/dev/games 05 Aug 2008 09:28 am
Dear Warcraft Diary (Part One)
When World of Warcraft went Beta, I stayed up all night for several nights playing it. I played a Dwarf Priest. Looking back on it now I’m pretty sure I didn’t know about training on even levels or talent points. I just liked walking around, seeing Iron Forge for the first time. Seeing my first Night Elf was crazy (HOW DID YOU GET TO LEVEL 18 SO FAST). I was frothing pretty hard for this game to come out, even if it was going to be released less than a week before Jess and I left Chicago for our wedding in Los Angeles. Before the Beta even dropped, I had already reserved the Collector’s Edition. At Best Buy.
The morning the game was released, I walked over to Best Buy from my office. Got there at about 9am, right as they opened. There weren’t people lined up or anything. I walked over to the World of Warcraft display, and there was some dude standing there. This guy, this terrible awful guy, asked me if I had pre-ordered. I said “yep!” and he told me that pre-order people had to pick up copies of the game at Customer Service. I stared at about 10 copies of the Collector’s Edition for too long, then I asked if they had those over at the Customer Service area. He said “yes.” I walked over to Customer Service. There was a reasonable line already there. Perhaps a five minute wait. Everybody was picking up copies of World of Warcraft (regular editions, mind). I got to the front and said I wanted a Collector’s Edition. The woman said “you have to go get one off the shelf,” and I said “oh the guy said I’d get one over here,” and then I ran back to the display, but lo, Dear Reader, the Collector’s Editions had been devoured in my absence. The employee guy was gone. I would never have an opportunity to buy a CE version of the game; I had a wedding to go to, and a job to stop getting paid at. Didn’t change the fact that the part of my heart capable of loving video games (according to medical researchers, this part of my heart is several sizes larger than the national average), was broken.
So, don’t ever reserve products at Best Buy. Also, don’t ever talk to the employees there unless you are trying to trick them into giving you a deal on a TV.
But I really, really wanted that Panda.
My friend Juls had managed to get his copy of the CE, thousands of miles away in Florida. We met up (in the game) and he had the panda and it was awesome. I spent about 40 hours on a Dwarf Priest in those early days, not having any idea how to play, panda-less, newly married, and I quit that January (only paid for one month after the free month). I didn’t have any fun, really. I got to level 19. Was this because I was a dwarf priest, or because, deep down, I knew that I could never have a panda?
