Poulscath: Personally, I believe the cartoony graphics are one of WoWs advantages, since they don't date so quickly and horribly as photorealistic graphics.
Besides, what's with this habit people have of equating "good graphics" with "photorealistic graphics"? Cartoony or stylised doesn't mean
bad :P
KavazovAngel: Yea, aesthetics are more important than realistic graphics, especially for MMOs.
Fuunny how miost older gamers wanted better graphics way back when, and thought better graphics were awesome to behold. Now such gamers think graphics don't matter as much. Bah, graphics being better improves immersion and make playing better sometimes. Not just the quality even but the style. And IMO the cartoony graphics don't make the world seem serious enough to me......too childish looking tbh.
Mentalepsy: No, but they don't necessarily mean 'not bad', either. I don't fault World of Warcraft for going with a cartoony, exaggerated visual style, but I do find a lot of fault with the execution. It looks sort of like something Rob Liefeld would draw, in my opinion.
Poulscath: Oh, I freely admit that WoWs graphics are getting dated and weren't the best even at release, but there's far too many people who seem to thing that stylised or cartoony are bad
by definition, regardless of their actual quality. (I'm not just referring to WoW here, remember the screaming at the cel shaded Zelda game?)
I have to wonder what those people think of the graphics in Pixar or Dreamworks films though :)
It's that a game that tries sometimes(like with the new expansion Cataclysm and it's video ads) to be serious in plot fails with it's style of toony childish graphics. They don't fit the plot/storyline IMO.