Those that were lucky enough to try out WoW during 2004-2007 may appreciate this. http://imgur.com/a/jj3m7 It's quite amazing that Blizzard stayed true to their ideas. The game art didn't change at all. I'll admit that I originally had no intention of getting this game. I was never a warcraft fan back in the day. I played a little bit of the original Warcraft and a little bit of Warcraft II. I didn't even bother with Warcraft III. I played Ultima Online for few months back in the day which was my first MMORPG and liked it. Then I played Star Wars Galaxies which left a very bad taste in my mouth.. so I thought that would end my MMORPG career. Then one day, I was out with my friend at a Target and we happened to see a single copy of WoW sitting on the shelf in December, a month after it had launched (the game was still impossible to find at this point) and he picked it up and put it in my hands and said, "You are going to get this and you will not regret it!" I hesitated for awhile, but ended up getting it. I brought it home and threw it on the ground and didn't install it until a week later.. and surprise surprise, the sign up page on blizzard's site was still getting hammered. After a few hours, I was able to register and get into the game. I was floored. My jaw dropped for the first few months while playing this game. It was just so polished. I think one of the reasons why my experience with this game was so good was because, literally, ALL of my friends played this game. I even found out later that friends that I lost touch with 5 years prior even played this game. Given that each of my groups of friends were on different servers, I could switch around if needed. I ended up playing with booda and guicho the most as they actually had the same playstyle I did. Pvping more than questing.. looking for world pvp and sometimes a bit of ganking. Blizzard patches were no joke either. They were literally would you would consider full expansion packs for other games. Throughout the years, Blizzard, has made a ton of changes to the game. Everyone who has played the game from the beginning will tell you that it ended up being for the worst. But, Blizzard is just doing what they can to gain more and more different faces. Old subscribers will eventually quit any game so the best business decision is to expand yourself out to grab new ones. So now, here we are getting ready for a Mists of Panderia launch.. I'd be as bold as to say pinnacle of gaming for me. I had never been so engrossed in a game so much. It wasn't even a story or anything either. It was purely the game's atmosphere and mechanics. Flying over Burning Steppes for the first time as alliance.. questing in Hillsbrad as horde.. heading into Western Plaguelands for the first time. It was all so amazing. My rank = truth
WoW looks like a PS2 game in terms of graphics. They really should have updated them at some point, especially when the hugely misleading cinematics they throw out when new DLC is released look so good. If I got the update and started playing as a kung fu panda and didn't start kicking untold amounts of ass I'd consider sueing Blizzard for blatant false advertising.
There have been substantial upgrades to the graphics over the years. It hardly looks like a PS2 game. I'm guessing you've never actually played it? The magazine article was showing dev shots from three years before the game was released. In terms of the art direction and the size of the game world, I felt like WoW absolutely put Oblivion to shame, despite coming out two years earlier. WoW actually feels like exploring a huge, epic world in a way no other game I've played does. Even Skyrim is nowhere near as epic feeling as WoW.
It must have been because I was playing on a laptop, and not even my current one, it was the one I bought in 2007 for around £300. This video makes the game look like it's running on a PS2 but having said that there's no way to tell how he had the graphics configured and what system he was running it on. http://youtu.be/GQ12VD2OUM0 The character models are particularly crappy looking. Check these abominations out. http://youtu.be/SRW1fgGB5DI I know the game is good fun and insanely addicitve because of great gameplay and I know the more complex the graphics the more things can go wrong such as bugs or crashes plus I guess they wanted to make it so that as many people as possible could play I still say the graphics are rather PS2ish.
The game launched at the end of 2004 and these shots from the magazine are from 2001. Nothing changed from that timeline in terms of graphics. Blizzard was adamant in keeping everything the same to hit their goal since this game was in development for an eternity. Because of this, WoW launched as a DX7 game in 2004. For the record, the XBOX launched in 2001 and was a DX8 capable system. Throughout the years through patches, Blizzard dropped a ton of updates to the graphics. So say you tried to played WoW today on the same setup you initially played wow on in 2005. It'll be a slideshow. There's been a bunch of notable upgrades to wow such as a hugely updated particle effects system, bloom lighting, and water effects.
Gameplay>Graphics The gameplay speaks for itself. Thats why I used to play nonstop for 30 hour periods without sleep.
Wow, Jack Black really gets around. @phisix, 10 more hours and you could have been newsworthy, like this guy. http://www.kotaku.com.au/2012/07/man-dies-after-playing-diablo-iii-for-40-hours/
I played Final Fantasy X-2 for 48 hours straight once, that guy was a lightweight. @Phisix I know gameplay is more important than graphics, Worms proved that to me many years ago. But that's not to say graphics don't add to the experience, they are indeed a huge part. I was merely pointing out that WoW looks old, because it is. I didnt mean to say the game is crap, I just felt they could have made the graphics better, which apparently they have.
bout 36 hours is my max... so far. who knows where my 'love' will take me though my free time dwindles and dwindles as I get older.
Just got an email from Blizzard offering me 7 days free to come back in the build up to the new expansion. Looked at the talent calculator and I have to say I hate the new way talent system. The game has become far too simple for my liking as they have tried to draw in the more casual crowd and I fear playing it now would simply make me wish for the old days. Levelling was made too easy years ago and that put me off enough even when playing but the game is becoming more and more unrecognisable with each patch.
I remember when Cata first came out and it took two days to level from 80 to 85. Leveling was just a joke from Wrath on wards.
This is some sort of April Fool's joke right? Tell me they did not just throw kung fu pandas into the mix. Im gonna guess Pandas use lion dance costumes for mounts, and panda mages conjure steamed pork buns for food. Hmm...I may have just talked myself into this
That's what I had to do, I still hardly believe it. Welcome back to teh forum Guicho... however long it exists.
So I just started this back up as I haven't played since late 2010 right when Cataclysm came out. I basically had to relearn the entire game. Everything is completely new from the talent system, to the world's layout, all the way down to the quests. You don't have to train anymore. You learn and rank up your skills as you level which makes everything much faster (and cheaper). Quests are much more streamlined now as they are all in chains. So you basically get all quests in specific areas of the zone at one time. There's multiple flight paths per zone now (more than before) so things move alot quicker. As for pvp, battlegrounds brackets are every five levels now. For example, there's a 30-34 and 35-39 bracket so you don't get completely demolished anymore. You also gain a ton of xp per battleground so you can literally level all the way through pvp. There's a glyph that allows a druid in travel form to become a mount. There's also an alchemy recipe that turns the alchemist into a mountable drake. I gotta say Blizzard is quite crazy for how many resources they put into this game. You can experience all of these new changes without even buying a single expansion. Redoing the entire world of the game was one thing, but redoing all of the quests and creating entirely new quest chains in their respective zones is another. In redridge mountains, they created a sequel to one of the quests you did in vanilla wow (the guy you saved and escorted back to lakeshire who was captured by the blackrock orcs) and it becomes an all out epic phased event. Thousand Needles is entirely underwater now. Van Cleef is officially dead and his daughter has taken over. The barrens has become split in half due to the cataclysm. Northern barrens is as you remember it. Southern Barrens has become a lush paradise due to the events that occurred in the wailing caverns. They've continued the story of the druid you rescued from the emerald nightmare in there. The humans have been chased out of Hillsbrad and have settled in Fenris Isle in silverpine forest. The talent system has been completely changed and overhauled (or underhauled.. however you see it). It is much more simplified. No more hybrid specs anymore. You CAN dual spec now though. Example: Protection warrior - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/tool/talent-calculator#Zb! Flying in the old world makes a huge difference in view: http://i.imgur.com/TtV4OTu.jpg Also, the Mists of Pandaria expansion isn't as crazy as some people see it. If you don't follow the warcraft lore than yea it literally looks wacky. But for people who played the bonus campaign, The Founding of Durotar, from the Frozen Throne expansion of Warcraft 3, a pandaren, Chen Stormstout was a playable character in that game. Vanilla wow also had a keg you find that starts a quest Chen's Empty Keg that references the events that occurred in that scenario.
It's interesting how the game has adapted to suit a changing audience. It went from being really hardcore in the beginning to now being quite casual.