For the longest time, I complained of the boredom that this long, hot, activity-less summer had cursed me with. Amidst my idleness, I turned to the internet for answers to life's questions, hoping against hope that I may come across a light at the end of this seemingly endless tunnel of boredom. Fortunately, as fate would have it, I did.
I signed up for the free 10-day trial of "World of Warcraft" and I can proudly announce that it's the best MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) ever! I got so absorbed in it that, after my free 10 days were up, I signed up for another free 10-day trial account. Haha.
As you may already know, an MMORPG lets a huge number of people play in interaction with the other players. But World of Warcraft is not like most MMORPGs here in the Philippines. WoW servers are accessible from all around the globe. So, unlike Ragnarok Philippines or Mu Online Philippines, you can log in to WoW and play with people from the U.S.A. and/or Australia or wherever the heck the other players are playing from.
The real downside to this game is the high cost of playing it. The retail version costs about P1795 here in the Philippines. You can skip that payment by downloading the whole game via the free 10-day trial account, but after the free 10 days, the subscription costs would still be painful for someone like me. The main billing process that WoW takes advantage of is payment through credit card. It costs about $19.99 to activate an account and get 30 calendar days of "free" (so-called) game time. It would cost another 20 bucks to keep playing for the next month, and another 20 bucks to play for the month after that, and so on and so forth. And in some places, the amount could still be higher due to subscription tax. Here in the Philippines, it could cost as much as P1,000 per month to keep playing.
Payment via pre-paid cards is also available here in the Philippines, but it costs pretty much the same. The only available pre-paid card that I know of costs P1,995 and adds 60 calendar days to your game time.
But, if I have the money, I do believe that I will keep playing this game because (1) it rocks, and (2) WoW is, more than a game, a community. And I feel drawn to this community.
You see, the World of Warcraft is divided into two factions, the Horde and the Alliance. At one point in the history of Azeroth (the name of the world where the game takes place), the Horde was an evil, demonically-empowered legion obsessed with conquering the world and destroying anything that stands in its way; while the Alliance was the congregation of noble defenders out to save the world. But after a long and interesting (I even dare say award-winning) history, those distinctions no longer exist. Each faction has its own goodness. Each has its own evils.
When I created a character, I chose for it to be a Horde character. Due to the factional divide, there was the other faction - the Alliance - for everybody in the Horde to treat as a rival. And because of this, members of the Horde treat each other as more than just allies, but brothers and sisters in whatever battlefield that Horde and Alliance members trudge upon at the same time. Sure, conflicts break out between members of the same faction, but the game rules do not allow open violence between allies, at least not beyond consensual duels where nobody can die.
In contrast to this, the game doesn't allow meaningful interaction between members of opposing factions. Horde members cannot understand the languages spoken by Alliance members, and vice versa. This is integrated into the game world by blocking off all dialogues of one faction from the view of the opposing faction. The most meaningful interaction that I have gotten so far from Alliance players are on instances when they wave at me, dance with me, laugh at me, taunt me, spit at me, challenge me to a duel, or engage me in open combat.
Playing in this world really makes you feel like living in a community. And, so far, the community I chose is turning out to be the ideal community I would like to have offline.
My first character is named Blackfist. He is a Tauren Warrior, and for now, also a herbalist and alchemist. I chronicled his first few adventures through screenshots and I'm hoping to post them on this blog soon along with more information on what a "Tauren" is and on their history. Meanwhile, feast your senses on these other stuff:
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