This sounds like a poopoo-post, but I swear it’s genuine.
Dragonflight seems to have breathed some life back into the old girl, but I’m not hearing anything that says it’s earth-shattering. And when WoW needs earth-shattering, how much longer of this cycle of expansion samsara do you think we’ve got left?
My guess is that they’re going to end in a x5 or x0 expansion (15, 20, etc) and since we haven’t heard a damn thing about this so far I bet we have a good 5-10 years left. They might start putting more expansions out faster, and even branch out with different games in the universe to get us there faster but I don’t see them doing it for a long long while
If they dont carry over all our achievments, mounts, mogs etc etc etc, I dont really want a WoW 2 myself…
Theyre able to clean up the current game, if they wanted.
WoW2: The Search for More of Your Money
Still no player housing though.
Someone said on social media recently I think that WoW’s “sequels” have already been happening, via what some of us refer to as the “eras” of WoW.
Cataclysm, for instance, was WoW 2. It revamped the old world, overhauled a ton of class designs to be the version of “rotations” we have in WoW combat to this day, completed the LFG tools begun in Wrath, and moved leveling to be more streamlined and accessible, placing a greater emphasis on endgame. Oh yeah and transmog!
Legion was our WoW 3 with the introduction of artifacts and various similar gimmicks per patch like the crucible, world quests, the expansion of the collections tab and many things moving to account wide progress. Plus the new models. Though they were a WoD feature I frankly consider WoD more like Legion Alpha than an expansion in and of itself.
Dragonflight feels like the logical next designation for WoW 4 what with the new talents, right?
WRONG. Equip your tinfoil hats, guys. I have a theory.
The WoW team, as per the credits for Dragonflight, has doubled. Or something close to that estimate, varying per department. Dragonflight is great, filled with so much land to explore and features that I find myself enjoying rather than begrudging. Yet it’s nothing too crazy. The sheer amount of content, besides the larger than usual zones, is generally about the same as the last few. The only difference is that I like the content more than Shadowlands’.
So we’ve got all this new production capacity and not much more content, initially. Granted, maybe the production is being geared towards more timely patches, given our roadmap. And I’m sure that’s helping in that regards too. But what if they’re also undertaking another task? A much more massive one that will be our next expansion and possibly our “WoW 4”.
Let’s take stock of what we have aligning here. A new talent system being broken in currently. A new flight system. A new UI, also being broken in. Over the last few expansions, mobs have been updated visually. Name an old world mob that hasn’t been updated. Gnolls? Centaur? Quillboar? Wolves? Bears?
We’ve been datamining updated Stormwind human buildings for years that haven’t been added anywhere yet. Over the course of these expansions we’ve also been seeing updated buildings to go with the updated mobs mentioned above. Centaur assets, naga assets, murloc assets, the list goes on. Not to even mention the entire arsenal of flora models the team has available now.
I speculate there to be another old world revamp. It’s in the cards. They barely have to make any new models, all they have to do is sculpt terrain, apply textures, and plop down things that are already stored in the asset bank.
It’ll still be a big undertaking, of course. There’s a lot of ground to cover. But with so much prebuilt, it’s now within the realm of possibility.
A brand new world, with a tested and refined talent system to appreciate the journey of leveling with, and a modern flight system to explore through. Not to mention all the things they’ve been testing the waters with in the open world like elemental storms, or the siege event, all of which could easily make old world zones relevant to endgame content again.
I’m not a dev, though. I’m just a silly fan likely jumping at shadows. But it’s fun to imagine.
As for a completely new game, though?
I don’t think they’d do it. I’d like for a cleaned up world map/story, and the spaghetti code seems to be tangled in knots horribly given the prevalence of really strange bugs like Kael’thas going bald.
But the cons outweigh the pros in my eyes. I’d never switch to another game that didn’t have the progression I have on my current WoW account. And the logistics of transferring it all to another game built from the ground up would probably be a nightmare the likes of which Xavius would cower from. And two MMOs running side by side competing with each other likely isn’t good for business, unless they did the classic deal of one sub fits all.
But hey, next expansion is the tenth expansion for the game. Whatever they decide to do, I imagine it’ll be something big.
Same, if I lose all my stuff that makes me look obnoxious then what’s the point!!
I’m not a dev at blizz but I work on aging software that could be cleaned up if the parasite executives just budgeted for it. So I imagine if they put aside a big pile of money for WoW 2 and dedicated it to just rework WoW and it’s existing content they could reinvent the game into being WoW 2 without us losing all our stuff.
I just don’t want too lose my stuff lmao. Which I imagine I’m not the only one and could severely affect player retention. How do we keep the old farts while making the game easier for new people you join.
Altielle are you aware that you are a fire demon ghost now?
I mean the main thing that keeps me coming back to this game is the history I have on it. 10+ years worth of stuff I can look back at.
Game is a huge time commitment, and being asked to start over… think id just move on at that point.
My passion for the Horde has elevated me to the status of Horde Wraith. I live and breathe honor.
I don’t think they’ll ever move to a “WoW2” simply because if they do, people who are attached to their in-game things will call it quits.
I think what they’re more likely to do is to take the existing platform and give us an upgraded engine and graphics, keeping the same features and base storyline. I expect that to announce in a few years.
If I was in charge, I would have already had people working on that so that in about 2 expac’s time, the switch could take place. But I would never brand it as WoW2.
Honesty that’s why I can’t get into other MMOs. Sure, I’ve heard this or that MMO does this thing better but I think I’ve aged out of MMOs at this point.
If I were to start WoW now I probably wouldn’t play it. Especially with how confusing it is for brand new people, both narratively and game play lol
Its exactly why Classic was and isnt appealing to me too. Especially knowing that Classic is on an even shorter lifespan in the long run…
I wonder if MMOs are just gonna continue with the current dinosaurs and then just go extinct. Even the relative “newcomers” like ESO and FFXIV are like 10 years old at this point, and those had to rely on existing IPs to gain traction (esp. ESO, which I imagine only has an audience due to people dying of TES thirst in the 10+ years since Skyrim)
The only other new MMO that got much attention I can think of is New World, which I do not think did that well. I played its beta and immediately lost interest due to bad character customization (humans only, no species diversity, and the humans themselves look sort of lame) so idk if it is actually good or not.
I guess there’s lost ark too? I hear people call it an MMORPG but it just looks like a diablo clone to me so idk if it is actually an MMO or just one of those live-service-always-multiplayer-but-not-really-an-MMO games that are so common these days.
It is sad because at their best I think MMOs can achieve something really special, creating a huge world you share with thousands of other players is a truly unique experience in games. I thought that the explosion of ARK-like games could be amazing if translated into an MMORPG format rather than <100 person servers with no centralized character progression, but that hasn’t happened.
Anyway I bet WoW will continue for quite a while because there’s still so little competition. Shadowlands taught lots of people that FFXIV exists and is probably better but, like I mentioned before, FFXIV is still a fairly crusty old game itself that isn’t in an amazing position to become king of MMOs, because its really quite daunting to get into now with 10 years of mandatory questing to get through.
The New World hype for what apparently turned out to be a mediocre game was sort of interesting because it showed what an appetite there is for new MMORPGs that just isn’t really being met, and nobody really seems to be trying to put anything out other than dubious devs like “Amazon, no not the delivery company we make games now” and whatever ARK-like 5 guys and a copy of unity can make.
There is no way they would pull off another Overwatch 2 scenario without leaving behind so much content that it wouldn’t be worth it.
Destiny is a good example of sticking to your current game rather than making a Destiny 3. They somehow got all of their planets and expansions filed away neatly and drop in old content periodically like it’s no big deal. I feel like if Blizzard tried to lighten the load by closing WotLK and BC areas the whole game would undo itself.
Perhaps that’s the ultimate goal of Classic? Log all of the dated content into a “new” game, so the normal WoW only has new stuff?
WoW should end with Azeroth dying, and everyone moving to Draenor.
Then a few patches in we meet Mo’moneydormu, and for a nominal fee you can visit azeroths past
While Preach was visiting WoW HQ, devs were planning for the 10 years that follow DF iirc.
Same… considering how lackluster most of their storytelling is, I doubt I would pay for it.
Too bad theyve already destroyed alternate Draenor with the Maghar stuff.
Hear me out:
An alternate of alternate Draenor.
What’s below zero percent?