World of Warcraft Review - Mac

There are many reasons why 2004 will be remembered for years to come, be the wars, elections, or scandalous pop stars. But for a slew of hopelessly addicted massively multiplayer online gamers, 2004 will be remembered as the year that World of WarCraft became a part of their lives. In a genre flooded with blockbuster name competition, against such brands as EverQuest, Final Fantasy, and even Star Wars, Blizzard has shown that it leads the pack when it comes to making incredible, compelling game experiences. World of WarCraft has enjoyed an incredible amount of hype going in to its release, but does it live up to expectations? Without a doubt, that answer is an enthusiastic yes.

A Battle for the Ages

World of WarCraft drops players in the midst of one of the most classic conflicts in gaming. What once began as orcs vs. humans, has expanded into the bitter war between the horde and the alliance. Good and evil at its very best, you can choose from four different races from each faction. As a member of the alliance, you can choose from the humans, dwarves, gnomes, or night elves. If savagery and evil are more your cup of tea, then the forces of the horde’s orcs, trolls, undead, or the minotaur-like tauren are at your disposal. Each race has its own set of abilities and advantages, and all are useful in different class combinations, but as befits this type of game, excelling at some more than others.

Class is in Session

Both sides have access to the same set of standard classes, each filling a well-defined role. Warriors lead their groups into the fray, decked out in the toughest armors. Mages cast punishing spells, while hunters command a tamed woodland creature and assail their foes from a distance with either bow or gun. Warlocks are more devilish in their wizardly ways, and control demons such as imps or succubi, while diminishing their enemies’ abilities with a variety of curses. Priests are the most powerful healers, while also commanding formidable combat abilities, and druids command nature-based abilities, including the ability to turn into an animal form. Rogues sneak into combat, and use poisons to their advantage -- scruples having no place on the battlefield, after all.

Each side of the conflict also has a powerful class all its own. The Alliance has the holy paladins, while the Horde sends its versatile shaman into the fray. The classes are well balanced for group combat in a rock/paper/scissors sense, with some classes excelling at defeating others, while not faring well against those designed to capitalize upon their weaknesses. Best of all, each class can solo effectively, for when you don’t have time to get a group together, or just want to spend a few minutes killing beasts before bedtime.

Your characters will gain power and abilities by adventuring, which is equal parts questing and the defeating of enemies. Questing is one of the areas where World of WarCraft absolutely shines. Whenever you encounter a character in the world that has a quest appropriate for your level they are clearly marked, and keeping track of the quests is a cinch as well, with a well organized quest log that marks your progress and provides you with detailed instructions for how to proceed. Important areas are created as individually instanced zones for your party, so you’ll never have to camp out and wait for a specific boss enemy to spawn. In essence, all of the drudgery and boring wait times that have plagued these games in the past has been eliminated.

Tricks of the Trade

It seems that Blizzard has meant for players to simply enjoy themselves and achieve steadily progressing fulfillment, as opposed to the punishing ways that other games have dealt with such issues as trading, and character death. The in-game auction houses are a simple, versatile, and elegant way to sell and trade in-game commodities such as tradeskill ingredients and magic weapons that would best suit someone else. And death, well known for being a horrid, gut-wrenching event in nearly every other online RPG, is well handled in World of WarCraft.

After dying at the hands of your enemies you simply spawn as a ghost in a nearby graveyard, and have the option of running back to your corpse for revival with no penalty, or you can revive at the gravesite instantly if you choose to endure some temporary item degradation and 10 minutes of reduced effectiveness. You won’t lose experience, you won’t lose your treasured possessions, and you won’t curse at your monitor because you’ve lost two hours of your life due to a mismatched encounter or a griefing opposing player.

Well-conceived play mechanics does not create a wonderful role-playing game, but once you take into account World of WarCraft’s endearing graphics and formidable aural features, you begin to see the complete package. The seamless world allows you to transition from one beautiful locale to the next, and the consistent artistic design of the environments make it the most visually enticing game world you could hope to explore. From barren plains, to spooky forests and icy mountain ranges, everything has been crafted with the distinctive artistic style that endeared players to WarCraft in the past.

The characters may be seen as cartoony by some, but the relatively low polygon counts aren’t a negative when one considers that the game runs incredibly smoothly on mid-range systems, while other games necessitate the mightiest of video cards. World of WarCraft derives elements of a steampunk setting, which seamlessly melds traditional sword and sorcery fantasy with technology and humor. Everything has been rendered with this style in mind, from the familiar "zug-zug" orc sound bytes, to the goblin zeppelins and gnomish technology.

The Power of WarCraft Compels You!

World of WarCraft has taken massively multiplayer online games to a new plateau. Sure, there are growing pains. At times you’ll deal with server lag and disconnections, and it still needs more dedicated content. But the steadily increasing rewards system is that X factor that makes you want to play an extra 15 minutes, even in the wee hours of the morning. Best of all, the Horde versus Alliance conflict in World of WarCraft is essential to the game, and few games have as much potential for exciting player versus player action. At the moment there is no system of rewards for player versus player combat, but from what is now in place and the information Blizzard has released regarding its upcoming Battlegrounds expansion, one can presume that good things are in store for the future. World of WarCraft is well worth the subscription fee, and may well be the only game you will want to play for months or even years to come.  This is the best example of what a massively multiplayer online game can offer, and is highly recommended to anyone who simply enjoys playing games.