OCTOBER 2019 PCWorld 67Draenor, but it usually
manages to redeem
itself with a followup
patch (as it largely
does with the latest
Rise of Azshara (go.
pcworld.com/roaz)
content drop in the
main game). Some of
WoW’s changes over
the last decade have
felt excessive (or at
least unnecessary), but
I highly doubt WoW would have retained so
much of its popularity had it clung to the same
design we find in Classic. And by any realistic
measure, World of Warcraft is one of gaming’s
most stunning success stories.
Part of that success, though, has a lot to
do with the fact that the game’s official
timeline has unfolded in one unbroken line
from 2004 until now. Most games feel
anchored to a certain point in history, or—like,
say, The Witcher 3—have a timelessness
springing from the fact that you can play them
over and over again so long as you have a
supporting system.
World of Warcraft, though, has a
dedicated high-population multiplayer base,
a constantly evolving storyline and world, an
old age for a game, and a sustained faction
rivalry that give it a linear history that few other
games have. Combined, all these factors help
World of Warcraft feel more like a real world
than many other persistent worlds.
This is a special thing, and it’s unmatched
by any other game save perhaps EVE Online.
You’ll find similar situations in other
MMORPGs like EverQuest and Final Fantasy
XIV (go.pcworld.com/fxi; and even Second
Life), but those games usually lack one of the
critical ingredients outlined above. This sense
of a long, shared history and a persistent
world is critical to WoW’s continued success;
it makes it feel like a place we can always go
home to. It sometimes even leads me to think
of my character as an extension of myself. I
was a member of one of the better-known
guilds back when this content was fresh—we
had a handful of world-first and -second raid
boss kills (go.pcworld.com/bskl), and a
truckload of server firsts—and the mage I used
in those means a lot to me. I keep him
“retired” on a ranch so he’ll be happy even
though I play another class these days.I do miss big server events, though.