Eh I get troll vibes from the OP but I wanna address why fantasy =/= real life is a faulty statement.
People write and create stories inspired based on what they know. If I write about war, obviously I’ll take inspiration from wars that has occurred throughout history and also what I’ve seen before in other fantasy stories, along with original ideas and twists.
A good example here the Targaryen-Baratheon dynastic conflict in ASOIAF is heavily inspired by the War of the Roses, and the Red Wedding is inspired by the Black Dinner (a real Scottish historic event).
So the entire notion of fantasy =/= real life is inaccurate because it implies that fantasy has never drawn any influences or inspiration from real life events. We see, time and time again, inspirations and amalgamations of real life events, cultures, and architecture in fantasy.
Obviously it’s not meant to be an exact copy and paste, and those who do it well will make it hardly noticeable to the average player. But if you pay attention, it’s everywhere. Just look at the Nordic mythology, Lovecraftian and Tolkien influences that WoW has.
We also have WoWified versions of Christmas, Day of the Dead, Thanksgiving, and you see influences in architecture as well. A vast majority of Human culture and architecture is typically Eurocentric. Gilneas has Tudor and Gothic styles. Then there’s Uldum and the obvious Ancient Egyptian influences. In BfA we had an entire city that is an amalgamation of Mesoamerican and South American styles. Night Elf architecture has a mix of Korean, Celtic, and Greco-Roman influences. Despite the real world influences, the key point here is that they all have a ‘WoW’ flavor to it.
There’s honestly a lot of analysis that can go in to this, and I think I can dig up some really good posts from people who have analyzed this topic if you’re interested.
Let me switch the question though. What’s exactly wrong with a Human civilization or settlement that is influenced by a mix of historic cultures and architecture? There’s influences that can come from the Aksum Empire, Persian Empire, Durrani Empire, Kingdom of Kush, Tunisian architecture, and even Numidia architecture.
And this isn’t even a brand new concept. E.g. in FF14 there’s an entire city/region inspired by Turkish landmarks and architecture, and another city inspired by Rajasthan.
Imo, as long as it’s cool looking, has a ‘WoW’ spin to it, has interesting stories, and has good loot, then all this is perfectly fine to me.
It just requires someone on Blizzard who can actually do research and create something new and interesting that also aligns with WoW’s art style.