I don’t feel immersive going through all the new zones in Dragonflight/War Within… But whenever I go back to WOTLK zones. any of them, something hits hard… the design/music/atmosphere. everything… the mobs… theme… overall it’s just outstanding.
Also, can we all agree that Dalaran is just something else for a Main City? It should always be the Main City… instead of a boring big place…
Well the Northrend zones were a bit smaller then what we have today. Also Northrend is a large continent and players would complain it takes too long to reach the next quetsgiver. So they sized it down from 9 to 5 zones at initial launch instead which is a lesson they learned from Cataclysm. But worry not it seems in Last Titan we will return to the wotlk lands in whatever capacity that may be.
It’s the colors.
Dragonflight and War Within are just too cheerfully colorful with bright colors all over the place for a game about constantly fighting all sort of world ending threats.
Going underground in War Within zones for example, what should be dark is lit up like you have a sun beating down on you, literally in the case of Hallowfall.
I’ve always hated Dalaran.
Are you serious? TWW has two of the best zones in the game in Hallowfall and Undermine
Does Azeroth even have a south pole?
It’s also very clean, very sharp.
There is a lack of texture that the older graphic art had.
I noticed the difference when they unveiled housing as it looked like a combo of Wizard 101 and Hearthstone as opposed to WoW, to me.
There are several things that have gone array with zone design.
Some of it people actually like. Such as more emphasis on a story (not for me, but whatever). But most of what’s gone wrong is just blizzard not caring and catering to players who want to rush to the end game (instead of just boosting them or something.)
It’s also worth noting that Delves I think are in part an attempt to recapture the old feeling of questing.
What’s wrong with it?
Classes aren’t balanced around it. Too much aoe, too much self healing, and too many defensives make it difficult to challenge the player.
Dragonriding. The zones were designed with flying in mind.
Level scaling introduced in late BFA has resulted in a very unbalanced questing experience.
RP, talking heads, cutscenes. They aren’t being properly paced, they aren’t well written. And are very goofy most of the time.
Gimmick quests. (quests that don’t involve using spells/abilities) are too frequent.
Quests are too close together. Before planning an efficient path was part of the fun/challenge. Now the path is essentially planned for you in development.
Questing is linear. There are no skippable zones, and the questing path doesn’t split the player base like it did back in Northrend.
Mobs are just too weak. Far too weak. And seems intentional that blizzard wants them to be that weak.
Leveling takes about 8 hours now, when back in Northrend it probably would have taken closer to 20.
Loot feels bad. Gear doesn’t matter, gold doesn’t really matter anymore, also exp is less valuable. Those 3 things comprise 90+% of the loot you receive.
Changes to mob tagging also made it easier to mooch off other peoples kills.
Sholazar was like the brightest jungle zone ever though. Grizzly Hills is also really similar to Dragonflight zones.
It’s probably the memories, like visiting a place from your childhood. Not that this is a bad thing btw
Yeah, that’s where Pandaria is. If you look at the map, it’s perfectly aligned with Northrend, just in the south. Azeroth’s poles don’t function like ours. In fact, don’t even think about the weather, climates, and temps there; it’ll hurt your brain.
It really isn’t… I recommend going to both Sholazar and Grizzly Hills then going to the Dragon Isles zone that you think is the least colorful.
Sholazar is basically just dark green brown/gray with discoloured water, same with Grizzly Hills except for the giant tree that is a bit more on the light side of brown.
Azure span is probably the closest in terms of what it’s trying to be and it’s flush full of dark orange, red and yellow ground contrasting the dark green trees, not to mention the bright blue fog or the blue ice cliffs.
Funny that’s exactly how I feel about Dal. Boring as all get out.
Nostalgia can be a fickle thing.
I just want to say this is a great post, and I know it’s unlikely, but I hope someone at Blizzard sees this.
Hallowfall isn’t all sparkles and sunshine, neither is Azj-Kahet .
Especially Azj-Kahet and going further into the Ringing Deeps.
And Undermine has that nice dark,neonish vibes that reminds me of a cross of steampunk,the market place in MMBTD(Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome) feel and I’m down for it.
Bright and cheerful is your home city,Ardenweld, for example.
I mean we don’t even see the sun in Undermine so other than the lights it’s not really cheery with bright colors.
So, I have some good news….
Yep. Nostalgia has a big impact. It has nothing to do with the way zones look now vs then, it has everything to do with the game being a lot newer, and finally getting to go to the main location from Warcraft 3. It was still an adventure then because the game was still young.
Hallowfall is just another boring human zone for me. My arathi rep is not grinded right now and very low.
my second favorite zone and basically how I imagined an actual underground zone.
They hit the goblin theme spot on and it was great. Never gonna leave there so much fun it is.
You’ve literally just describe the issue I pointed out.
The color and aesthetic makes no sense for what Warcraft is supposed to be as a universe.
If that’s what people like and want, that’s fine, but Warcraft was originally dark and gritty, a Tolkienesque high fantasy universe. Steampunk doesn’t fit that, so it feels out of place to a lot of people that grew up playing Warcraft 1, 2 and 3 and early WoW.
Goblins have always been there.
Congratz on announcing you didn’t actually play any of those games, or you would remember the goblins.
And the submarines.
Sounds like nostalgia to me.