World of Warcraft

Metachronos overall score = 94 / 100

Positive
# Huge, beautiful, seamless world
# High streamlined and conducive to short or long play sessions
# Exciting, action-packed combat
# Elegant, easy-to-use interface
# Excellent music and sound

Negative
# Some stability issues immediately following launch
# Player-versus-player elements not complete

Though massively multiplayer online role-playing games have been around for years, it has taken this long for the genre's breakthrough hit to finally emerge. Here is the online role-playing game you should play, no matter who you are. This is because World of Warcraft brings out all the best aspects of this style of gaming, if not many of the best aspects of gaming in general. It also features many of the specific characteristics that have made Blizzard Entertainment's previous games so entertaining, memorable, long-lasting, and successful. Of course, the company's past track record did not guarantee that World of Warcraft could have turned out this well. Such high quality simply cannot be expected, nor should it be missed. No small part of the pleasure of playing World of Warcraft comes from admiring its richly detailed, visually inspired gameworld. The game sports its own cohesive, highly stylized look that's influenced by comic book art and anime, so it's far less "vanilla" than the look of most games and therefore likely to polarize players. Most of these players will probably think World of Warcraft looks fantastic, while a few of them might not like these characters' exaggerated features and animations, perhaps because they don't look realistic. At any rate, from an artistic standpoint, it's hard to deny that World of Warcraft is impressive. Not only is the game filled with tons of imaginative characters and creatures, but the topography of the world itself seems vibrant, larger than life, and incredible in scope, yet somehow believable because the art direction is so consistent.



World of Warcraft also sounds uncharacteristically excellent for an online RPG. Subtle ambient effects work wonderfully in concert with the visuals, making the world seem that much more alive. Excellent audio cues highlight key moments, such as when you level up, when a friend of yours comes online, or when you accept or accomplish a quest. Beautifully composed symphonic music punctuates your travels, perfectly synchronizing with the sense of wonder you will likely experience as you set foot into the game's different, colorful regions. The music truly is outstanding, but by default it plays rather softly, mostly just for an extra bit of ambience. Meanwhile, Warcraft III fans will feel right at home during battles, which feature many of the same hard-hitting effects, as well as plenty of new ones. The game even makes great use of stereo effects as well as other audio tricks, resulting in clear and resonant echoes within cavernlike environments, in audio distortion when exploring or fighting underwater, and in other such things. World of Warcraft also makes good use of speech, both for player characters' occasional outbursts and also for all non-player characters, who'll verbally greet you, which helps evoke their personalities. Many of the enemies you'll face also make some rather memorable noises when you manage to draw their wrath. The worst thing about World of Warcraft is that you can't just play it all the time. After all, chances are if you start, you'll never want to stop. Again, though, part of what makes this game so remarkable is it doesn't assume that all you have to do in your busy life is play this one game, and so it delivers a high-quality experience regardless of how much or how little time you're able to invest. Paradoxically, then, it can become the last game you'd need to play for weeks, months...who knows? The point is, World of Warcraft features an overall level of quality that's typically reserved for the best offline games, which have always had a leg up on online games in their ability to present tightly-woven, story-driven settings. But World of Warcraft achieves this in the context of a massive, evolving world populated by thousands of other players who you may choose to interact with, which makes the proceedings seem that much more meaningful. This is a stunning achievement that will make you feel privileged to be a game player.

I was watching my cousin play this the other day and it looked real good but dont think i would play it myself.

one of our members is hooked on it and he stopped logging in lol

damn you WOW!

This video game is sexy for the first couple of weeks, but it is HIGHLY repetitive. You go somewhere, kill some stuff, level up, spend an hour walking to another place, kill some stuff, level up. It gets boring.

Snobothehobo wrote:

This video game is sexy for the first couple of weeks, but it is HIGHLY repetitive. You go somewhere, kill some stuff, level up, spend an hour walking to another place, kill some stuff, level up. It gets boring.

thats 99% of all mmorpgs lol

Tymon wrote:

Snobothehobo wrote:

This video game is sexy for the first couple of weeks, but it is HIGHLY repetitive. You go somewhere, kill some stuff, level up, spend an hour walking to another place, kill some stuff, level up. It gets boring.

thats 99% of all mmorpgs lol

I played Ultima Online for 8 years, and I still don't think I've completely quit. A lot of MMORPGs are quite boring after the first couple weeks, though.

Snobothehobo wrote:

Tymon wrote:

Snobothehobo wrote:

This video game is sexy for the first couple of weeks, but it is HIGHLY repetitive. You go somewhere, kill some stuff, level up, spend an hour walking to another place, kill some stuff, level up. It gets boring.

thats 99% of all mmorpgs lol

I played Ultima Online for 8 years, and I still don't think I've completely quit. A lot of MMORPGs are quite boring after the first couple weeks, though.

yup your right

I created a carecter on wow yesterday and played it for an hour or 2 lol

I play it at my uncles coz there is no way it would run on this laptop so ill probably play it every saturday for an hour or 2! I found it very confusing at first but im sure ill get the hang of it!

killer-kurt wrote:

I created a carecter on wow yesterday and played it for an hour or 2 lol

I play it at my uncles coz there is no way it would run on this laptop so ill probably play it every saturday for an hour or 2! I found it very confusing at first but im sure ill get the hang of it!

cool

i played the burning crusade and they are almost the same