World of Warcraft: Cataclysm

Name: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm
Developer: Blizzard
Platform: PC
Release Year: 2010
Stephen's Rating: 7/10

Let me start by saying two things. Firstly, I only played World of Warcraft after Cataclysm had been released so I have no experience of any of the previous incarnations of the game, or any of the expansions that came after. Secondly, I only played this game for 3 months. I clocked a lot of game time during that fateful period in my life, but my experience is still limited.

Basic Plot

World of Warcraft: Cataclysm was the third expansion to the original World of Warcraft game.

The entire story is based around the world created in the Warcraft series of real time strategy games. The story follows the two factions of Alliance and Horde and their battle with each other as well as other outside forces which threaten the world.

The primary story introduced in the Cataclysm expansion is the return of the evil dragon aspect Darkwing the Destroyer. He has returned, healed and angry, and his return smashes apart the world causing large scale changes all over (thus the name Cataclysm). This meant that areas of the map that players previously knew well had changed. Whole areas that were once desert may have been flooded by the ocean, huge chasms opened up over the land, etc.

I'm not going to go deeper into the story but it is hugely detailed and goes back a long way.

Gameplay

World of Warcraft is the quintessential massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG). More people play WoW than any other online game, and nothing else seems to be able to take a hold in the industry because of its very existence.

The game starts by creating your character. Probably the biggest decision is which faction you want to join. For me it was a no brainer, my friends all played Horde so I went Horde. The faction you choose severely impacts the social aspect of the game. Once you pick a faction, you are unable to communicate with members of the opposing faction in game. The only time you'll see them is usually when they are trying to kill you in a PvP arena or just out in the open world. Each faction had several races to choose from. During the time of cataclysm it was:

Horde

• Orc
• Tauren
• Troll
• Blood Elf
• Goblin
• Forsaken (Undead)

Alliance

• Human
• Night Elf
• Gnome
• Worgen
• Dwarf
• Dranei

Races have benefits and drawbacks, and not every race can choose every character class. I was a Tauren.

Choosing your character before entering the game world.

Then you got to choose your character class. Your class defined your abilities and what armour you could wear and in terms of combat within the game was the most important decision. The classes were:

• Druid - The character class I chose. The druid is the most adaptable class and can fulfil all the major class roles including melee dps, ranged dps, healer, and tank. However, this comes at the cost of power, and a druid often lags behind other character classes in terms of how effective they are at their job. This isn't entirely true (especially for the restoration druid), but there were certainly less abilities to go around. The three skill trees were feral (shapechanging), restoration (healing), and balance (caster dps).
• Hunter - A ranged dps character who uses bows and tamed animal companions to fight. The hunter caught a lot of flak when I played with the term "huntard" used often. The three skill trees were beast mastery, survival, and markmanship.
• Mage - A specialist ranged dps class who uses elemental spells to inflict damage from afar. I originally started a mage but found it a difficult class to solo and quest with. The three skill trees were arcane, frost, and fire.
• Paladin - Another multi-purpose character class the Paladin was excellent at filling either the tank, melee dps, or even healer role. The skill trees were holy, protection, and retribution.
• Priest - The priest is the ultimate healer class and can specialize in either a protective healer or a straight healer. They can also become a powerful ranged dps with the shadow tree. The skill trees were shadow, discipline, and holy.
• Rogue - A melee dps character often used in PvP. The rogue could use stealth and did massive damage using backstabs. The skill trees were assassination, combat, and subtlety.
• Shaman - This class could either specialise as a melee dps, ranged dps, or healer and was very common in the game. The skill trees were elemental, enhancement, and restoration.
• Warlock - Another ranged dps spell similar to the mage. The warlock could specialise in the destruction, affliction, or demonology trees.
• Warrior - The standard melee warrior who could specialise as a tank or melee dps. The warrior had the arms, fury, and protection trees.
• Death Knight - Introduced in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, the Death Knight started at a high level and was suited to either a melee DPS or tanking role. The skill trees were blood, frost, and unholy.

Once you pick a character class you have the arduous task of finding a name which is unique (no two names can be the same on a server) and doesn't sound idiotic, and then you can start the game.

It pans out mostly as a top down third person RPG game. The game involves some major elements:

• Questing involves talking to NPC characters, and then completing some task. This usually involves collecting something, or killing something. Quests are generally very similar and repetitive. I completed over 1500 quests by the time I got to level 85.
• Dungeons are another way of gaining experience and were crucial to finding decent pre-raid gear. They involve teaming up with four other players to tackle a dungeon. Dungeons can be played very early in the game (level 10?) and you can theoretically skip all questing and level up doing them instead.
• PvP instances were another way to gain experience but rely on you actually winning your arena in order to gain experience fast. They involve large teams of Horde and Alliance players battling each other and capturing points on a small instance map. There was specific PvP gear which was only good against other players that could be obtained.
• Crafting and trade was another important part of the game. Every player could pick two skills to level up in such as leatherworking, blacksmithing, enchantment, alchemy etc. They could also pick up generic skills such as healing. The tradehouse on each server is huge and people are constantly buying and selling their goods.
• Raiding was similar to doing a dungeon, but you had to find your own party to join one (at the time, now you can). Raids are exceptionally hard instances which require prior knowledge of the boss fights and smooth team work. The best gear can be obtained in raids. There are two types; 10 man and 25 man. Raiding is generally only completed by players who are already at the level cap and at the time it was almost exclusively done by guilds who would ask for people who wanted to join from time to time to make up the numbers.

 A boss fight during a raid.

Starting players tend to complete quests. This is a good way to gain experience and some basic gear, and if it is your first time it reveals stories throughout the lands which add to the game experience. Once you start, it just doesn't stop. There is always a new quest to complete, a dungeon to do, an auction you are holding at the tradehouse. The gameplay opens out to a free-for-all of whatever interests you.

Dungeons and Raids sometimes had specific mechanics for the boss fights. For example; one boss might stop now and again and glow white and the whole party might need to get close to him to avoid a lightning attack. Going into a dungeon or raid blind is tough, and usually you need to check online and watch a video of other people completing it or read a guide.

One of the big things about the game is travel. When you start, you are a slow little turtle. It takes forever to get anywhere by foot, but you can pay to travel by windrider. At level 20 you can get your first mount which travels somewhat faster. At 40 you can get an advanced mount. At 60 you can buy a flying mount, and I think at 80 or 85 you could get a faster flying mount. You also had to get extra skills and pay in-game currency to be able to fly in all the different zones. Druids had a nice bonus of have a travel form (chetah) as well as flying form and advanced flying form to get around. They also had an aquatic form to swim faster and breathe underwater.

Cataclysm Specific Gameplay

One nice new feature was the dungeon finder. This allowed you to queue up in the dungeon finder and get put together with four other players from across multiple servers to complete a dungeon. Each time you queued you flagged if you were going to play dps, healer, or tank. Each party consisted of three dps, and one tank and one healer. Apparently the new expansion as a Raid Finder as well which is a cool new feature.

There were a lot of other changes. I know that it became easier to level up since the original game as it used to take an extraordinary time to get to level 60 but it only took me a month or two.

General gameplay.

Positives

For one thing, there just isn't any other game that has the player base that World of Warcraft does. As a result it has the richest player community in the world. There are always people to play with any time of the day or not, and there is a huge amount of material out there to help you become a master at your character.

The world itself is massive. When you combine all the outdoor areas of Kalimdor, Azeroth, Northrend, and Outland... it's epic.

The game is challenging. The complexity of the economy system and the tradehouse is great.

The aesthetics of the whole world are immersive. It is easy to get lost in the game and never come back...

Negatives

The game is too repetitive. Quests are always the same - go there and kill 6 of these, or collect 8 of those. You do 1500 or more of those just getting to level cap. That's not considering if you create more than one character. Once you get to level cap you end up doing the same 5-6 dungeons over and over again trying to get better gear. Once you get that, you end up doing the same Raids over and over again hoping for better gear.

The game quickly becomes a chore rather than a fun thing to play. The game always dangles the next apple in front of your mouth wherever you go. Whether it be the next level, or the next item you need to improve your item rating, it becomes a vicious cycle of doing things to get better, so that you can do more things to get better... and it quickly becomes pointless.

A lot of the old content is lacking love. I quested all through Kalimdor and found a lot of great questing areas, but a lot of the outdoor events and other quests which were the thing to do back in the day when it was new content were no logner functioning, or required more people to be around to work. The focus for most players became the same few areas that had the daily quests.

The skill system is horribly linear. When you pick to be a "healer druid" you take the restoration tree, and there is literally a set of ideal skills you should choose to be the best you can at healing. There is no wiggle room, no creativity, it feels pre-set. Take this in comparison to Diablo II where you could combine skills from different trees to create truly unexpected characters. World of Warcraft instead encourages you to pick one tree and stick to it.

Memorable Moments

When I was low level, maybe 20ish, I went on a little adventure from Orgrimmar and just wandered south in search of new areas to explore. It sort of gave me sense of the enormity of the world. I really enjoyed that adventure that took me a couple of days, walking around Ragefire Chasm into Alliance territory. Luckily as a feral druid I could use stealth to get through those areas, but it was quite exciting. I remember coming across a very high level (probably level capped) Worgen sitting by a lake fishing. He was there, moved around a bit, but didn't even flinch at the sight of me. That trip was great and I got to a whole new set of flight paths to areas which were about the right level for me to explore. I continued South over the next few weeks and ended up at Un Goro Crater which was just before I headed to Outland at level 58.

I played a Tauren feral druid as my main (and pretty much only) character. I maxed out leatherworking and skinning, and focused on the feral cat dps build. I got to level 85 after 3 months of heavy playing until I finally realised what a monumental waste of time it was and how it had become a chore, more than something fun to play. I joined a NZ based guild, did a few dungeons with them, did my first and only raid which was intense, and then gave it up.