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WoW - Fun, short, no Depth, and PvP is emphasized.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 14
Date: May 15, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This is an enormously fun game for a few months and then the boredom sets in. The game really ends at level 60 -- it just simply has no depth to it. I played it for about 3 months and just got so bored with it -- most of the quests were variation of Kill X mobs and bring me back Y. Only a few quests had real stories to tell. The chat channels were the most childish I have ever seen and the community seemed to be made up of 12 years old boys.

It seems very novel when you first start but the novelty wears off quickly -- the quest you get in you first 2 home zones are the most interesting but after that Horde and Alliance can do the same quests in the same zones.

The zones are very small and you can "do" them all in a few days - as they aren't difficult. The crafting system is non-existant -- get 5 items and hit combine. A really primitive system -- plays like it was an afterthought.

I think the worse thing in the game is the PvP -- now I am strictly a PvE player and I did not like having PvP on the same server I played on. There is only ruleset -- so PvE classes are constantly being "nerfed" to balance PvP. Also you can get quests to do which make you turn PvP for about 10 minutes --- no warning about the quest till it happens.

Blizzard does everything possible to force players into PvP -- and much of their new content is constantly PvP oriented -- This makes the game little better than a massive Diablo. They want you go to to battlegrounds and areas which are strictly PvP -- and some of the best rewards are only attainable via PvP. I am sorry I don't care for that mindset on the part of the developer.

Actually I went back to EQ2 and with all the new changes it is a much more solid game than WoW. Better and more quests, bigger game world -- no PvP on PvE servers.

Do not buy the game at this time

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 16 / 28
Date: March 30, 2005
Author: Amazon User

When the game came out things worked pretty well. The glowing reviews were well deserved. But with each passing day since, the bugs and stability have gotten worse. It has now gotten to the point that the servers go down everyday. And each time the servers go down the length of time they are down gets longer. Most of the time the servers are down for a few minutes to a couple of hours. Today it is now approaching 12 hours downtime and that is for nearly half the servers and the most popular ones. It wouldn't be that bad if the downtimes were when most people were not playing. But the downtimes almost always occur in the evening at the peak player times.

There are many bugs that many players know about and go unfixed. It has become the old doctor joke. You know, the patient says "Doctor, it hurts every time I do this" and the doctor says "Don't do that". That is how many players play the game, there are many things we are supposed to be able to do but when we do it the game locks up or crashes, among other things. So we avoid doing certain things. Again, with each passing day more and more bugs appear.

The PVP(player versus player) system in the game is probably the worst and most pointless of any online only game in existence. This can be especially frustrating for players trying to level on a PVP server. There is supposed to be a system that punishes players from killing other players of a significantly lower level. This is called "ganking". After the first couple of areas on a PVP server you enter areas that are PVP enabled, meaning the other faction can attack you. Unless you have very high level players with you, you will be "ganked" and many times. Which makes it very hard to level and complete missions in these areas. After about level 15 you enter the PVP enabled areas.

When you do PVP with players of nearly equal level there is no reward for winning or punishment for losing. You also do not gain any experience. It is pointless. The community has been screaming to Blizzard to give PVP meaning. Blizzard was supposed to have a meaningful PVP system in place when the game was released and have promised this ever since the game came out. But, again, with each passing day, we are told something is coming soon. We are still waiting.

All things considered, with the server instability, the bugs and the meaningless PVP system I would suggest waiting to buy the game at this time. I would wait about 3 to 6 months, check the latest reviews(make sure you read the date the reviews were submitted, don't be fooled by reviews that were written when the game first came out) to see if things have improved.

(Edited August 13, 2006)

As you can see the original review was written over a year ago. What has happened since then? If I didn't know better, it almost appears that Blizzard had my concerns at the top of the list for things to address.

The game works almost flawlessly, with only the occasional down time, lags and bugs. But honestly what MMO doesn't have these problems? WOW now works as good or better than any MMO.

Some people now say the PVP is the best part of the game and it is something that everyone should give a try, especially the PVP haters, you may be surprised how much you like it.

Kudos to Blizzard for doing it right!

Immersive and plain fun

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 9 / 12
Date: September 01, 2006
Author: Amazon User

What a great game! It successfully combines the winning features of my favorite roleplaying games: The wonderful sense of exploration (as in the Might and Magic series), the fast action (as in Diablo II) and great questfilled storylines (used well in many games, but most recently in Never Winter Nights).

The game itself is a MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game), which means that you play in with hundreds of other players being in the world with you. They're not from around the globe though - there are special American servers. I haven't tried other MMORPGs, so I can't compare - but it gives a great game dynamic to play with lots of others. There are enough to choose your friends from, but not so many that you won't begin to recognise some after a while (unlike, e.g. Diablo where the chances of running into the same person twice are slim). The one big disadvantage to MMORPGs is that there's a monthly FEE for playing the game. As you install it you need to type in your credit card number. No withdrawal will happen until you've played a month, but each month after the first will cost around $14.

The world has two warring factions that you need to choose between: The Alliance (Human, Night Elf, Dwarf and Gnome), and the Horde (Undead, Troll, Orc or Tauren). You can choose to play in a PvP world, where alliance players can attack horde players and vice versa, or in normal worlds where you can only be attacked by other players if you agree to it (creatures in the world will not extend you the same courtesy, though).

The gameplay is very easy to get into, and quite hard to fully master - but you'll learn as you go. Thousands of skills, items, talents, monsters, quests and environments give the world a depth and near endless possibilities, but you won't feel overwhelmed, as you don't need to use or understand them all to be an efficient player. The graphics are very smooth and pretty. Enjoy - but watch the time! Set an alarm clock to remind you that you have a real life too :-)

So much better than EQ...I love it!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: December 21, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Well the only other MMORPG I have played is EQ, so that must be my comparison. So many improvements...where to begin...I played EQ 2 for a couple weeks and mostly did not like it. The lag was the worst part. Unless you have a top of the line system it is impossible to play unless you set the graphics to "horrible". In WOW the graphics are more cartoonish, but still beautiful and THERE IS NO LAG. I was so happy. The travel system is great, no more running forever to get somewhere and no more half hour boat rides. The quests are awesome and actually worth doing and give great exp. You can lvl up quickly just doing quests and get nice items while doing so...and you can actually figure them out without doing a bunch of online research. I love the loot system the best I think. Good items can drop randomly off of any lvl appropriate mob. In EQ the good items were on rarely spawning named mobs that were always camped by higher lvl players and the casual player never had a shot at them, or had to buy them in the bazaar. So the casual soloer like me can have gear generally as good as anyone else, I love that. Also, when you kill a quest mob it will drop the necessary item for everyone in your group. So one kill and you are done instead of camping the same mob for days. Also, the named mobs I have encountered pop fast, not hours apart. Not to mention how many nice touches they have put in the interface to make grouping and communicating with friends easier. OH, and the tradeskills! They are actually worth doing, at least so far (im only lvl 25). I skin and do leathwork and most of my armor is stuff I made myself. It's great...and it does not take a million attempts to gain a skill lvl, you can lvl your skill pretty fast. Anyway this is the funnest and most addicting game I've ever played and I would reccommend it to anyone who enjoys mmorpg's.

A great MMO! And it'll save you money!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: April 15, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I picked this game up maybe 2 months ago, and I think it's great! I played Final Fantasy XI a few years back and had fun for a while. About 2 months into it (FFXI), I hit a wall as far as progressing through the game. Quests took way too long and the rewards were rather lame. If you want to gain levels, you NEED a party (I barely made it to my low 20's in 3 months). Also, travel was very lengthy; getting from one major city to the next took at least 30 minutes on foot. Getting killed was also an annoying setback as well. Finally, if you want more than one character, you need to cough up an extra $1 per month.

Well, World of Warcraft changed all that! Quests not only give you some reward that you may or may not use, but experience, money and reputation. I've played for 2 months now, and one of my characters is 36, and the other 2 are in their teens (no extra fee either). I had a lot more time to put into FFXI, since I played it during the summer. I've been a full time grad student during my time with WoW. By the way, most of that leveling was done solo! Blizzard also took care of the annoying travel times: hearth stone, trains, boats, magic and gryphons all help you get around a lot faster. As far as getting killed, you might have to spend a little time running back to your corpse (or taking a hit on your armor repair bill, your choice), but you loose no experience and you have no chance to level-down. Ultimately, this is a very well-done game.

If you're wondering how this game will save you money, try it. You'll likely go out much less, and hence will save money.

Been playing the game since its release almost 2 years ago........

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: May 16, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Well I think by this time everyone including non-gamers have heard about World of warcraft. Its in the news, its on tv, its talked about at work, school, college etc. Families play the game together and the game has even contributed towards breaking of relationsips, falling of grades, people losing jobs etc but inspite of all these facts World of warcraft is still the best MMO out there. Lots of MMO's have come and gone trying to compete or take over the throne from this game but none have suceeded thus far. I have personally over the years have switched back and forth between wow and others mmo's to only come back to wow. This game has some strange and almost majical allure to it.

This all being said I throughly enjoy the game. It's very solo friendly. Has top-notch graphics and the biggest aspect is the huge world which truly does justice to the words 'epic' and 'massive' when its comes to mmo's. The game has both a good and a darker faction to play. The classes are numerous and well thought off too. You have everything from pure specialized classes to hybrids. Choose your faction, pick a class and off you go. The game caters to different playstyle too...for pve oriented people you have pve servers and for hardcore pvp oriented people you have pvp servers(full of gankage and griefing if thats what you like). However, the great thing about the game is that even being on pve servers you have various option to pvp and test your mettle against real players. A person can flag themselves for world pvp or participate in instanced battlegrounds(my favourite)to pvp at your time and choosing. The game also has the feel that there is a constant war going on among an epic struggle between different factions for resources and philosphies. Cities gets attacked, players gets attacked and there are constant raging battles going in battlgrounds.

But aside from all this the game offers some of the most fun questing that i have ever come across in mmo's. If you want to just quest and better your character via leveling it up than the game will grip you too and no wonder people are known to loose a part of their life to this game. But my advice....'Moderation' and you will be all happy both in real and your virtual life.

In conclusion....I will advice this game to anyone who is intrested in playing a great mmo that is not a bore also. A testament to this is my 2 years with this game among all the other posters who gave this game high marks too. Check it out yourself but 'BEWARE'..they are lots of 'clones' out there but none have even half the majic or charm or fun which is the hallmark of a game called World of Warcraft.

The single best MMORPG

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: September 18, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I've played the first EverQuest, Lineage II, and Guild Wars. Frankly, none of those games can compare to World of Warcraft.

First, I think the graphics are far superior. Not because they look more realistic - because they don't. WoW has it's own world. There's a style to the game that is really pleasing to look at. Think of it like this, remember Terminator 2? When that film came out, the FX were awesome - they blew everyone away. Now, 13 years later, they look old and fake. The same is going to happen to Lineage or Everquest II. The graphics look great now - but they won't in a few years. They'll be dated. WoW, on the other hand, will probably do a better job of standing the test of time. They went for a pleasing appearance over "reality". It may not be for everyone, but I love it.

Secondly, this game is made to be played. It's that simple. While that may seem obvious - those who've played the first Everquest (or the second, I gather), will understand that game play isn't always a factor when these games are being made. In EQ, quests (ironically, considering "quest" is in the game's name) were basically pointless. Unless you grouped, you had to be a few levels higher than the quest to complete it (meaning the reward wasn't that great). Not only that, but it was hard to know what to do, and where to go to complete the quest. You had to get on-line and look them up, write down the instructions, and then grind for hours or days. Not so in WoW. You are given a quest log with fairly clear instructions on what to do. Many quests can be completed early (like finishing a level 35 quest at level 34), even when soloing. And you have trackers - which track the items you need for your quest (for instance, informing you that you've killed 5 of the 10 mobs you need).

And this game works for solo players, or those who like to group. Or, for that matter, those who like to do both. I have a level 50 - and I've done about 98% of that solo, and without long grinding. After a few months of casual play, I have that character, a lvl 34 hunter, a lvl 30 paladin, and about six other characters 20+. But this game is still really challenging.

If you get bored with questing, you can always go into instances (because of the "elite" mobs, you either have to be 5-10 lvls higher than the mobs if you're soloing, or go in there in a group) or do raids.

And, best of all, you are rewarded in game. In EQ, trade skills were pointless. You could never carry enough things in your bags to actually advance your trade skills quickly, or you'd never turn a profit till you got your skill past 200 (but you'd spend a fortune getting it up that high). In WoW, you get most of the stuff you need from the world. Either from the mobs you kill (skinning them, or as drops) or from mineral nodes and herbs in the game. It's extremely easy to keep pace with your leveling - or to even exceed it (for instance, being able to make equipment for a few levels higher).

The variability in WoW isn't as great as EverQuest. There are 8 races for each faction (Horde and Alliance), and 9 or so classes. The character customization is alright (two characters of a given race don't all look alike, but some races only have a few good choices). But the armor is what sets the game apart. From about level 15 (once you start having a lot of uncommon equipment) until mid-50s, you seldom come across another player that looks like you. You can mix armor sets, or go full the full set. There are rare drops that you can only get in instances or raids, and there are uncommon drops that can be found on mobs in the world. Plus (as already mentioned) you can make your own equipment with leatherworking, tailoring, or blacksmithing.

In short, this game is the best of it's kind. You don't have to play all day, every day. In fact, this game encourages you not to. You get a rested bonus for being logged out (this bonus accumulates faster if you're in an inn). This bonus DOUBLES your XP for kills. So you level twice as fast - which comes in handy as a higher level.

Humble Beta Testers Opinion

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 10
Date: September 18, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Well I have been playing this WOW game for months now as an actual highly active Beta tester and I can say that many of the points mentioned are close to true. The game is awesome, it is still being worked on. I am doing my part to make bug reports and help tweak the game to perfection. I can tell you I have also pre-ordered two copies myself as well.
I have played all classes, all races and all skills.
I am a Guild Master and will be taking my Guild into Retail. We have 50+ members and we invite you with positive attitudes to join us.
I am 39 myself, not that it should matter but I do appreciate that the game has functional enjoyment for young and older players alike. There are in fact many options for solo playing and as many for small teams to cover a lot of ground even faster. Some areas are fast paced heavy intense action and others are laid back.
It is a fact that experience points get divided amoung groups in parties. But it is a simple fact that a team can take on a lot more creatures of a lot larger size (more XP) and do it in much less time, something that balances out very well. You will discover that questing nets you more XP than just killing and groups make questing much faster.
Most of my Characters I have leveled twice in a session with groups while solo only one level due to time spent healing myself for the extra wounds I recieved. Of course solo there is less concern over dividing treasure. I recomend exploring all avenues of the game as I have.

Like most things in life you will get out of it what you put into it. If your frustrated get yourself a cold drink and ask someone for help. Having guild mates that can be there for you is a huge plus, saves time in questing also. We often chat across continents even though we are sometimes playing solo.
I can't speak for all Guilds, I started mine so that I could find other like minded players to interact with, we are an easy going bunch but we have a variety of interests from those who just want to go "fishing" to hard core "Raiders" as a group we are economically superior also because we can support each other without paying merchants for as much. One characters trash is another's needed material so why pay a middle goblin?
There are a variety of tradeskills available to experience and develope, we as beta testers are currently scrambling to dump all but two skills since that is the limit for "Professions".
There are a lot of actual Game Design Industry people doing the testing as well including EQ staff, I am not at liberty to name names but I will say they are very impressed. I find that bit of trivia very interesting and it makes me feel even better about what the end result will be.
I am only posting this because the tornados have shut us down for the moment, otherwise I would be playing and submitting bug reports and suggestions to make sure everything is as good as possible by the time you get it.

Ps I am not paid to do this, although I sure wish I could be.

I pity other MMORPG developers

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 10
Date: March 02, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Awesome game.

1) Game technology
WOW doesn't bring anything new to the genre. There are no dynamic quests or terrain altering effects. There's no global strategy.

What WOW did was take existing technology and implement it better. You get quests, just like other games of this type, but WOW quests are bigger, better and much, much more plentiful. I have leveled from 1 to 60 and always had multiple quests waiting to be done. I had to skip a number of them -- by the time you've done most of the quests, you're ready to move to a higher level area, meaning some quests will still be new to you if you level a second character. There are combat skills and spells, just like other games of this type, but WOW has more of them with more tactical options that really gives you something to think about as you fight your way to the top. There are dungeons, just like other games of this type, but WOW dungeons range from "medium" to "superhuge". Other games have loot, WOW has more loot, with more variety, meaning less of a huge gap between the "haves" and "have nots".

Etc. WOW doesn't do anything really new, it just took what the genre already had and made it all better.

2) PvP
Player versus player action is optional but I recommend giving it a shot. Normal servers have 100% consensual PvP. You must do something specific before you can attack or be attacked. PvP servers have it opened up by dividing the world into three types of areas: Horde, Alliance and Contested.

In a Horde zone, Alliance can be attacked at will but they cannot fire until fired upon. Vice versa for Alliance zones. These are basically the lowest level zones, from around level 1-20 or so. You can get your feet planted and learn your class and get some abilities before you have to worry about being attacked.

Contested zones are "team PvP". Horde and Alliance can attack each other on sight. You cannot attack your own team (except in special Arenas). There are no level limits -- a level 60 can squish a level 30 if they are both in a contested zone.

However, unlike many other PvP games, level differences are diluted. The level 30 will not be completely helpless. Though his weapons and spells will do much less damage and he will be physically weaker, he can at least fight enough that a level 60 facing a group of level 30's will be facing a likely death -- death by pinpricks, but they can definately impact him. My secondary character is a Warlock, and at level 26 my "Fear" spell works pretty well even against level 60's. They show up to murder me for a free win because I'm so small and feeble, they think again as I cast Fear on them, which sends them running away uncontrollably as I high-tail it in the other direction and hide behind a tree.

3) Blizzard's "no tollerance" policy.
Sony Online Entertainment is notorius for allowing hackers and cheaters and troublemakers to continue to play the game. Blizzard is notorius for banning them from the field. This is excellent. As with any game, hacks and cheats get made and discovered, but Blizzard is quick to find these people and suspend their accounts.

Like a good referee, Blizzard keeps the game fair for honost players and I appreciate that as much as any technical aspect of the game.

I can't say enough good about it, this game rocks, it's by far the best MMORPG yet.

We can quibble over the graphical style, class balance or "lag", but issues like that are almost immaterial. MMORPG's all update, graphics change, class balance changes, lag issues come and go, it's the same from UO to EQ2. The important thing is that the design is solid, the content is solid, the mechanics are solid, WOW is going to be the game to play for the forseeable future. I honostly pity other MMORPG developers because unless they invent something totally new, I don't see how they can draw the fantasy RPG crowd away from World of Warcraft.

time drain

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 10
Date: December 15, 2004
Author: Amazon User

When I can play Doom 3 and HL 2 with ease, I was shocked that I got all sorts of issues with World of Warcraft when I first started playing (solved by self), and again with a recent (12/7) patch. It had me unable to play due to significant amount of lag I experienced (infinite loop) while in game.

However, much to my delight, I was able to play lag/problem free for the past 3 days (since 12/12). That made me confident in my 5 star rating for this game. Since I had done nothing else to my system for this last problem, the answer can only be Blizzard fixing the problem they caused. This shows that Blizzard isn't sitting on the high praise on this game, and is constantly working on the game not just in expansion of game content, but in making the game playable to a broad an audience as possible. Big thumbs up for that!

The game itself -

The game is surprisingly demanding on your system requirement. I'm forced to set my graphics and sound pretty low to run this game smoothly. But even with lowered graphics, I'm really enjoying the art style they chose for this game. Also worth noting is the distinctive look each area is given. When you leave one region and enter a new one, there is a completely different feeling you get from the surrounding. The subtle touches they put in each region is brilliantly designed.

There are still a lot for me (lvl 22, Undead Rogue my main character) to do in this game. New areas to explore, quests to complete, new skills to learn, animals to skin, leather armor to make, auctions to watch, and even goofing around is fun! Nothing like dancing on top of an open flame, let me tell ya!

This game still suffer from leveling syndrome. But thusfar, I have never felt like the next level is too far off, and never did I travel far to complete my quests. And quests themselves aren't too difficult to do solo, so long as you go for the yellow quests. Yes, color coded the quests are. Green is below your level range, yellow is in your level range, red is...wait til you level up or get a group started. Easier the quest for you, less exp, harder, more exp. So there is some incentive to try out the more difficutl for your level quests.

World of Warcraft has a craft selection. But I find it just not worth that much to invest my time in crafting. Also, the game lacks that involveness with your character. There's very little push for roleplaying outside your own need to do so. YOu can't set up shop, you can't get your own place...you are constantly on the move from one area to another. Once you finish with your starting region, there's little reason outside of visiting the major city to even come back to it. Since all the quests and monsters in your level range is localized, you never have to travel back to where you were. Your guild has a name, and you have it registered, but that's about it. There's a mail system, and guild chat system, but there is no place you're guild can call their own. In short, there really isn't anything that connects you, the person, to the character you play in the game. World of Warcraft is more of an action/adventure title then a rpg one, in my opinion.

A solid game, and as other MMORPG's have shown, things can only get better *knock on wood.

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