Cataclysm Beta: Goblin Adventures

Feature from Matt - Sunday, 08 August 2010 @ 7:24am

If there's a single game that dominates PC gaming it's World of Warcraft. With approximately 11 million players around the world it's a larger community than many countries, and with each of them paying around about $20 a month for the privilege of this citizenship it's a lucrative title.

It's no surprise, then, that the upcoming third expansion is of great interest to a lot of people. Not least those of us who are in its clutches.

World of Warcraft: Cataclysm adds two new races to the existing lineup, the Worgen and the Goblins. I was never that enthusiastic about this. The addition of Draenei and Blood Elves at least added something significantly new, but Goblins and Worgen have been in WoW since vanilla, albeit just as NPCs.

The addition of Worgen to the alliance is an interesting and strange thing. The Worgen lore is something of a mystery to me. Though to be honest the lore of most of WoW is sort of irrelevant in my mind. Something about a Sun Wheel and some undead. I'm vague on the details. Nevertheless, as the Alliance are supposed to be the "good guys" the Worgen's diseased and dark nature seems better suited to the horde. No doubt there will be some sort of tragic tale of unwilling victimhood ala Anne Rice Vampirism.

The start of a very long road for this very small rogue

But we're not here to talk about werewolves, oh no. That's for next time. This time we're talking about Goblins.

Goblins have been ever-present in wow, mostly running various shifty scams, or operating neutral trading outposts, like Booty Bay. Their other contribution has been in the form of Goblin Engineering, an engineering specialization that focuses on damage and explosions, by comparison to the Gnomish fun and whimsy.

Starting a new character is a generally familiar experience for anyone who has ever... you know... started a new character. I chose to make a Rogue because it just seemed appropriate. Also I've never played a rogue, and thought some experience with the mechanics of it would be useful.

The Goblin as a race is strangely unbalanced. Their racial traits are surely up for the chop, as they're a little overpowered by comparison to other classes. Granted not Death Knight overpowered, but still. Goblin racials include cheaper prices for all items purchased, benefits to engineering, free rocket boots, and the ability to fire a rocket from their belt. It's fun, but... all that?

New Goblins start on the island of Kezan, home of the Goblin race. Like all of the other starting areas it's suspiciously small for a major urban centre, but that's about the only thing it has in common with anything else. Achitecturally and design-wise, Kezan is like nothing else you've seen in WoW. It has traits in common with gnomish design, but more haphazard and darker. Most particularly it has one major feature that stands out. Roads. Kezan is covered with freeways made of large slabs of... something. They're clumsy and strange, and quite ugly, but that's a design feature of the Goblins disregard for aesthetics and nature, rather than bad design on the art department's part.

The Island City of Kezan. Sort of a fixer upper.

It takes a little while for the reason for the roads to assert itself. The first few quests are fairly typical of a starting area. Go get 5 of these, wake up those guys, find some stuff. They ARE more interesting and entertaining than the usual WoW standard, though, and the writing is far more engaging than generic quest text. It's obvious they wanted these new starting areas loaded with personality and character, and they've succeeded at that.

After a few quests are completed and you've got a level or three under your belt (which is of course very quick at this stage) you move onto a new quest and a new overall goal. There is a party tonight- your party. You're celebrating a big promotion and doing it in style.

Almost all of the quests from here are to the furtherance of that goal, and you are given a helpful new item - your Hot Rod.

You get a hotrod. It goes fast. Any questions?

Yes, now you can cruise the highways in a hotted up car, zooming through the absurd loops and exits to get to your objectives! Vehicles, this is something that we've not seen before endgame previously, and throwing it in a starter area is a neat addition and a nice bit of fun.

All in all that's what the Goblin starter area is. Fun. If anything it might be a bit too easy. Monsters and enemies maybe should be harder. Or maybe rogues are just OP. I'd believe that, based on the number of times I've been killed by them in world PvP. But still, the goal has been to make things fun. Quests include deliberately running over fleeing enemies with your hot rod, shocking troll slaves to make them behave, setting fire to own house to get insurance money for it, and throwing bombs at defensive players in a kind of uberviolent football game.

Trying to avoid spoilers here, but in the end you leave the Island of Kezan, and take up a fight for the Goblins very survival.

If what I've played of the Goblin game is any judge of the overall quality of the Cataclysm expansion there's a lot to like. If you get Cata and you end up playing the Worgen because you're an Alliance sissy, at least give the starter area for the Goblins a go. It's well worth your time.

The Goblin starter area is genuinely funny and a lot of fun to play

Next up: Worgen starter area. Aka Worgen on Sunshine. Men at Worg. Featuring Dexta Worgen.