It's spring somewhere... right?
I am not sure how the mind works... or specifically how my mind works... but I have a chesty cough that has taken all but my last ounce of strength so it is today that I decide to defrost my fridge/freezer
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Saying that - it is an enormous time sink... it is said that even if you are an "expert" it takes about 7-8 days (that is 168-192 hours) of play time to get a character to the current level cap of 80. I don't want know how much time I have spent on my characters!
There's also the fact that there is no real "end" to the game... once you reach 80 there are plenty of things still to do. Plus the fact you can have more than one character, it's really endless. I dread to think how much time I have spent playing over the last 3-4 years.
There's a lot of detail in the game... and it can be really pretty in there at times. The sun rises and sets based on the server time (which is central european time for me) then the moon rises and sets. It rains and snows. The leaves change colour in the autumn.
There's a version of most real world holidays in the game too; Halloween, Valentines, Midsummer, Easter, Christmas/Hanukkah, and the Chinese New Year, most of which are renamed to prevent upsetting specific groups!
The developers have a seriously warped sense of humour... one of the last vendors (like a shopkeeper) I visited was called Ann Summers (she doesn't sell anything rude... just cheese!) There's so many references like this in the game... some are song lyrics, film quotes, TV shows, and a team of sad people with much more spare time than I have have made a list.
I guess the most addictive part of playing a game like WoW is "the Ding" When you reach a new level, or complete a series of linked tasks that complete an achievement, you get an animation, a whooshing sound, and sometimes a bar to tell you how great you are... and that may sound pretty lame, but after a while playing the game it's like crack - you NEED the next level or achievement.
The sneaky part is... the gaps between levels increases. At level one it only takes 400 "experience points" to get to the next level... at level two it takes 900, level 3; 1400... by the time you've got to level 79 it takes a whopping 1,670,800! That's a solid 5-6 hours of play... if you're lucky!
The last thing (and perhaps the most important to some) that sets games like WoW apart from the other types of games is the multi player aspect. It doesn't matter if you want to team up with players, or go it alone, you will be affected by the actions of others... there's not many places you can go to prevent this. This can either be a pain (some of the people who play WoW really are social misfits) or it can be a surprising pleasure. I've been helped out by passing strangers, either helping to finish off a particularly difficult foe, or healing me just before I was about to die. In turn I try to help out those around me too. The interaction with other people who are into the same stuff you are is nice. You just have to remind yourself that the really attractive Blood Elf on your screen is, in all probability, played by an over-weight teenage boy with poor personal hygiene. But who plays computer games to meet women right? ;)
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I heard that the majority of people that play WoW is female. This is really interestingly shocking to me.
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Interesting note... whilst researching this I came across the following acronym: In WoW, G.I.R.L. = Guy In Real Life.
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