Yet *another* preview of World of Warcraft

Inside Mac Games has posted a 3 page preview of Blizzards newly annouced MMORPG, World of Warcraft. The preview boasts a couple new screenshots and is worth the read. Here’s a snippet:

The item system will likely not follow the random-property generation ability found in Diablo II, as this is extremely difficult to implement and balance for all players. Of course the team does like that model’s use within Diablo II, because it gives players a sense of discovery, of possessing a unique object so some elements of this item creation method will remain. The team wants to include items that have a unique feeling and individual properties, enabling characters to look and act in very different ways. This diversity has been something that has helped the success of previous titles and inspired countless hours of questing for new items, and we are sure it will be a part of the game but there was clearly an emphasis on character role playing and development over the sometimes tedious quest for material objects that Diablo and other online games can become. The WoW team seemed to want game items to be a bonus, but never the focus of gameplay.

You can find the rest of the article here.