![]() It should be noted that this is having an impact on role-players and power-gamers. Kill-stealing? Disallowed! ¿ber-unique items? Nonexistent. The money, quest, and crafting system is deliberately set up to keep players moving around the world, keep them circulating. While it's smaller than most MMOs, everything you see, every plant, tree, ridge, and mountain range feels deliberately placed. World of Warcraft avoids this pitfall by simply saying, "No." The world of Azeroth does an amazing job of channeling you to where you want to go. Give people the ability to kill other players at will, or steal, or cause other players grief, and it's guaranteed that there will be some subset of players out there who will have their fun by ruining the fun of others. ![]() Unfortunately, if you give people the ability to do anything, they will. MMOs advertise the ability of players to do literally anything within the game-world. One of the ironies of game design is that great game design is more about limits than about freedom. Rule #2: It's a Theme Park, Not a Playground Is there a reason why everything takes so damned long in most other MMOs? Was it to slow down the players? Keep them from leveling up too fast and burning out the game's limited content? There are many possible explanations, but the point is that sitting around for five or ten minutes waiting to heal is simply not fun. It's removing some of the things that were pointless and annoying. ![]() It's taking things that were fun from an earlier generation of MMOs and putting them in. The difference is the sheer level of polish that Blizzard is bringing to the title. Veteran MMO players can be seen hiding smiles when they listen to new people in the World of Warcraft beta talk about things that were old hat back in the glory days of EverQuest. In keeping with this tradition, World of Warcraft is not an innovative MMO. In fact, every title it's delivered has usually been in a genre pioneered by somebody else. Blizzard has never published an innovative game. ![]()
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