Okay, so I finally broke down and got myself into World of Warcraft. I figured it was high time I figured out what all of the buzz was over, since it is arguably the most successful MMO in today's market. But, why? What makes this game so fantastic that it is the monolith of today's gaming genres?

To be honest, as of yet, I'm just not sure. I mean, yeah... it's interesting in terms of eye-candy. The graphics are non-traditional in comparison to other games out there. It has its own look and feel way beyond what any other title offers. But is that enough? I don't know... I've played many games in my time, and what I look for is not only look and feel, but also the other aspects of great gameplay: UI-friendliness, music, lore, immersion. I want to believe what I'm playing, and I don't want to be frustrated in the process.

WoW already frustrates me, although not in a completely negative fashion.

Listen, before you go off on me... the one thing I cannot stand is corpse-recovery. I mean, seriously. So I die... I should take an armor hit if I choose to find something else more fitting to my level to do and don't want to head back out to the area that killed me in the first place?!? Really, don't make me chase my corpse. Let me revive and move on. Way back when, EverQuest II had something similar... it was not your corpse, but a "shard". Basically, a portion of your "soul" that would be in the world. You could either return to retrieve it, or you could choose not to and be at a reduced health for a period of 24 hours until the shard disappeared and was "reabsorbed" into you. This was very annoying and frustrating, especially if you died in a dungeon or surrounded by beasts. You had to actually gain the point of death to retrieve your shard.