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I should start by saying that I’m not exactly someone with a lot of time on their hands. After having exposure to EverQuest as my first MMORPG, I was a bit skeptical of trying anything new. However I was pleasantly surprised at the thought put into making this game work well on all levels of gameplay. World of Warcraft truly embraces all of the positives from Warcraft and Diablo/Diablo II, plus many concepts are familiar enough from playing other MMORPGs that the learning curve is quick.
For those new to MMORPGs, this is a great introduction to all the possibilities of enjoying an MMORPG. The game is primarily quest based, which earns you significant experience points, loot, and money. The graphics are pleasing yet not overbearing. While the characters and landscape may look a bit cartoonish for some people’s tastes, think about all the processor speed you are saving. I’ve hardly noticed any lag in performance so far.
Creating your character only takes time if you care about how you look (hair, face, skin tone). Otherwise it is a simple choice of Alliance vs. Horde, and then race/class. I haven’t figured out what it means to be Alliance vs. Horde, besides the general “good vs. evil” faction, and the fact that if you run into an oppositely aligned character you won’t be able to communicate with them at all. I suppose on a PVP server this may open up many possibilities, but for the regular player it doesn’t seem to make a difference other than being able to play different races/classes. Certain classes are not available to Alliance or Horde. An obvious example is a paladin being only an Alliance class.
Your starting town is different depending on the race you choose. You have your newbie equipment and the first thing you see is an NPC with a big yellow exclamation point above his head. Those are NPCs that have quests for you. Not only do they give you experience, and sometimes money and loot for rewards, they also give you a way to know where you should explore for your level range. Often the quests will take you to new areas. The maps are gorgeous and detailed and very informative when you discover a new area (otherwise, it is pretty much blank!)
While it is often easier to group with others to complete quests (many of which can be shared, especially on collection quests), everything is solo-able. Some classes have harder times than others obviously, but for the most part you don’t have to only rely on others to complete your quests. It is also often more beneficial for you to grind experience while on quests, since many of the quests have you killing a certain number of monsters, or killing them to loot the quest items.
The game also sneakily somewhat discourages power-gamers who play for hours and hours at a time on one character. Basically if you camp at an inn in a town, depending on how long your character has been camped out, there is a “resting bonus” to your experience gain the next time you log in. The longer you have been logged out, the longer the resting bonus.
Traveling between zones is also fluid and there is hardly ever any “zoning screen” except for particular places like the tram stations. You can also travel via griffins, which is done beautifully and in real time (you may see others traveling via griffin at the same time, plus others who are on the ground as well doing their own thing). It gives a nice touch of realism to this fantasy-land. Also if you don’t know where to find something in a town (which can be difficult since maps aren’t labeled quite that detailed), you can always chat with a guard who will mark your destination on the map, or there are usually street and shop signs which you can mouse-over and popup the names for your convenience.
Death is also not quite as harsh as in some other games. When you die, you are transported to the nearest graveyard (usually outside of a town). Your character becomes a “ghost” and if you can run to the vicinity of your corpse, you will get resurrected on the spot. Otherwise if it is too dangerous to be resurrected in that location, or if you don’t want to spend the time running, you can get resurrected by the angel-like creature in the graveyard. However you get a penalty for doing this – all of your equipment, including ones in your inventory, become slightly damaged, meaning you have to repair them for cash at the shops.
Gaining experience not only gains you levels, but also “talent points” which you can concentrate in the skill tree of choice. For example, mages have skill trees in fire, ice, and arcane magic. A mage can concentrate skill points into one tree in particular, or spread them out evenly – however, there are only a total of 51 skill points that you get total (about 1 per level) and in order to obtain the highly advanced skills you will have to concentrate on a particular skill tree. Of course you may reset all your talent points whenever you would like, but for an increasing price every time.
A similar concept goes for trade skills. You may choose two trade skills for your character. Trade skills are basically either collection trade skills or production trade skills. It’s probably best to choose trade skills that complement each other, such as mining and blacksmithing, herbalism and alchemy, etc. Again you can also reset your trade skills whenever you want, but for a price – plus you lose all trade skill points gained for the trade skill you remove.
While there are always little bugs here and there, Blizzard seems to be quite responsive to fixing the problems as quickly as possible from what I understand. I have had a good amount of fun playing this game so far. It’s a refreshing change from many of the problems I have found in other games.