World of Warcraft: Cataclysm

When Blizzard decides to make an epic move in their massively multiplayer online role-playing game, they go all out. In this third expansion, they don’t just add to the world, they burn the old one to the ground. Deathwing, an awoken dragon with a fiery attitude, has broken free of his prison and laid waste to Azeroth, causing floods, earthquakes and fires to alter the terrain drastically. Many of the old zones have changed and new zones, including a beautiful but deadly underwater world called Vash’jir, give the game a fresh feel for people who’ve been playing for over six years. Along with new content, such as dungeons, loot and two new playable races—Worgen (werewolves) and Goblins—the gameplay is redesigned to create a better flow while leveling your characters. If you’re not one of the more than 12 million players, a new expansion probably won’t entice you to start playing, though it should. Even with a wealth of new content on top of an already expansive universe, Cataclysm streamlines the game making it easier to start from the beginning. Deathwing may have destroyed much of Azeroth but he breathed new life into the game, enough that some tech companies in California gave employees its release date off.