Amazon.com: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Collector's Edition: Pc: Video Games

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37 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For the hardcore fan, December 7, 2010

David "Of Billings" (Florida) - See all my reviews

This review is from: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Collector's Edition (DVD-ROM)

This review is for the contents of the collectors edition package, not the game itself.

The 175 page art book is fantastic. It's hardback and has a nice protective sleeve covering it. The sleeve depicts Deathwing as seen on the Cataclysm website. The concepts and literature inside are great to read/view and it's really cool to see the artistic visuals of all the new NPCs, clothing items, zones and even stills from the cinematic trailer. Many pieces of art depict several different stages of concept certain characters passed through over the period the expansion was developed. Some pieces give a visual representation of events that have transpired and affected the current storyline (there is a piece showcasing the Garrosh/Cairne duel which ultimately ended in.. well i won't spoil that one for you ;) ) The artwork is just really cool. Blizzard certainly has some very talented artists working for them. Various letters written by characters in game are peppered throughout the pages which give insight to the events which have happened and served to shape the new world since the shattering. While not essential for casual fans, they are still a great read for those who love the lore behind World of Warcraft and the book is a wonderful addition of graphic art to any person's collection.

The soundtrack features 17 absolutely phenomenal orchestral tracks from in game. I'm a huge fan of the music of World of Warcraft and the new tracks are very beautifully done and really invoke a real sense of "epicness". The title track is the best its been since the vanilla days (it even incorporates the original Legends of Azeroth theme), and the addition of revamped tracks from old world zones like Elywnn forest and Durotar are a nice, nostalgic touch. I enjoyed the score from Wrath of the Lich King but i think i enjoy this one much more.

Also included:

- In game Lil' Deathy companion pet. He has a welp model, but looks like a midgit-fied Deathwing. every character you'll ever start again will receive him along with a feat of strength. Standard and digital versions of Cataclysm will not receive this pet.

- Mouse pad depicting Deathwing looking upon the ravaged continents of Azeroth. I use an optical mouse so i really have no use for a mouse pad, but it may very well serve as a nice showpiece for any player looking to add a little flavor to their desktop.

- Wrathgate starter deck with a Landro's Gift loot card. Not really useful to me since i don't play the trading card game, but the loot card can provide a very lucrative reward if you're lucky. For instance, one of the possible obtainable items when you receive your gift box is a swift spectral tiger, which bar none is the rarest mount in game and very expensive if purchased from anywhere else. I wasn't lucky, and only got Papa Hummel's pet biscuits.

- Behind the scenes DVD featuring insight into the development of Cataclysm, which is about an hour long. I haven't watched it yet, but i would say it's a fair guess that the DVD is top notch. No hardcore fan of the game would pass up the chance to see how the creative process at Blizzard works, since we rarely if ever have a chance to outside of blue posts.

** After writing this review i was able to watch the DVD in it's entirety. Let me tell you, i didn't expect much going in but by the end my expectations were well exceeded. There is a lot of information packed into this disc and Blizzard went into great detail about all of the changes that were made and explained a lot of the secrets behind their programming magic. There are thorough explanations behind why old world flying was never included in the last 2 expansions, the reasoning and logic behind many of the zone changes, and the developer's went into great detail on the process of creating new zones for this expansion, the challenges they faced in creating content that would rival or exceed what we saw With wrath and their desires to create an experience that was rewarding not just for new fans but for old veterans of the game as well. Also discussed on the disc was the process behind creating the cinematic movie for the expansion ( a project that proved to be far more challenging than i ever thought it was), Warcraft History and a plethora of interviews by developers and artists associated with the World of Warcraft.

- And the expansion itself, which comes on 1 DVD disc. The beauty of this expansion is that the bulk of the material was already patched in before release, so all players really needed to do was provide their activation codes and wait until the servers went live. since all the content can be digitally downloaded once your account has been upgraded, the DVD is more or less a means to reinstall the game without an internet connection.

The package is very sturdy and well put together. All the items that come with it rest in little cutouts on a tray which are lined with felt to prevent scraping or scuffing of your items, and everything fits in smoothly without sliding/bouncing around inside. the tray slides into the outer sleeve kind of like a really big DVD set. You can stand the box vertically and it will remain still, or you can put it on a shelf like a book. Either way is up to you. I would personally rather display it out in the open since it looks so cool, but that's me.

A worthy purchase at 80 dollars, and a great addition for any fan of the game out there.

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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Activision killed Blizzard, Blizzard is killing WoW., May 27, 2011

N. Berryman (Philadlphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars

Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)

This review is from: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Collector's Edition (DVD-ROM)

I have loved and played Warcraft since vanilla. However, it has gotten to the point where the game has become completely unenjoyable and tedious. In addition to the unbearable, frustrating, and boring grind-fest that max level has become, other players have begun mimicking the blizzard dev posts they see in the forums: sardonic, rude, know-it-all, and generally unhelpful. Let me elaborate.

Class changes- Am I playing my shaman or my resto druid? I don't know, I just spam this one spell now (but its definitely my fault if people die standing in fire). Am I tanking on a Paladin or a Warrior now? Beats me. Am I dpsing on my mage or hunter? I don't know the three abilities I have feel about the same. I think you see my point. Roles have been homogenized to extreme mindlessness. Two button rotations are not fun or enjoyable, not matter what role you are playing.

New profession: Archaeology: Oh what a terrible let down. What was promised as a fun way to learn more lore and upgrade your character to be even more customizable and fun was sacked at the last minute before the release of the expansion, leaving you with BY FAR the most unfun grindy thing ever added to the game. Flying for hours and digging for hours to get the same grey for the 32nd time. Wow, just wow.

New races: the starting zones are actually amazing, but end quickly and abruptly. Adding new races at all (which you must have all four expansions to play) were just another way to cover up how little they actually added this expansion.

1-60 content. This is sort of great for new players, until they get in a party, city, or in some way have a chance to interact with *other* players. Solo questing in the new-old zones is fun and enjoyable, for new players. However, once a completely new player joins a group, he should expect to be ridiculed and harassed because he is not in full heirlooms doing top dps..... in a lvl 20 dungeon. Expect dps meters to be spammed.... In your lvl 20 dungeon.... After every pull. Blizzard further enforces this sort of belittlement as groups have the ability to vote-kick people, even if the reason given is something like "lol u suk".

Low level battlegrounds are similar, thought they did do a lot of work at giving you at least some interesting moves earlier on. Classes are and probably always will remain unbalanced, however.

60-80.... Suddenly every story line you were following ends, you are put 10 years in the past, and most people abandon their alts somewhere along this stretch. Dungeon queue times quickly become insanely long at these levels.

80-85. Questing again, alone, is very good here. Normal dungeons can also be fun maybe the first time around. But theres only 7, so you will probably not want to run them too much now, after all, that's all there is to do once you hit 85.

Level cap: 85

Blizzard said going into this expansion that they felt people wanted to "grind less" I guess meaning that they thought players did not want to spend alot of time and quickly get to max level to enjoy end-game content. Oddly, they made level 85 the most un-enjoyable max level experience thus far in the history of the game. Fewer dungeons, less raid bosses, coupled with few factions mean you really have nothing left to do at 85 in your non-raiding time than pvp and run heroics... which are now pretty un-enjoyable.

Rated battlegrounds were a great idea, but queue times are terribly long.
Battlegrounds are as enjoyable-- or unenjoyable as they always were, depending on your opinion. Little to no work was done to improve these. The two new battlegrounds are 100% recycled from Ab and WSG that are years and years old. Then, there's Tol-barad. This was terrible in beta, and masses of testers saying that this wasn't working out, reality be damned they released it anyways. The first few months were, depending on your server, near impossible to lose control of once your faction captured it. Then their idea was to over reward a team for winning so that everyone in both factions would queue, then afk for 10 minutes, and reap the massive honor reward from doing so. This for me destroyed everything pvp was about. This was blizzards answer to the problem: afk and we will give you free honor, just please stop complaining about our lack of thought and effort.

Heroics. This is what finally caused me personally to call it quits. Even as a tank or healer with quick queue times (I have played all three roles, before someone asks), groups take a longer time to form. Once formed, if using the dungeon finder, you may find you have no CC, and/or as mentioned above, extremely terrible and or rude players in your group. Even in a good group the dungeons just take too long to be enjoyable. In the early days of the expansion, I was in a H DM run that lasted I kid you not, 3 hours (not even mentioning that this is a lazy, re-used attempt at making you think you are getting something new and getting your money's worth, which you are not). The bosses were okay in most heroics, but there is often so much trash and huge pulls and tedious need to CC that by the time you get to a boss, you are probably bored with the place already. Not to say that things have been made ridiculously hard, just well, boring. Maybe hard in the sense that you have to smash your own face with a hammer just to care long enough to get through the bloody dungeon. Blizzard only wants people with one character and 3 hours a night to run heroics anymore I suppose. And god forbid someone in the group makes *one* mistake because the insults will be flying and the group will quickly crumble.

They tried to adjust queue times by giving tanks more money and goodies.... Um, not the people that has to wait an hour just to get in a group, for it to fall apart... then wait another hour... They reward the people that abuse the system, talk trash, and just leave at the first sign of trouble, because after all, they can just get right back in another group.

Raids. Smallest raid content available, and what was looking to be an entertaining story fizzles with re-used encounters. Second tier of raiding was promised already, but still has not been released.

It's all very disappointing because Blizzard used to be a zenith of quality products that you could really enjoy, and the community used to be a fun one to be a part of. Maybe now that activision has their hand in the pot, scheming to add more and more monthly fees, virtual pets and mounts you have to pay even *more* money for, and terrible customer service, I don't know if its really Blizzard, or the players, or Activision that has ruined the experience for me.

So there we have it, an MMO that is only fun (to me) for solo play. But then what's the point? The M in mmo stands for multi-player, and that has been destroyed and broken almost beyond repair. Players concerns about the game are now meet with unprofessional digital middle fingers from the people making the game, and the few that will be able to stay with WoW until its fixed are adopting this behavior. Many of the types who would help other players and guildies with a low level dungeon or group quest, answer a simple question in trade without ridiculing the person who asked, or help someone they meet in the world while questing are leaving the game for other mmos (this is a fact, they are losing many subscribers, and more quickly than ever before). I used to love having many max level characters, but now I can't bear to do anything. I'll log in, check my mail, stand there, and if I'm stupid enough to queue for a heroic I immediately regret it. What was once fun has become work, and painful work at that.

Would cataclysm itself be worth $25-$40? Yes, maybe, if I didn't have to pay a monthly fee. Is cataclysm with the $100 you spend for all 4 expansions, and a monthly subscription to be verbally abused by both the game devs and other players? Nope, sorry, not at all.

If you are not a warcraft player, whatever you do, don't become one now, it's the worst time to play in all my 6 years of playing. Thank goodness there are 4 mmos coming out in the next 2 years that I can give a try. Untill then, if I want to be verbally abused by unemployed fat loners or snotty teenage boys, Ill play something on psn.

As far as the collector's edition box itself, its pretty :P

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7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good game 3 stars because...., December 30, 2010

Clifford Dale Harrin Jr. - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

= Fun:3.0 out of 5 stars

This review is from: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Collector's Edition (DVD-ROM)

This game is good. I like the new story line. It seems to be more in depth than the past expansion. Also they have voice overs now and alot of cutscene cintematics. The heroic dungeons are a challenge now and you really cant just walt in and aoe pull like you used to (atm anyways) If your a hardcore and casual fan you will like this. It will keep you occupied for at least a month if you like to play for new content. The reason I gave it 3 stars is because the game itself is getting Old. while there is new content nothing really catches the eye anymore for veterans. Iv'e played WoW since open beta. While this game offers new instances, lore, pvp its not really enough to hold someone in thats played a long time in my honest opinion. Would reccomend buying though just to try out.

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