World of Warcraft (Video Game)
November 23, 2004 · 21st Century
World of Warcraft, developed by Blizzard Entertainment, launched on November 23, 2004, as a massively multiplayer online role-playing game set in the fictional world of Azeroth. Building on the Warcraft real-time strategy franchise, it allowed thousands of players to simultaneously explore, complete quests, and interact within a persistent online world. The game reached over 12 million monthly subscribers by 2010, establishing a subscription-based model that shaped the MMORPG genre for the following decade.
Key Figures
Rob PardoMichael MorhaimeAllen AdhamJeff Kaplan
Locations
Irvine, California
Topics
fantasypcgameMMORPGonline gamingBlizzard Entertainment
Connected Events — 2 Connections
Doom pioneered networked multiplayer gaming and its deathmatch mode created the mass market for online PC gaming that Blizzard scaled to millions with WoW Doom (Video Game)
The web drove mass broadband adoption providing the always-on internet connections WoW persistent online world required for 12 million subscribers The Birth of the World Wide Web
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