Numbers don’t lie: more than 10 million people play World of Warcraft, the massive multiplayer online role-playing game. Not only is it the gold standard against which all MMORPGs are viewed, but it holds the Guiness Book record for most popular, based on subscribers. WoW is a gaming phenomenon that is still going strong to this day, seven years after it launched on the PC. It changed the industry, bringing forth wave after wave of copy-cat MMORPGs who muck out their lives in niche genres like superheroes or Star Wars. I don’t have to tell you people that World of Warcraft is a fun and popular game to play.

But I am going to tell you why I think it’s the most popular. And it isn’t because WoW has timelessly cartoony graphics in a huge gameworld, a robust character-creation system with a wide variety of races and classes, or 100s of hours of exciting quests and activities. Nor is it because the Horde rules.

World of Warcraft is the best MMORPG because when you play, you actually become a part of the world of Warcraft.

And what a delightfully diverse world

Did I just blow your mind? Probably not yet, at least. Allow me to explain. For the most part, there are two types of MMORPGs: games based on an existing property from movies, comic books or elsewhere, like Star Wars: The Old Republic or DC Universe Online; and games that are created from scratch, with characters and worlds that only exist in this one MMORPG, like City of Heroes or Guild Wars.

World of Warcraft is unique in that it is based on a series of PC games dating back to 1994, telling a progressive story starring familiar characters and locations. Game developer Blizzard has gone to great lengths to maintain the look and feel of the Warcraft games, creating a rich consistency in their fictional world that has lasted for nearly two decades, through several different games.

Their big idea for the sequel? Pirates!

It’s that consistency that makes World of Warcraft the best and most exciting MMORPG. It’s all about immersion in the story and in the game world. When you join World of Warcraft, it’s like you’re going home again, able to actually meet characters and visit locations that have been around in gaming since the early 90s. And since the story of Warcraft has really only been told through PC games, the game world of WoW feels more ‘real’ and authentic than other MMORPGs when played on the PC.

The style of gameplay, and the fully-realized nature of the game world are part of this consistency. Allow me to explain, after the jump.

Warcraft: Orcs & Humans was the very first game in the series, released in 1994. It was a real-time strategy game, which is kind of like playing soldiers on a massive game world. The player is positioned above the battlefield, and it’s your job to build up your armies in order to send them off to fight the opposing army. The game was set in the fictional world of Azeroth, where humans had lived in peace and harmony for many years. Then an evil sorcerer opened a Dark Portal to another dimension, and the orc race invaded Azeroth. You could pick either side of the conflict, human vs. orc, and try to defeat the other.

The game was soon followed by Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness, which had better graphics and more units to build and destroy. Again, it was a real-time strategy game. The player is an overseer, building each individual soldier or boat or catapult, and then ordering them to march off to war. You could build knights, ogres, warships, summon dragons; all manner of fantasy fun.

Try to make sense of the chaos

Most importantly, Blizzard made sure to keep the game world the same. You were still in Azeroth, still the humans vs. the orcs. But by the second game, they’d added ogres, elves, dwarves, dragons and much more. Blizzard was telling the continued tales of the war. They would reference cities, heroes and adventures from the first game, building the mythology of Warcraft.

And it would continue into Warcraft III, which had an even greater focus on the world and characters of Azeroth. In Warcraft III, Blizzard introduced the ‘hero’ system, in that instead of just controlling armies, you would also control specific heroes who would have cinematic cut scenes between the levels. You’d get to watch the heroes like a little mini-movie within the game as they battled evil, struggled with the hardships of war, and made friends and allies with other heroes.

Not to mention even better graphics.

3D makes everything better, right Hollywood?

Which brings us to World of Warcraft, launched in November 2004. It wasn’t the first MMORPG, but as I’ve said, it perfected the form. In a massive multiplayer online role-playing game, instead of being an overseer controlling an army, the player creates their own individual character to be a part of the game world. Then once you create your character, you join other players and their characters from around the world, teaming up on adventures and battles that the game developer, Blizzard, has created for you.

And boy did they create something great.

This is a place you can visit, it's a troll village

For World of Warcraft, Blizzard basically created an entire continent, two continents, in fact. They stuck with Azeroth, mapped it out and then built it from the ground up in the computer. They put in forests, they created deserts, formed mountains and filled vast oceans. And best yet, all of these different areas were connected. Your character can literally walk from one zone to the next. You could start in the southern tip, the tropical forests of Stranglethorn Vale, and walk the roads all the way up to the snowy north country without ever having to worry about load screens or breaks in the game.

More on load screens later.

Everything you see here, you can visit

So in designing and populating this massive world map, Blizzard went back through all of the previous games for ideas. They filled Azeroth with familiar towns, villages, castles, landmarks and more from all the previous games. One mission in Warcraft: Orcs & Humans had you attacking the human town of Goldshire. Well in World of Warcraft, your character can go visit Goldshire. Or what about the Dark Portal that the evil sorcerer used to bring the orcs into Azeroth? It’s there in World of Warcraft. You can go visit it, you can even walk through it back into the orc homeworld if you’d like.

Looks ominously green

And it’s the same with the characters. Many of the heroes that were introduced in Warcraft III are alive and well in the World of Warcraft, you can go and meet them. They will interact with your personal character, give them missions.

This is what I mean by ‘real’ and authentic. Let’s compare this to other MMORPGs.

When you meet Superman in DC Universe Online, that isn’t the ‘real’ Superman. It’s just the game version, put there to give you your next quest. The ‘real’ Superman is from comic books, and has been telling comic book stories for more than 60 years. The game version stands in one spot waiting for your character to walk up and talk to him. Or when you meet The Statesman in City of Heroes, the chief superhero of their game. Who the fuck is The Statesman? He was created solely for City of Heroes, so there is no pre-existing interest in him or any of the other superheroes in that game.

But when you meet Thrall, the Orc Warchief, in World of Warcraft, it’s the ‘real’ Thrall. He has only ever existed as a character in a computer game, and players know his story from the previous computer games. We first meet Thrall in Warcraft III, where we helped him defeat the evil demon armies. Well in World of Warcraft, we can go visit Thrall in his home, in a building that looks exactly like the buildings from Warcraft III. He’s the ruler of an entire nation, living in the capital city. And with all the stores, citizens and public transportation a normal city has. You get the sensation that Thrall isn’t just standing around waiting to give you your next mission, he’s ruling a city, and you just happen to stop by.

Bow before the glory of the Horde!

The mythology and lore built across all of the Warcraft games gives it a unique heart and soul that other games lack. Blizzard had to have known this in the way that they built their game world. When you visit Azeroth in World of Warcraft, it’s almost exactly how it looked and felt back in Warcraft: Orcs & Humans. But if you visit the Batcave in DC Universe Online, it’s only the game’s interpretation of the Batcave. There have been dozens of different Batcaves over the years, and the game version is just one in a long line.

And not all MMORPGs are one big world. Most games, like City of Heroes or DC Universe Online, are broken up into sections, and you have to pass through a load screen if you want to visit another section. Those games are constantly reminding you that you’re in a video game.

Oh hey, Power Girl. What's that? You want me to wait a few minutes while you get the game ready? Alright, I guess. At least I have something nice to look at

But in World of Warcraft, you’re part of a world, the same world you’ve been playing in since you were a boy. I know I have. I come from a big Warcraft family, even my dad loved playing the original games back in the 90s. I love visiting the familiar locales from the previous Warcraft games. I love the grandeur of walking into Thrall’s throne room and kneeling before him. I love the sense of exploration and immersion I get from playing World of Warcraft.

I’ll end with one of my favorite memories of World of Warcraft. I was still new to the game, and was doing a little exploring. I hadn’t looked at the map or figured out where I was going, my character was just walking. I found myself in a zone called Thousand Needles, which is designed like those tall, rocking outcroppings in the American southwest.

A prime vacation destination for Void Walkers

There I was, walking along, when suddenly the tall mountains of Thousand Needles opened up into a giant salt flat stretching as far as the eye could see.

It just goes on forever...

I was amazed! A giant salt flat just came out of nowhere. Nobody had told me to go visit the salt flat, I didn’t have any missions there. I was just out exploring, immersing myself in the game, and I was rewarded with this surprise. But there’s more. As my character strolled across the salt flat, what did my eyes behold but a race track.

Where geek meets NASCAR

Out in the middle of nowhere, and having absolutely nothing at all to do with my character, my quests or even the game’s story in general, Blizzard had built a race track. You could sit in the stands and watch the race, buy ice cream from one of the vendors and listen to the two-headed ogre announcer as he called the race.

Because you don’t play World of Warcraft, you live it. And it rewards you for that.