In the build-up toBlizzard Entertainment’srelease of the 10thWorld of Warcraftexpansion, The War Within, the focus has been put upon the developer’s disappointing dismissal of player feedback while 2020’s Shadowlands expansion was in play. Going forward, the team is now abiding by the community’s needs to rejuvenate the world of Azeroth.
Elsewhere in the franchise,World of Warcraft Classic- an MMORPG running alongside the main game that reworks past expansions - recently welcomed Cataclysm, and fans were happy to seerewards in place for smaller guilds. Giving the people what they want seems to be a major goal of Blizzard’s going forward and the latest expansion’s game director wanted to share the plan in place.
World Of Warcraft Developers Want Alliance And Horde Friends To Be Able To Play Together
Cross-faction guilds are just a first step.
As World Of Warcraft Players’ Needs Shift, Blizzard Will Adjust Accordingly
In an interview withPC Gamer, The War Within game director, Ion Hazzikostas, says the team at Blizzard is putting players first and the developers have spent the last few years in “a time of introspection and reexamination of all of the building blocks, the design DNA of WoW”. Basic systems in the MMO were included in the inspection, and some had to be rebuilt to create a more solid foundation going forward.
“Turning over every stone holding it up to the light and examining it and asking ourselves, ‘This clearly served us well for a long time, is it still the right thing for our players in 2024?’,” was part of the restructure said Hazzikostas. “And in many cases the answer is yes, put the stone back and we continue. In other cases, it’s time to rebuild some foundations,” the director continued.
Blizzard believed they built Shadowlands on a bed of “time-honored WoW principles”, but thanks to player feedback, the developer quickly realized this wasn’t what the community wanted anymore. “What we were hearing from players was ‘that’s not what we want anymore. I did this one, why do I have to do it again? I don’t want this power to be tied to a cosmetic choice, I want them to be separate’,” Hazzikostas explained.
A previous GDC presentation earlier this year confirmed a mass exodus of players who abandoned the game after Blizzard failed to acknowledge the issues in Shadowlands, but the developer began listening during Dragonflight’s development, which went on to be much more successful.
Hazzikostas made a point of saying “The way people approach WoW has changed and it’s our duty as caretakers of this world not just to stubbornly cling to our original vision but to evolve and meet them where they are and to ensure that Azeroth remains a place that they want it to be.”
World of Warcraft’s The War Within expansion is scheduled to release on August 25, 2025.
World of Warcraft
World Of Warcraft: 10 Hardest Raid Bosses, Ranked
Each Raid Boss in World Of Warcraft presents a challenge, but these are surely some of the hardest ones the players have encountered.
