They still prefer you play with friends for M+ (anything above +10 keys seems a must) and Raids are definitely better in a guild/community and it’s likely the same for BGs (guild/community) and Arena (friends).
Accommodating new ways for world-quest players to have some kind of “end-game” is not discouraging the community aspect, if that’s your viewpoint.
An alternative viewpoint is that “spending on solo content like Delves takes away from other content.” That’s invalid too… the Gilded Bruto alone raked in $410M by some speculative accounts and I certainly see them all over Dornogal so they certainly rolled bank with that move… a bank roll that easily pays to expand the team and cover a fourth end-pillar.
All the creep in “compressed leveling” and feeling like a super-hero because all the expansions are maintained but largely not experienced in a new player’s first leveling journey is a shame, but they tried forcing new players through each expansion a bit at a time while leveling and it was a completely disjointed mess. Then they said “pick an expansion to level in” and that does seem to be more coherent, but as you say leaves so many other expansions on the floor.
Unless you closed the book on old expansions (except the most current and most recent previous), then you end up with this problem that grows with each new expansion. I don’t have any suggestions for that (I think forcing payers through a single chosen expansion is good enough for now), but I also don’t see any suggestions in the OP… just a lot of nostalgic “wish it was still like it was” complaints. Could always play Classic if you want that vibe (not for me, but perhaps it’s a good variant for you), since Retail can’t really close the books on old expansions so it’s always going to have that problem and it will worsen over time. Embrace “how it is” or leave it behind, but complaining with no ideas for a solution seems pointless.
What made the original World of Warcraft so special was its massive, immersive world something retail and most expansions just haven’t been able to match. However, I don’t think we’ll ever see a vanilla-like experience again because the scale of the original game was just too big, and recreating that kind of leveling experience would take way too much time and effort.
Instead, the devs have focused more on endgame content and seasonal designs, which has pulled the game further and further away from what made classic wow so great as each expansion has released. It’s a shame, but I guess they felt it was necessary. That said, I’ve always hoped that since classic wow’s release perhaps it would inspire or remind them of some of the things players found fun from the original game.
Depends how you define MMO. But I will say it is very different game from classic to wrath. But FFXIV is also a very different game but is still technically an mmo.
I personally like it this way. More difficulty options means more players can see endgame and people can push into endgame. Rather then it being a mountain to climb just to see the inside of a raid.
Thing is in a sense older expansions also had multiple difficulty levels. What you’d do is have to run earlier tier in order to get gear to be able to run later tier. We don’t have to do that anymore. Instead it’s a streamlined 4 difficulties per season.
They already cut the amount of difficulties for M+ by about half. I think we’re good.
Also I have a feeling this is a thinly veiled anti LFR thread. I don’t run LFR much anymore because I find pugging normal to be easier now days but it doesn’t hurt to keep it.
That’s kinda silly. Why would they make retail more like classic WoW when there are official classic servers? If you want to play a WoW more like classic then play classic. If you wanna play one more like retail, play retail. Making them the same thing seems silly.
I have way more social interactions going on now than I ever did in the 15 years previous. Like, my day is filled with social interactions both in-game and out of game. At the same time, I’m more active in accomplishing goals than I ever have been, whether it’s trying for achievements, collections, raiding profession, delves, or whatever else. I have over 40 toons, all at least level 70.
Everything you stated above may be true for you, but it doesn’t have to be. You dug yourself into a lot of that. You can go have a fun leveling experience through old world content right now with a group of people if you really wanted to. You’d just have to put in the legwork to accomplish that.
Nearly every change they made from Classic until now was requested by the majority of players. From LFR to Warbands, these were ALL insanely requested. Warbands, which you argue against above, has been actively desired for over ten years if not more. I get that you, personally, don’t like or agree with it but it IS what the majority of players have wanted, myself included. Unlocking the same rep over 40 toons ain’t fun.
has wow as an mmorpg changed? of course. but so have you. so has everyone. so has the world and how we interact with it. so has how people interact online.
you would have to change all of the above to get that so called magical mmorpg experience back again. and no, even in classic it doesnt exist anymore, at least not in the way you want it because people, and gamers especially, are not the same as they were in 2004.
what this seems like to me is a bunch of middle aged balding gamer nerds having their version of a midlife crisis about their online addiction, WoW.
I don’t see a reason why Blizzard making retail feel more like an MMO, is such a bad thing.
there’s plenty of other ways to solve this issue other then insert: I HaTe lOnG lEvElInG GrRrRrRr
As a primary retail player myself and someone who’s been here from pretty much the beginning. Sure the arts better but you just don’t get the same level of world building you did back then…
walking through the entrance hallway to the Lordaeron throne room and hearing the faint haunting echos of the crowd cheering where arthas once stood right before he killed his father…so chilling, that kinda stuff is now an afterthought and it’s kinda sad.
It’s the nature of convenience. Needing other people is what builds a community.
In Retail you still need people. But only for hard content like high end PvE and PvP. For everything else, you can just pick a handful of disposable pugs out of the ether, do your content and then go your separate ways, never seeing each other again.
We kinda saw this where Classic had less of a community than Vanilla and devolved into mass GDKP spam because the content is pretty easy and people have gotten much better at the game.
An MMO can be a lot of things. There’s not really a good definition of it. However, based just on vibes, WoW still feels like an MMO. MMOs and expectations from the people who play them are different now than they were 20 years ago.
Also, Blizzard puts a lot of effort and detail into the world. If you’re playing retail just for the dungeons and you don’t like that, maybe spend some time exploring things in the outdoors and see what the Blizzard devs put out there. This is a player problem, not a problem with the game necessarily.
Here’s the problem, define MMO. You can’t use the word “feel” because that’s subjective and varies from person to person. And once you go back to the actual objective definition, WoW still meets the requirements to be called an MMO.
In all honesty the feeling of classic will never be the same . Reason classic holds its position on top is because of Warcraft 1,2 & 3. Players were introduced to the World of Warcraft and zones etc and characters through those games. Then, blizzard released World of Warcraft and now every character and zone you saw in Warcraft was open world . Traveling the world of Azeroth the first time , experiencing it all , some historic sights like the fall of Grom, seeing Darnasas , Lordaron after the Scourge invasion of Warcraft 3 etc . As much as you want , you will never get that original feeling back of first time classic
The MMO problem is not the question if its retail or classic. The problem is how people interact with each other.
The difference in vanilla was that people did more stuff in small communities, mostly in their guild or on relatively small realm servers. In the time before cross realm groups and LFR even the realms were small communities, and you ended up seeing the people again when looking for raids in MC, BWL or AQ.
You can still have this in modern WoW when looking for a nice guild, make friends there and perhaps also do stuff outside of WoW with them.
It is not just about WoW, it is also having a nice time with friends. it is not fair to blame Blizzard if people fail at their social interactions.
A game in which the massive, shared world is both the primary appeal and the primary gameplay space.
Is that honestly true of modern wow? Because, if we’re being honest, most players spend majority of their time in some sort of instance nowadays. That was not true in the first handful of WoW iterations.