Personally I don't care about the 'numeric rating' and I think it's hypocritical to come in here and start ranting about fanbois. The sole point that I and several others are making in response to the review is that the graphics are not obsolete, they look the way they're supposed to look for this game, and that a lot of what passes for 'state of the art' graphics in newer MMO's is really pretty ugly in comparison.
I'm neither a fan or a hater. I didn't like WoW to begin with because of the lack of class choices (i'm used to having 30+ classes to choose from) and the fact that the quests are so boring that I couldn't get into the game...at all, much less reroll another character to repeat the same boring content. You do eventually repeat the same content, no matter what different race you reroll. Assuming you find more than 1 race attractive enough to play, which I didn't really in the original WoW (I like Humans only the first time around).
Because Vanguard was unfinished, I went ahead and bought TBC. I started a BE Paladin and I loved the game after that. However, after 30 levels, I ended up repeating some of the same content as before or I only had content to choose from that was in a gloomy and depressing area, which made it very boring to play...so I quit and went back to DAoC.
I think the graphics are fine. The guild I joined on a RPing server, was 80+ strong, plus we were gearing up for raids and such...we still RPed. We were 1 of many guilds like ours, so saying RPing doesn't exist is stupid. Show me another game that has multiple guilds on one server with 80+ members that RP and do all content in the game.
TBC is a good expansion, because it offered new content for the majority of your playing time and they released it in a polished state, unlike many game companies we know. That is my short review. Take it for what it's worth.
MMORPG's w/ Max level characters: DAoC, SWG, & WoW
Currently Playing: WAR Preferred Playstyle: Roleplay/adventurous, in a sandbox game.
you give an expansion pack a score of 7 (Still a good score) which adds minimal NEW stuff and all the fanbois are up in arms.
It's a review for gods sake. It is subject to the reviewers opinion. Besides, this one is MUCH better then most of the retarded reviews I have read about it. It seems gaming sites give the review to the guy on their staff that plays it and worships it.
So, really. It's ok.
The problem, i believe, is that most people relate the score to their old grades in school. 7=70=C which is in many cases not considered a good thing. Many people do it subconsiously but it still sticks. its supposed to be 1=new coaster 5=avg 10=OMG!!! so 7 is respectable but most only see 7 as just a notch above a D grade in school.
Well, "people" are morons then.
Nothing new I guess.
I think the score is quite fair. I mean, is the *new* content in BC really that impressive that you can not imagine something much better?
Pretty good review actually, except for maybe the concern about the graphics (Its the gameplay that's important, don't ya know)
I just question whether BC really meets the promise that it is friendlier to the more casual player. Seems like you need to have a pretty well organized, raid savy guild to tackle the content like Kara.... the fact it has a raid ID pretty much proves this to be true.... casual players need not apply.....
But hey, lots of people are happy and having fun.... regardless of the expansions ratings...
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I found the graphic score very childish. Are you guys going to give a new Everquest expansion a 3 for graphics? How about a 2 for the new UO expansion, because its graphics are clearly outdated compared to todays standards..
the Burning Crusade is an expansion, not a new World of Warcraft.
Just my thoughts. Blizzard could keep the same art style in the game, the same look and designs, if they did better lighting and shadows. If they added a few polygons to the enviroment, so that things like trees were round and not squared it wouldn't change the look of WoW. It would make the trees round. Better graphics doesn't mean the game would look like EQ2 or VG, just that the WoW engine would use some of the software technology that is available. It is a very simple engine doing very simple things; it is outdated compared to modern machines, and doesn't utilize the hardware to it's potential. The styling of the game means absolutely NOTHING about the graphics.
Madden football games have maintaned the same look and feel since the release of Madden '00 for the PS2; yet every installment has improved upon the graphics.
I think the review is spot-on, including the graphics score.
Notice, he didn't rate them a 1. He didn't say they were "bad" graphics, he said they were pretty decent for an MMO circa 2004. You really want a higher score for that? Those of you complaining about the graphics score either have very low standards, or are letting your WoW-love cloud your judgement. It's a nice looking-game, it's got great art direction, but it never has and never will be blow-my-socks-off gorgeous. I would have MAYBE bumped it up to a 6 on artistic merit alone, but as far as whether or not the game has state-of-the-art, cutting-edge, gorgeous graphics, obviously the game doesn't -- and that's BY DESIGN. That's a design choice Blizzard made, allowing the game to run on more lower-end systems, and thus earn more customers. Great business decision, but you don't get a free pass on the graphic score in an honest review because of it.
Notice, also, that not all games that have great graphics are any good (in fact, there are probably more of those than games like WoW). So don't get your panties in a wad. It's a good, honest review, and it's very refreshing to read one instead of the many whore-critic reviews that just rate it a 10 on everything because it's Blizzard.
MMO history: EQ1 - 65 DE Wizard DAoC - 50 Dwarf Thane, 50 Dwarf Healer EvE - Amarr, Caldari BShip Pilot CoH - 40 Ice/Ice Blaster, 40 Dark/Regen Scrapper WoW - 60 Undead Priest, 60 Tauren Warrior LoTRO - 30 Hobbit Burglar Currently Playing - Tabula Rasa
Graphics - While the polycount hasn't increased, the artwork is still within the style of Blizzard. Which is pretty top-notch stuff. There is a pretty large amount of new weapons, armor, and monsters into the expansions so this quote of "...a few new monster skins..." is just quite limited in description. But I guess coming up with a one-sentence description of artwork is just pretty difficult. I do agree that the animations and spell-graphics are pretty simple in their design. Some of the old-world content of the game has a dated look to it, but it should be comparable to say, Everquest. Which they didn't upgrade their graphics for the original content until Everquest 2, and that was 5-6 years into the production. So 2 year old content is still good, but it's not a "stellar-remodelled-everything-for-the-expansion" upgrade. I wouldn't be surprised if the next graphics engine update will include DX10 compatable shaders with it. There is something to say about a game that could have a 25/40 man raid group all doing their spells against a boss and still get 60+FPS on some low-end systems. Blizzard doesn't just have to pander to the high-end gamer, putting normal-mapped, 2k x 2k texture maps on player models that sky rocket to the 6k polycount range.
Music - The new soundtrack is a good expansion of the original. As for battle-music.. that's just crazy talk. You want to hear the battle music every 10 seconds when you're trying to run a killing-quest? To me, that would be more irritating to the gameplay. Even if there was an option to play some battle music in the sound menu, the music would be pointless to the experience. What would have really been a point to talk about was to have a built-in MP3 playlist support. So you could listen to whatever music your MP3 player has, without loading it into the background to play music. They added in the ability to play sounds in-game when you're Alt-tabbed out of the game or not having the window on top. Sometimes that's a good thing.
Sounds - Lots of new voice-acting here. Unlike the original WoW, there's more vocal response lines from bosses. That would be one thing that would make the game experience more complete. Having all the bosses speak would probably take some creativity from the sound dept, but it would be nice to even have an option for it. Perhaps this is the "upgrades" to voice-overs that you speak of? Some of the sounds got recycled into other classes. Hunter's stun having a Rogue's stun sound? It makes everyone annoyed and confused. This is where I would agree that some of the effects should have gotten upgrades. New abilities, new sounds? That would have gotten a plus in my area of it.
Lag - There is lag and everyone sees it. This will always happen unless someone figures out the bottlenecks. Mostly it's the loading of player models in major cities. Everyone and their little sister knows of "Lag-forge". Which is the major thorn in everyone's side when they try to goto the auction houses. When Blizzard can upgrade their graphics engine to minimize this eye-sore, people will be much happier for it. Not to mention the loading of addons. The LUA script keeps getting revised and updated so that Blizzard can curb out bots and auto-farmers to try and make the user-made addons usable. Just that at almost every patch they've been broken. Only on the recent 2.0.10 patch did I not have to re-check the "Load out of date addons".
Roleplay - Meh.. You are what you want to make of it. If you don't feel like playing into it, I understand. Just don't say there isn't any roleplaying in WoW. "Dirty Horde.." "Smelly Alliance." Only those who are into wanting to roleplay in the game will do so. The Burning crusade just extends what you get to roleplay about now. New topics to dicuss. This portion of the review is pretty weak in trying to describe roleplaying in WoW. Now, if there were some objectives (PVP and not), sprinkled throughout the game for the horde and alliance to have some goals to be done, that would be more in the line of immersing the player into a richer Roleplaying gameplay. Just the only portion of the game thats conflicting like this is the Zone PVP objectives in each of the new zones. The only roleplaying experience that's really deep will come from the players in this area. Blizzard doesn't have to make the experience FOR the players.
Community - While it may be fragmented, it's a functioning society. Guilds don't need alliances to know that if you run some instances with another guild or single members, and they do good, you'll invite them back. The chat channels are a good way to have a Guild-to-Guild chat. They're always open and there if people want to chat. If a guild has a problem with another guild's member, they'll either not want them in a raid-group or party for runs. If the person starts griefing another guild, they can complain to the guild leader of the guild. Simple as that. What is starting to become more common and that is taking Blizzard a while to take action on, is the Gold farming and spam ads people get whispered and mailed. Sure, they nuke the player/accounts, but they just reincarnate and come back for more. This is one problem that affects every MMORPG, but should be easier to filter them out.
Customer Service - Most of the time, there really isn't any problem with playing WoW. When it does happen, I've always gotten a GM ticket answered within a day. Instant response isn't a requirement for everything. Though people do have their own opinions of what a GM should help a player with, most problems are pretty minor to the game. Item returns and BOP swapping are most of the tickets. There are those people who do pick on the GMs to get their way done though. Horror stories of GMs refusing to return items or what-not. Then players sending 3-5 tickets until they find a helpful GM that will do what they need of them.
Fun - Something that is always subjective. Just ask the people who still play Counter-strike, quake 3, or Unreal:XMP. I would say that the fun in the game peaked when people were first into it, but probably will plateau back to the level of the original WoW in a few months. Once everyone has lvl 70'd their main characters or one of the new races out.
Value - While $40 is pretty high for what's considered an expansion, it's close to what a top-notch game should have a starting price at. People don't have to get the expansion to enjoy some of the new Jewelcrafting benefits, but they won't be able to go past 60 or play any of the new content without it. Normally an expansion like this would be around $30 for it's content. That would have been a more reasonable price for everyone. The Collector's Edition, which if you look for it around on the net, the DVD has some nice content. The problem is that it wasn't as packed as the WoW:Collector's edition was. There could have been some player-made movies thrown on there and/or a "History of Warcraft" digital book to flip thru to read the storyline from WC1 up through the Burning Crusade. But I guess for those things thats why we have the Internet for. The special nether-welp pet is just a small novelty item. Nothing really to make your Collector's edition any more special than the regular edition in-game.
Anyways, the review could have used some more meat into it. For someone that's "had a month to play it", the points weren't really extensive to make it really a "review" of the expansion. The feeling from the review is that the reviewer wasn't into the game, and not even interested in anything about the expansion in detail. Could have been summed up with "I hate this game. That is all." Which is pretty weak all around for someone to review a game with so little information of a month's worth of knowlege accumilated.
I'd give this review a 3 of 10 on a scale of doing a review of a game out for a month.
There is still no game out that is anywhere close to being as good as WOW - in any context. Vanguard, you say? please, that is the biggest non-immersive, mediocre, bug filled, piece of crap in existence - and this from someone who really tried to like it. EVE Online?- hahaha. I find the graphics in WOW to be great - just what a 'fantasy' setting should be. The game is smooth, it works, it flows, it's as fun and entertaining as you make it . The expansion added some great content - new races, lands, mobs, quests, crafting, story, great pvp scenarios, instances, flying mounts, items. I bought the expansion, installed it , started it up and haven't crashed once since it came out - no lag either. Communitty is, like the game itself, what you make of it - you can find good people to play with if you put some effort into it. I am looking forward to trying LOTRO, Spellborn , and AoC. But until then, and most like through and beyond then, WOW is a phenomenal game I enjoy playing and the expansion just made it even better.
In any context??? Lineage II kicks Wow's graphics ass by a ton. LOTRO is absolutely stunning.
Thanks for the review. Looks interesting. Even if i have no interest in WoW. I did play though (regular, not the expension), but the queue was so rediculous that i deleted the thing.
I found the graphic score very childish. Are you guys going to give a new Everquest expansion a 3 for graphics? How about a 2 for the new UO expansion, because its graphics are clearly outdated compared to todays standards..
the Burning Crusade is an expansion, not a new World of Warcraft.
EQ got a couple graphics revamp. UO will... what we were talking about again? Oh yeah, wow graphics
Hello little hamster. I see you've opened your eyes a bit. Yes...yes, you're in a wheel. What's that you say little hamster? You ran and you ran and you thought you had gotten somewhere? No, I'm sorry little hamster, it's just a wheel. It goes 'round and 'round. Our goal is not to let you go anywhere, our goal is to keep you running. You say you want off the wheel little hamster? That's fine. You go take a rest for a while. We'll get another shiny new wheel prepared for you when you're ready to start running again.
That read like a fair review that gave props to BC where due.
Seriously folks, defending WOW's graphics sounds just a silly as those making excuses for Vanguards bugs ..
Sooner or later you're going to pay the piper that's how this buisness works. Blizz gambled on releasing WOW with dated graphics that run on 3-4 year old systems.
Guess what the gamble paid off with subscriptions...but the sacrifice was in the graphics department.
There are plenty other areas where WOW shines, however graphics aren't one of them...
Personally I think the graphics are fine. Game play is a blast and Blizzard does a nice job with colors in the game. I use pretty up to date equipment but I have yet to see a "great" graphics game run smooth as an mmo. EQ2 is probably the closest.
That read like a fair review that gave props to BC where due.
Seriously folks, defending WOW's graphics sounds just a silly as those making excuses for Vanguards bugs ..
Sooner or later you're going to pay the piper that's how this buisness works. Blizz gambled on releasing WOW with dated graphics that run on 3-4 year old systems.
Guess what the gamble paid off with subscriptions...but the sacrifice was in the graphics department.
There are plenty other areas where WOW shines, however graphics aren't one of them...
let it go.
World of Warcraft's graphic were excellent, and to be honnest, they still are, because the ART makes up for the lesser powerful engine. World of Warcraft was the evidence that slapping a fancy engine on a game does not make it have great grapics, and Everquest 2 backs that up as well. You have to take in consideration the system requirements when you judge a game's graphics, as well as its age. Should reviewers give all Nintendo Wii games a bad rating in graphic deparment because it runs on a less powerful system? ofcourse not.
That read like a fair review that gave props to BC where due.
Seriously folks, defending WOW's graphics sounds just a silly as those making excuses for Vanguards bugs ..
Sooner or later you're going to pay the piper that's how this buisness works. Blizz gambled on releasing WOW with dated graphics that run on 3-4 year old systems.
Guess what the gamble paid off with subscriptions...but the sacrifice was in the graphics department.
There are plenty other areas where WOW shines, however graphics aren't one of them...
let it go.
World of Warcraft's graphic were excellent, and to be honnest, they still are, because the ART makes up for the lesser powerful engine. World of Warcraft was the evidence that slapping a fancy engine on a game does not make it have great grapics, and Everquest 2 backs that up as well. You have to take in consideration the system requirements when you judge a game's graphics, as well as its age. Should reviewers give all Nintendo Wii games a bad rating in graphic deparment because it runs on a less powerful system? ofcourse not.
WOW's graphics were never great they were serviceable and that's exactly what Blizz intended for them to be. Blizz decided it was more important to have as many as possible play the game in lou of graphics. Hence the trade off plain and simple.
I don't buy that art excuse either as Lineage II which came before and Guild Wars soon after are examples of great Artistic style.
So again... WOW is a great game in other areas such as fun factor and ease of gameplay but graphics is not one of them..
I played for hours and hours the first year of WoW. PvP got stupid so I PvE'ed and even got a legendary...
But I played the first week of BC and couldn't keep interest after the first week. It's just more of the same game, and a game that took a wrong direction imo.
Much of WoW's current popularity is a result of its first year success. It's time to move on, but like many have realized, there isn't a place to settle down in the MMO world in the current market.
The problem, i believe, is that most people relate the score to their old grades in school. 7=70=C which is in many cases not considered a good thing. Many people do it subconsiously but it still sticks. its supposed to be 1=new coaster 5=avg 10=OMG!!! so 7 is respectable but most only see 7 as just a notch above a D grade in school.
1 editorial edit.
Starting zones are from 1-20 roughly and not 1-10.
Comments
totally fair review.
good job
Games i'm playing right now...
"In short, I thought NGE was a very bad idea" - Raph Koster talking about NGE on his blog at raphkoster.com
I'm neither a fan or a hater. I didn't like WoW to begin with because of the lack of class choices (i'm used to having 30+ classes to choose from) and the fact that the quests are so boring that I couldn't get into the game...at all, much less reroll another character to repeat the same boring content. You do eventually repeat the same content, no matter what different race you reroll. Assuming you find more than 1 race attractive enough to play, which I didn't really in the original WoW (I like Humans only the first time around).
Because Vanguard was unfinished, I went ahead and bought TBC. I started a BE Paladin and I loved the game after that. However, after 30 levels, I ended up repeating some of the same content as before or I only had content to choose from that was in a gloomy and depressing area, which made it very boring to play...so I quit and went back to DAoC.
I think the graphics are fine. The guild I joined on a RPing server, was 80+ strong, plus we were gearing up for raids and such...we still RPed. We were 1 of many guilds like ours, so saying RPing doesn't exist is stupid. Show me another game that has multiple guilds on one server with 80+ members that RP and do all content in the game.
TBC is a good expansion, because it offered new content for the majority of your playing time and they released it in a polished state, unlike many game companies we know. That is my short review. Take it for what it's worth.
MMORPG's w/ Max level characters: DAoC, SWG, & WoW
Currently Playing: WAR
Preferred Playstyle: Roleplay/adventurous, in a sandbox game.
they gave the fanbase more of the stuff they liked
its not what everyone had hoped for
but i guess it was the safest way to create new content and a lot of people "enjoy" the new content
you may rate the burning crusade low cause it didnt became what you wanted it to be
but it is still good cause it fullfilled its purpose for the majority
Pi*1337/100 = 42
The problem, i believe, is that most people relate the score to their old grades in school. 7=70=C which is in many cases not considered a good thing. Many people do it subconsiously but it still sticks. its supposed to be 1=new coaster 5=avg 10=OMG!!! so 7 is respectable but most only see 7 as just a notch above a D grade in school.
Well, "people" are morons then.Nothing new I guess.
I think the score is quite fair. I mean, is the *new* content in BC really that impressive that you can not imagine something much better?
Pretty good review actually, except for maybe the concern about the graphics (Its the gameplay that's important, don't ya know)
I just question whether BC really meets the promise that it is friendlier to the more casual player. Seems like you need to have a pretty well organized, raid savy guild to tackle the content like Kara.... the fact it has a raid ID pretty much proves this to be true.... casual players need not apply.....
But hey, lots of people are happy and having fun.... regardless of the expansions ratings...
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
the Burning Crusade is an expansion, not a new World of Warcraft.
I don't want to write this, and you don't want to read it. But now it's too late for both of us.
Well written review.
Just my thoughts. Blizzard could keep the same art style in the game, the same look and designs, if they did better lighting and shadows. If they added a few polygons to the enviroment, so that things like trees were round and not squared it wouldn't change the look of WoW. It would make the trees round. Better graphics doesn't mean the game would look like EQ2 or VG, just that the WoW engine would use some of the software technology that is available. It is a very simple engine doing very simple things; it is outdated compared to modern machines, and doesn't utilize the hardware to it's potential. The styling of the game means absolutely NOTHING about the graphics.
Madden football games have maintaned the same look and feel since the release of Madden '00 for the PS2; yet every installment has improved upon the graphics.
The score was very justified.
I think the review is spot-on, including the graphics score.
Notice, he didn't rate them a 1. He didn't say they were "bad" graphics, he said they were pretty decent for an MMO circa 2004. You really want a higher score for that? Those of you complaining about the graphics score either have very low standards, or are letting your WoW-love cloud your judgement. It's a nice looking-game, it's got great art direction, but it never has and never will be blow-my-socks-off gorgeous. I would have MAYBE bumped it up to a 6 on artistic merit alone, but as far as whether or not the game has state-of-the-art, cutting-edge, gorgeous graphics, obviously the game doesn't -- and that's BY DESIGN. That's a design choice Blizzard made, allowing the game to run on more lower-end systems, and thus earn more customers. Great business decision, but you don't get a free pass on the graphic score in an honest review because of it.
Notice, also, that not all games that have great graphics are any good (in fact, there are probably more of those than games like WoW). So don't get your panties in a wad. It's a good, honest review, and it's very refreshing to read one instead of the many whore-critic reviews that just rate it a 10 on everything because it's Blizzard.
MMO history:
EQ1 - 65 DE Wizard
DAoC - 50 Dwarf Thane, 50 Dwarf Healer
EvE - Amarr, Caldari BShip Pilot
CoH - 40 Ice/Ice Blaster, 40 Dark/Regen Scrapper
WoW - 60 Undead Priest, 60 Tauren Warrior
LoTRO - 30 Hobbit Burglar
Currently Playing - Tabula Rasa
Graphics - While the polycount hasn't increased, the artwork is still within the style of Blizzard. Which is pretty top-notch stuff. There is a pretty large amount of new weapons, armor, and monsters into the expansions so this quote of "...a few new monster skins..." is just quite limited in description. But I guess coming up with a one-sentence description of artwork is just pretty difficult. I do agree that the animations and spell-graphics are pretty simple in their design. Some of the old-world content of the game has a dated look to it, but it should be comparable to say, Everquest. Which they didn't upgrade their graphics for the original content until Everquest 2, and that was 5-6 years into the production. So 2 year old content is still good, but it's not a "stellar-remodelled-everything-for-the-expansion" upgrade. I wouldn't be surprised if the next graphics engine update will include DX10 compatable shaders with it. There is something to say about a game that could have a 25/40 man raid group all doing their spells against a boss and still get 60+FPS on some low-end systems. Blizzard doesn't just have to pander to the high-end gamer, putting normal-mapped, 2k x 2k texture maps on player models that sky rocket to the 6k polycount range.
Music - The new soundtrack is a good expansion of the original. As for battle-music.. that's just crazy talk. You want to hear the battle music every 10 seconds when you're trying to run a killing-quest? To me, that would be more irritating to the gameplay. Even if there was an option to play some battle music in the sound menu, the music would be pointless to the experience. What would have really been a point to talk about was to have a built-in MP3 playlist support. So you could listen to whatever music your MP3 player has, without loading it into the background to play music. They added in the ability to play sounds in-game when you're Alt-tabbed out of the game or not having the window on top. Sometimes that's a good thing.
Sounds - Lots of new voice-acting here. Unlike the original WoW, there's more vocal response lines from bosses. That would be one thing that would make the game experience more complete. Having all the bosses speak would probably take some creativity from the sound dept, but it would be nice to even have an option for it. Perhaps this is the "upgrades" to voice-overs that you speak of? Some of the sounds got recycled into other classes. Hunter's stun having a Rogue's stun sound? It makes everyone annoyed and confused. This is where I would agree that some of the effects should have gotten upgrades. New abilities, new sounds? That would have gotten a plus in my area of it.
Lag - There is lag and everyone sees it. This will always happen unless someone figures out the bottlenecks. Mostly it's the loading of player models in major cities. Everyone and their little sister knows of "Lag-forge". Which is the major thorn in everyone's side when they try to goto the auction houses. When Blizzard can upgrade their graphics engine to minimize this eye-sore, people will be much happier for it. Not to mention the loading of addons. The LUA script keeps getting revised and updated so that Blizzard can curb out bots and auto-farmers to try and make the user-made addons usable. Just that at almost every patch they've been broken. Only on the recent 2.0.10 patch did I not have to re-check the "Load out of date addons".
Roleplay - Meh.. You are what you want to make of it. If you don't feel like playing into it, I understand. Just don't say there isn't any roleplaying in WoW. "Dirty Horde.." "Smelly Alliance." Only those who are into wanting to roleplay in the game will do so. The Burning crusade just extends what you get to roleplay about now. New topics to dicuss. This portion of the review is pretty weak in trying to describe roleplaying in WoW. Now, if there were some objectives (PVP and not), sprinkled throughout the game for the horde and alliance to have some goals to be done, that would be more in the line of immersing the player into a richer Roleplaying gameplay. Just the only portion of the game thats conflicting like this is the Zone PVP objectives in each of the new zones. The only roleplaying experience that's really deep will come from the players in this area. Blizzard doesn't have to make the experience FOR the players.
Community - While it may be fragmented, it's a functioning society. Guilds don't need alliances to know that if you run some instances with another guild or single members, and they do good, you'll invite them back. The chat channels are a good way to have a Guild-to-Guild chat. They're always open and there if people want to chat. If a guild has a problem with another guild's member, they'll either not want them in a raid-group or party for runs. If the person starts griefing another guild, they can complain to the guild leader of the guild. Simple as that. What is starting to become more common and that is taking Blizzard a while to take action on, is the Gold farming and spam ads people get whispered and mailed. Sure, they nuke the player/accounts, but they just reincarnate and come back for more. This is one problem that affects every MMORPG, but should be easier to filter them out.
Customer Service - Most of the time, there really isn't any problem with playing WoW. When it does happen, I've always gotten a GM ticket answered within a day. Instant response isn't a requirement for everything. Though people do have their own opinions of what a GM should help a player with, most problems are pretty minor to the game. Item returns and BOP swapping are most of the tickets. There are those people who do pick on the GMs to get their way done though. Horror stories of GMs refusing to return items or what-not. Then players sending 3-5 tickets until they find a helpful GM that will do what they need of them.
Fun - Something that is always subjective. Just ask the people who still play Counter-strike, quake 3, or Unreal:XMP. I would say that the fun in the game peaked when people were first into it, but probably will plateau back to the level of the original WoW in a few months. Once everyone has lvl 70'd their main characters or one of the new races out.
Value - While $40 is pretty high for what's considered an expansion, it's close to what a top-notch game should have a starting price at. People don't have to get the expansion to enjoy some of the new Jewelcrafting benefits, but they won't be able to go past 60 or play any of the new content without it. Normally an expansion like this would be around $30 for it's content. That would have been a more reasonable price for everyone. The Collector's Edition, which if you look for it around on the net, the DVD has some nice content. The problem is that it wasn't as packed as the WoW:Collector's edition was. There could have been some player-made movies thrown on there and/or a "History of Warcraft" digital book to flip thru to read the storyline from WC1 up through the Burning Crusade. But I guess for those things thats why we have the Internet for. The special nether-welp pet is just a small novelty item. Nothing really to make your Collector's edition any more special than the regular edition in-game.
Anyways, the review could have used some more meat into it. For someone that's "had a month to play it", the points weren't really extensive to make it really a "review" of the expansion. The feeling from the review is that the reviewer wasn't into the game, and not even interested in anything about the expansion in detail. Could have been summed up with "I hate this game. That is all." Which is pretty weak all around for someone to review a game with so little information of a month's worth of knowlege accumilated.
I'd give this review a 3 of 10 on a scale of doing a review of a game out for a month.
eqnext.wikia.com
eqnext.wikia.com
Best describes what WoW is:
Hello little hamster. I see you've opened your eyes a bit. Yes...yes, you're in a wheel.
What's that you say little hamster? You ran and you ran and you thought you had gotten somewhere?
No, I'm sorry little hamster, it's just a wheel. It goes 'round and 'round. Our goal is not to let you go anywhere, our goal is to keep you running.
You say you want off the wheel little hamster? That's fine. You go take a rest for a while. We'll get another shiny new wheel prepared for you when you're ready to start running again.
Seriously folks, defending WOW's graphics sounds just a silly as those making excuses for Vanguards bugs ..
Sooner or later you're going to pay the piper that's how this buisness works. Blizz gambled on releasing WOW with dated graphics that run on 3-4 year old systems.
Guess what the gamble paid off with subscriptions...but the sacrifice was in the graphics department.
There are plenty other areas where WOW shines, however graphics aren't one of them...
let it go.
Dutchess Zarraa Voltayre
Reborn/Zero Sum/Ancient Legacy/Jagged Legion/Feared/Nuke & Pave.
If VG gets a higher score then WoW's TBC then I wont take this site's reviews seriously anymore.
Games I've played/tried out:WAR, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, AoC, EQ1, EQ2, WoW, Vangaurd, FFXI, D&DO, Lineage 2, Saga Of Ryzom, EvE Online, DAoC, Guild Wars,Star Wars Galaxies, Hell Gate London, Auto Assault, Grando Espada ( AKA SoTNW ), Archlord, CoV/H, Star Trek Online, APB, Champions Online, FFXIV, Rift Online, GW2.
Game(s) I Am Currently Playing:
GW2 (+LoL and BF3)
Bird
WOW's graphics were never great they were serviceable and that's exactly what Blizz intended for them to be. Blizz decided it was more important to have as many as possible play the game in lou of graphics. Hence the trade off plain and simple.
I don't buy that art excuse either as Lineage II which came before and Guild Wars soon after are examples of great Artistic style.
So again... WOW is a great game in other areas such as fun factor and ease of gameplay but graphics is not one of them..
Dutchess Zarraa Voltayre
Reborn/Zero Sum/Ancient Legacy/Jagged Legion/Feared/Nuke & Pave.
I doubt I'll be going back to WOW though...
I played for hours and hours the first year of WoW. PvP got stupid so I PvE'ed and even got a legendary...
But I played the first week of BC and couldn't keep interest after the first week. It's just more of the same game, and a game that took a wrong direction imo.
Much of WoW's current popularity is a result of its first year success. It's time to move on, but like many have realized, there isn't a place to settle down in the MMO world in the current market.
1 editorial edit.
Starting zones are from 1-20 roughly and not 1-10.
carry on
-Hasani-