The WoW Diary

Executive Summary: It's hard for me to be partial about this book as it combines two things that have consumed most of my time the last 15 years: World of Warcraft and Software Development.

Full Review
World of Warcraft changed my life. I've made lifelong friends and had unforgettable experiences that no other game before or since has matched. It's also coincided with my professional career as a software developer as I graduated from college the year wow was released.

Once upon a time I had aspirations to be a game developer, but somewhere along the way I decided I wanted to play games more than I wanted to write them. This book shows I made the right choice. I've spent far more hours playing World of Warcraft than I'd like to think about, but I don't know that I'd have wanted to put in the countless hours it took Blizzard to make.

This book combines two things I love in one package. When the kickstarter was announced I backed it immediately. Blizzard has been notoriously closed lipped about everything, especially the development of their games. I was a bit shocked to hear they not only approved of the book but also contributed various images.

It was fascinating to me to learn about early features that got cut, design decisions that were made and the marvel the game ever got released in the first place. For someone like me this was a perfect blend of storytelling and technology.

I don't think it's so technical that your average World of Warcraft fan wouldn't be able to follow it. I don't know if they will have the same enjoyment I did however. I found myself reading longer than I planned every time I picked it up. For that reason I gave it 5 stars.

I'd love to see similar books about the time and development of the game since it's launch, in particular the lessons learned and hardware and software details they applied to fix all the scaling and uptime issues they had in the early years of the game.

If you're interested in a peek behind the curtain of Blizzard, or World of Warcraft in particular this book is worth checking out.