World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria (PC DVD)

This seems to be getting a lot of bad press so I thought I'd put a few things into perspective for people.The biggest and most important point I can make is this: It's an expansion to World of Warcraft. Quite simply this means more of the same but in a different setting. It happened in The Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, and now Mists of Pandaria. Throughout it's life it has always been the same type of thing, grinding, quests, dungeons and raids so don't expect something entirely new.The second obvious point are the similarities between Mists of Pandaria and the children's movie Kung Foo Panda. People are reviewing down based on this, yet it is clear by the box art, let alone the description, that the pandas use martial arts. If this isn't your thing then why buy the game? I'll admit I find the vulgar rip off a little unsettling but the bottom line is the pandas are not actually as bad as I'd originally thought they would be, and the monk class is playable by not just pandas. I took a panda shaman through the starting zone as was very impressed by the art work. Likewise I'm sure the monk will be a fun class to play when I get round to it, it doesn't have to be a panda.Now that's out of the way I'd also like to mention the significant differences between Mists of Pandaria and Cataclysm. For me Cataclysm was a huge let down, Blizzard seemed to lose the way in terms of content and lost a fair few players due to the increased difficulty. People are entitled to their opinions on this matter, but I am of the belief that the game should be playable by everyone, from the casual to the hardcore. From the get go Mists of Pandaria has dumbed the difficulty back down to 3.3 levels, whilst this might infuriate the odd hardcore guild it means casual players can experience content without too much difficulty. Once done with dungeons you can move onto the new Raid Finder tool, which offers the raiding experience but decreased difficulty. The regular raiders still have their normal raids, and the hardcore their heroic raids. Blizzard have even given the dungeons a challenge mode, to reward the more hardcore casuals. So from a "normal" end game experience, there really is something for everyone.Mists of Pandaria also features more additional content than ever before. There are plenty of quests, including a mass of dailies. The reputation rewards are there, with some cool mounts as rewards. There are new scenarios, for 3 players to do epic instanced quest like chains in. Pet Battle offer a Pokemon style game for pet collectors and Farming will offer a Farmvillesque slant to the game. Then of course there are the usual profession updates and an entirely new class, the aforementioned monk.I'll also mention briefly the continent of Pandaria. It's nice to be back on a new continent, and Pandaria is really really beautiful. Remember when you first saw Icecrown Citadel in Northrend? You get that kind of feeling, a lot. The art guys did really well here.Mists of Pandaria is shaping up to be a brilliant expansion. If you quit due to Cataclysm then now is a great time to come back and restore your love of World of Warcraft. At the end of the day you don't have to be a Kung Foo Panda if you don't want to be.

Before I get to the actual gameplay I need to have my say about Blizzard (the makers of the game)as a whole.Once upon a time Blizzard was started by a bunch of blokes, much like myself, who loved gaming and wanted to do things 'their way'. Little could they have imagined that one day the company would be a corporate giant raking in almost obscene amounts of money each year.World of Warcraft became a cash cow, bringing in a constant supply of cash with it's subscription system and we have now got to a point where the company is reliant on this cash cow and is ever creating inventive ways to get more money from it's players. We now have Blizzard pushing the 'Limited Edition' in our face, pets and mounts you can purchase will real world money plus a host of 'paid for' services in addition to the quite high subscrition fee and forking out for each expansion as it comes out. I realise that plenty of people want these services but I just don't agree with much of it and the tendancy of Blizzard to gradually try any method they can to squeeze every last penny from their players. I feel the model they are pursuing is unsustainable. This cash cow is one day going to run dry and they need to be prepared for this outcome.Now let me get on to the game itself. Firstly, let me start by saying that I paid £30.00 (including postage) for the physical copy of the game which conatains 2 DVD's which are pretty much useless. As soon as you put them in, all they do is direct you to the website for upgrading the game. You already have all the data on your computer and you just need to put the code in to activate it. This gives you a feeling of having been ripped off because effectively the two DVD's are pointless. The instruction manual is also a 4 page affair which is virtually pointless. The original game had a nice thick one. All that profit and the can't find the cash to put a decent manual if there. I guess I should expect so much in the 'standard' version of the game.on to the game play, as many have already pointed out, the title and the use of Panda's is a big miss step on the part of Blizzard. The Oriental theme itself is awesome and the usual artwork standard is met and exceeded here in the creation of the world you play in. But it is severly hampered by the ridiculous 'Kung fu' panda characters and storyline. Let's be clear, the Panda's are silly and childish, and the decision to call the land of the pandas Pandaria is lazy and absurd. It's the kind of thing I would done when creating a world for a short story when I thirteen - 'It's a continent, peopled by a Panda like race and I'm going to call it... Pandaria'. I have no idea how this passed Blizzard quality control. There are already half a dozen other races in the game which would have been better suited (one race for the horde and alliance) and let's just call this new continent Mistaria. That's unoriginal but it's better than Pandaria.Having played the game for about eight hours I can say that's it's no revelation. It's good fun, it's enjoyable and I want to play more. The graphics, models and textures have notably inproved and the acting is mostly decent (but still not great). The overhual of some of the game mehanics is mostly a positive change a there's now no definitive talents or Spec.The storyline is hit and miss. Blizzard try their best to make you feel like you're in a war and that it's harming a tranquil land. But hey it's inhabited by overweight panda's with moustaches who have a liking for Kung Fu. How seriosuly can we take all this?All in all, that Vanilla Wow feeling that you are playing an epic game has long sinced departed me, perhaps never to return. But that being said I'm sure there's plenty of fun to be had here.