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By creating the beautiful Blood Elves, Blizzard taps into the market of Barrens chatters who want to play Horde and look pretty at the same time. If you're lucky enough to never have encountered the Barrens phenomenon, imagine a text-based Lord Of The Flies. While questing, Horde lowbies use the chat channel and the spelling is terrifying, the questions idiotic and the answers almost always obscene.

With the arrival of Burning Crusade, the folks asking for hints and walkthoughs, and the folks answering "UR MOM!" now look like glowing, fair-skinned, delicate elves.

While I was waiting for the expansion, I was excited about the new Alliance race, the Draenai, and the new profession, Jewelcrafting, but mostly I couldn't wait to play a Blood Elf. I was enamored with their pretty hair and high magic homeland. The Blood Elves' racial abilities are a mana tap, a stackable power which sucks opponents mana and gives it to your avatar, and area-of-effect spell silencing. These are especially impressive when compared with the dwarven ability to spot treasure and the human ability to spot certain hidden characters.

And they're pretty. Did I mention how pretty? Blood Elves are the first and only attractive race for the Horde side, which previously had only Trolls, Orcs, Tauran and Undead. Before the expansion, players who wants to join the Horde could only play characters with horns, facial piercings or rotting flesh. My highly reliable and technical research (typing "Who's a real girl?" on the chat channel) led me to believe that while there are a fair number of XX chromosomes, the majority of players are actually teen boys enjoying the dance emotes and sexy new clothes. When an WarCraft underwear party broke out, I noticed that one of the toons was named FuuckMe... which means the more obvious name was already taken.

Game developers are always trying to find ways to attract women to their game. "Women" is too huge of a category... by trying to attract Tetris players on the telephone, Sim-playing girls, and Quake chicks, developers often come up with something that pleases no one. When I refer to a rhinestone-covered pink Nintendo DS, designed by Paris Hilton, please believe it's an actual product and not a clever use of literary hyperbole. Blood Elves seem brilliant because they are aiming not for a mythical Female Market Sector, but for goth teen players and for typical Horde players beginning to outgrow Barrens chat.

The Blood Elves' emotes and hair are a little over the top, which means that other WarCrafters can enjoy the campy fun. The female Blood Elf flirts by saying "My mana tap brings all the boys to the yard," while the male asks "Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like me?" My personal favorite is still the male dwarf's flirt "You look pretty. I like your hair. Here's a drink. Are you ready now?" I heard that one a lot, probably because I'm one of the few lady dwarves in Azeroth. If you're playing WoW and see a female dwarf, stop and say hi, it's probably me.

Then again... I haven't made a Draenai yet...

External Link: http://fasterthantheworld.com/2007/01/my_mana_tap_...