RUMOR: WoW to Go Mobile in 2008

Baris Karadogan, a venture capitalist with ComVentures, is predicting that a scaled-down version of World of Warcraft will be gracing mobile phones in 2008. According to Baris, “You will be able to play a small version of WoW on your cell to win a small number of experience points. The game will be different but it will be the extension of the overall experience. So when you have three hours free, you’ll play the real thing, when you have 30 minutes free you’ll play a small casual game on your PC that counts towards your experience in the big game and when you have 5 minutes free you’ll play the mobile handset version.”

Could the most popular MMO of all time really be headed to mobile phones? Don’t get in an uproar just yet as this has not been confirmed nor denied by Blizzard at this point, but a new form of playing our favorite MMO is not so far-fetched. Jeffery Steefel, the executive producer on Turbine’s Lord of the Rings Online, spoke of this possible development of MMO interaction when CVG spoke with him last year.

During the interview, Jeffery mentioned: “I’ve got this thing called Lord of the Rings that my subscription, depending on how much money I pay, entitles me access to in different ways. Each device, each way of interacting, has a different strength and weakness. So I can manage my inventory on a cell phone very easily, I can do crafting on a cell phone. Doing a raid on a console? That’s cool. Doing more social things, chatting, maybe that’s better on a PC. Think of it that way – I built this game, now I’m going to translate it and put it on this thing, put it on that thing. It’s a broader vision, it’s harder, more risky, but that’s where we headed”.

I can see something like this occurring on a cell phone with a large enough screen such as the iPhone, but when the majority of us still own phones with puny little screens, it will cause nothing more than a headache. However, it is not something we should ridicule because we have seen huge strides and major growth in the mobile phone gaming venue this past year alone.

Via: CVG via WRAL