Hey all, I want to start by saying this post spawned from watching a Platinum WoW vid and a Hirumaredx vid. To Hiru’s point I wanted to make a post that finds a way to celebrate something Blizzard is/has done. And to Plat’s point, well his video directly sparked the though.
So, here goes. The War Within and by extension The World Soul Saga will see the remaining Titans killed off (the final Expac is called The Last Titan, leading one to believe that there will be a singular titan by the end of the story), and more importantly will reveal that Azeroth has already successfully been corrupted by the Void Lords. And this is what I believe will lead to the fall of the current titans. Because they have been trying to figure out how to heal the corruption of a Titan since pre vanilla. So, they will have to sac themselves to successfully cleanse Azeroth. Which would make sense because it has been established that, if she awoke, would be the best of the Titans and the one that, above all else, needed to awaken uncorrupted.
But, let’s turn to Azeroth. After all the times we’ve been told that we successfully held off someone who wanted to corrupt her, we are meant to believe that we have been the heroes time and again throughout the story. And that’s cool, we want to feel like the heroes of Azeroth while we play. But, why should we believe any of those who have told us that? C’Thun, Yogg’Saron, N’Zoth, Y’Sharraj, Xal’Atath, Manari… There have been a metric ton of corruption on and in the planet since day 1. And honestly before that, as the Titans are noted as realizing that the Old Gods had already entwined themselves with the husk of Azeroth by the time they found it. To the point, removing them would kill the planet. That’s pretty corrupt. We ended up killing off some of these, helping kill remains of others and then Sargerus showed up and shoved a sword into the planet. To which we shoved a metric ton of artifacts into to “heal”…
But among those weapons were Xal’Atath and The Skull of Manari (to name a couple I know by name because I play those classes). So, we as the Heroes of Azeroth, shoved a ton of corruption on top of the old gods and Sargerus. So I’ll ask again, why should we believe these people who have told us we succeeded in staying off the corruption? How would they know that the World Soul isn’t corrupted. Only Magni MIGHT know. And by the time he became the Speaker of Azeroth, she had already been in communion with corruption. So, even when it comes to Magni can we really trust that he knows.
All of this is to say, as much as I wish Blizzard would spend more effort on live rather than Remix or classic, Blizzard has crafted a genuinely enjoyable story thus far. Is it One Piece level? Not a chance in hell. But, is it a story that has been finding ways to pay off certain bits while building up others? Very, very much so.
I will continue to give Blizzard hell for not putting their effort into live, splitting it between multiple formats. BUT, the story really has been solid and every Expac has been leading to this moment. I’ve always been a fan of the idea “End your story before it outlives its welcome” so maybe I’m just hoping that The WSS will take three exapcs to close out this story. If this is the end of WoW, I personally will complain less about other formats because that is how WoW will live on after it’s story is complete.
I hope this came across as praising Blizzard for the effort they have put into their story because I genuinely believe they have been telling a story worth my time. And am anxious to see what TWW gives us (I’m sorry, I’m not calling The War WIthin TWiW, if anything it should be TWWi)