World of Warcraft : A Whole New World

MMORPG.com World of Warcraft Correspondent Eric Grucza writes this look at Cataclysm and makes the case that with the addition of this new expansion, Blizzard is opening up a whole other world of possibilities for players.

Now that Blizzcon has officially been over for a few weeks and we have been left with quite a bit of information on the new expansion pack, what does it mean to current players? At some point we have all looked at World of Warcraft and asked ourselves if anything is ever going to change. Many players every few months will quit the game and come back after a hiatus just to get away from the gear grind. The core of World of Warcraft is coming up on its five year birthday and I can't help but think the developers at Blizzard have abandoned the old world of Azeroth that we grew to love in the original World of Warcraft. The idea of leveling again has completely been removed from everyone's thoughts. Those who do decide to level again will simply blow through the 80 levels as fast as they can so that they can get to the end game content. Yet once they get there, they will be greeted by nothing but gear grinding and raid farming.