This section is going to be all about my favorite game. Since I love it so much and it’s such a HUGE thing, I’m planning on reviewing quite a few different aspects of the game. For starters I’ll definitely go over character creation/design, layout, social aspects, some linguistics specific to the game, and some gear/stat elements. Be prepared because although I love to compare good and the bad, I’m going to be very biased.
I’ve played this game for five or so years, off and on, and have met some really awesome people and had some hilarious moments. However, I have also seen it and games like it, that hurt families and relationships. Like all things: take it in moderation!
Character Creation
I’ve been around the gaming block a little bit and being a writer, I absolutely love character creation. That’s my favorite part of starting a new game or a new story.
To be honest, WoW has a terrible character creation system. It’s not as bad as Diablo II where you only have five or so characters to choose from and they are gender specific. So if you want play a warrior, it has to be a boy or the wizard is always a girl and they always look the same. Compared to that, it’s nice. But compare it to City of Heroes or Soul Calibur 4. It is atrocious.
There are only a few different types of hair, a few different colors, and depending on the race, different markings, horns, earnings, or patches of missing skin. Since my primary character is a Night Elf, we’ll use this as an example.
There is only one hair style that I like from the original batch. In the last year, they have allowed characters to change their hair style and that has been awesome. Before that, what you picked in haste to play the game, was what you had for life. My first choice was a ponytail that I absolutely grew to detest. I celebrated the day I could take my toon to the barber and get something done about it.
With this ability, they also put out a few more hairstyles that can only be attained by going to the barber. Initially, I didn’t really like many of them, but it might have been because I already had a hairstyle in mind. I got the one I had been dreaming about for years, only to run around for a while and realize that every. single. night. elf. chick. had the stupid hair. For most of us women, that bugs when we have the same looks as someone else. In one instance, I had the same hair, facial markings, and hair color as another person and that just drove me off the edge to going to get (another) complete makeover.
Much to my dismay, the hairstyles all seemed to be ugly. They were cut weird, or too bushy, or too pulled back or too something. I probably spend an hour and at least 40 gold sitting there trying to figure out what I could spend my time staring at. Finally, I had to pick the hairstyle my sister already had. It isn’t very popular and made sure it was a different color from hers, but it was cute enough to stare at for hours.
WoW does have a lot of races (and more to come) to choose from and that freedom is nice. But that does not make up for the lack of choice when actually creating a character. Added to the hairstyle conundrum is the gear sets. As you are leveling, there are lots of different armor that makes you seem unique but once you hit 80 and start getting Tier armor, you start to be clones of each other. It’s no good.
For those persons who don’t care if they look the same as everyone else, then the character creation might suit them. For us other picky people, it’s annoying, especially after the awesome, seemingly limitless creations of City of Heroes and Soul Calibur 4.
For those of you who haven’t played these games, I’ll explain City of Heroes a bit. Also note, it’s been a few years since I’ve played so the exact details maybe a little off.
You get to pick the class and then a sub class. So just right there there are like 24 different combinations. Then the characters themselves: height on a scale from tiny to huge, weight from skinny to obese, tons of different hair styles available in any color of the rainbow. The armor has, as far as I can remember, I think like seven different categories and each category has 3 to probably 20 different types of belts or shoulders or shirts. I simply cannot do it justice in a short amount of time. Suffice it to say that the possibilities are limitless and the odds of someone looking even close to you are very slim.
The character creation of WoW is it’s biggest weakness, and although they have made some steps in the right direction, there is still a long ways to go.
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