In a recent survey taken 36.4% of high school students smoke cigarettes, and 63.7% of Greenfield High School students play the online phenomenon The World of Warcraft, or WoW. Okay, I am making up those statistics but none the less WoW's popularity is growing. Thanks in part to Trey Parker, Matt Stone (creators of South Park), and the episode “Make Love not Warcraft” this game has been publicized to the max.

In this Game of the Year, players choose from two different teams, the Alliance(good) and the Horde(bad), and a base of 8 different races; Humans(A), Dwarves(A), Gnomes(A), Night Elves(A), Orcs(H), Trolls(H), Tauren(H), and Undead(H). Also a variety of class types for each race, Warrior, Hunter, Rogue, Mage, Druid, Paladin, Warlock, Shaman, and Priest.

This game consists of nothing more than just walking around a very large mythical world, completing a few quests here and there and of course slaying beasts…just kidding. This game is much more than just another pointless fighting game, which many people think. Then they try it out and are hooked(won’t mention any names…list would be too long) because there is much more than just running around and fighting. Different professions,such as mining for gold(Mining), or creating a gun(Engineering), keep you occupied while not in battle.

I urge any and all who do not play…to not play. This game is horridly addicting, and heed my warning, your grades will plunge. There is no such thing as “just trying it out” which many say they’ll do as current WoW addicts try and get everyone to break to peer pressure and try it.

I once thought of this game as a waste of time, until a one Vincent Johnson was playing one day while I was at his house. I said to myself “eh, this game looks pretty sweet, but I don’t want to waste my time and money on it.” Well I was a fool and not much later I took a trip to the mall and bought the game. Once I got home and was in the process of downloading the game onto my computer I couldn’t help but notice the loading bar go up, and I thought to myself “as that bar goes up, I’m sure my grades are going down”. The game hasn’t affected my grades much, some actually going up since I’ve bought the game, but I notice that a lot of my time is being wasted.

Again, anyone that reads this and does not play…don’t. Though it is a great game, and I have enjoyed every minute of play, I fear that the more people that get hooked the more this game will grow, until the World of Warcraft…takes over the World.