Honestly, if there’s one thing I think WoW has 100% lost from the earlier days, it’s the willingness to let scary things be unsettling. Of course, Vanilla was the king of this. C’Thun is in my opinion the most intimidating enemy in all of WoW’s history, just because his emotionless whispers and taunts were so incredibly unsettling, only to witness his form as a terrifying mass of teeth, flesh, tentacles, and eyeballs.
Naxxramas of course had Thaddius, who’s cries still unsettle me to the point of me rushing to kill him as quickly as possible. To a much lesser extent, The Corrupted Ashbringer’s whispers were also a neat little creepy thing.
There were also other general things, like the gnoll tents having faces on them, the hanged corpses in Deadwind Pass, and outside of the Scarlet Monastery. Not to mention the removed Karazhan Crypts, which was easily the darkest thing I’ve ever witnessed in WoW, while it was removed, the fact that they were considering it being added shows that they wanted the world to contain a lot of creepy things. Also, just about all of the Forsaken zones are rightfully creepy.
Of course, Vanilla wasn’t the only source of creepiness. Yogg-Saron in Wrath was incredibly unsettling, his whispers didn’t hit quite as hard as C’Thun’s did, but it was still creepy, and his design was gloriously unsettling. Besides this, I suppose things like Rotface and Festergut were unsettling, just not to the same level, because I was too focused on the fact that Professor Putricide was an undead reference to Professor Farnsworth from Futurama.
The main thing that comes to mind besides that, End Time was definitely nice, dark, and creepy. Y’Shaarj is somewhat creepy, but not to the extent of the other two old gods. The barbershop in Stormwind has a creepy little easter egg.
I’m naturally missing some things here and there, but the point is, it feels like there simply aren’t that many things designed to creepy the player out. Not a lot seems to be even slightly unsettling. I mean, look at N’Zoth, his look doesn’t even come close to the other three old gods we’ve seen, and his voice is simply not creepy in the slightest.
Besides just the old gods, you don’t see things like the outside of the Scarlet Monastery, Thaddius, or the gnoll tents anymore. There’s nothing in the game that really makes me creeped out. Things like Maldraxxus and Revendreth, which are designed around the idea of being dark, spooky, and death centered, are just not that creepy or unsettling to me.
When you see the Hellfire Peninsula’s road of bones, it’s unsettling because you don’t expect it. It’s an immediate rush of darkness out of the blue. The entirety of Tirisfal is creepy, but the hanging corpses is just a new level of an unsettling fate, and a display of what happens to those who don’t follow the Crusade’s rules. The gnoll tents are in the otherwise bright areas such as Westfall and Elwynn, making it shocking when you notice this.
Things like this don’t really happen in WoW anymore, and I think they should, it really adds a different level to the game when it’s allowed to be unsettling.