Why can't I be truly evil and fight alongside the Lich King?
I guess the story is at fault. It can't branch off in two different directions…
There is actually plenty of lore surrounding why this is. The undead are not your typical undead; they're the Forsaken! They broke free from the Lich Kings control and took over Lorderon. They're ruled by a fallen Elf ranger called Silvanas who Arthas raised as a Banshee. This all happened in Warcraft3 days.
As for whether you should play it… Probably not? Too expensive. If you're paying $15 a month, even when you can afford it easily, it still sort of feels like you should be playing the game you're renting at the moment.
Then you pretty much HAVE to buy the expansion and it's going to make all your old work obsolete as new "green" quality items from the expansion will be more powerful than your "oh god I raided for 8 hours for this epic" quality items.
Blizzard got it right at some point, BC days, Lichking days, but they didn't stop there because they want to make more money! Its just like Hearthstone. Just when you think you have it all a new expansion comes out and you have to pay again. Plus you really are just playing the new expansion every time
Blizzard sort of sucks now.
I'd probably say ESO is your best bet for the fully voice acted quest dialogue. Don't even worry about getting the gold version. I did and never hit any of the DLC content before I was max level. Get the plain version and have a friend buy you a mount!
That said, I convinced a friend to play ESO with me for the freeplay weekend and he hated it and said it was nothing like elderscrolls. He was so disappointed.
And I guess while I'm on an epic rant I might as well mention I bought LOTRO at release and thought it was rubbish compared to WoW. Similar story to Everquest2 where I went straight back to WoW.
Guildwars 2 is free, isnt it? That one was alright for a bit. Same with Age of Conan, also free2play now. They're both still "straight back to wow", but maybe worth a look.