13 Years Ago Today, Blizzard Entertainment announces World of Warcraft

[Elvine]

First Alpha Game Play Footage

[Lime]

Wow, a WoW trailer I haven't seen before. I thought I saw them all.

Also, thank you for narrating it Optimus Prime.

[DeleteThisUser]

I haven't seen this in a bit. Thanks for the post. =P

[Maulis425]

Wow, a WoW trailer I haven't seen before. I thought I saw them all.

Also, thank you for narrating it Optimus Prime.

Optimus Prime it is!

[thilicen]

I miss the first screenshots they ever showed of the game back then, wish they still had them on the website with timestamps :<

[Buu]

Wow, a WoW trailer I haven't seen before. I thought I saw them all.

Also, thank you for narrating it Optimus Prime.

I saw it during Cataclysm Beta. I believe the person who posted it said that it was as a farewell to the old world, with the revamp of the old zones. The ORIGINAL teaser of WoW.

[Elvine]

Added First Alpha Gameplay Footage to OP

[thilicen]

That ingame trailer from the first beta, don't even recognize most of it. Goldshire looked so much more cozy back then! And is it just me or did the water details in that trailer look a lot higher than what was eventually released?

[Noomz]

13 freaking years.... I'm old and a big part of my life has been a single game. #yolo

I remember these trailers vividly, because I rewatched them over and over and over and over. It was amazingly supercool to me, because I was a humongus fan of Warcraft. Oh how I miss that innocence.

The human models in the alpha were SO GOOD!

- - - Updated - - -

That ingame trailer from the first beta, don't even recognize most of it. Goldshire looked so much more cozy back then! And is it just me or did the water details in that trailer look a lot higher than what was eventually released?

I know right? Some of the stuff in that video looks a lot better than what was released. It was something I noticed back then too but never thought about twice.

[Deleted]

I couldn't play wow back then. I had a shitty dial-up internet connection and no way to get a better one because I live in a villa and it wasn't cost effective for the ISP company to install broadband to houses instead of the neighbouring blocks of flats. It would be years before the damn ISP company finally graced the houses with a decent 1mb cable net and I could play online games.

[Jaese]

It was the vanilla open beta that pulled me from the grasp of Lineage II.

Quests? I can level from quests? You mean I don't have to grind on mobs all day to gain one level? What? You also say I have good chances of actually getting gear? Be still my beating heart.

I still get my old L2 fix on private servers, though. I like the armor/character designs that KRPGs have.

[The Stormbringer]

God, I was twelve back then. I loved Warcraft 3, and was so excited (even though I knew I wouldn't be able to get it for a long time). They've made so many improvements and changes...

...I wish they still had skirts of variable length with legs underneath.

[Sassafrass]

That ingame trailer from the first beta, don't even recognize most of it. Goldshire looked so much more cozy back then! And is it just me or did the water details in that trailer look a lot higher than what was eventually released?

Goldshire looked "more cozy" because, in the alpha/early beta builds, towns and cities were more life sized. It didn't work out very well though so they shrunk them down.
The water was also higher detail but they had to replace it because of low performance computers. It came back in Cata though!


As for the trailer, I first saw it when I bought WC3. WoW was definitely a different game than it is today - it was more about the adventure in the world than the epic loot. I think that's why so many people have nostalgia for it.

[Deleted]

it was more about the adventure in the world than the epic loot. I think that's why so many people have nostalgia for it.

I would actually strongly disagree, there is still large quest chains and vast areas to explore, dungeons still have lore behind them and in MoP I think they did it extremely well with the sorta pre visit quests and explanation that as to why you are fighting in that dungeon (something I can't exactly remember classic and beyond did), there are still secrets to be found etc.

With all that said, it really is a perspective or how you choose to play the game

Oh and also the topic itself, it is insane to think that a game have lived for so long, and is still going at full steam.

[MetroStratics]

Crazy to think how much was different in my life 13 years ago. Meanwhile, still playing WoW.

[Independent voter]

Left EQ1 for EQ2. Couldn't stand EQ2 mostly because it would run poorly on even the best PCs of the day. Moved to WoW and never looked back.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Halt! Your driving me radically NUTS with nostalgia!

[Pabzi]

OH WOW. I think I was watching Pepper Ann on tv.. back then..