Yu Gi Oh: Poc Yugi The Destiny for WIN 98SE, W2K, WME , XP for Windows

There are many Massively Multiplayer games on the market, and have been over the years. When World of Warcraft game onto the market in 2004, it was already competing with other games that had been on the market for years. However, it was an MMORPG with the history and professionalism of a company that kept a franchise going for 10 years, and a story that was detailed and involving.

I first tried World of Warcraft when it was in closed beta. I thought it was interesting, but not enough to spark my interest. Then in April of 2005 went out on a limb and purchased the game, and within hours I was hooked.

I found World of Warcraft to be engaging from the very start. The interface is intuitive, with quest givers marked out with bright yellow exclamation marks, and quest dialogue that was both intriguing and involving to read, but also informative to those who want to just get the quest over with. The mechanics of the game are easy to understand, enough for even a casual gamer or perhaps one who has never played an online game to get the hang of it within a week or two.

The requirements for the game are fairly low by today's standards. It requires an 800mhz processor, 256mb of RAM (although 512 or more is recommended), and a 32mb video card. Even the bandwidth usage of WoW is fairly low, allowing those who are still on dialup connections to play, although at reduced performance.

The graphics for World of Warcraft are not state of the art by today's standards, but this seems intentional. Modern graphical technology is in the right places, but the world is designed to retain the feel of the Warcraft universe, so at first glance it seems a bit cartoony. The world however is richly detailed, with a lot of subtle details one might miss at first glance.

The game comes with a varying number of CDs, depending on the date of purchase. When I had recieved my copy of WoW, it had 4 CDs within, although friends of mine who had purchased the game months afterwards claimed to have around 5 CDs. The installation time of World of Warcraft is quite extensive, requiring anywhere between 20 to 40 minutes to install depending on computer specs, not including required patches.

One thing I like very much with WoW is the ability to mod the User Interface, or UI. The UI is coded in LUA (LUA 5.1 as of the 2.0 patch) allowing players to modify or create their own utilities for the game. This level of customization is endless, from changing the appearance of your UI, to creating completely new tools and elements to aid you in your gameplay.

As for the gameplay, there are four types of servers, Normal and PVP, grouped in twos under Roleplaying and non-roleplaying servers. Normal servers differ from PVP servers as PVP is consentual, meaning a player can flag themselves as PVP enabled if they so choose to PVP. Regardless of the server type, there are PVP battlegrounds that players can queue up for to do PVP in a more structured fashion, either with capture the flag, or point conquest. WoW also comes with an Honor system, allowing the players to accrue honor points in exchange for armor, weapons, trinkets, even a special mount to ride.

The level cap in this game goes to 60, which for even a casual gamer is attainable without too much expense in time. And at 60 the game does not end. There is quite a lot of end-game content for players, from special raid quests, to raid instances requiring anywhere from 10 to 40 people. There is also a reputation system in game used to award players with various faction rewards.

Characters can be from two different sides, the Alliance and the Horde (characters on a PVP server can only choose one side per server, while those on a normal server can have both). Each come with four different races. The Alliance also get the Paladin class which is akin to a warrior who can heal, and the Horde get the Shaman class, which is good with melee attacks but augmented by magic and the ability to lay down totems which buff various stats, heal, or attack with differing magic attacks. (In the expansion, The Burning Crusade, each side will get an additional race and the ability to play Paladin or Shaman on either side).

After over a year and a half, I still find myself addicted to this game. Something in it keeps me interested. I dont find that it's an absolutely fantastic MMO in every regard, as there are a few problems every patch that take time to get fixed, and UI mods tend to require manual updating every patch. But the various elements of this game work together to put forth a highly polished game that runs very smoothly and with little interruption. As a veteran of over 40 various Massively Multiplayer Online games (whether live or beta tested), few MMOs stand out to me like World of Warcraft. So far it has stood the test of time, and it looks as if good things await for it in the future.