I’m going to try something new today, in terms of game reviewing, since the regular deal just won’t do when it comes to a game as well known as World of Warcraft. Just the other day I has a friend asking me the usual question: “How’s the game?” I found it rather hard to answer, because I always get lost in useless details and he would most likely become bored and look for another MMO to play. So presuming you’ve never experienced World of Warcraft firsthand, I’ll lay it down for you nicely.

Taking about two years in the making, World of Warcraft was released in November 2004 and quickly became the most popular pay-per-month MMORPG in the western world. So if you’re a RPG fan not into the Asian animation techniques or Sci-Fi, then you’re probably interested in neo medieval fantasy games. <-250x250 Square - left->World of Warcraft took the existing elements seen in pioneer titles as Acheron’s Call or Everquest and brought them further, being the first MMORPG done “the Blizzard way”. This means developers were extra careful on game glitches and bugs. My WoW rarely, if ever, crashes and I haven’t experienced a game bug in a very long time. Then we have in game support through Game Masters, which is featured in most online games, but here, you get a quick response even at 2am in the morning. Although it may not solve the problem on the spot, it’s great to know that you’re not ignored and will receive feedback no matter what. In Warcraft3, patching the game every month with balance chances between the existing races was a recipe for success, keeping their player base intact and gaining new adepts. Blizzard learned from this success and did the same thing on a grand scale with WoW. Every two months or so there are patches that take care of that imbalanced Hunter skill everyone hates, or buffing the Rogue class for added survivability and the rest. There are also client and world fixes, as well as content updates, providing for new zones to explore and items to acquire, all for free. There are MMORPGs out there with 9 expansions already, and you have to pay for each and every one of them in order to compete with other players your level. That’s not the case here and it’s one of the main reasons players stay hooked to WoW, it’s harder to get bored.

There is a choice in playing on a PvE (player versus environment) server, where battling other players is only consensual. You can also go straight for the big boys’ playground, the PvP (player versus player) realms, where every step past level twenty-something can be your last, or your enemy’s last. If you’re new to MMORPGs and can’t take competition, it is suggested you start playing on a PvE realm, because creating alternative characters on the same PvP realms is highly encountered and their experience playing the game might put you in a bad situation. There is also the third option of RP (role playing) servers, where you can really get inside your character’s skin, think, act and evolve as your avatar should. Once you create the first character, you find yourself in the Warcraft world of Azeroth, ready to play your part in the battle between the Alliance and the Horde. More or less you have the regular fantasy races encountered in Warcraft, all in all eight choices evenly distributed between the two enemy factions, with different bonuses and abilities which won’t make a huge difference in your gameplay. My advice is to play the race you like best in terms of looks and lore. As usual, class wise you can be healer, damage dealer, tank or hybrid, depending on your aptitudes. Warriors and rogues take it up and personal in melee range, hunters and warlocks deal damage having the extra control given by their pets, mages hurt you from a safe distance while paladins, shamans, priests and druids can either heal or do damage in different ways. If you’re new to the game, it’s a good idea to get player-friendly class which can handle itself properly against creatures. I’d advise hunter, warlock or rogue. As true hybrids, capable of tanking, dealing damage and healing, all at the same time if needed, Druids come first to mind and maybe Paladins too. While leveling, class is not that important, but you might want to look ahead and decide what role you wish to fulfill in raids and the general scheme of things once you reach the maximum level. Be aware that the game changes and it’s basically a new beginning at level 70. Also, more than 50% or WoW players are already level 70 and even if you’re completely new at this, somewhere in the next four months you will get there.



But what’s different about WoW? For once I must agree God is in the details. Developers took everything the MMO scene had to offer, adapted it and did it better. The world is huge and it’s non-instanced, meaning that if you get a means of flying transportation from Undercity to Booty Bay, you’re going to see the players below you in real time, as well as the surroundings. When you do it for the first time it’s breathtaking. Blizzard struggled to make WoW load-free, and tried to make map transitions seem natural, as in reality. After all, you don’t see a loading screen while buying from McDonalds in real life, do you? Of course, there are instanced zones too, where you can fight harder monsters which drop rare loot, but you need a five man team to get in there. While the point of MMOs is to get players to fight between themselves or cooperate for greater glory, WoW did the smart thing of not forcing you to go either way. It’s entirely up to you if you’re going to quest alongside two other players of just solo the place by yourself. I for one love the freedom of movement and choice.

People enjoy WoW for different reasons. There is great room for socialization, making friends with other players, also for the sense of achievement when you just soloed a high leveled creature of killed a raid instance boss with help from 24 more guys in your guild. There are countless machinimas on the net, player made videos of WoW footage that have a story and soundtrack, turning their creators into virtual film makers. There have been weddings inside WoW, role playing raids on the opposing faction’s towns, and fishing contests. If you want fast paced PvP action you can get that regardless of your realm type by joining the queue for the battlegrounds. They’re instanced small to medium maps where you team up with players belonging to your faction and try to eliminate the opponent team. It’s either capture the flag in Warsong Gulch, domination in Arathi Basin, king of the hill in Alterac Valley or a mix in Eye of the Storm, games within the game, not far from their FPS counterparts. You can also go for organized small team play within the arenas, where you can create a group with help from your guildies or friends and match up against others with similar power and skill. Blizzard even has a ladder system where you can see daily rating changes and ranks, in a fight for the #1 spot or just for fun. I can say from experience that this kind of play rekindled the flame inside many Starcraft and Warcraft 3 players, as the system resembles the Battle.net ladder. Honor points gained through battlegrounds and world PvP will gain you access to a wide array of epic items that will make you life easier, just as well as arena points can get you unique and powerful armor sets. Level 70 life usually revolves around high end instances where you need 25 players to help with a boss kill. This will add depth to the game, because you need people to be online, a good class setup as well as predetermined roles in the upcoming encounter. Additional traits required are tactics and coordination, so everyone must do a good job in order to be successful. It’s more than just slashing away at a clueless pack of mobs.



WoW breeds a stable economy on each realm, entirely ruled by players through the rule of offer and demand. At some point people will need decent amounts of gold in order to get better gear. You can say having a knack for manipulating the Auction House prices is a skill not many possess. Just get in there, set up your item for a starting price and wait for another player to buy it from you. Some also buy cheap and sell high in an instant, so say goodbye to the old model where you were needed to idle around for hours in a town and spam the chat with “Want to sell” messages. This is important since all MMORPGs have that which is called “time sinks”, the many little yet useless things you are forced to do in order to get ahead, thus wasting your precious time on things that are not fun, like grinding the same mobs for cash. It’s not that far from having a bad job in order to get the money for survival.

Overall, there is plenty of casual and hardcore content to keep you busy for a long time. There are also bad things about WoW. The maximum level population is so great that all content add-ons regard level 70 players specifically, which will send most newcomers in a rush to level faster. Thus finding people to level with, quest and do the natural game progression through the lower levels is difficult. I advise you playing on a relatively new realm, one which Blizzard kindly recommends you on logon. There you’ll meet more players ready to share your experience, which in turn means they are less knowledgeable than a band of low level alternative veteran characters. There is currently a dispute regarding the time involved in gaining the PvP items through points. Some think they are too easy to obtain, thus making it useless to go through the usual instance runs and reputation gains at level 70 in order to get geared up appropriately. Many low level characters, or newcomers, complain that life on a PvP server is hell while leveling to 70, since being killed by a character ten times more powerful than yourself is possible and represents a major dent in your morale. There are also benefits from this system, because you’ll feel just as good when your successful riposte kills an enemy player of your appropriate level range.

There is a lot more to be said, but this resembles the overall view. You can get a clue about the graphics by watching the following pictures and should you be interested, Blizzard is always giving away free trials for the game here.

Just what kind of gamer are you? You may be casual, ready for some instant fun with no strings attached to your lifestyle, or you may be hardcore, willing to sacrifice much for the save of your virtual life progress. Regardless of how you play, there is always that craving for more. I’ll be the first one to admit it that games are fun and eventually you’ll feel the wonderful thrill going through your bones, wishing you’d have more time off from school, job or family and just dig deeper into the game. There is little one can do when real life takes precedence over your selfish gaming addiction, yet some people got the best out the situation.

I remember seeing a really old post on the World of Warcraft forums that just blew my mind. There was this middle aged guy lucky enough to travel around the world and he decided to show us what he’s doing while being offline. Here he had all these pictures of him, with recognizable landmarks in the background, always staring down through his dark glasses to a book he was holding. He was reading next to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Big Ben in London, the Coliseum in Italy or by Mountain Rushmore in the US, always with a focused look, absolutely unaware of his surroundings. You get too see enough pictures of him in strange places to become really envious, until you see the last image and understand what he was reading. That’s when the punch line hits you like a truck, for tucked away in his hands for the past 30 pictures lays no other than the World Of Warcraft manual!

While that was a nice try, most of us just browse forums in our insatiable search for more game input, look for gaming blogs and read online magazines. Still, you may not be aware of the next best thing, the subtle mesh of humor, good graphics and game wit that comics bring to the table. That’s all the easier should you be a MMO fan, since within the multitude of players you can interact with, some are bound to go out of their way and show their gratitude for the game in with a pencil and a piece of paper. Multiply that by a couple of thousands, since current day online games range well into millions of active accounts, and you’re off to a place where boredom will never catch up with you.

For instance, take this wonderful piece of art called “The Noob Comic,” a strip dealing with OhForF’s adventures in the fictional MMO Clichequest. Courtesy of Gianna Masetti, you can witness each and every possible thing we learned to hate about online games, starting with l33t speak, on to excessive role playing and utterly childish behavior we sometimes slip into while playing. Toons are drawn in a simple manner which will appeal to both comic strip casuals and devotees, with humorous wit in an evolving storyline. Following in the footsteps of an evergreen noob over the 269 episodes Gianna has released, you will find experiences similar to your own, within that favorite MMO you’re been fancying. Need I say that the main character’s name is short for “oh for f*cks sake”? Universality is the main quality of her work, since it doesn’t matter if you’re a Guild Wars player, Acheron’s Call, Everquest, Anarchy Online or anything else. You will meet the helpful yet annoying elderly player, the aimless noob, the player killing bloodthirsty yet socially challenged geek, even the overweighed Tolkien addicted girl you’ve been leveling with, which you never wanted to meet in real life. At some point, maybe, just maybe, you’ll see yourself within the pages of this comic strip and laugh yourself away, for it’s just as addictive as a game. You can start here.

There comes a time where every one of us thinks about that significant other, maybe the one that got away. You may dream about it when the night is cold and you seek shelter from the outside world within your fantasies, yet sometime we're not talking about THE girl. Such is life that I came across a moment just like that, and it's actually about a game.

<-234x60 Half Banner - left->Auto Assault, I never got around to revel in its magnificence. Honestly, for a hardcore gone casual gamer, there is always the temptation of starting anew, especially when it comes to Multiplayer Online Games. Auto Assault was my fantasy, not as epic as World of Warcraft, not as technical and cold as Eve Online, yet somewhere in between, on the fast track of Sci-Fi. I often feel we have way too many medieval oriented MMOs so, this was a promise, a breath of fresh air which as all gone now. Yes, my curious friend, MMOs are born, grow in power and eventually die. With Auto Assault it was sooner than later, because only 16 months after its launch, the servers shutdown for the last time, never to be restarted again.

It was a money issue, said the NCSoft owners, the same guys that keep Guild Wars, City of Heroes, Lineage and Tabula Rasa alive. They always wanted to promote a different kind of MMO to the market, be it like Guild Wars, where you can play on an official server with steady maintenance yet you wouldn't have to pay for it a monthly fee, or the comic-based City of Heroes. Auto Assault had its own unique elements, starting with the whole concept of battling automotives, in the vein of the old Carmageddon insanity, only this time around there were real players you could tamper with.

As a newcomer to the Wasteland you could either join the Humans, Mutants or Biomek. This race suggestion would then dictate your class and then the world would be yours. This means you get to interact with other players in cities, then leave the comfort of the garage for some solo or convoy teamed action while blasting away through NPC machinery. While PvP was fairly limited in the early stages, it would only go all out, in a free for all PvP environment called Ground Zero, once you reached the maximum level. It's all about questing and tactical encounters in a type of game that appealed both to casual and hardcore gamers, due to its lack of time limitations.

Unfortunately the game wasn't promoted enough, saw no expansions and it just collapsed unto itself. There are worse games out there still living the good life. I couldn't really say who is to blame, since developers did their best and there were regular weekend bonuses for casual players, along with catchy events and collaborations. Even 1UP.com joined to help at some point last year, with major Easter eggs and special vehicle customization to give you bragging rights for a life time. There are worse games out there still living the good life and Auto Assault didn’t deserve this fate.

And so it came to pass that on 27 August, players and developers alike played a gruesome monster bash, with instant power leveling, group battles and free end-game weapons being handed to whoever would crave for them. In a sense they kept this dreamy image I had alive, since I can't really remember the last time when game masters were so benevolent in a MMO game. Four days later servers shut down permanently. It was a death to remember! So rest in peace Auto Assault and may your memory spawn progeny in the following years. Who could resist a vehicle based MMO, blasting away your enemies with your front weapon and bashing them with melee at 150 mph?

If you were a part of this Wasteland community and you'd like to share your thoughts with us, you are more than welcome to do so in our comment section. But until then, let’s take a look at what Auto Assault had to offer, the juicy piece of pie you and me will never get to taste.