Current mood:	relaxed
Current music:	gondwana- ignoracia

january 24th blog
This is the first time that i play a mmorpg seriously. The only other mmos that I had played intensively were CounterStrike and Day of Defeat (these are first person shooting games which run on the Half-Life engine.

In comparison to the games mentioned above, the interface for wow is a lot less user friendly. I learned the interfaces for the shooters in about three hours of gameplay but I still struggle with the wow interface sometimes (for example, I misused my first talent point because the choices I had were not very clear). I believe that the game developers could further explain certain things about the interface. For example, some mining equipment (such as mining explosives and this other device which supposedly rids minerals of flaws) have no description or explanation so one can never be certain how to use them. This creates skepticism at the time of buying/trading and, at least in my case, reduces the amount of bartering that goes on.

However, it must be said that the first person shooters are very simple games with very limited commands. The result is an easy to learn interface. World of Warcraft tries to focus on all aspects of human interaction and day-to-day living [aquiring a profession, resting, maturing(levelling up),] and therefore has a far more complex interface. For example, while first person shooters' interfaces ussually have an interface consisting of equipment options, wow's interface ranges from reputation ratings to engineering skills.

As far as the world goes, the visual aspects are incredible. The level of detail achieved, considering the expanses of the terrain, are beyond anything I could have imagined. However, the level of detail plays against you at times. For example, when one reaches a town or the site of a popular quest, a noticeable lag kicks in and reduces the quality of gameplay. I read in the message board that what happens is that computers have a hard time processing "the million things flying around".

Despite the occasional lag, the gaming experience is very enjoyable and lends itself for more interaction between players than any other game I've played before. But I'm saving that for another blog. lol