World of Warcraft
"World of Warcraft" was first announced by Blizzard at the ECTS trade show in September 2001. Released in 2004, development of the game took roughly 4–5 years, including extensive testing. The 3D graphics in "World of Warcraft" use elements of the proprietary graphics engine originally used in "Warcraft III". The game was designed to be an open environment where players are allowed to do what they please. Quests are optional and were designed to help guide players, allow character development, and to spread characters across different zones to try to avoid what developers called "player collision". The game interface allows players to customize appearance and controls, and to install add-ons and other modifications.
World of Warcraft
"World of Warcraft" has inspired two board games: "" (including "Shadow of War" and "The Burning Crusade" expansions) and "World of Warcraft: The Adventure Game", produced by Fantasy Flight Games. There is also a trading card game, and a collectible miniatures game on the market, both formerly produced by Upper Deck Entertainment, now produced by Cryptozoic Entertainment. Cryptozoic released an "Archives" set which contains foil reproductions of older cards produced by Upper Deck. In August 2012, Megabloks launched a licensed line of World of Warcraft 'building block' toys based on the game scenes, scenarios and characters. In March 2014, "" was released, which is a free-to-play digital card game based on the Warcraft universe, using classes similar to World of Warcraft.