World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft (often abbreviated as WoW) is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game
(MMORPG) by Blizzard
Entertainment. It is the fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first
introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994.[7] World of
Warcraft takes place within the Warcraft world of Azeroth, approximately four
years after the events at the conclusion of Blizzard's previous Warcraft
release, Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne.[8] Blizzard
Entertainment announced World of Warcraft on September 2, 2001.[9] The game was
released on November 23, 2004, on the 10th anniversary of the Warcraft franchise.
The first expansion set of the game, The Burning Crusade, was released on
January 16, 2007.[10] The second
expansion set, Wrath of the Lich King, was released on
November 13, 2008.[11] The third
expansion set, Cataclysm, was released on December 7, 2010. At BlizzCon in October 2010,
lead producer J. Allen Brack announced that there would be a fourth expansion
set for the game, though the developers did not yet know what it would be
about.[12] On October 21,
2011, the fourth expansion set of the game, Mists of Pandaria, was announced at BlizzCon 2011 by Chris Metzen.[13]
With 10.2 million subscribers as of December 2011,[14] World of
Warcraft is currently the world's most-subscribed MMORPG,[11][15][dead
link][16] and holds the Guinness
World Record for the most popular MMORPG by subscribers.[17][18][19][20]
Gameplay
Main article: Gameplay of World of Warcraft
Starting a character or
play session
As with other MMORPGs, players control a character avatar
within a game world in third- or first-person view, exploring the landscape, fighting various
monsters, completing quests, and interacting with non-player
characters (NPCs) or other players. Also similar to other MMORPGs, World
of Warcraft requires the player to pay for a subscription, either by buying
prepaid
game cards for a selected amount of playing time, or by using a credit or debit
card to pay on a regular basis.[21]
To enter the game, the player must select a
realm—sometimes referred to as a server. Each realm acts as
an individual copy of the game world, and falls into one of four categories.
Available realms types are:
- Normal – a Player Versus Enemies (PvE) environment where the
gameplay is more focused on defeating monsters and completing quests, and any roleplay
is optional, and player-versus-player fights must be consensual.
- PvP – an environment where, in addition to defeating
monsters and completing quests, open player-versus-player
combat is the norm, and a player can be attacked by an opposing faction's
player at any time.
- Normal-RP – a variant of PvE, where players roleplay
in-character.
- PvP-RP – roleplay-PvP – a variant of PvP, where players
are in-character and cross-faction combat is assumed.
Realms are also categorized by language, with in-game
support in the language available.[22]
Players can make new characters on all realms, and it is
also possible to move already established characters between realms for a fee.[23]
To create a new character, in keeping with the storyline
of previous Warcraft games, players
must choose between the opposing factions of the Alliance or the Horde.
Characters from the opposing factions can perform rudimentary communication
(most often just "emotes"), but only members of the same faction can
speak, mail, group, and join guilds. The player selects the new character's race,
such as Orcs or Trolls for the Horde, or Humans or Dwarves for the Alliance.[24] Players must
select the class
for the character, with choices such as mages, warriors, and priests available.[25] Most classes,
except for special "Hero classes," are limited to particular races.
Ongoing gameplay
As characters become more developed, they gain various
talents and skills, requiring the player to further define the abilities of
that character.[26] Characters can
choose from a variety of professions, such as tailoring, blacksmithing, or
mining. Characters can learn four secondary skills: archeology, cooking,
fishing, and first-aid.[27][28] Characters may
form and join guilds,
allowing characters within the guild access to the guild's chat channel, the
guild name and optionally allowing other features, including a guild tabard,
guild bank, and dues.[29]
Much of World of Warcraft play involves the
completion of quests.
These quests, also called "tasks" or "missions", are
usually available from NPCs.[30] Quests usually
reward the player with some combination of experience points, items, and
in-game money. Quests allow characters to gain access to new skills and
abilities, and explore new areas.[31] It is through
quests that much of the game's story is told, both through the quest's text and
through scripted NPC actions.[32] Quests are
linked by a common theme, with each consecutive quest triggered by the
completion of the previous, forming a quest
chain. Quests commonly involve killing a number of creatures,
gathering a certain number of resources, finding a difficult to locate object,
speaking to various NPCs, visiting specific locations, interacting with objects
in the world, or delivering an item from one place to another.
While a character can be played on its own, players can
group with others to tackle more challenging content. Most end-game challenges
are designed in a way that they can only be overcome while in a group. In this
way, character classes are used in specific roles within a group.[30][33] World of
Warcraft uses a "rested bonus" system, increasing the rate that a
character can gain experience points after the player has spent time away from
the game.[26] When a character
dies, it becomes a ghost—or wisp for Night Elf
characters—at a nearby graveyard.[31] Characters can
be resurrected by other characters that have the ability, or can self-resurrect
by moving from the graveyard to the place where they died. If a character is
past level ten and they resurrect at a graveyard, the items equipped by the
character degrade, requiring in-game money and a specialist NPC to repair them.
Items that have degraded heavily become unusable until they are repaired. If
the location of the character's body is unreachable, they can use a special
"spirit healer" NPC to resurrect at the graveyard. When the spirit
healer revives a character, items equipped by the character at that time are
further degraded, and the character is significantly weakened by what is in-game
called "resurrection sickness" for up to ten minutes, depending on
the character's level. This "resurrection sickness" does not occur
and item degradation is less severe if the character revives by locating its
body, or is resurrected by another player through special items or spells.[34][35]
World of Warcraft
contains a variety of mechanisms for player
versus player (PvP) play. Players on player
versus environment (PvE) servers can opt to "flag"
themselves, making themselves attackable to players of the opposite faction.[36] Depending on the
mode of the realm, PvP combat between members of opposing factions is possible
at almost any time or location in the game world—the only exception being the
starting zones, where the PvP "flag" must be enabled by the player
wishing to fight against players of the opposite faction. PvE (called normal or
RP) servers, by contrast, allow a player to choose whether or not to engage in
combat against other players. On both server types, there are special areas of
the world where free-for-all combat is permitted. Battlegrounds, for example,
are similar to dungeons: only a set number of characters can enter a single
battleground, but additional copies of the battleground can be made to
accommodate additional players.[37] Each
battleground has a set objective, such as capturing a flag or defeating an
opposing general, that must be completed to win the battleground. Competing in
battlegrounds rewards the character with tokens and honor points that can be
used to buy armor, weapons, and other general items that can aid a player in
many areas of the game. Winners get more honor and tokens than losers. However,
players also earn honor when they or nearby teammates kill players in a
battleground.[36]
Setting
World of Warcraft is
set in the same universe as the Warcraft series of real-time
strategy games, and has a similar art direction.[21] World of
Warcraft contains elements from fantasy, steampunk, and science
fiction: such as gryphons, dragons, and elves; steam-powered automata; zombies,
werewolves, and other horror monsters; as well as time travel, spaceships,
and alien worlds.
World of Warcraft takes
place in a 3D
representation of the Warcraft universe that players can interact with
through their characters. The game world initially consisted of the two continents
in Azeroth: Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms. Two separate expansions later
added to the game's playable area the realm of Outland and the continent of
Northrend. As a player explores new locations, different routes and means of
transportion become available. Players can access "flight masters" in
newly discovered locations to fly to previously discovered locations in other
parts of the world.[38] Players can also
use boats, zeppelins, or portals to move from one continent to another.
Although the game world remains relatively similar from day to day, seasonal
events reflecting real world events—such as Halloween,[39] Christmas,
Children's Week,[36] Easter, and
Midsummer—have been represented in the game world. Locations also have variable
weather including, among other things, rain, snow, and dust storms.[38]
A number of facilities are available for characters while
in towns and cities. In each major city, characters can access a bank to
deposit items, such as treasure or crafted items. Each character has access to
personal bank storage with the option to purchase additional storage space
using in-game gold.[40] Additionally,
guild banks are available for use by members of a guild with restrictions being
set by the guild leader.[41] Auction houses
are available for players to buy and sell items to others in a similar way to
online auction sites such as eBay.[42] Players can use
mailboxes, which can be found in almost every town. Mailboxes are used to
collect items won at auction, and to send messages, items, and in-game money to
other characters.[26]
Some of the challenges in World of Warcraft
require players to group together to complete them. These usually take place in
dungeons—also known as "instances"—that a group of characters can
enter together. The term "instance" comes from each group or party
having a separate copy, or instance, of the dungeon, complete with their own
enemies to defeat and their own treasure or rewards.[43] This allows a
group to explore areas and complete quests without others interfering. Dungeons
are spread over the game world and are designed for characters of varying
progression. A typical dungeon will allow up to five characters to enter as
part of a group. Some dungeons require more players to group together and form
a "raid" of up to forty players to face some of the most difficult
challenges.[44] As well as
dungeon-based raid challenges, several creatures exist in the normal game
environment that are designed for raids to attack.[39][45]
Subscription
World of Warcraft
requires a subscription fee to be paid to allow continued play, with options to
pay in one month, three month, or six month blocks, although timecards of
varying length are available both online and from traditional retailers.[46] Expansion packs
are available online, and are also available from traditional retailers. As the
game client is the same regardless of the version of World of Warcraft
the user owns, the option to purchase expansions online was added as it allowed
for a quick upgrade. World of Warcraft has 10.2 million subscribers as
of December 2011.[14] World of
Warcraft is available as a free Starter Edition, which is free to play for
an unlimited amount of time. Starter Edition characters are unable to gain
experience after reaching level 20, and there are other restrictions in effect
for Starter Edition accounts, including the inability to trade, use public chat
channels, join guilds, or amass more than ten gold.[47]
Parental controls
As for some players the game may be excessively
attractive and consume more time than preferred, the company offers parental
controls[48] that allow to
set the various limits on the playing time. It is possible to set the daily
limit, weekly limit or to specify the allowed playing schedule. In order to
control these settings, it is necessary to log in with different credentials
than are used just to enter the game. It is also possible to receive the
statistics on the time spent for playing. Apart from controlling children,
adults sometimes use parental controls on themselves[49] The company
supports this kind of protection as otherwise the potential players or their
supervisors may choose to uninstall or block the game permanently[50]
Development
World of Warcraft was
first announced by Blizzard at the ECTS trade show in September 2001.[51] Development of
the game took roughly 4–5 years, and included extensive testing. The 3D
graphics in World of Warcraft use elements of the proprietary graphics
engine originally used in Warcraft III.[51] The game was
designed to be an open environment where players are allowed to do what they
please.[52] Quests are
optional and were designed to help guide players, allow character development,
and to spread characters across different zones to try to avoid what developers
called player collision.[53] The game
interface allows players to customize appearance and controls, and to install
add-ons and other modifications.[54]
World of Warcraft runs
natively on both Macintosh
and Windows
platforms. Boxed copies of the game use a hybrid CD to install the
game, eliminating the need for separate Mac and Windows retail products. The
game allows all users to play together, regardless of their operating system. Although
there is no official version for any other platform, support for World of
Warcraft is present in Windows API implementations Wine and CrossOver allowing the game
to be played under Linux and FreeBSD.[55]
Regional variations
In the United States, Canada, and Europe, Blizzard
distributes World of Warcraft via retail software packages.[56] The software
package includes 30 days of gameplay for no additional cost. To continue
playing after the initial 30 days, additional play time must be purchased using
a credit card or prepaid game card. The minimum gameplay duration that a player
can purchase is 30 days using a credit card, or 60 using a prepaid game card. A
player also has the option of purchasing three or six months of gameplay at
once for a 6–15% discount.[57] In Australia,
the United States, and many European countries, video game stores commonly
stock the trial version of World of Warcraft in DVD form, which includes
the game and 20 levels[58] of gameplay,
after which the player would have to upgrade to a retail account by supplying a
valid credit card, or purchasing a game card as well as a retail copy of the
game.
In Brazil, World of Warcraft was released on
December 6, 2011 via BattleNet. The first three expansions are currently
available, fully translated, including voice acting, into Brazilian
Portuguese.[3]
In South Korea, there is no software package or CD key
requirement to activate the account. However, to play the game, players must
purchase time credits online via credit card or the ARS billing system. There
are two kinds of time credits available: one where the player is billed based
on the actual number of minutes that will be available, and one where the
player can play the game for a number of days. In the former, time can be
purchased in multiples of 5 hours or 30 hours, and in the latter, time can be
purchased in multiples of 7 days, 1 month, or 3 months.[59] As software
packages are not required, expansion pack contents are available to all players
on launch day.
In China, because a large number of the players do not
own the computer they use to play games (e.g. Internet cafes), the CD
keys required to create an account can be purchased independently of the
software package. To play the game, players must also purchase prepaid game
cards that can be played for 66 hours and 40 minutes.[60] A monthly fee
model is not available to players of this region. The Chinese government and NetEase, the licensee for World
of Warcraft in China, have imposed a modification on Chinese versions of
the game which places flesh on bare-boned skeletons and transforms dead
character corpses into tidy graves. These changes were imposed by the Chinese
government in an attempt to "promote a healthy and harmonious online game environment" in World of
Warcraft.[61][62] The Chinese
government has delayed release of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion,
due to what it feels is objectionable content.[63] NetEase took
over licensing of World of Warcraft from The9 in June 2009 following the expiration of
The9's contract,[64] and were able to
secure a launch for Wrath
of the Lich King on August 31, 2010, nearly two years after its
Western release.[65]
Post-launch development
The World of Warcraft launcher (referred to in
press releases and the menu bar as the "Blizzard Launcher") is a
program designed to act as a starting point for World of Warcraft
players. It provides a way to launch World of Warcraft and starts the
Blizzard updater. It was first included with the version 1.8.3 patch. The 2.1.0
patch allowed for an option to bypass the use of the launcher. Features of the
launcher include news and updates for World of Warcraft players, access
to World of Warcraft's support website, access to the test version of World
of Warcraft when it is available to test upcoming patches, updates to Warden,[66] and updates to
the updater itself. The 3.0.8 patch redesigned the launcher and added the
ability to change the game settings from the launcher itself. The launcher
update from patch 4.0.1 also allows people to play the game while non-crucial
pieces of the game are downloaded. This requires a high speed broadband
internet connection.
Patch
1.9.3 added native support for Intel-powered
Macs, making World of Warcraft a universal application. As a
result of this, the minimum supported Mac OS X version has been changed to
10.3.9; World of Warcraft version 1.9.3 and later will not launch on
older versions of Mac OS X.[67] PowerPC architecture Macs
are no longer supported since version 4.0.1.[68]
When new content is added to the game, official system
requirements may change. In version 1.12.0 the requirements for Windows were
increased from requiring 256 MB to 512 MB of RAM. Official Windows 98 technical support
was dropped, but the game continued to run there until version 2.2.3.[69] Before Mists of
Pandaria, World of Warcraft will officially drop support for Windows 2000.[70]
Expansions
Main articles: World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, and World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria
Three optional expansions are currently available: The Burning Crusade, released in January
2007, Wrath of the Lich King, released in
November 2008, and Cataclysm, released in December 2010. Players are not
required to purchase the expansions to continue play. However, the expansion
packs allow further leveling of characters beyond level 60 and access to newer
content and areas. Characters cannot enter the additional regions without their
respective expansion packs.
On June 28, 2011, The Burning Crusade was
automatically applied to all previous Warcraft accounts, and all new Warcraft
accounts created in the future will have The Burning Crusade applied at
no additional cost. All The Burning Crusade content is now effectively
part of the original game.[71]
Beta Testing for Mists of Pandaria was opened on March 21,
2012. [72]
Audio
The soundtrack for World of Warcraft was composed
and arranged by Jason Hayes, Tracy W. Bush, Derek Duke,
and Glenn Stafford. It was released on November 23, 2004, together with the
collector's edition of the game. It is sold separately on one CD in the MP3
format.
|
|
|
|
vocalists, pianists, strings, and other instruments, World
of Warcraft Sheet Music Anthology in solo and accompaniment formats with
CD. These works include four pages of collectable artwork, and vary by number
of songs included.
Reception
World of Warcraft was
almost universally praised by critics upon release,[74] following a
period of high anticipation before launch.[80] Although the
game follows a similar model to—and was noted for using many familiar concepts
from—the roleplaying genre,[21][75] the new
approaches to reducing pauses between game encounters were well liked.[32] A common example
was the approach to character death. In some previous MMORPGs, a player would
suffer a high penalty for character death; in World of Warcraft, a
player is able to recover and start playing quickly.[21] Combat was
another area where "downtime", or pauses between play, was reduced.
By allowing all character types to recover from damage taken, players can
return to combat quickly.[32] Reviewers felt
that these changes in pacing would make the genre more accessible to casual
players—those who play for short periods of time—[32] while still
having "deep" gameplay that would attract players of all levels of
interest.[31] The concept of a
"rested bonus", or increasing the rate at which a player's character
gains experience, was also welcomed as a way for players to quickly catch up
with their friends in progression.[21]
Questing
was described as an integral part of the game, often being used to continue a
storyline or lead the player through the game.[32] The high number
of quests in each location was popular, as well as the rewards for completing
them.[21] It was felt that
the range of quests removed the need for a player to "grind", or
carry out repetitive tasks, to advance their character.[31] Quests also
require players to explore every section of the game world, potentially causing
problems for social gamers or roleplayers seeking somewhere quiet.[32] Quests that
required the player to collect items from the corpses of creatures they had
killed were also unpopular; the low "drop rate", or chance of finding
the items, makes them feel repetitive as a high number of creatures need to be
killed to complete the quest.[31] The large number
of new players in a particular area meant that there were often no creatures to
kill,[32] or that players
would have to wait and take turns to kill a particular creature to complete a
quest.[21] Some critics
mentioned that the lack of quests that required players to group made the game
feel as if it were designed for solo play.[77] Others
complained that some dungeon or instanced group quests were not friendly to new
players, and could take several hours to complete.[31] Upon release, a
small number of quests had software bugs that made them
impossible to complete.[21]
Characters were felt to be implemented well, with each
class appearing "viable and interesting", having unique and different
mechanisms,[77] and each of the
races having a distinct look and feel.[21] Character
development was also liked, with the talent mechanism offering choice to
players,[75] and profession
options being praised.[21] Character
customization options were felt to be low,[31] but the detail
of character models was praised.[80]
The appearance of the game world was praised by critics.
Most popular was the fact that a player could run from one end of the continent
to the other without having to pause at a "loading screen" while part
of the game is retrieved from storage.[80] The environment
was described as "breathtaking". Players found it difficult to become
lost, and each area in the game world had a distinct look that blended from one
to the next.[32] Critics
described the environment as "a careful blend of cartoon, fantasy art, and
realism".[75] The game was
found to run smoothly on a range of computer systems,[21] although some
described it as basic,[32] and mentioned
that the bloom
light rendering effect can blur things.[31] One reviewer
described the ability to fly over long stretches of scenery as "very
atmospheric".[77] The user
interface was liked, being described as "simple", with tooltips helping to get the
player started.[21]
The game's audio was well received, particularly the
background music. By assigning music to different areas of the game world,
reviewers felt that the fantasy style added to the player's immersion,[75] and that the
replay value was increased.[31] The sounds and
voices used by characters and NPCs, as well as the overall sound effects, were
felt to add a "personality" to the game.[75]
World of Warcraft won
several awards from critics upon release, including Editor's Choice
awards.[21][31] In addition, it
won several annual awards from the media, being described as the best game in
the role-playing and MMORPG genres.[81] The graphics and
audio were also praised in the annual awards, with the cartoonish style[82] and overall
sound makeup being noted.[83] The game was
also awarded Best Mac OS X Entertainment Product at the 2005 Apple
Design Awards.[84] World of
Warcraft was recognised at the 2005 Spike
TV Video
Game Awards where it won Best PC Game, Best Multiplayer
Game, Best RPG, and Most Addictive Game.[85] In 2008, World
of Warcraft was honoured—along with Neverwinter Nights and EverQuest—at the 59th
Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for
advancing the art form of MMORPG games.[86] In 2009, Game Informer ranked World
of Warcraft 11th on their list of "The Top 200 Games of All
Time".[87]
World of Warcraft was
the best-selling PC game of 2005 and 2006.[88] As of January
22, 2008, World of Warcraft has more than 10 million subscribers
worldwide, with more than 2 million subscribers in Europe, more than 2.5
million in North America, and about 5.5 million in Asia.[89]
Less than two months after beginning operation of World
of Warcraft in China on September 19, 2009, NetEase was ordered to
immediately stop charging players and to cease accepting registrations.[90][91] A press estimate
indicated that if World of Warcraft were shut down in China, the loss of
subscribers would have caused Activision Blizzard's earnings to fall from 65
cents per share to 60 cents per share.[90] In April 2008, World
of Warcraft was estimated to hold 62 percent of the MMORPG subscription
market.[92]
Corrupted Blood plague
incident
Main article: Corrupted
Blood incident
The Corrupted Blood plague incident was one of the first
events to affect entire servers. Patch 1.7 saw the opening of Zul'Gurub, the
game's first 20-player raid dungeon where players faced off against a tribe of
trolls under the sway of the god Hakkar the Soulflayer. Upon engaging Hakkar,
players were stricken by a debuff
called "Corrupted Blood" which would periodically sap their life. The
disease was passed on to other players simply by being near infected players.
Originally this malady was confined within the Zul'Gurub instance, but it made
its way into the outside world by way of hunter pets or warlock minions that
contracted the disease.
Within hours, Corrupted Blood had completely infected
major cities because of their high player concentrations. Low-level players
were killed in seconds by the high-damage disease. Eventually Blizzard fixed
the issue so that the plague could not exist outside of Zul'Gurub.
The Corrupted Blood plague so closely resembled the outbreak of real-world
epidemics that scientists are currently looking at ways MMORPGs or other
massively distributed systems can model human behavior during outbreaks. The
reaction of players to the plague closely resembled previously hard-to-model
aspects of human behavior that may allow researchers to more accurately predict
how diseases and outbreaks spread amongst a population.[93]
Security concerns
When players create World of Warcraft accounts,
they are asked to choose a username and password. Afterward, whenever they play
World of Warcraft, they are asked to supply the same username and
password in full. This is also the case when using account management
facilities online. This type of authentication is vulnerable to keystroke logging. While
this is not unique to World of Warcraft and is common to many MMORPGs, the game has been directly
targeted with trojans
being specifically crafted to capture account login details.[94] Attacks have
been reported as early as May 2006, and may extend as far back as July 30,
2005.[95] The game does,
however, allow players to save their account name to the program to allow the
player to only have to type their password.[96]
In September 2006, reports emerged of spoof World of
Warcraft game advice websites that contained malware. Vulnerable
computers would be infected through their web browsers, downloading a
program that would then relay back account information. Blizzard's account
support teams experienced high demand during this episode, stating that many
users had been affected. Claims were also made that telephone support was
closed for isolated periods due to the volume of calls and resulting queues.[97] In April 2007,
attacks evolved to take advantage of further exploits involving animated
cursors, with multiple websites being used.[98][99] Security
researcher group Symantec
released a report stating that a compromised World of Warcraft account
was worth US$10 on the black
market, compared to US$6 to US$12 for a compromised computer
(correct as of March 2007).[100] In February
2008, phishing emails were
distributed requesting that users validate their account information using a
fake version of the World of Warcraft account management pages.[101] In June 2008,
Blizzard announced the Blizzard Authenticator, available as a hardware security token or mobile
application[102] that provides two
factor security. The token generates a one-time password based
code that the player supplies when logging on. The password, used in addition
to the user's own password, is only valid for a couple of minutes, thus
providing extra security against keylogging malware.[103]
Blizzard makes use of a system known as Warden on the Windows
version of the game to detect third-party programs, such as botting software, allowing World
of Warcraft to be played unattended. There has been some controversy as to
the legality of Warden. Warden uses techniques similar to anti-virus
software to analyze other running software on the players' PCs, as
well as the file system.
However, unlike most anti-virus software, it sends a portion of this
information back to Blizzard, which caused privacy advocates to accuse it of
being spyware.[104] One example of
the information Warden collects is the title of every window open on the system
while WoW is running.[105] Blizzard has
not stated what information is passed by Warden over the Internet, or if that
information is encrypted, so it is entirely possible that this information is
passed over the Internet back to Blizzard. On the other hand, many gamers
responded positively to the development, stating that they supported the
technology if it resulted in fewer cases of cheating. Blizzard's use of Warden
was stated in the Terms of Agreement (TOA).[106]
The Warden's existence was acknowledged in March 2008,
during the opening legal proceedings against MDY Industries.[107] The lawsuit was
filed in federal court in Arizona,
and also listed Michael Donnelly as a defendant. Donnelly was included in the
suit as the creator of MMO Glider,
software that can automatically play many tasks in the game. Blizzard claimed
the software is an infringement of its copyright and software license agreement, stating that "Glider use
severely harms the WoW gaming experience for other players by altering the
balance of play, disrupting the social and immersive aspects of the game, and
undermining the in-game economy." Donnelly claims to have sold 100,000
copies of the $25 software.[108]
Real ID
Main article: Battle.net#Privacy
and Real ID
On July 6, 2010, Blizzard Entertainment announced that on
its forums for all games, users' accounts will display their real names tied to
their accounts.[109] Blizzard
announced the change following an agreement with Facebook to allow Facebook to
connect persons who choose to become friends to share their real identity (Real
ID, as Blizzard calls the feature). The integration of the feature to the
forums on the Blizzard Entertainment sites has raised concerns amongst fans of
the many game series Blizzard has created over the years.[110][111]
In response to the concerns, Blizzard released an updated
statement on July 9, 2010, announcing that the Real ID integration with the
official forums was being canceled.[112][113]
Sale of virtual goods in
the real world
Further information: Virtual economy
As with other MMORPGs, companies have emerged offering
to sell virtual gold and associated services. The practice of amassing gold and
in-game items for financial profit is frequently referred to as gold farming.
After Blizzard started offering free trial gameplay
accounts, players noticed an increase in spam from bots advertising these
services.[114] One study shows
that this problem is particularly prevalent on the European realms, with gold
being over 14 times more expensive to buy on US realms than their European
counterparts.[115]
In patch 2.1, Blizzard responded to this by adding
additional anti-spam mechanics including whisper throttling and the report spam
function. Additionally, trial accounts are prevented from speaking in the
public chat channels (although they may speak to players within range or
whisper to other players that have first whispered to them), participating in
in-game trades, and using the Auction House and the mail feature, among other
limitations.
In May 2007, Blizzard filed a complaint against In Game
Dollar LLC (trading as peons4hire) in U.S. federal court. In February 2008, the
parties filed a consent decree in which In Game Dollar agreed to refrain from
using any World of Warcraft chat or communication to advertise any
business or sell any services relating to World of Warcraft.[116]
As characters progress in World of Warcraft and
take on some of the toughest challenges, many of the rewards received are bound
to that character and cannot be traded, generating a market for the trading of
accounts with well-equipped characters. The highest noted World of Warcraft
account trade was for £5000 (€7000, US$9,900) in early September 2007. The high
price was due to the character possessing items that at the time were owned by
only a handful of millions active players, due to the difficulty in acquiring
them.[117]
The practice of buying or selling gold in World of
Warcraft has generated significant controversy.[118] On February 21,
2008, Blizzard released a statement concerning the consequences of buying gold.
Blizzard reported that an "alarmingly high" proportion of all gold
bought originates from "hacked" accounts. The article also stated
that customers who had paid for character leveling services had found their
accounts compromised months later, with all items stripped and sold for virtual
gold. The article noted that leveling service companies often used
"disruptive hacks ... which can cause realm performance and stability
issues".[119]
Community
See also: Social interaction via MMORPGs and emergent gameplay
In addition to playing the game itself and conversing on
discussion forums provided by Blizzard, World of Warcraft players often
participate in the virtual
community in creative ways, including fan artwork[120] and comic strip
style storytelling.[121]
Blizzard garnered criticism for its decision in January
2006 to ban guilds from advertising sexual orientation preferences. The
incident occurred after several players were cited for "harassment"
after advocating a group that was a gay-straight alliance.[122][123] Blizzard later
reversed the decision to issue warnings to players promoting LGBT-friendly guilds.
On October 7, 2010 World of Warcraft reached a
subscriber base of over 12 million players.[124] Since May 2011,
the number of players playing had decreased by 10% from 11.4 million to 10.3
million. Blizzard's CEO Mike Morhaime said that the reason was probably due to
a drop-off in the Eastern markets.[125] In 2012, senior
producer John Lagrave told Eurogamer
that the drop in subscriptions may've also been attributed to the recent
release of BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic.[126]
Oficial
Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYK_Gqyf48Y
Source: www.youtube.com
