There are still some people who argue that video games are not art. To those people, all I can suggest is to immerse themselves up to their air holes in the engaging narrative of World of Warcraft, focusing primarily on the ‘Battle for Azeroth’ and ‘Shadowlands’ expansions. Whereas relics of authorial past like George RR Martin and JRR Tolkien subjected their audiences to characters constrained by the suffocating bounds of consistency, the writing team at Blizzard has gifted its audience with the absolute freedom of a story where themes and internal logic are in a perpetual state of flux, providing players with an infinite number of possibilities.
Nowhere is this masterful use of subverted expectations more expertly employed than with Sylvanas Windrunner, one of the game’s principle characters. You will note, gentle reader, that I refrain from using either the word “protagonist” or “antagonist.” Whereas mundane examples of television, like The Sopranos or Breaking Bad, utilize a combination of tiresome sympathetic and unsympathetic traits to create troublesome characters that elude proper definition by their viewers, Blizzard’s team does their audience the service of explicitly stating which characters are good and evil. Most importantly, this definition of good and evil is malleable, allowing fans of particular characters - such as Illidan or Sylvanas - to rest easy, knowing that the object of their affection could be effortlessly absolved of their collective sins with a snap of the writers’ fingers.
Take, for example, the latest developments in Shadowlands. Sylvanas Windrunner has committed a number of actions that some people, largely those unfamiliar with Blizzard’s unique talent for nuance, may consider “evil.” Feeding into preexisting tensions to spark a war between the Horde and the Alliance, the Burning of Teldrassil and its civilian population, all with the knowledge that every slain soul would be sent into the Maw, a realm of insufferable torment, all at the behest of one of gaming’s most captivating villains, The Jailer; these actions serve to paint Sylvanas as a complex character, willing to undertake mildly questionable actions in pursuit of more noble aspirations. Again, in a masterful stroke of storytelling, Blizzard keeps these motivations hidden from its audience, and at times even from Sylvanas herself, as demonstrated through her internal monologue in the novelization.
But perhaps like those confined by archaic paradigms of storytelling, you say to yourself “These actions seem like something a villain would perpetrate!”
Tut tut, gentle reader. For as we have seen with the latest story development in Shadowlands, Sylvanas is no true villain. Having already aided The Jailer’s compelling struggle to blow up reality - after delivering a glut of mortal souls into the Maw, having aided his armies in the Shadowlands proper, aiding him in abducting Azeroth’s most powerful mortal commanders, and helping him secure the magical artifacts he requires - she demonstrates her true colours. For at the final moment, when The Jailer has already - by every measurable criteria - achieved his goals, Sylvanas objects to the part of his plan where he intends to make all serve him.
This is where Blizzard’s writing team showcases their brilliance, and successfully demonstrate Sylvanas as a character to live on in the annals of storytelling. After unsuccessfully attempting to stop the Jailer, after her own efforts have empowered him, Sylvanas is - seemingly - reunited with her soul. If true, this expertly absolves her of all her previous wrongdoings by the simple fact that the audience is forced to ask “Can somebody who didn’t have their entire soul really be blamed for Teldrassil? For helping to enslave Anduin, or condemn countless innocents into endless torment or oblivion?”
Clearly not.
And so Blizzard has once again blessed its consumers with the most compelling of narratives. For either Sylvanas Windrunner as we have known her throughout World of Warcraft has ceased to exist, instead being restored to the Sylvanas we fondly remember from a handful of Warcraft III cutscenes, or else she has been rendered blameless for her previous actions through being reunited with her soul fragment. And clearly, one who can object to the Jailer’s motives after aiding him for the past two expansions cannot possibly be truly evil. Nay, she is instead the bravest, and perhaps most noble, of Warcraft characters, willing to throw away the victory for which she has caused so much suffering because of The Jailer’s choice of words.
How will Sylvanas help save the day? Are The Jailer’s motives any deeper than what we have already seen? How did Azerite, the Old Gods, or anything else that happened in Battle for Azeroth fit into this sweeping example of dramatic prose?
If Blizzard’s writers continue to excel in their particular brand of storytelling, unburdened by foreshadowing and arc building, we may not know until shortly after they do.
Wait and see, gentle reader; truly, we have reached the pinnacle of dramatic storytelling.
EDIT - TL DR: I feel like I’m being subjected to a form of non-invasive lobotomy and this is the only way I can reasonably cope with that.