I know that WoW always had the weird cartoony and colorful art style since vanilla, but it also had some elements of edge in it. Duskwood, Tirisfal Glades, Human faces on Gnoll tents, etc, some dark elements made WoW interesting as it was a strange mix of whimsicalness and grittiness.
Nowadays (IMO) WoW is more cartoony and colorful with some wacky humor and pop culture references that seem to dominate WoW’s art direction. I miss it back when WoW had some gloomy art styles and frightening storylines. I think Shadowlands kinda neutered it and now I think the current game is more like Disney/Pixar than being something that is a mix of LotR and Warhammer. I can see why some people are finding Warhammer to be more interesting even though it was discontinued in 2016.
It should always have dark and gritty elements. Old human and undead areas always had a little of that. And some of the best areas recently was the Drust and Nazmir areas.
Tired of hearing faction conflicts are neutered and now gritty elements neutered. rolls eyes It’s called a new direction for the game and I personally like it. Just my 2 coppers.
I consider staying around for these threads to see how many of my WoW bingo squares get filled; and convert those into how many beers I can have over the course of the week. However, at this rate, GD is gonna turn me into an alcoholic.
The quest line with Sendrax felt pretty gnarly, too, in Waking Shores. Last boss of Azure Archives or whatever Nexus 2.0 dungeon is called also is tragic.
The concepts are fine - giant lava dudes genociding dragons cuz they’re angry giant lava dudes. Centaur civil war. But nothing is compelling about any of it.
I remember hating when we got pandas but then playing through Pandaria and actually feeling compelled by the Pandas story. I don’t get that with Dragonflight yet.
And yeah, the wacky zaney crap you KNEW you were going to get when you did quests for gnomes or goblins almost feels like it’s every side quest now.
Because he’s the hero Azeroth deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we’ll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he’s not our hero. He’s a silent guardian, a watchful protector. A dark Death Knight.