It might help to think of it less like a video game and more like a million person bowling league.
People would log in to hang out. To chat. To bullshit.
Sometimes, to level up or to raid or to pvp.
Sometimes, people would log in and play for a few hours just…going around helping other people with stuff.
Some people take their characters to the starter zones, handing out bags and some nice gear upgrades and advice to new players.
And that doesn’t even take into account the RP servers, where people would have like guild meetings in game, or legit life events like a wedding in game. Funerals when a guild mate dies? Of course!
That is how it became the biggest MMO ever.
And the game has largely strayed from those roots, which is why so many WoW players go for the Classic version, rather than play the new expansions.
Adding to that: this was back when a lot of people were getting high speed internet for the first time, which allowed them to play for much longer periods. While messaging programs already existed, the social aspect was super important and the artificial difficulty of certain enemies was an attempt to force people to socialize, before dungeon/raid finder killed a significant part of that.
“You don’t miss spamming LFG with need tank, need tank, need tank, nowadays you just press a button and wait!” - from the “you think you do, but you don’t” guy
Many things killed it off. I’d add external databases and addons.
It is not that I hate external databases and addons. They are great and help a ton. But they also did remove the “exploration” part of the game. If you know exactly where to go and addon also plans out the optimal route +if you do not know what to do, external database will tell you in details - this kills exploration and player interactions on top of dungeon-finder and auction damage.
It might help to think of it less like a video game and more like a million person bowling league.
People would log in to hang out. To chat. To bullshit.
Sometimes, to level up or to raid or to pvp. Sometimes, people would log in and play for a few hours just…going around helping other people with stuff. Some people take their characters to the starter zones, handing out bags and some nice gear upgrades and advice to new players.
And that doesn’t even take into account the RP servers, where people would have like guild meetings in game, or legit life events like a wedding in game. Funerals when a guild mate dies? Of course!
That is how it became the biggest MMO ever.
And the game has largely strayed from those roots, which is why so many WoW players go for the Classic version, rather than play the new expansions.
Adding to that: this was back when a lot of people were getting high speed internet for the first time, which allowed them to play for much longer periods. While messaging programs already existed, the social aspect was super important and the artificial difficulty of certain enemies was an attempt to force people to socialize, before dungeon/raid finder killed a significant part of that.
“You don’t miss spamming LFG with need tank, need tank, need tank, nowadays you just press a button and wait!” - from the “you think you do, but you don’t” guy
Many things killed it off. I’d add external databases and addons.
It is not that I hate external databases and addons. They are great and help a ton. But they also did remove the “exploration” part of the game. If you know exactly where to go and addon also plans out the optimal route +if you do not know what to do, external database will tell you in details - this kills exploration and player interactions on top of dungeon-finder and auction damage.