Digitally Disillusioned

While in my last adventure I’d set foot outside the snowladden mountainsides beneath the Dwarven capital of Ironforge, I still had plenty of adventuring to do there. Once I’d delivered the ale, I quickly returned to the more familiar environments.

And the first item on the agenda was vengeance. A vendetta. Retribution. When my companions and I had previously encountered the behemoth known as Old Icebeard we were quickly and immediately dispatched. While only a few levels beneath him numerically, he presented an overwhelmingly insurmountable challenge that I only overcame through suicidal burglary. As we were soon going to leave these lands behind us, I had an urge to tie up some loose and embarrassing ends.

I find it quite delightful how World of Warcraft structures the difficulty of enemies. There is always some temptation to reach beyond your level, and with a few allies and the right enemies this is a very achievable and satisfying feat. However, with epic or unique enemies, such folly is an aberrant sort of self-destructive behavior that should perhaps get one interred in an institution. But once you are on par with that same villain, the challenge is reasonable yet still daunting. Indeed, even at the lower levels, party composition and spell selection begins to weave a tangible thread through the experience. You start to see actual tactics here. Thankfully this is not of the sort to marginalize certain play types, but it brings forward questions about your own future development.

I’ve not studied the classes closely, indeed I’ve only reviewed at the lightest level general wisdom on warlocks, but with the diversity of the talent pool each character class breaks down into what we perhaps could call subclasses. There are options for many play styles, and the feeling of personal investment in your character shoots up radically by these decisions being brought up by the game.

Which only encourages you to play more, you see.

There isn’t much to relate in how Old Icebeard fell. Now that we’d obtained an appropriate level he fell relatively quickly and while not entirely painlessly there was little panic or frantic reaching for health potions. While Old Icebeard was only a level 10 encounter, this was without a doubt a ritual of sorts for me. I had found the metaphorical mountain, been defeated by it, and then advanced and returned to rise to the challenge. In a microcosmic way I had experienced the best the game had to offer. It was, perhaps ridiculously, exhilarating.

Simultaneous to this epiphany of sorts, I also began to discover the somewhat repetitious nature of World of Warcraft. While advancing back towards our exodus from the land of snow we came across a dwarven mine infested by Troggs. We set about exterminating the infestation - but by that I mean “obtaining our quota to achieve the quest rewards” rather than enacting any change within the actual game. Not that actual change would be a reasonable expectation, but I talk here simply about suspension of disbelief. Many other areas of this type are designed in such a way to not make this permanent sort of monster lair carry an air of temporalness, but this was not one of them and it gave me an dissatisfied feel. What I mean by this is that other quests involved invading a lair to obtain a certain item, or certain quantity of skins. The goal was never eradication. There the quota system of quests made a thematic sense. Here, the dwarven community has been deeply disturbed by a “new” menace you are asked to help purge. However, once you have done this it remains very clear that your efforts have accomplished nothing - the infestation persists for the next hardy band of adventurers.

Perhaps I fail to make myself clear here, however all I intend to relate is that overall this quest left me feeling down as it clearly highlighted the futility of effort in regards to the plot of World of Warcraft. It is masked well in many parts of the game, but invariably it will shine through as you adventure through the game.

Which is where we begin to wrap up my 10 day adventure through the World of Warcraft. Once you overcome the novelty and associated challenges of getting your characters feet on the ground, the game does become fairly repetitive. While I could relate further personal adventures they are all cut from the same skein as my previous exploits. This is not intended as an implicit criticism but only as a description of how the game plays, and all in all is fairly equivalent with every other game you’ve ever played.

In reading some of the strategy guide I inherited, I discovered the concept of being “at par”. The ability to complete quests and kill monsters is not only tied to your level, but to your success in keeping your character abilities appropriately boosted. This is all tied to your equipment - quite soon in the game you’ll find that everything from underpants to shoulder pads comes in types that boost skills. One needs to ensure that one keeps acquiring items that boost the scores tied to whatever ability you use to inflict damage. For my warlock, that is intellect. Should you fail to do this, you’ll find your spells resisted more and more as you fall “below par”. This is not a concept expressed within the game well, even if it is easily detected with simple intuition. Indeed, once I found my spells being resisted at an annoying rate, some quick alterations to my wardrobe restored my efficacy in battle.

Which reflects on what perhaps is the largest overriding goal of World of Warcraft: the acquisition of goods. Goods you find, selling the ones you don’t need to acquire the funds to purchase those that you do. Since establishing myself as a tailor of moderate ability, I’d branched into another trade: Enchantment. This trade hinges on the collection of undesirable merchandise as one breaks it down into the ingredients necessary for enchanting. I’ve started having to make decisions around how much I can actually sell while still maintaining items for my enchantment needs. This becomes a social aspect of the game as my play partners are now donating goods for the purposes of disenchantment. But enchantment can be a key component of staying on par, as I now possess the (limited) ability to add ability boosts to items. While still a long way from being actually useful, the options of enchantment diversify the dynamics of what was once a straightforward economy of loot collecting.

However the other thing that has become apparent at this point in the game is the sheer size of the World of Warcraft. I’ve had a number of quests that sent me over great distances and 15 to 20 minute walks were growing common. But the game world has a key feature to mitigate this as much as possible: air travel. And, just before the end of my trial, I was sent on a quest to experience the basics of gryphon flight.

And, to rip off Arthur C. Clarke, my god it’s full of stars.

I’ve previously expressed that the World of Warcraft is a lavishly beautiful game. The graphics are rather simple by comparison to other games, but they are composed with a mastery of all aspect of artistic production. The models and textures both are works of sheer brilliance, and traveling by air the first time hits you like a sock full of quarters to the head. In real time you are thrust up into the air and over the lands you’ve spent so much time marching about on. Indeed, this is where the scale of the game world first hits you as you digest vast quantities of it all at once.

The key to air travel is to create a network of known flight paths in the game. This creates a necessary exploration component, but is analogous to American Airlines forcing you to drive to Tampa Bay before you can go back home and book a flight there. That oddity aside, it quickly becomes an integral element of accessing the necessary locations in the game. The walk from Thelesamar to Ironforge isn’t that long, but the small amount of money it takes to fly their quickly is a necessary lifeline for quick and easy access to the retail and training opportunities of the capital city. And, as I progress onward out of Loch Modan and down into the Wetlands, the network of flight paths created accessible backtracking as no matter how far one walked, the next city you discovered offered immediate and safe transit back to where you came from.

And it is bloody gorgeous. The vertical dimension is not often used within the game, indeed it has only marginal effects to ground travel and no impact on combat or anything else you actually do. Soaring up into the sky on the back of a winged mount constructs an added layer of tangible depth to the entire game world, and while this is just eye candy its ability to connect disparate parts of the world solidifies the scale of this being an actual world.

There are other modes of transportation - a free subterranean train connects Ironforge and Stormwind - and my last bit of adventuring on my 10 day trial brought be to the very harbor that would connect me to the far distant shores of Kalimdor. However, my time was at an end.

I’d had a lot of fun sampling the World of Warcraft. Devoted players would note here that I’d made a minuscule level of progress for 10 days of play, and that indeed vast portions of the game mechanics remained unseen. My focus, as it always has been, was on evaluating the World of Warcraft as a casual game. I’d only really interacted with my real world friends, and the rest of the densely populated game world was something I mostly ignored.

But now was time for a decision.

The World of Warcraft has been a commercial success beyond the expectations of even the most optimistic internet demagogues. While it clearly has set a new bar in terms of commercial success within the MMO market, there is still a strong segment of the gaming demographic that avoids such online games be it for cost, perceived impact on lifestyle, or simply a matter of taste. Prior to this test-run of World of Warcraft I was one of those constant skeptics that argued that quality gaming should not be burdened with a recurring fee.

Leaving aside the issue of cost, it has been two months since I first stepped into Blizzard’s online magnum opus and I still close each game session with reluctance and anticipate the next session eagerly. Without a question of a doubt, World of Warcraft provides solid and enjoyable gameplay and constantly provides enough new experiences to keep play fresh and interesting after almost 48 hours of gameplay. Few games in my library have such staying power.

However, the key to this analysis is the understanding of how I approached the game. I made a commitment to the rest of my life that I would keep my playing hours of World of Warcraft to a reasonable level and for the most part this pact was kept. Excepting a few evenings to experience the Christmas content Blizzard provides the weeks surrounding the annual Christian holiday were utterly bereft of time in game despite the fact I was on holidays due to my putting family and friends first. There are ample examples of individuals who have jumped much more eagerly into the game world than I and sustained continued interest, however I felt I stood on the cusp between compulsion and quality game experience. Should you desire to be compulsive be my guest, my intent is simply to express to those who wish to avoid total immersion that World of Warcraft still packs a huge wallop in terms of value and fun.

In the generalist of terms, World of Warcraft is an elaborate update to Diablo II. The conventions and action-based play is remarkably similar despite the shift to 3D and the dramatic increase in scale. The scale, of course, exponentially increases the diversity of play options and while there is a consistent similarity to the things you will be doing as you play, there is a constant sense of fun, adventure, and excitement in doing it. The level advancement of the characters is extremely well balanced and it is easy to ensure a challenging play experience every time you sit down at the keyboard.

What of course is totally different than Diablo II is the social layer the persistence of the game world infuses the game with. I’ve not come anywhere near the major social functions of World of Warcraft - that being guilds and raids - but the dungeons I have experienced demand a social flexibility to pick up and play with whomever is online at the time. I think it was integral to the quality of my experience that I dragged two real-life friends with me, but we constantly included others met in the day-to-day life of the game in our adventures and the results were very entertaining. While this would be tremendously enhanced with better communication abilities (e.g. in-game voice support) it was still a quality experience that was dramatically different from what I’ve found in other online games.

But what about commitment to the game? How many hours will it take to succeed? Most players in the game (including both my friends) are progressing much faster than I am, but this is not a barrier to my enjoyment or my satisfaction. If anything written in this series sounds the slightest bit intriguing you owe it to yourself to try the game on for size and see if it is to your liking. I can only think of a handful of people who wouldn’t like World of Warcraft, and while like all things moderation is essential, World of Warcraft is delectably tasty in moderated bites.

Which brings us to the issue of cost. A month to month subscription costs be $17 CDN which quickly adds up to the retail cost of a brand new game. However, in big picture, anyone with a reasonably decent income will find this an utterly superficial cost. This is the cost of a lunch with a pint of beer. So the problem is not the literal cost (except for poor people), it is the perceived value of the game. Is World of Warcraft worth this price?

The answer is an unqualified yes. While I can’t compare it to other online games, World of Warcraft provides me with a totally unique game play experience that has nearly limitless game play. I can’t even imagine how long it will take me at the current rate of progress to reach the level cap, but I do know I’ll have a lot of fun doing it. And for less than twenty bucks a month this is a cost I simply couldn’t bear not to take on. It is a beautiful blend of exciting adventure and a casual social experience all from the comfort of my own iMac. Indeed, despite the total cost of ownership being excessive, World of Warcraft may be the best gaming dollars I’ve spent in an extremely long time.