Over at Zanderfin’s blog, he asked the question, "Who got you into WoW?" Then, Trollin’ picked up on the meme on his blog, which is where I first read the question.
A bit more than 3 years ago, I was newly promoted from Moderator to Board Manager at the Vault Network forums. My primary responsibility in this new role was to manage the various forums dedicated to EverQuest II. I had been admitted to the beta, and while I hated the original EQ, the new version held promise (or so I thought). At the same time, of course, World of Warcraft was in development.
With its "cartoony" charcter models, 24-hour game day, and other "issues," I pooh-poohed Blizzard’s entry into the MMORPG world. But then I was offered a beta slot (our more senior managers had connections). And I was hooked. Sure, I got EQII when it came out, and moved there with my Asheron’s Call II/Horizons guild (after all, I was the #2 person in the guild). And I played. Some. But I was just marking time until WoW was officially released. I haven’t looked back since! My original WoW guild was on the Icecrown server, and was initially composed of Vault Network managers and moderators, plus a few other board personalities.
So, to continue the meme…who or what got you hooked on WoW?
I had an inside track – old college friends of mine (from our old tabletop RP campaign) were on the development team for a new game at Blizzard. When it came time for the Friends and Family alpha, they were able to get my wife and I into the playtest.
I was also immediately turned off by the cartoony looks of the models – coming from an EQ background I was really looking for a more realistic look and feel for a fantasy game. But they’d hit a home run with their quest system and the entire game was easy to learn – this fact is one of the reasons I think the game has been so popular. WoW is a gateway game for MMORPGS that also contains enough complexity at the upper end to appeal to almost every online gamer.
My friends still work at Blizzard, right now hard at work on WotLK. Can’t wait to see what comes next!
A friend of mine got into the Alpha and wouldn’t stop talking about it. I almost didn’t bother getting into the Open Beta because of my negative experience with EQ, but after about 10 minutes of playing, I knew I was in trouble.
And I prefer the artwork and graphics of WoW to games like LoTRO and EQII. I find it hard to create a character I like in those games that isn’t creepy looking.
The friend of an old roommate who first got the roommate hooked. Then one night, when he was passed out on the couch, I rolled a character on his account just to see what it was like, and something like several hours later, was level 11 and completely hooked. I had my own account shortly after that in no time.
And to think of how much we ridiculed our friend when he first brought the box over.
Merry Christmas!
For months people had been telling my boyfriend and I that we “had” to play WoW, and that “Oh you’ll play eventually. You just don’t know it yet.” We got really, really annoyed and basically vowed never to play WoW.
One day, however, one of our friends let my boyfriend try out his copy. He spent hours playing. The next day, he told me about it, and I installed the trial which I’d had laying around. A couple weeks later, we both had our own accounts
I guess our friends had been right this whole time!
November 2004…my ex boyfriends little brother held the box in his hands. I looked it over and HAD to have it. A few weeks later Christmas arrived and I promptly installed my own copy that the ex had gotten me. He started playing a few months after that. 2 years later, that ended and I had to convince my new boyfriend that if he wanted to play – he should. Now he’s got a 54 rogue and we often run ST together (or, as often as we get a full group). I’ve played off and on ever since i got the game. Since we dont have much money, it really is the cheapest form of entertainment for a month straight.