57PM (#14681341)
    The one that always has a new set of clubs and loves to talk about how great they are.
    The one that's late for tee time and spends half the day on the phone, while everyone waits.
    The one who pretty much sucks, but tells everyone how they should play the ball.

    Oh, wait...

  • WoW is not Golf (Score:5, Funny)

    by The-Bus ( 138060 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @04:58PM (#14681349)
    If World of Warcraft was like golf, then WoW players would:
    • obsess over every single detail of the game
    • have others complain about wasting money on such a frivolous pasttime
    • spend endless hours comparing equipment and bemoaning the lack of funds to acquire upgrades...


    Wait a second...
  • However, I do believe virtual golf can be the next golf. Then perhaps after that virtual virtual golf, where you could almost swear you were playing real virtual golf.
  • A place where friends, acquaintances, and perhaps even business partners will meet up to "talk shop" and swap stories. Personally, I can't wait until I have my next job interview in the Deadmines.

    Deadmines? Deadmines? Which entry level position are you trying to obtain?
  • I've never heard of any online game called "golf". Who the hell would want to play golf online?

  • Joi Ito is an exception, or the start of a trend? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mcguyver ( 589810 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @05:09PM (#14681481) Homepage
    Joi Ito is a rare breed of Warcraft player. He's a very successful entrepreneur and it's doubtful he has many peers online. Just because he plays Warcraft, does that necessarily mean Warcraft is accepted as a good place to talk shop? I would like to be in the presence of this guy and would play the game (again) for a chance to shoot ideas off him, but more likely than not any chatter on Warcraft is going to be about someone's day doing tech support.
  • There's a mistake here. World of Warcraft is actually predicted to be the next GORF

    -carl

  • won't replace golf (Score:2, Interesting)

    by MrJynxx ( 902913 )
    Ok,

    About 5million ppl worldwide play WoW. I'm sure many more people play golf. I suspect maybe MMORPG's can be used for team building, but not building new business contacts. How are you to know the guy on the other end isn't a 10 year old kid.

    This posting did kinda make me laugh. I personally play WoW with a boss who is two levels above me, so it's definitley helped break the "oo your to high of a manager to talk to" gap. It also provides me with a way to discuss shop outside of the normal bounds, but
  • All the Walking. World of Walking.

  • You bet it will... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Harlow_B_Ashur ( 35202 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @05:18PM (#14681583)
    ... about the same time Linux rules the desktop.

  • Um no (Score:2)

    by Jack9 ( 11421 )
    There's no indication that this is true. A couple suspicious anecdotes, serving to hype the game, do not qualify.
  • How about creating a WoW in-game Golf? Where Alliance and Horde can tee off and play a few rounds over the game land?
  • Oh... wait. I get it. They're talking about that old white man ( and Tiger Woods ) thing where you wear lame clothes and hit a tiny white ball around a big, expensive, manicured lawn.

    Dude, I don't care if it's WoW as long as *something* replaces that kind of thing as a business tool... I couldn't afford green fees as a kid, and I'm not about to learn to golf *now*.

  • Realistically, this article is entirely bunk, even on the elementary level the arguments presented that WoW could somehow present itself as a medium for business meetings or and meeting beyond that of a social gathering of people already established in game is ludicrus. WoW, at its most basic level, is a game. It would be equivilant to say that the game Monopoloy or Scrabble could have become a "medium" for communication. The only communication offered by WoW that exceeds chat, which, by the way, is achieve
    • If you are in a high-end raiding guild, you can find out a -lot- about someones leadership ability, I assure you.

      How they handle adversity, boredom, burnout, etc. is very critical to the success of the guild, especially when you get to BWL-type raiding (or even putting MC on farm status).

      We (as one of these guilds) have seen all these problems and more. Running a high-end raiding guild means coordinating 40-80 people's schedules (for MC/BWL/ZG/WorldBoss/etc), getting them to show up dependably and on-time,
  • WoW has become so ubiquitous that most people where I work have at least played it, if they're not currently playing it. It makes transition to new groups/coworkers a little bit easier (some common ground outside work), and can act in place of the typical sports conversations that we used prior to MMORPGs.

    I have friends that I've played MMORPGs with for years (and RPGs before we all got real jobs and ended up scattered to the winds), and we find MMORPGs are a fun way to keep in touch that allow us all t
  • Golf tends to be associated with the CIO and CEO types chatting it up over business deals. World of Warcraft would instead tend to be the common ground of the workplace person.

    It certainly seems to be for me. A few of my co-workers and I sit down at lunch and talk about the weekend's instance runs, guild drama, etc. It beats being overheard while talking about how the management can't seem to tell a hard drive from a processor.

    And yes, that's a generalization. I've yet to meet a boss that plays WoW in m
  • One the one hand I stopped playing WoW because it took up far too much time from family, mainly because there's not pause button and although it's a lot easier to get into and out of then EQ back in the day, when the munchkin wants some play time it's too hard to just stop... ...On the other hand there's CIV4...it's really paused ALL of the time, and for some reason it's equally hard to stop, if not harder.

    What's the point of this story? I like stories.

  • I'm not an avid WoW gamer, but I suspect it lacks the perky, sinlge, flirty beer chick that drives by every 20 minutes. Somehow, yelling upstairs to ask Mom to "throw another Mountaind Dew down to the basement" doesn't have the same appeal.

  • I can identify everyone on my team who abuses "l337" speak and fire them. I honestly think my team would be better off without anyone who chooses to type in a juvenile manner just for a misguided perception of being cool.
  • Anyone in a hiring position at the company should really have enough experience to be doing Molten Core instead.
  • I should write an article that asks if Tennis is like P2P file sharing, and the in the article explain that they aren't.

    After that, I'll write an article that asks if Apple's new strategy is similair to Abortion Rights. Of course, the answer is no.

    The only part of the article that hints that golf may be good for tech discussions is in the first paragraph. He says there that many water-cooler discussions revolve around WoW. The rest of the article says that the opposite situation does not happen.

    My

  • different servers? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by h3llfish ( 663057 ) on Thursday February 09, 2006 @06:31PM (#14682310)
    I've discovered that various people I run into during the course of my day play WoW, but it's impossible for me to "hang out" with them in a virtual way because they are on different servers. Even if I start a new character on my friend's server, I can't run with him, because I'll be a rank noob while he's got 3 epics already.

    So the analogy isn't perfect, as many other replies have already said. BUT, I could easily see groups of people who work at the same company gaming together on a regular basis. And if one of those folks happened to be your boss, that would be a major advantage you would have over your non-gamer coworkers. So everyone who is spitting up on themselves about how imperfect this analogy is should probably chill out, and go find out what server their boss is on.
  • Is that potions? Yay for saving 3 letters.
  • Oh, yes. Because when I think about making business deals, I think to myself: how can I have this conversation over a third-party server, probably in plain-text?
  • Golf is the next WoW! Picture it, you get together with your boss and a few other underlings, and head out to the golf course dressed up as orcs, and go around kicking the shit out of groups from rival companies dressed as alliance folk. Plenty of good bonding opportunities here, and you might get to permanently reduce market competition as well.
  • Dear god, please, no.

    World of Warcraft is utterly repulsive to me, even more than most other similar games.

    I will lose all faith in humanity if World of Warcraft becomes even marginally accepted anywhere outside smelly, unwashed nerds basements, dorm rooms, and bachelor pads.

    As a former MMORPG player, for many years, words cannot express my loathing for World of Warcraft.

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