Spending Time with the New Drug of Choice...WoW

After all the turkey was digested Thursday, I took it upon myself to go out and pick up World of Warcraft on my way back into town Friday. I used to be really into Ultima Online from about 1997 through 2000 or so, then gave it up once I started my career.

So I know how addictive MMOs can be.

That being said, I probably made a bad decision buying WoW on the weekend leading up to my final week of classes, which include a 15 page paper and a video project that hasn't even been started yet. O well...I convinced myself I needed to play WoW to further my research. Anyway, the game is pretty dam good. I started out as an Undead Warrior (which I played through some of the beta), and began questing. For the most part, the quest system works very well. Occasionally, you end up looking for 30 minutes in the wrong place for a quest, but this is only a small percent of the time. Most early quests you can complete solo, but some you'll need to group with other players to complete. I also had my first taste of PvP (playing on a PvP server). For some reason a dwarf decided to show up at an undead quest cite, and was quickly ganked by my group of 5. Not sure what the little guy was thinking...

World of Warcraft is probably the best designed MMO I have come across. Aside from UO, I have limited experience with EQ and DAoC. None of these games measure up to WoW so far. The beauty of WoW is that you can play however you want to play. Want to do solo quests? No problem. Need a group to complete some other quests? Easy. Feel like PvPing? Just head south from Sepulcher. Feel like crafting and selling items? Just train from an NPC and start collecting materials, then go to the auction house.

This game really appears to have been designed for all types of players, regardless of playstyles. The only negative I have come across are the servers. You'd think since UO's debacle in 1997 in terms of lag and server support, the others in the industry would plan a bit better. Nah. Blizzard was definitely not prepared for the onslaught of traffic their servers had to handle during the first week of WoW. They actually almost doubled the number of game servers after the first few days the game was released...and some of those servers are already full too! Blizzard's latest press release is that they sold 250,000 units over the first few days, with 200,000+ players registering new accounts. It's off to the races...