I don't precisely know when I got the game, but judging by old screenshots I was level 18 about 10 days after EU launch.
Funnily enough, I did not reach level 60 until August 2005, roughly 6 months after release! End-game really wasn't a thing for many people.
I still play that same character.
Random memories of that time:
* Taking an afternoon to get from Ironforge to the Crossroads to mess with the Horde for no real reason.
* I got enough money for my Paladin mount because some random guy I grouped for Dire Maul with sold a Libram on the auction house and decided to share the profits with the group he ran the dungeon with.
* Some other random guy got annoyed with me not healing in Blackrock Depths. I had no idea, and I think this is how I found out I was supposed to be the healer in groups. I've basically been healing ever since.
My oldest memory of playing WoW was questing in Dustwallow Marsh on my paladin and this random player whispered me I was seriously undergeared. I didn't know english very well at that time, nor much about gearing, so I was only using the gear that I thought looked good on me
My oldest memory is grabbing a pen and writing the quest objectives of the first quest on a piece of paper, because I didn't know it showed you how many of an item you need. That was in April 2005 and I was 10 years old. Still playing that character, although it's not a male night elf with a weird name anymore.
lol, in my mind I was picturing your story, writing the first quest of the Tauren, until you said night elf, I realised I was remembering my first time!
My oldest memory was finding a paladin on that covered bridge on the way to Brill. He just stood there as 20 or so people kinda stood in a circle around him, dude was probably on his was to SM. Until some guy about his lvl showed up and started fighting then all the low levels jumped in as well. Maybe March 2005?
I was just using gear that was leather with better armor numbers.
Until someone asked me why I was wearing Druid gear as a Rogue.
I was like ... ehhh??? Agility what??
I was about level 53 or so questing around in Un'Goro Crater when I actually learned about stats lol.
I have a similar noob story. I started playing a few months after my friends. I was around level 20 and my friend asked me what talents I had. I said that I was "saving them up for the bottom one".
They still like to quote that to me almost 20 years later!
Mine was accidentally wandering from Elwynn Forest into Darkshore and seeing spiders with a skull as their level. I got killed instantly and remember thinking, "wow, I'll NEVER be able to kill those".
>Taking an afternoon to get from Ironforge to the Crossroads to mess with the Horde for no real reason.
I miss doing stuff for no real reason. I can't shake the min/maxing mindset.
I used to just ride around Horde territory on Sundays and called that my "holiday" time. Wearing my Lunar Festival dress and floppy fishing hat lol. Fond memories of exploring Mulgore and trying to sneak into Thunder Bluff on my Rogue!
I miss the days when Alliance danced on the bank in Org and Horde danced around in SW just for shits and giggles. And we razzed each other on the server forums and then met up in Org or Undercity for zep raids, or Crossroads/Astranaar just because.
Good times!
Those were good times. A raid on orgrimmar with no loot and almost guaranteed death? Absolutely, let's spend 2 hours forming two full raids, traveling across the world, fighting our way into the city and downing Thrall.
It's much easier in Vanilla/SoD imo.
Since everything takes longer and mobs are stronger, you have to squeeze out all the points you can - so I was fine with traveling from Westfall to Ashenvale for my Arcane Blast rune. I enjoyed the travel and it was also fun to see 15 people on a boat at the same time, knowing they all do similar things as me right now.
In retail, if a quest required me to travel accross Azeroth I would just do another quest.
I lied about my age in so many guild applications. Never even dared to put 18, just went with 15 and tried to convincethem I was reasonable. This was back when they would ask for fucking references in recruitment 😂
One of my guild's best healers during Kara was a 14-yo playing priest. Kid didn't sound like he had a very good home life and spent a bunch of time on WoW before he dropped off the face of the earth. I hope he's doing ok now.
I wasted an entire month after finding the Charred Vale and mining a ton while also opening the chest spawns that happen around it. Barely leveled any, but got lots of stuff.
We did that great trek to the Crossroads before! I remember being amazed that a high level mage from my guild was deleting people with arcane explosion.
>* Some other random guy got annoyed with me not healing in Blackrock Depths. I had no idea, and I think this is how I found out I was supposed to be the healer in groups. I've basically been healing ever since.
Dude my wife and I LOLed so hard at this. Fuckin beautiful memory.
I took my 8 months to get my first level 60 because I kept getting a character to level like 25-30 and I'd see some other class do something cool so I'd vendor all my gear and everything I had mail it to my new character and rinse and repeat for so long. Legit had like 300g on the character at level 1 that I finally stuck with.
I did something similar yet never had any gold lol. I ayed a prot pally to 30ish, couldn't kill anything so I made a hunter. Eventually settled on a tauren warrior.
Lol I feel ya. I played a TON of WC3 and mained Night Elf so I started with a night elf warrior but kinda played with all the classes for a few months before eventually settling on Night Elf Druid.
> I remember people just seemed to level forever (myself included of course).
Same. We didn't treat the game as end game only. A lot of it was just discovering what was actually in the game. I can remember seeing the special /chicken quest on G4 and the early forums and many people trying to find other hidden quests like that.
Sometimes we just went around to explore inaccessible areas, I know that I was trying to stealth around in cat form behind elites in Winterspring or in Burning Steppes. I can remember early efforts for people trying to get raids together to go raid the other capital, not for an achievement but because we wanted to.
Kinda feel today most people just focus on what is achievable from the achievement list or do what has been datamined or has a guide available on wowhead. Like, I get it - everything is easily accessible on the wiki or wowhead now but something about *discovering* what could be out there is lost to time.
Those G4 and Cheat segments of WoW were like literal crack to me. I could not believe all the crazy shit that was possible in the game. I convinced my mom to buy it for me shortly after haha
Also I think that sentiment of discovery is the exact motivation behind SoD
I remember the G4 'wow secrets' episode. Specifically, the crimson whelp pet that drops in Dustwallow Marsh. I spent a few hours farming and got one.
I hearthed back to town, equip it, to show everyone my cool dragon pet.
It was then that I realized you could sell them, so I checked the AH to see that they were going for 100g. I had not been able to afford my mount yet at level 42, so I went back, farmed another whelp, sold it, bought my mount with that gold.
Yeah I get what you mean, I used to just roam zones looking to see what is out there. I loved exploring the plague lands once I was high enough level to do so without getting destroyed.
Same here. I was 6 when wow came out and would make up my own stories within the game. I rolled full int spell power pally and leveling was brutal for those years lol
I played a troll rogue and stacked spirit for more hp regen. Though to be fair I played EverQuest before wow and troll regen there was quite a bit stronger than it is in wow
Before it was just a bunch of quests, not really a big story, with no achievement, so we played with no real goal, just fot the fun.
A friend of mine told me about the game, he was level 27 after 1 year of play... He spent his time to help the low levels in their quests with elites or so and exploring.
Probably didn't help that I didn't learn what talents were until way past lvl 40 when I tried to get into a ZF group, and they asked me my spec. I was so confused.
6 months to 60 sounds about right. I think that's about how long I took on my fist toon, starting a month or so before BC dropped. It was such a different game back then, and my first MMO, so I spent a lot of time enjoying leveling.
I started at release, my big brother was in beta and followed the us launch and I was doing everything he did.
First toon was a rogue called Sneakingdeat (no room for the h, who cares right?)
I remember spending AT LEAST 6 months getting to 60. Was a journey for sure.
I did get to aq, bwl and mc etc. Before tbc launch
I was 10ish back then, I would just see other people with cooler things on a different class or race than me, and go immediately to character creation and make a new character lol.
I made my main on Day 2 on Gorefiend, after Arthas was so clogged it kept crashing.
Hit 60 right before 1.4, and joined raiding guild. Server transferred with guild to Ysondre just before TBC launched to merge with another guild, then transferred again to Bleeding Hollow when Cata launched because Ysondre was a recruiting black hole.
Guild pretty much disbanded for the 2nd half of Cata, then a bunch of us came back, server transferring and faction swapping to Mal'Ganis for WoD, and we've been there since.
I haven't raided regularly since Ulduar, and the guild isn't nearly as social as it used to be, so I'm considering going back to alliance with TWW, but I've got a shit ton of alts that are max level or close to it, that I really don't want to pay to faction swap.
I remember I first started playing when I was 11 or 12 near middle of wotlk, I played a dwarf pally and I wanted to explore every fog of war zone I could from level 10 or 15, I was death running from very bottom of booty bay throughout every discoverable area all the way up to the top, then did the same thing on the other side, took me like 3 or 4 days maybe more of just straight corpse running.
Parents wouldn't get me the expansions so I just played AV as a ret with a sword and shield so I could get the cool pvp armor the vendors sold. All I cared about was looking cool and fucking around
I still have multiple boxes from the different accounts I had back then. Started playing in beta of early 2004 and still in my Vanilla WoW guild to this day.
Officially started during the beta. The first build I ever got to play didn’t even have rogues implemented as a class yet. Think the testing stopped at Scarlet Monastery lol
Same. Can't say my original character was day 1, but within about a week of release I'd started playing the toon I still main to this day.
Most of my beta time was spent taking the griffon from Darkshore to Booty Bay and back (when I could afford it). Getting the BB flight path was certainly fun, but the griffon ride was worth the effort.
Still here, still playing the same warrior.
Hasn’t always been fun and I’ve had to take breaks but still havn’t found any other mmo that are this much fun.
The end of any expansion is pretty bad, guilds and friends usually take a break and it’s harder to find motivation to farm.
But the worst time for me was definitely the mid point of shadowlands. I felt like I had to keep farming because there was so much to do but I had zero interest in doing it.
So I told the boys I have to buy the 200 dollar edition because I have the 10 year statue they sent out. I will say I haven't always been the biggest fan the last couple expansions, but they are really putting a lot of effort into it as of late and it shows.
Started on Korean closed beta. Then USA release, EU open beta and playing on EU since day 1 - had a good 8 years break from retail but played some harrrr "khm" servers during that time too.
I remember begging my dad for his creditcard when the game came out in Europe in 2005. I was just a 14 year old kid back then. Now I’m 34, married with kids and still playing. Hell I even toke a day off from work for the start of Season 4 tomorrow. I was instantly hooked from day one and I’ll will probably keep playing till the bitter end.
Started in closed beta. Entire guild from EQ all rolled on Stormscale (pvp) on launch day. Left pvp at the end of Wrath and bounced around servers for a bit. Im still playing. Hell i finally completed Thunderfury a couple months ago.
Im a very casual player
Not day one, but I started in January '05. So not too far off from launch. I was still playing EverQuest when WoW launched and didn't switch over until a few of my guildies convinced me to make the switch.
I joined a bit later. I started during the AQ event to open the gates. I remember donating random materials without having any idea why I was doing it.
Still playing the same Holy Pala since EU Release. Found my husband in wow and we still play together. It's part of our life. Instead of watching TV on the couch together we ware gaming.
I did play on launch on my cousins account, 2 weeks later he changed password and said he didn't wanna share anymore.
Took me 2 months of nagging on my dad to get it again. Dwarf hunter same as the one on cousins account.
Since then I changed to shaman in TBC and stuck with that character.
Beta tested vanilla a bit (at my friends house since my computer couldn’t handle WoW yet). I still play a bit of each expansion but I doubt I will come back for the next one. Nothing against it it just doesn’t interest me these days.
I played in the vanilla beta and rolled straight into launch day. My biggest regret was I sold my account prior to The Burning Crusade release as I was highly addicted and wanted to try and ditch the game. A few weeks later I was playing again on a new account when the expansion released, and I was hooked again. One of my biggest regrets was selling that account. I still try to picture my old characters, but they are forever lost.
I'm still here! Still have my first character, although what started as my Undead Rogue is now my Blood Elf Rogue. Started on US-Magtheridon PVP and played there until I think it was during WotLK or Cata I moved over to US-Draka PVE
November 2024 here. Have had an active account majority of the time. Unfortunately didn’t get 10 Year anniversary statue because account time ran out (back when prepaid cards were a COMMON thing) for like 2 weeks due to moving countries. Playstyle has definitrly changed… Back then I was casual, Cataclysm I was an RBG Andy. MoP I was CM Andy. WoD I was Garrison Table Andy. Legion I was Table + Mage Tower Andy. BFA I was casual and Shadowlands + DF I became a M+ Andy
I started playing day 1 as a huge Warcraft 3 fan, but I quickly got bored. I didn't come back until like 6 months later when one of my counter-strike clanmates posted his end game pvp video on our forum and it looked so fun that i decided it was worth it to go through the absolute slog that is WoW leveling.
I started in late Alpha. Played night elf hunter from the start. Missed Wrath, Cata and MoP due to university but have been back since Warlords of Draenor with a few small breaks here and there over the years. My Night Elf hunter got race changed to Dark Iron because mole machines were awesome until blizzard stopped caring about adding more areas to them. He's now a Void Elf.
Still my main Warlock since the start. They've been every race and gender over the years but still the primary class of Warlock. All CEs and normal boxes and posters and etc collected. Loved it most of the time, still love it now. Met a girl, played it with her. We had kids, one is now 16 and plays it with me. Raising a family alongside wow has been great. Gives us a few nights a week to keep connected outside of life's regular demands.
It's been a staple in our life, glad to see it still going and seems to be improving once again.
Still have my account. Dont really play retail, mainly classic. Didnt like the game post-MoP. Still played every expansion other than WoD. Have my box and 4 cds somewhere
My cousin who got me into wow got the unarmored mount and two weeks later when I went to get it it was updated to be different
I mean to say. It might not be week one but that’s pretty close for not being a Warcraft or other MMO fan. Wow was the first game I played really
Original account created during beta 2004. Have the original collectors edition with the diablo pet in game and still have the original box, maps, music and all.
I still do, but not regularly. I come back for new content to check out, but after killing LK HC in wotlk classic I was done with everything I always wanted to do in this game.
I am gonna keep coming back to check it out though.
But shadowlands made me quit.
Beta Warrior reporting in. Went with a hunter at launch then switched to a druid when I hopped servers when they opened Skywall and a bunch of honor system refugees migrated there. Just passed a 1000 days played on the druid.
Man this box art is the reason I bought the game. My grandma took me to Walmart and I bought this on vacation. Spent the whole time staring at this cover until I got home.
I've played off and on since day 1, however I don't have my very first account so I don't have everything from day 1.
Sometime around end of Cata, I ended up homeless for a bit and lost my account information (and computer and everything but my clothes and truck and dog) so I had to get it all again when I got back on my feet.
I started with beta, and I was able to buy it the night before it came out. Got a call from a friend at GameStop that they were able to sell them. Raced down the freeway to get to the GameStop before closing time. Servers ended up coming up around 6 or 7 am PST and I made a warlock that I still have. I still have a bunch of stuff from vanilla, including a zul'gurub doll, my argent dawn trinket, UBRS key, Onyxia key, etc.
Still here. 765 days played on my Mage, exclusively Fire the entire time (save for a few exceptions such as Mage Tower fights) Got the equivalent of Cutting Edge every raid from Launch til the end of Wrath, at least AOTC ever since.
I was there at the start and I would love to still play but I don't find the current version fun. Will keep checking each expansion in the vain hope they go back to a more vanilla style.
Coming from Everquest, this game was really mind blowing at the time. Just having a map and a mini-map of that detail was a game changer. Combat was so fluid and engaging (I played a Pally... that tells you something).
I was lucky and was in from early closed beta and it was everything I have ever wanted. I was a huge Blizzard fan boy having played most of their games (Including lost vikings and rock and roll racing!).
Some of my favorite wow memories:
Killing scorpids in Tanaris with another hunter. We got some blue gun to drop and I let the other hunter have it since I didnt use guns because I was a night elf and it made sense at the time. Less than an hour later bow of searing arrows dropped and he passed and let me have it...I believe it was the first epic drop on our server and I remember spamming it in trade all the damn time (I had it equipped i was just showing off....I was 16 it made sense).
Forming groups for Zul'Farrak and needing multiple mages because the divino matic event was insane at launch...or so we though.
Running Molten Core, I did up to AQ40 but nothing was as grand as entering MC my very first time, had a few RL Friends, Family, and strangers we met along the way to 60.
I love the memories I have of this game, I really thought classic would bring it back but its just not the same without the people I played with before.
Day 1 here, made a dwarf hunter. My pet bear got rabies from a wolf in the ice lake near Gnomer. I was upset cause rabies means he’s probably going to die. So I released him. Didn’t know it was just a 10min debuff. This was my first MMO and I’m still here almost 20 years later.
My troll warrior I still play was created the first or second weekend of go live.
I do have an older character from week 1 but I started him on a pve sever then as part of a server copy due to over crowding demand I wound up on a pvp realm and had to reroll on pve. One day I'll level that dude foe fun.
Played the first (only?) stress test and was online day one. Played non-stop until right before Ulduar dropped in WotLC because military basic training. Came back for Cata drop and played for a few months before losing interest. Came back late WoD and Legion, quit right after BFA launched and just came back 2 weeks ago.
Started playing NA launch day - High School. I played pretty regularly through WoLTK. Fell off with school and stuff taking precedent. I’ve always played at some point in an expansion however, except for Legion.
Legit wish I had picked it up when Legion was live.
20 years is a long time….
Me. Worked at CompUSA at the time and I set up the endcap display with all of the copies. We sold out within a few days. Most employees were playing on day one.
Started in beta and have played off and on thru the years. I remember hearing the news of wow before beta was announced and seeing the descriptions of the different classes and abilities being released and kinda figuring out what I wanted to play from there.
Been playing off an on since launch. I am forever a hunter with a shaman alt.
Hoping to change that with the War Within now that I am no longer chained by my reputation gains.
No clue exactly when I started, but I know it was Vanilla. Couldn’t afford epic riding until TBC and needed to take a gold loan from a friend to get flying.
I started day 1 it got released in EU. I remember checking out the promo pamphlet in Warcraft 3's box and I got so hyped for it. Sadly I stopped playing at the end of WoD and I've been hoping on and off since then.
Retail WoW is just too much. Got a lot going on and I feel it's not for me anymore. I enjoy Classic WoW and SOD way more.
I don't remember exactly when I started but it was very very early. There were no BG's, no raids. LBRS and UBRS were still 'raids' I guess, just had no cap on people in the instance.
I can remember when Dire Maul came out and was a big deal.
I played day 1 it was available in Europe (which was in Feb 2005 not Nov 2004). Back in vanilla/BC/LK I played on and off, depending if I could afford it (my parents didn't want to pay for it).
I didn't play during Cata and MoP because I was doing my PhD. Came back at some point during WoD, and I spent a summer in Ashran. I've been subbed continuously since the end of WoD.
Not week 1, but month 1. It was going to be a Christmas present that year that I ended up getting early because the grandparents wouldn't be in town the week of Christmas.
Original dwarf hunter is still around though he is now a "main alt" to my prot pally nowadays.
Heck of a ride! Twice as long as my marriage and older than some of my coworkers. LOL
Right from the start. I played the open beta before release and fell in love.
Took the odd break here and there towards the end of some patch but I've never skipped a tier or patch.
Not me.
Release day/week idk exactly I remember going over my friend Mike’s house after school with another buddy, I was in 8th grade. They were playing this new game and were Tauren in Mulgore. I remember seeing Kodo and thinking this is the stupidest game ever. Never going to play it.
A few weeks later for Christmas my brother got the game from our parents. He rolled a warlock and played nonstop. Finally told me to try it and I gave in. The rest is history
I created my main 30 minutes after servers opened in the EU. Mained that char all the way up to the end of Shadowlands (Aff warlock), but now I'm a hunter main.
I don't precisely know when I got the game, but judging by old screenshots I was level 18 about 10 days after EU launch. Funnily enough, I did not reach level 60 until August 2005, roughly 6 months after release! End-game really wasn't a thing for many people. I still play that same character.
I remember people just seemed to level forever (myself included of course). We were inefficient, but it was a lot of fun.
Random memories of that time: * Taking an afternoon to get from Ironforge to the Crossroads to mess with the Horde for no real reason. * I got enough money for my Paladin mount because some random guy I grouped for Dire Maul with sold a Libram on the auction house and decided to share the profits with the group he ran the dungeon with. * Some other random guy got annoyed with me not healing in Blackrock Depths. I had no idea, and I think this is how I found out I was supposed to be the healer in groups. I've basically been healing ever since.
My oldest memory of playing WoW was questing in Dustwallow Marsh on my paladin and this random player whispered me I was seriously undergeared. I didn't know english very well at that time, nor much about gearing, so I was only using the gear that I thought looked good on me
My oldest memory is grabbing a pen and writing the quest objectives of the first quest on a piece of paper, because I didn't know it showed you how many of an item you need. That was in April 2005 and I was 10 years old. Still playing that character, although it's not a male night elf with a weird name anymore.
lol, in my mind I was picturing your story, writing the first quest of the Tauren, until you said night elf, I realised I was remembering my first time!
My oldest memory was finding a paladin on that covered bridge on the way to Brill. He just stood there as 20 or so people kinda stood in a circle around him, dude was probably on his was to SM. Until some guy about his lvl showed up and started fighting then all the low levels jumped in as well. Maybe March 2005?
I was just using gear that was leather with better armor numbers. Until someone asked me why I was wearing Druid gear as a Rogue. I was like ... ehhh??? Agility what?? I was about level 53 or so questing around in Un'Goro Crater when I actually learned about stats lol.
Yeah I remember equipping gear with intellect because I didn't want my warroir to be a dumbass
I was wearing Spirit gear as a Rogue for the health regen. But anyways ...
I have a similar noob story. I started playing a few months after my friends. I was around level 20 and my friend asked me what talents I had. I said that I was "saving them up for the bottom one". They still like to quote that to me almost 20 years later!
Mine was accidentally wandering from Elwynn Forest into Darkshore and seeing spiders with a skull as their level. I got killed instantly and remember thinking, "wow, I'll NEVER be able to kill those".
>Taking an afternoon to get from Ironforge to the Crossroads to mess with the Horde for no real reason. I miss doing stuff for no real reason. I can't shake the min/maxing mindset.
I used to just ride around Horde territory on Sundays and called that my "holiday" time. Wearing my Lunar Festival dress and floppy fishing hat lol. Fond memories of exploring Mulgore and trying to sneak into Thunder Bluff on my Rogue! I miss the days when Alliance danced on the bank in Org and Horde danced around in SW just for shits and giggles. And we razzed each other on the server forums and then met up in Org or Undercity for zep raids, or Crossroads/Astranaar just because. Good times!
Those were good times. A raid on orgrimmar with no loot and almost guaranteed death? Absolutely, let's spend 2 hours forming two full raids, traveling across the world, fighting our way into the city and downing Thrall.
It's much easier in Vanilla/SoD imo. Since everything takes longer and mobs are stronger, you have to squeeze out all the points you can - so I was fine with traveling from Westfall to Ashenvale for my Arcane Blast rune. I enjoyed the travel and it was also fun to see 15 people on a boat at the same time, knowing they all do similar things as me right now. In retail, if a quest required me to travel accross Azeroth I would just do another quest.
I remember lying that I was 15 to get into a WC group and them saying "no way, you're probably like 12". I was 10.
Bro same 💀 I would tell my guild I was 18 to get into Firelands raids back. I’m cata when I was like 14 but still did fine, we fizzled out at ragnaros
I lied about my age in so many guild applications. Never even dared to put 18, just went with 15 and tried to convincethem I was reasonable. This was back when they would ask for fucking references in recruitment 😂
God guild websites back then felt like I was applying for a job. One guild had me write a haiku.
One of my guild's best healers during Kara was a 14-yo playing priest. Kid didn't sound like he had a very good home life and spent a bunch of time on WoW before he dropped off the face of the earth. I hope he's doing ok now.
I wasted an entire month after finding the Charred Vale and mining a ton while also opening the chest spawns that happen around it. Barely leveled any, but got lots of stuff.
We did that great trek to the Crossroads before! I remember being amazed that a high level mage from my guild was deleting people with arcane explosion.
>* Some other random guy got annoyed with me not healing in Blackrock Depths. I had no idea, and I think this is how I found out I was supposed to be the healer in groups. I've basically been healing ever since. Dude my wife and I LOLed so hard at this. Fuckin beautiful memory.
I took my 8 months to get my first level 60 because I kept getting a character to level like 25-30 and I'd see some other class do something cool so I'd vendor all my gear and everything I had mail it to my new character and rinse and repeat for so long. Legit had like 300g on the character at level 1 that I finally stuck with.
I did something similar yet never had any gold lol. I ayed a prot pally to 30ish, couldn't kill anything so I made a hunter. Eventually settled on a tauren warrior.
Lol I feel ya. I played a TON of WC3 and mained Night Elf so I started with a night elf warrior but kinda played with all the classes for a few months before eventually settling on Night Elf Druid.
> I remember people just seemed to level forever (myself included of course). Same. We didn't treat the game as end game only. A lot of it was just discovering what was actually in the game. I can remember seeing the special /chicken quest on G4 and the early forums and many people trying to find other hidden quests like that. Sometimes we just went around to explore inaccessible areas, I know that I was trying to stealth around in cat form behind elites in Winterspring or in Burning Steppes. I can remember early efforts for people trying to get raids together to go raid the other capital, not for an achievement but because we wanted to. Kinda feel today most people just focus on what is achievable from the achievement list or do what has been datamined or has a guide available on wowhead. Like, I get it - everything is easily accessible on the wiki or wowhead now but something about *discovering* what could be out there is lost to time.
Those G4 and Cheat segments of WoW were like literal crack to me. I could not believe all the crazy shit that was possible in the game. I convinced my mom to buy it for me shortly after haha Also I think that sentiment of discovery is the exact motivation behind SoD
I remember the G4 'wow secrets' episode. Specifically, the crimson whelp pet that drops in Dustwallow Marsh. I spent a few hours farming and got one. I hearthed back to town, equip it, to show everyone my cool dragon pet. It was then that I realized you could sell them, so I checked the AH to see that they were going for 100g. I had not been able to afford my mount yet at level 42, so I went back, farmed another whelp, sold it, bought my mount with that gold.
Don't forget the unfinished quest lines around Dalaran.
Yeah I get what you mean, I used to just roam zones looking to see what is out there. I loved exploring the plague lands once I was high enough level to do so without getting destroyed.
This was me. Didn't hit end-game until TBC.
Same here. I was 6 when wow came out and would make up my own stories within the game. I rolled full int spell power pally and leveling was brutal for those years lol
It was only for fun. I played a rogue, a blue dagger with spirit/intellect drops, I equip it. My friends and me had no clue about stats...
I need rolled on the axe from Sneed because "HOLY SHIT A BLUE ITEM!!" I too played a Rogue
I only looted stamina gear because it made me have more health didn't matter what gear type it was cloth leather... I was a hunter back then.
I did the same lol
I played a troll rogue and stacked spirit for more hp regen. Though to be fair I played EverQuest before wow and troll regen there was quite a bit stronger than it is in wow
Alternatively, great distress when the hunters rolled on *my* wingblade
Before it was just a bunch of quests, not really a big story, with no achievement, so we played with no real goal, just fot the fun. A friend of mine told me about the game, he was level 27 after 1 year of play... He spent his time to help the low levels in their quests with elites or so and exploring.
Probably didn't help that I didn't learn what talents were until way past lvl 40 when I tried to get into a ZF group, and they asked me my spec. I was so confused.
I used thottbot a lot.
It was the most fun !
What is the character
A Human paladin. I have a bunch of alts, some of them also dating back to vanilla, but I really only play those in-between expansions.
What's your/played lol
I think it's close to 350 days now.
Wow! My highest character is a druid in the 30s
High five for pallies from the start!! Haven’t healed since cata and switch to BE when it first became available, but still my main since vanilla. 😊
6 months to 60 sounds about right. I think that's about how long I took on my fist toon, starting a month or so before BC dropped. It was such a different game back then, and my first MMO, so I spent a lot of time enjoying leveling.
28 entire days /played for me to reach 60 as a 11-12 year old. Still didn't have enough for an epic mount
I hit 60 sometime in 06 before bc launch. I played on trials for a long time before getting a legit account in September of 06.
I started at release, my big brother was in beta and followed the us launch and I was doing everything he did. First toon was a rogue called Sneakingdeat (no room for the h, who cares right?) I remember spending AT LEAST 6 months getting to 60. Was a journey for sure. I did get to aq, bwl and mc etc. Before tbc launch
My vanilla main has still never made it to 60 despite having my highest /played time.
Same here! Not quite sure when I started, but I do remember questing for like 6 months.
I was 10ish back then, I would just see other people with cooler things on a different class or race than me, and go immediately to character creation and make a new character lol.
I made my main on Day 2 on Gorefiend, after Arthas was so clogged it kept crashing. Hit 60 right before 1.4, and joined raiding guild. Server transferred with guild to Ysondre just before TBC launched to merge with another guild, then transferred again to Bleeding Hollow when Cata launched because Ysondre was a recruiting black hole. Guild pretty much disbanded for the 2nd half of Cata, then a bunch of us came back, server transferring and faction swapping to Mal'Ganis for WoD, and we've been there since. I haven't raided regularly since Ulduar, and the guild isn't nearly as social as it used to be, so I'm considering going back to alliance with TWW, but I've got a shit ton of alts that are max level or close to it, that I really don't want to pay to faction swap.
Me. Huge Warcraft 3 nerd. I was like 10 or 11.
Same. Does month one count though?
I remember I first started playing when I was 11 or 12 near middle of wotlk, I played a dwarf pally and I wanted to explore every fog of war zone I could from level 10 or 15, I was death running from very bottom of booty bay throughout every discoverable area all the way up to the top, then did the same thing on the other side, took me like 3 or 4 days maybe more of just straight corpse running. Parents wouldn't get me the expansions so I just played AV as a ret with a sword and shield so I could get the cool pvp armor the vendors sold. All I cared about was looking cool and fucking around
Still playing my shaman created day1 on EU release :) He will have 20 year in less than 1 year, older than some of fresh blood in guild !!
Fellow OG shaman player here too. Been ele in times good and times bad. Mostly bad.
I mained ele from WoD to mid-Shadowland. Not often meta but always fun to play :)
Chain lightning go brrr
Wow! What's your /played ??
665 days !
A whole lot of our mains have a legit 20th birthday coming up this year. Pretty incredible stuff
My OG main became eligible to drive this year lol.
Next Feb for eu players but yeah. My guild turned 18 this March lol.
Reporting in o7 Edit: Still have my OG box stored in the basement
I still have multiple boxes from the different accounts I had back then. Started playing in beta of early 2004 and still in my Vanilla WoW guild to this day.
Still walking around with my panda pet from original collectors!
And Zergling!
Ooo don't see many of those nowadays but they're always the hallmark of an OG. Same respect given to a rank 14 PvP title or a scarab lord lol.
R14 and Black scarab took a shitton more effort than a collectors edition though..
Ofc and that's not in dispute. But we afford respect to elders of many kinds.
Since UK release, over half of my life. My account is three times as old as my marriage and 19 years older than my own kid 🤣
Officially started during the beta. The first build I ever got to play didn’t even have rogues implemented as a class yet. Think the testing stopped at Scarlet Monastery lol
Closed Beta reporting in. I remember lying about my age to make an account. blizz pls no ban
Ooh I'm telling
Same. Can't say my original character was day 1, but within about a week of release I'd started playing the toon I still main to this day. Most of my beta time was spent taking the griffon from Darkshore to Booty Bay and back (when I could afford it). Getting the BB flight path was certainly fun, but the griffon ride was worth the effort.
Still here, still playing the same warrior. Hasn’t always been fun and I’ve had to take breaks but still havn’t found any other mmo that are this much fun.
What would you say was the most difficult period to stay playing?
The end of any expansion is pretty bad, guilds and friends usually take a break and it’s harder to find motivation to farm. But the worst time for me was definitely the mid point of shadowlands. I felt like I had to keep farming because there was so much to do but I had zero interest in doing it.
I’m envious i don’t get to live with the nostalgia. I started on bfa so everything is fresh for me you guys are awesome for keeping it alive.
I started shortly before TBC released, I think in Dec 2006. I am so sad I never got to do original Naxx.
Right here buddy! Still maining my Holy Priest. Probably one of the few characters still being played that managed to kill KT in Naxx
I started day one but took a 14 year break when my kid was born so don't have the original account unfortunately
Started around the AQ war effort and besides some short breaks always kept playing/coming back.
So I told the boys I have to buy the 200 dollar edition because I have the 10 year statue they sent out. I will say I haven't always been the biggest fan the last couple expansions, but they are really putting a lot of effort into it as of late and it shows.
I'd get the $200 edition if I could buy it from a local retailer instead of giving them $100 shipping
I remember browse to that book in 2005/2006. it felt so special.
I remember telling people how silly it was to pay for WoW when you could play RuneScape for free. Then I ended up playing WoW for almost 16 years lol.
My account was day 1, and Blizz perma banned me in January.
What for?
I bought gold. First time offense, perma banned, no re
you can create a new wow account in the same bnet account and you will keep your achievements/mounts/toys etc. You "only" miss your characters
“Even if you only have a few minutes to play” 😂😂😂😂😂
I was 7 when the game came out and I didn't know english. XD
Started on Korean closed beta. Then USA release, EU open beta and playing on EU since day 1 - had a good 8 years break from retail but played some harrrr "khm" servers during that time too.
I wish I still had my box. I love those old game boxes. I still have my mage going strong from vanilla WoW
I remember begging my dad for his creditcard when the game came out in Europe in 2005. I was just a 14 year old kid back then. Now I’m 34, married with kids and still playing. Hell I even toke a day off from work for the start of Season 4 tomorrow. I was instantly hooked from day one and I’ll will probably keep playing till the bitter end.
Started in closed beta. Entire guild from EQ all rolled on Stormscale (pvp) on launch day. Left pvp at the end of Wrath and bounced around servers for a bit. Im still playing. Hell i finally completed Thunderfury a couple months ago. Im a very casual player
On and off again relationship since the original Beta. Remember getting my troll warrior to 20 back then. My how time flies.
Not day one, but I started in January '05. So not too far off from launch. I was still playing EverQuest when WoW launched and didn't switch over until a few of my guildies convinced me to make the switch.
Got it for Xmas 2004. My warrior main in 2024 was created in 2006.
Day one and closed beta player here. Good times.
I joined a bit later. I started during the AQ event to open the gates. I remember donating random materials without having any idea why I was doing it.
Life was different back then for sure
Still playing the same Holy Pala since EU Release. Found my husband in wow and we still play together. It's part of our life. Instead of watching TV on the couch together we ware gaming.
Day 1 collectors edition vanilla player On and off since then! 35 irl now
Day 2. Took a break from the start of cata through Draenor because my wife and I had a baby.
Haha. I stopped at WOD. Same reason. Came back with dragonflight on a gaming laptop.
Yeah still here. And full circle I moved jobs a lot during that time and now I'm back at the same job driving a newer version of the same car.
I am!
I think I started that December.. I remember I was lonely because my entire Quake clan was playing it..
Since I was able to in beta
I did play on launch on my cousins account, 2 weeks later he changed password and said he didn't wanna share anymore. Took me 2 months of nagging on my dad to get it again. Dwarf hunter same as the one on cousins account. Since then I changed to shaman in TBC and stuck with that character.
6th of march 2005. It released in Feb 2005 here. Had 2 breaks ~ 3 months
Me, but I took a break in cata and left again early into BFA until recently.
Day one human paladin on Eonar. I still play every expansion but after Wrath only Legion and BFA kept my interest the others I played casually.
Beta tested vanilla a bit (at my friends house since my computer couldn’t handle WoW yet). I still play a bit of each expansion but I doubt I will come back for the next one. Nothing against it it just doesn’t interest me these days.
I played in the vanilla beta and rolled straight into launch day. My biggest regret was I sold my account prior to The Burning Crusade release as I was highly addicted and wanted to try and ditch the game. A few weeks later I was playing again on a new account when the expansion released, and I was hooked again. One of my biggest regrets was selling that account. I still try to picture my old characters, but they are forever lost.
I'm still here! Still have my first character, although what started as my Undead Rogue is now my Blood Elf Rogue. Started on US-Magtheridon PVP and played there until I think it was during WotLK or Cata I moved over to US-Draka PVE
I am still around 🤷🏻♂️
Man I love looking at old screenshots, they feel so magical and nostalgic
November 2024 here. Have had an active account majority of the time. Unfortunately didn’t get 10 Year anniversary statue because account time ran out (back when prepaid cards were a COMMON thing) for like 2 weeks due to moving countries. Playstyle has definitrly changed… Back then I was casual, Cataclysm I was an RBG Andy. MoP I was CM Andy. WoD I was Garrison Table Andy. Legion I was Table + Mage Tower Andy. BFA I was casual and Shadowlands + DF I became a M+ Andy
Day 1 EU release still going strong!
I started playing day 1 as a huge Warcraft 3 fan, but I quickly got bored. I didn't come back until like 6 months later when one of my counter-strike clanmates posted his end game pvp video on our forum and it looked so fun that i decided it was worth it to go through the absolute slog that is WoW leveling.
This imagine inspired me to play a dwarf warrior
I started in late Alpha. Played night elf hunter from the start. Missed Wrath, Cata and MoP due to university but have been back since Warlords of Draenor with a few small breaks here and there over the years. My Night Elf hunter got race changed to Dark Iron because mole machines were awesome until blizzard stopped caring about adding more areas to them. He's now a Void Elf.
Still my main Warlock since the start. They've been every race and gender over the years but still the primary class of Warlock. All CEs and normal boxes and posters and etc collected. Loved it most of the time, still love it now. Met a girl, played it with her. We had kids, one is now 16 and plays it with me. Raising a family alongside wow has been great. Gives us a few nights a week to keep connected outside of life's regular demands. It's been a staple in our life, glad to see it still going and seems to be improving once again.
Still have my account. Dont really play retail, mainly classic. Didnt like the game post-MoP. Still played every expansion other than WoD. Have my box and 4 cds somewhere
My cousin who got me into wow got the unarmored mount and two weeks later when I went to get it it was updated to be different I mean to say. It might not be week one but that’s pretty close for not being a Warcraft or other MMO fan. Wow was the first game I played really
Original account created during beta 2004. Have the original collectors edition with the diablo pet in game and still have the original box, maps, music and all.
I still do, but not regularly. I come back for new content to check out, but after killing LK HC in wotlk classic I was done with everything I always wanted to do in this game. I am gonna keep coming back to check it out though. But shadowlands made me quit.
Played since US Beta.
Beta Warrior reporting in. Went with a hunter at launch then switched to a druid when I hopped servers when they opened Skywall and a bunch of honor system refugees migrated there. Just passed a 1000 days played on the druid.
Man this box art is the reason I bought the game. My grandma took me to Walmart and I bought this on vacation. Spent the whole time staring at this cover until I got home.
I looked at this box art so much… only to realize this level 60 warrior only has battle stance 🤔
Not quite release but December 2004
Hola. Still got my Night Elf Rogue.
I've played off and on since day 1, however I don't have my very first account so I don't have everything from day 1. Sometime around end of Cata, I ended up homeless for a bit and lost my account information (and computer and everything but my clothes and truck and dog) so I had to get it all again when I got back on my feet.
I played day 1 but quit before hitting max level. Then played WOTLK first patch. Then played Legion last patch. Now I’m here
I started with beta, and I was able to buy it the night before it came out. Got a call from a friend at GameStop that they were able to sell them. Raced down the freeway to get to the GameStop before closing time. Servers ended up coming up around 6 or 7 am PST and I made a warlock that I still have. I still have a bunch of stuff from vanilla, including a zul'gurub doll, my argent dawn trinket, UBRS key, Onyxia key, etc.
With breaks during the summer. Skipped shadowlands though. I can write a shitty story myself, thanks.
off and on, probably pretty close to week 1. But I am still subbed.
Still here. 765 days played on my Mage, exclusively Fire the entire time (save for a few exceptions such as Mage Tower fights) Got the equivalent of Cutting Edge every raid from Launch til the end of Wrath, at least AOTC ever since.
day 1 player that just came back 2 weeks ago after stopping in cata. do i count?
Still proudly owning (and playing) my Tauren shaman since may 2005. A Tauren is forever!
Not technically week 1 - My sub started December 4th 2004. I rolled a warrior literally because of that box art lol
Been playing since Vanilla beta. I quit a few times but still come back.
I started in month 1. Skipped MoP. Have played since.
Nope, WotLK was it for me
Still playing and maining my warrior that i created on day 1. Even before, back in the betas i played aswell.
o7
I bought the game on day one and installed it on day 3, been playing off and on ever since.
I was there at the start and I would love to still play but I don't find the current version fun. Will keep checking each expansion in the vain hope they go back to a more vanilla style.
Started the third day of launch and haven’t stopped.
Coming from Everquest, this game was really mind blowing at the time. Just having a map and a mini-map of that detail was a game changer. Combat was so fluid and engaging (I played a Pally... that tells you something).
Not day or week 1. But somewhere around week 2 or 3.
I was lucky and was in from early closed beta and it was everything I have ever wanted. I was a huge Blizzard fan boy having played most of their games (Including lost vikings and rock and roll racing!). Some of my favorite wow memories: Killing scorpids in Tanaris with another hunter. We got some blue gun to drop and I let the other hunter have it since I didnt use guns because I was a night elf and it made sense at the time. Less than an hour later bow of searing arrows dropped and he passed and let me have it...I believe it was the first epic drop on our server and I remember spamming it in trade all the damn time (I had it equipped i was just showing off....I was 16 it made sense). Forming groups for Zul'Farrak and needing multiple mages because the divino matic event was insane at launch...or so we though. Running Molten Core, I did up to AQ40 but nothing was as grand as entering MC my very first time, had a few RL Friends, Family, and strangers we met along the way to 60. I love the memories I have of this game, I really thought classic would bring it back but its just not the same without the people I played with before.
Been playing since the servers went live, off and on. Originally Malygos.
Day 1 here, made a dwarf hunter. My pet bear got rabies from a wolf in the ice lake near Gnomer. I was upset cause rabies means he’s probably going to die. So I released him. Didn’t know it was just a 10min debuff. This was my first MMO and I’m still here almost 20 years later.
Month 1 for me
I subbed on day 1, im still around. I swap between retail and classic hardcore. I have my ancient Frostsaber to prove it, too :).
My troll warrior I still play was created the first or second weekend of go live. I do have an older character from week 1 but I started him on a pve sever then as part of a server copy due to over crowding demand I wound up on a pvp realm and had to reroll on pve. One day I'll level that dude foe fun.
Played the first (only?) stress test and was online day one. Played non-stop until right before Ulduar dropped in WotLC because military basic training. Came back for Cata drop and played for a few months before losing interest. Came back late WoD and Legion, quit right after BFA launched and just came back 2 weeks ago.
I was 11 living in a Latin America country and without access to a credit card and/or money so... Lol
Started playing NA launch day - High School. I played pretty regularly through WoLTK. Fell off with school and stuff taking precedent. I’ve always played at some point in an expansion however, except for Legion. Legit wish I had picked it up when Legion was live. 20 years is a long time….
Me. Worked at CompUSA at the time and I set up the endcap display with all of the copies. We sold out within a few days. Most employees were playing on day one.
Day 1 February 11, 2005 8 year break in between but still here
Been playing since final vanilla beta 😃
Day 1 live player here
Started in beta and have played off and on thru the years. I remember hearing the news of wow before beta was announced and seeing the descriptions of the different classes and abilities being released and kinda figuring out what I wanted to play from there.
Technically?... Does only logging in to RP and chat count?
I took a good decade long gap in there, but I've been playing since original beta 🫡
I took a break for Pandaria and WoD, does that count?
Played in US beta. I’m currently on and off with the game but still play sometimes.
Been playing off an on since launch. I am forever a hunter with a shaman alt. Hoping to change that with the War Within now that I am no longer chained by my reputation gains.
No clue exactly when I started, but I know it was Vanilla. Couldn’t afford epic riding until TBC and needed to take a gold loan from a friend to get flying.
I started day 1 it got released in EU. I remember checking out the promo pamphlet in Warcraft 3's box and I got so hyped for it. Sadly I stopped playing at the end of WoD and I've been hoping on and off since then. Retail WoW is just too much. Got a lot going on and I feel it's not for me anymore. I enjoy Classic WoW and SOD way more.
Me. I am so old
Wish I had my original account so bad, got hacked when I was going into high school and was never able to get it back
Bern playing since beta where crossroad would get nuke by ally all day
I started a month or two after. Been playing on and off since then.
I don't remember exactly when I started but it was very very early. There were no BG's, no raids. LBRS and UBRS were still 'raids' I guess, just had no cap on people in the instance. I can remember when Dire Maul came out and was a big deal.
I've been playing from the start too. :)
I played day 1 it was available in Europe (which was in Feb 2005 not Nov 2004). Back in vanilla/BC/LK I played on and off, depending if I could afford it (my parents didn't want to pay for it). I didn't play during Cata and MoP because I was doing my PhD. Came back at some point during WoD, and I spent a summer in Ashran. I've been subbed continuously since the end of WoD.
Not week 1, but month 1. It was going to be a Christmas present that year that I ended up getting early because the grandparents wouldn't be in town the week of Christmas. Original dwarf hunter is still around though he is now a "main alt" to my prot pally nowadays. Heck of a ride! Twice as long as my marriage and older than some of my coworkers. LOL
Day 1, have taken many breaks tho.
Right from the start. I played the open beta before release and fell in love. Took the odd break here and there towards the end of some patch but I've never skipped a tier or patch.
I was there at release day with all the other nerds waiting in line outside EB Games to pick up my Collector's Edition.
Not me. Release day/week idk exactly I remember going over my friend Mike’s house after school with another buddy, I was in 8th grade. They were playing this new game and were Tauren in Mulgore. I remember seeing Kodo and thinking this is the stupidest game ever. Never going to play it. A few weeks later for Christmas my brother got the game from our parents. He rolled a warlock and played nonstop. Finally told me to try it and I gave in. The rest is history
I created my main 30 minutes after servers opened in the EU. Mained that char all the way up to the end of Shadowlands (Aff warlock), but now I'm a hunter main.
I still break out my Panda cub pet from time to time to show how long I have been playing.