World of Warcraft is often shortened to WoW, and with good cause. Take your character through adventures in a mystical fantasy world populated by creatures, monsters and other players. But we warned - it can become far too absorbing!
your character
A range of choices exist from the race to their class or abilities. As you are successful your character gains experience and better, more powerful abilities. Learning to use these abilities fluently is a major part of the game.
the world
The game world is huge, very detailed and in places very beautiful. Different areas have differing styles, so the dwarven city of Ironforge looks very distinct from the human Stormwind city. Exploring the virtual surroundings is rather enjoyable in itself. Especially when you can find ‘unofficial’ routes to strange places.
the players
The game is a MMOG and so you will see other players playing the same game, populating the same virtual space as yourself. You can choose to interact with them, teaming up for tricky bits or just swapping or selling items (the game has virtual monies) Its hard to explain why it becomes so interesting. Some of it is the constant challenge to complete quests, gain experience and improved abilities. The presence of other players seems to make the world far more believable and dynamic, and a LOT of people play. There is a freedom of interaction that few games manage. I suspect a lot of quite serious psychology could be written.
me
I’m a mage on the Thunderhorn server, so if you see “Ouchthathurt” running from some monsters, say hi.