Warcraft and I have reached an impasse. Or, more accurately, I have reached an impasse within the world of Azeroth. You see, I realize that, as a MMORPG gamer, I have an explorer's heart, rather than a grinder's (grinding being the activity of killing the same beasts over and over again merely to harvest the experience points needed to achieve the next level). I'm more interested in what's over the next hill than I am in what's available for my character at the next level.
Unfortunately, WOW doesn't really allow for this. Access to new areas is often conditioned on your character's ability to defeat the denizens of the region. Naturally, the ability to do so is directly related to the time you've spent grinding. Questing alone is an insufficient source of XPs. So, rather than immersing myself in the minutely detailed world, I'm forced to sprint back and forth between spawn spots, hoping that tonight I'll get the experience necessary to allow me to overcome the level 22 death chickens that live in the next valley. It's frustrating and boring.
While I've been more that happy to focus on character building in prior games - whether D&D or Diablo - I just haven't felt the same about WOW. Perhaps it's because I'm still new to the game, the options seem immense, and I'm not really sure what kind of character end-product I'm striving for.
I'm not advocating that the world shouldn't have at least some sort of level-based walls however. I understand the need to create incentives for players to want to achieve higher levels. Dungeons, ethereal realms and the mountain top aeries of dragons can all still remain the realms of the experienced. I'd just appreciate it if swimming across a river didn't equate a death sentence for my character.
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