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In yet another sign of Blizzard Entertainment's continuing progress toward world domination, Rob Pardo has been included in Time Magazine's Time 100: The People Who Shape Our World. Pardo, Vice President of Game Design at Blizzard and head of the World of Warcraft design team, received the recognition as a direct result of WoW's impressive success.

There's a country of 6 million people that's not on any map. It's called World of Warcraft, and it's a virtual country, a computer-generated fantasy environment that you can access, for a monthly subscription fee, via the Internet. It's also one of the most immersive and successful video games ever created, and it could be the future of electronic entertainment. Rob Pardo, 35, vice president of game design for Blizzard Entertainment (although minor deity would also be an applicable title), led the team that designed World of Warcraft, which involved generating from scratch history, geography, anthropology and ecology of a fully realized fantasy world spread over two continents. The game's 6 million fee-paying players can slay monsters, go on quests and even perform everyday tasks like fishing, cooking and tailoring. If World of Warcraft—aficionados call it just WoW—gets any more popular, it may be up for a seat in the U.N.

Time 100: Blizzard's Rob Pardo

Time 100: The People Who Shaped Our World

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