World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft is the MMORPG that defined the genre and remains, twenty years after its 2004 launch, the benchmark against which every other massively multiplayer game is measured. Set in the beloved fantasy universe of Azeroth — a world established through the Warcraft real-time strategy games — WoW invited players to inhabit that universe through a character they would grow, gear, and explore with over hundreds or thousands of hours. Its influence on gaming culture is incalculable: it introduced millions of players to concepts like raiding, guilds, server communities, and economy-driven auction houses. The game has reinvented itself across multiple expansions, from the burning Outland of The Burning Crusade to the dragon-riding spectacle of Dragonflight and the current The War Within. Classic servers have preserved the original experience for players who treasure it. WoW is more than a game — it is a shared cultural history.