World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Review
When you have an online game with over 8 million players, any expansion is by
definition a big expansion. In the case of The Burning Crusade it actually
delivers on this, providing plenty of new content for high level characters and
for players looking to start a new character in the game. There’s not as much
new here for players with mid-level characters who want to stick with these
characters to the end, but for everyone else picking up The Burning Crusade is
basically a no-brainer.
The Burning Crusade adds two new races to the game: the blue satyr-like Draeni join the Alliance and the impossibly beautiful Blood Elves join the Horde. The Draeni have come to Azeroth from another world and have made quite the entrance, arriving in a massive starship that exploded before landing and came down in a scattering of pieces over a newly discovered chain of islands to the west of Kalimdor. Some players may look at the introduction of a SciFi style backstory into the game with a wary eye, but in reality the Draeni are a more typical fantasy race than the tech-happy Gnomes. The Blood Elves were originally a race of good High Elves that were nearly decimated in the war with the Burning Legion. They have since become obsessed with the acquisition of magical power and their deep desire to take their revenge on the Legion has drawn them into the folds of the Horde. The Draeni easily fit in with the races of the Alliance, but the Blood Elves with their blond hair, fair skin, and toned physiques stand in marked contrast to the monstrous races of the Horde. One can’t help but wonder if they were added to the game to draw more players to the Horde since not everyone wants to play a green-skinned or rotting-fleshed character.
With the two new races the game makes the Shaman class available to the Alliance and the Paladin class to the Horde for the first time. Adding a “good” witch doctor and an “evil” holy warrior to the game may chafe the hides of the purists out there, but it doesn’t seem to have negatively affected the balance of the game in the PvP battles and it has given exclusively Alliance or Horde gamers the opportunity to try out a new class.
Each race is given a starting area consisting of a few islands off the shores of one of the two continents in the game. These areas are packed with quests and the respawn rates for the mobs appear to be much higher than that for other areas in the game. The high respawn rates have been countered with lower drop rates, though, so sometimes it can take a lot of killing just to collect ten doohickeys for your latest quest. The content-rich starting areas help characters to reach level 20 pretty quickly – much more quickly than the starting areas for the original races. Once you hit 20, though, it’s back to the normal grind of the areas that you’ve leveled your characters through before.
The downside to the new areas is that they’re a bit isolated in relation to the game’s other areas. There’s no flight path from the continents to the new areas so returning to one of the new race’s home city can be a bit of a trek. Furthermore, if you choose to play as a Draeni Shaman or a Blood Elf Paladin, it is very difficult to find class trainers anywhere but back in your home city. Every time you hit an even numbered level it means a long journey back home to pick up your skills and then another to return to the area in which you’re currently questing.
The Burning Crusade also adds a new profession to the game: jewel crafting. If you decide to create a new Draeni character, then you’ll find that they’re naturals when it comes to jewels and get a five point bonus in the craft. Jewel crafting allows for the making of rings, necklaces, and the like that bring various bonuses to their wearers. These bonuses make the crafted jewelry far better than most drops, making jewel crafting a very beneficial trade. Jewelry also commands a high price when sold to vendors or in the auction house which also makes jewel crafting quite profitable. Jewel crafting also lets you create special gems that can be used in the game’s new socketed weapons. Socketed weapons allow you to customize the weapons’ special bonuses to complement your character’s attributes and talents. If you’ve played Diablo II, then you already know how enjoyable it is to customize your socketed weapons to your liking. While jewel crafting is the only new professional trade, other trades benefit from the expansion as well. The skill cap has been raised to 375 for all professions and a myriad of new recipes have been added to the game.
Those of you with high level characters will be able to take advantage of the new continent added to the game: Outland. Outland is reached through the Dark Portal which will only let characters of level 58 or higher through. Even if you’re not much of an explorer, you’ll still want to take your character to Outland because of all the quests it provides that can help get your character to the new level cap of 70 quickly. In addition to plenty of new quests and new equipment, Outland has several PvP objectives to challenge you. There are several clusters of key strategic locations that will provide you with PvP reward tokens for their capture. There is even a town to battle over, Halaa. Whichever faction controls Halaa has the right to purchase special items there and receive special quests. Also, the new lands bring new dungeons, and also a new heroic setting that lets you revisit a dungeon filled with tougher foes but even greater rewards.
Outland is also home to flying mounts. Although pricey they will get you around Outland very quickly in addition to being a way to check out the wonderful scenery. You’ll need to hit the new level cap of 70 and pay a hefty price to get yourself a flying mount, though.
If you have a high level character, it’s hard to find a reason for you not to buy The Burning Crusade. An entirely new continent filled with great content and with some really imaginative zones to explore make the expansion a must buy. For those looking to start a new character, there is a lot of fun to be had starting off as a new Draeni or Blood Elf. Their starting areas are content rich and you’ll quickly build up a character that’s ready for the battlegrounds. Of course that still leaves you with a content gap while you guide that character from level 20 to level 60, but there’s a lot of fun to be had with all that “old” content in between.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated:
92%. A great expansion for a great game.