Now that we’ve touched upon the scenery and epic scale of the new World of Warcraft expansion, it seems like a good point to go into more detail about the content you’ll probably be spending a future paycheck on. As the beta test continues, more and more videos are posted to youtube while the unwitting watchers cry about the lack of balance between the classes. Specifically death knights. Before I go on, let me remind everyone that the expansion is still in the beta testing phase. Nothing is particularly set in stone in terms of talents/spells/etc. The developers have been very good about watching the forums and taking in new suggestions as well as listening to concerns that the players have.

Beta warning aside, I’m not going to get into most of the class mechanics, mainly because I’ve only played three of them in depth. Because of that, I feel I’m unqualified to theorycraft or whine on the unfairness or imbalance in the game. Besides, like I just said, they’re not finished yet.

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The internet is all a-twitter with excitement over Blizzard’s recent release of the Wrath of the Lich King beta. People are bouncing between extreme anticipation and extreme disgust. Some are whining about beta keys and others can’t wait to get their hair cut. Seemingly forgetting the fact that in a couple of months (this is me making a wild estimation) the expansion pack will be readily available for everyone. But I digress.

With a shaky hand I double clicked on my beta shortcut (after the long download, of course) and the sight of the new title screen coupled with the befittingly chilling new music only served to further my tingly anticipation. I would not have said this about The Burning Crusade but this time Blizzard has done it. They have managed to re-capture all the excitement and epic qualities of World of Warcraft into an expansion that will blow both old and new players away.

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“Listen. You are not your Redemption, Cryptstalker, Bonescythe, Frostfire, Dreadnaught, Plagueheart, Faith or Dreamwalker. You are not your Thunderfury, your Ashkandi, or your Scepter of the False Prophet.”

Two years ago, when I quit Death & Taxes, I wrote a rant titled that. I was angry and childish. I felt like I’d spent over a year in one of World of Warcraft’s top guilds, and all I had to show for it was a Redemption Ring—and one of the best geared characters in the world.

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We are smack in the era of fantastic MMORPGs. There are a lot of classics like Guild Wars, CoX, Ultima Online, etc. There are also a lot of upcoming games that show a lot of promise. Age of Conan, Warhammer– the list goes on. Promise isn’t everything, of course; a lot of hyped games fall flat on their faces. Aion, for one, is ticking me and others off due to the lack of progress with setting a retail date. Seriously, this is somewhere around the third or fourth beta, and there’s no news. Totally poor management. A general release estimate or something would tide me over, but no, nothing yet. Just more betas. Bad signs don’t bode well in such a competitive business–and MMORPGs are as competitive as they get now.

World of Warcraft, however, putters on without any hint of stopping as its competition races to dethrone it.

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Video games have always been my own personal hell, as I have a tendency to be perfect in everything I do. I had to be the person with the top kills in a shooter, I always have to have top performer in Rock Band, and when it comes to a Korean grind MMO I’ll always aim for the max level. When it came to playing World of Warcraft though, that attitude had to change–a little. Instead of the entire group being rewarded with an accomplishment, only a few choice individuals were rewarded. Despite the annoyance of the system, I grew fond of it. You worked hard to get your new piece of shiny loot, then you would sit in a capital city for a few days just so that everyone who inspected you would congratulate you or ask where you got it. Despite how annoying it always was, you’d answer, just to see the reaction of how great you were.

Lately I have noticed how lackluster accomplishments have become and how little of a challenge games are. There have always been cheat codes for console games that would make everything easy, so I grew attached to MMORPG’s. World of Warcraft is the one I’ve played for three years now and well, what is there left to that game that can be considered a challenge?

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I thought I could play World of Warcraft casually. I really did. I thought I could enjoy running a Karazhan on the weekends, perhaps someday stepping foot into Gruul’s Lair and Zul’Aman. I had dreams of Kharmaa’s Shroud of Hope, and a high ranked 2v2 team in the notorious BG9. Fuck, I mean, I even thought I could have a little fun while doing this.

Well, I have my cape now and I have a decently ranked 2v2 team.

But I’m also a new raiding member of an Illidan farming guild preparing for Sunwell.

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