In terms of gameplay, The Burning Crusade understandably stays close to its roots. It would be daft to make major deviations from a concept that has proven so successful. If you're one of the few that hated the game before, I doubt that anything in the expansion would change your mind.

Recipe for success: Take one wildly successful MMORPG; add facets of previously successful games from the same developer; throw in secrecy and tightly coiled anticipation. Stir briskly, serve warm and by the millions.

When it was released in November 2004, World of Warcraft raised the bar for the massively multiplayer genre, and more than two years later, none of its would-be competitors have even come close to matching it.

Beautiful new environments; Fun and varied world-PVP objectives; Lots of great new dungeons; Great orchestral soundtrack

Some quests are very repetitive; A lot of preexisting content is now obsolete

We probably don't even have to publish this review, because World of Warcraft is a game that carries its own legion of fans. The ever-popular World of Warcraft's first expansion, The Burning Crusade, is here, and WoW players will absorb it into the fold simply because it's more of what they already...

ups: tons of new material and areas

downs: some graphics quality; repetition

After a seemingly endless wait, it's finally here, the long-awaited expansion to the most successful MMORPG to date. World of Warcraft has over eight million players around the globe, a number that was steadily increasing long before The Burning Crusade hit stores.

Many new areas, quests, instances and raid areas; excellent visuals on the new zones; easily hundreds of hours of gameplay; two new races and the new jewelcrafting profession; new skills, an increased level cap and many more updates for players

Players must be level 58 or greater to venture into the new content areas; most pre-expansion content and items are now obsolete

When you have an online game with over 8 million players, any expansion is by definition a big expansion. In the case of The Burning Crusade it actually delivers on this, providing plenty of new content for high level characters and for players looking to start a new character in the game.

MMORPGs have been around for awhile. A genre brought into the mainstream by Everquest, MMORPGs are, to say the least, popular. None, though, have touched the popularity of the current MMO king, World of Warcraft. Boasting over eight million accounts, WoW is the crown jewel of the MMO market.

Several years have passed since the Burning Legion's defeat at Mount Hyjal and the races of Azeroth have continued to rebuild their once shattered lives. With renewed strength, the heroes of the Horde and Alliance have begun to explore new lands and broken through the Dark Portal to investigate the...

Back in October when previewing the game, I said the Burning Crusade was probably the most anticipated expansion in videogame history. I was wrong. The Burning Crusade is the most anticipated expansion in videogame history. Why have I changed my mind?

In 2004 Blizzard released World of Warcraft , the company's first foray into massively-multiplayer online gaming. Most expected the game to be good, but nobody could have predicted the game's enormous success.