T w e n t y S i d e d

Goldshire is the name of one of the newbie areas in the game. It’s the hub town for human characters between levels 5 and 12. (Give or take.) It’s a cute little farming village surrounded by woodlands. It’s also a natural crossroads. It’s just a two minute walk from both a major city (Stormwind) and the spawning area for new Human characters. I don’t think there are any other towns that offer this level of access.

For whatever reason, Goldshire has become a nexus of insanity and idiocy. Despite the fact that each server has its own self-contained copy of the world, every single iteration of Goldshire on all of the servers of WoW is a raging madhouse.

During busy hours you’ll find high-level characters dueling in the street. There are often several duels going at once, so the center of town is a swirling tempest of colorful particle effects, fire, and summoned beasts. Characters run naked (underwear) through the buildings and roleplay obscene or preposterous vignettes. The chat box is a rushing torrent of strange emotes and melodramatic shouting.

Like a town in a Stephen King novel, the place looks peaceful but is filled with crazy people!

In order to explain further I’m going to have to resort to anecdotes:

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “World of Warcraft:
Goldshire”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

So now I’ve sunk some real time into WoW. I’ve rolled up a character from almost every race. I’ve played a few of the classes past level 10. I’ve seen most of the early-game content (Alliance-side) and I’ve taken part in both solo and group play. Given the size of this thing, I am still a newbie, but I think I have enough of a handle on the game to start talking about the mechanics and gameplay without flailing about in ignorance.

But even a couple of hours into my first session I could see what imbues the game with its addictive properties. It provides a tremendous number of highly polished activities and goals for the player to pursue.

WoW is a rich source of expansive scenery. In the past I’ve praised Oblivion for it’s size, although that game feels like a couple of parking spaces next to the immense gameworld we have in here. The locations are large, beautiful, and varied. Some people fault the game for its chunky, cartoony style but I’d rather have strong art direction than photorealism any day.

What have I been up to in the game? I’ve been roaming through the golden fields of Westfall in late afternoon, hunting down the infamous Defias gang and bringing those sons of bitches to repeated justice. I’ve enjoyed soaring over the mountains at sunset on one of the in-game taxis flying gryphons, rushing through that narrow cleft in the snowy peak to enter the roaring underground city of Ironforge, last remaining stronghold of Dwarven kind. I’ve been prowling along the beaches of Darkshore at night, hunting the scuttling crabs while dodging clusters of Murlocs as they feasted on the carcass of some beached leviathan. I’ve been lost among the towering ancient trees of Teldrassil. I’ve seen the crazy purple crystals and those freaky moths they have around the ruined Exodar. I’ve been diving for treasure, climbing mountains, digging through dungeons, and winding my way through darkened woods.

I’ve been places, is what I’m saying. I’ve seen more spectacle than a dozen other games might offer, and I’ve seen less than a third of the World of Warcraft.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “World of Warcraft:
Addictive Gameplay”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.