I feel the opposite. I had originally left classic over the degenerate boosting/world buff/min-max/parsing meta but the more I play retail the more I miss the simplicity of classic. Everything in retail is too fast paced, too hectic. It feels closer to an ARPG than an RPG. And to me it doesn’t feel right. It’s good but it feels completely wrong. Classes don’t feel right, the zones feel too alien (beautiful, but alien), and it just makes me realize the game isn’t what I want anymore.
After two days trying Castle Nathria and running into difficulties on huntsman (got him eventually) and Devourer (still working on it), the encounters aren’t fun. It’s just a ton of crap flying around. You don’t need half a dozen gimmicky mechanics every encounter to make things interesting. I mean yes classic raids are easy but is that really a bad thing? It meant you can treat it more low pressure, like a fun evening with friends and not “okay everyone put on your game faces and let’s get down to business”.
Retail has not fixed the issues I have with the game (low player-driven content, lack of RPGish stuff, Blizzard’s PvP hatred, the never-ending treadmill of whatever the latest expansion’s gimmick is, etc.), so my interest is low. I applaud those who enjoy it though.
It is interesting that classic lost so many people despite Naxx coming out. Guilds on all of the classic servers are looking for people. Shadowlands has, indeed, been well received. No need for classic players to get defensive, facts are facts.
I think this is good preparation for the die-hard classic players as it applies to the TBC launch. At that point, classic (level 60 groups) will be a ghost town. The buzz will be in Shattrath. The very few die-hards will cry when Blizzard does not create separate servers for classic only because that nonsense never existed in the original release of TBC. Remember, #nochanges?
So get used to disappointment and just enjoy the ride before classic loses most of the community to TBC. Stop and smell the roses!
For me, I play classic because I prefer the “classic” game mode over the “retail” game mode. Both have their strengths and weaknesses, but for me it just comes down to what I enjoy playing more. It all basically comes down to personal preference of what each individual person enjoys doing - possibly some might even enjoy both!
It isn’t changed, things are a bit harder but you still mostly just mass pull everything and there’s so much self-healing you can solo elites, non-elites are a joke unless you pull 50 of them, etc.
The excellent reviews and warm reception for Shadowlands should be welcomed by classic and future classic TBC players. While there are many more people playing retail compared to classic, the two still maintain a symbiotic relationship. We need both to succeed.
I’m pretty tapped into both versions atm and tbh, especially this week, SL is starting to unravel. People are already starting to break on week 3 of time-gate central.
The 3rd week of collecting 1000 Anima, painfully long Torghast runs, moving that renown bar, and doing Maw before you can even get to anything resembling fun. None of those things have any end in sight either.
That’s a fundamental design difference between retail and Classic. Retail has infinite grinds/objectives where you’re never really done and Classic (or any traditional MMO) has some of the former but also content you can actually complete.
Plus you still are going to have all your progress invalidated every “season”. Hell, some people are sweating for ilvl 200 gear right now and even LFR is gonna wipe that out.
Shadowlands is missing a fundamental aspect of any mmorpg: community.
Guilds and servers are ghost towns. You may see alot of “players” in the shadowlands but those are just NPCs. They do not engage or interact with you, most guilds theres only a few people chatting with each other. Everyone just uses the “Finder”, whether the automated one or the manual Cross Realm LFG Finder.
Retail wow is dead. It’s a decent single player rpg. I highly recommend shadowlands for those who like rpgs but i dont recommend it to those who like playing an MMORPG.