This year, World of Warcraft will get its 10th expansion, the War Within, which as an occurrence is nothing particularly remarkable – there have, after all, been nine of them before. This time though, things seem slightly different. There’s an air of change around Blizzard, at least as far as World of Warcraft operations go. It’s personified by executive producer and vice president for World of Warcraft, Holly Longdale, who joined the WoW team in 2020 (from EverQuest) and stepped into the EP role about two years ago. She talks – in a presentation at a WoW War Within event in London – about the team trying, for about a year-and-a-half, to be more transparent and share development more openly with the community, then elicit feedback more readily from them. And though team-leaders tend to say things like this, there does seem to be some evidence to back it up. Look on the World of Warcraft website: there’s a string of in-development posts about War Within that reveal considerable information about it – there don’t seem to be cards held close to chests. There are also posts detailing recent experimental ideas like battle royale mode Plunderstorm, which came out of nowhere, and the equally unexpected new Remix idea, which supercharges an entire previous expansion’s content – in this case Mists of Pandaria’s – for a speedy recap levelling experience. It sounds like a great idea.
Things have needed to change. World of Warcraft has never faced more competition – not only from other MMOs like Final Fantasy 14, but also from games that might as well be labelled MMOs, such as Fortnite. Whether or not World of Warcraft still rules the roost, I don’t know, because Blizzard won’t talk numbers, which in itself is probably telling. More importantly, Blizzard has had to weather some ferocious storms. There was the lawsuit that alleged sexual discrimination at the company, which although it was settled last year for multiple-millions, has caused considerable harm. There was also, at the same time, the whole will-they won’t-they saga of the Microsoft Activision Blizzard buyout, which has now finally gone through and will bring changes of its own, such as Microsoft-enforced layoffs announced earlier this year.
It’s against that backdrop Blizzard tries to answer the not inconsiderable question of how to make a 20-year-old game still feel relevant today. It’s a remarkable innings, and it staggers me to think of how many millions of people and lives World of Warcraft has touched during it, but how do you bring those people back? Partially, some of the answer seems to be to go big. The War Within, unlike any previous WoW expansion, will belong to a trilogy – the Worldsoul Saga – which will build and build in scope until we’re facing those legendary titans we always hear so much about from the game’s foundational lore. Expansions two and three – Midnight, and The Last Titan, respectively – are already in development, and should combine to deliver the most ambitious connected storyline the game has ever seen.
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