Blizzard use to write lore everybody liked...what happened?

[Eggroll]

I think it's a matter of exposure and accessibility. Also, simplification.

In the early years of WoW, lore was a niche thing for hardcore nerds, now we have multiple youtubers like Nobbel and such, who are explaining and discussing the lore to tens of thousands of viewers.

And while flashy cinematics every other month are somehow great, it takes takes away the subtleness, the wonder from the story. It's all too much in yo face.

[javierdsv]

It's always been bad. But time ago stories were told on fast-paced games and "fantasy" was exiting.

See, everything that people have ever liked about WoW is related to anything that happened before WoW or was an extension of it. Newly introduced stories on MMORPGs are slow, and unrewarding.

[ravenmoon]

It's always been bad. But time ago stories were told on fast-paced games and "fantasy" was exiting.

See, everything that people have ever liked about WoW is related to anything that happened before WoW or was an extension of it. Newly introduced stories on MMORPGs are slow, and unrewarding.

Cos they shouldn't tell these kind of EPIC cataclysm/legion scale stories in this style of an mmo - they need a new game or tv series, while the game explores the world. Either htat or switch wow to a SWTOR style mmo, with lots of conversations, cinematics to augment the story and do a lot more about it, ofcus on being a race hero as opposed to a class hero. Since race is the lore relevant partition,while class has a lot less lore in comparison and usually defined by race, making race dominant. Class is the gameplay vehicle to experience the world.

[matrix123mko]

They write using the "rule of cool" not caring for proper continuity or reasoning behind characters actions

Yet when they avoid putting Tyrande in Nazjatar, reasoning that she is busy in Darkshore, people start rioting.

[Eazy]

They turned warcraft into an MMO, that's what happened.

When you have an rts, or books or whatever being the main format of your lore, you can make it really interesting and good. You can have kingdoms rise and fall and you can have the point-of-view change often and even have them die.

But with the MMO, you are the POV for everything. You also can't lose and will always win(unless there's 2 factions, then you have a stalemate). Then out of nowhere, enemies who probably hate each other and care nothing for you... will now focus you and you will kill them for their loot. Their character development no longer matters, besides them meeting their end. You'll never see Illidan get his revenge on Arthas, or major wars between factions that don't involve the playable faction.

You also have to suspend your disbelief like crazy. For instance, Arthas and the Scourge swept through the most powerful kingdoms and only grew mower powerful. Deathwing fought in the War of the Ancients and annihilated thousands of mortals and demons alike and has grown more powerful. Old Gods were said to have fought the Titans and even killed one and even imprisoned are more powerful than mortal imagination. Yet you will kill them all, you who has a mortal body and will be reminded over and over that you're not as powerful as Thrall, Jaina or even a crippled Garrosh... killed literal god-tier beings... over and over again.

The lore became shit the moment that there were millions of POV's and they're all technically canon and can never really die for as long as the game goes on(that's some real bad plot armor) and the bad guys could never win.

I agree. That's the problem, you cannot have awesome stories in MMO.

[Segus1992]

Lately, criticism outnumbers and outweighs praise, yet I remember when everything blizzard wrote was hugely popular and well loved.

It is not the case now, with a lot of dissatisfaction, disappointment, anger and resignation. While there are some praiseworthy bits here and there, it seems like in general the lore is pissing far many more people off than not, and even those who really love it have a lot of things they haven't been liking about it greater than what they like or at least irritating them a lot it is over shadowing the good parts (which are there - let's be fair)

Why is this ?
When did it start?
What is the main cause?

There are particular things I dont like, that I have been vocal about using positive tones more often than not usualky by trying to remind blizzard of the things I liked about their lore that dont seem to be developed.

I think bottom line is people are NOT seeing things in their fave race happening that they find exciting or empowering. I think the devaluing of race which a lot of people's characterisation and role play identify with is part of the problem while focusing too much on special characters and the two factions either seems to focused (legendary characters) or too encompassing (factions) such that you dont feel your character via race has any identity.

In a game that doesnt tell the story of your character specifically (you are identified in the story as a random hero or a bunch of heroes, it's never about you personally unlike a game like Swtor or FFXIV, in wow, the exploits are by a random adventurer), so consequently you live through your races as the primary identifier in lore and the first port of call to reflect you and represent your progress, then your class (which defines your gameplay) then your faction (the collective)
Faction isn't personal enough - which is where theyve thrown all the focus, legendary characters like Thrall, Khdgar, Sylvanas and Jaina are not you, so too much focus on them doesnt carry though either.

For the Alliance ? Dont really give a shit tbh, For the Horde? Dont care really, they've never been as interesting collectively as the individual races, so it's a huge mistake to only ever focus on them. I think race should be the main focus, then every now and them class, and once in a while a huge faction thing. After all, night elves and blood elves got me into warcraft lore, and a lot of people often talk about and care about their races...yet dont find anything meaningful ful or progress written for them...usually just pawns used to stir up drama. Its meaningless when my character causes a victory in wow, cos he is a nobody, it means much more when it is my race tho and I helped that.

Means little to me if a legendary character does it and exalting my faction is too broad a net

When has the writing ever been good? I'm not even being a classic forum whiner, I don't really mind the current story too much - but it's never been good. Early WoW there was just little to no story to be had, and it's never been more than "ooh cool character from another game".

WC3 is obviously different for obvious reasons. If you're comparing WoW's story to WC3 you're honestly just stupid.

[Lothaeryn]

They write using the "rule of cool" not caring for proper continuity or reasoning behind characters actions

This, a lot of the writing fell into this trap, with Gameplay>Lore being their excuse for lack of continuity and constant retconing.

Also explains why they favored Horde stories over Alliance ones, a lot more room to create 'cool' stories from their point of view. From a certain perspective, Alliance can only write drama based storylines, which considering the rockstar personas of Blizzard's original devs, probably seemed boring to them.

[ravenmoon]

I agree. That's the problem, you cannot have awesome stories in MMO.

Which is why I say, leave those epic stories to a new game series - Witcher 3 style/Dragon Age/ Mass Effect (especially since the last 2 aren't doing well at all - it's the perfect time to create a massive hit game combining story and gameplay...then let wow focus on telling the sotry of the races, continue what classic was doing, where you explore the effects of the massive story lines and the progress of the races.. that you champion.

You are the champion of your race (and class) you are helping your legendary leaders make true gains for their people and overcome obstacles - as the stories of each race continue dadapting tot he new world or new circumstances, rebuilding what they've lost or entering an unprecedent age, as they overcome their own unique challenges and smaller issues, often in the aftermath of the big storyline plot of the other game series.

Cataclysm and legion are so epic, they needed their own game or an RTS style thing - meanwhile the wow expansion then picks up on afterwards, and what was happening in each race - for legion and the night elves, so much would happen, with Suramar's return, arcane addiction's cure, the nightmare and cure of shaladrassil, Illidan being right, demon hunters proven to never have been the enemy and joining the fight, the concept of the legion was never after their magic or their well - it was just the icing on the cake, but the world soul , andt hat they would have found Azeroth regardless of the night elves - these are HUGE things that would redefine the current identity and restore the original identity of the night elves, the one they had before the sundering before arcane addiction that we haven't seen.

Things like that. each massive plot like the Cataclysm, WotLK, Legion has many implications for many races and groups, and ends chapters and eras for someo f htem, starting a new beginning that the game can now explore - imagine now exploring a resolved night elf peoples, and building them up from there, questing showing what they were upt o, and some form of night elf federation or something happening - that leads to new challenges,


races interacting with others - it can actually be very exciting - because each race would hae something, and there would be mini plots and cool stories like the ones we had in Suramar.

Allied races and stuff like that could also get their epic storylines introduced like we had for Suramar and the highmountain, as the MMO would flesh out aspects the main game or film couldn't because here you can explore the world

- - - Updated - - -

When has the writing ever been good? I'm not even being a classic forum whiner, I don't really mind the current story too much - but it's never been good. Early WoW there was just little to no story to be had, and it's never been more than "ooh cool character from another game".

WC3 is obviously different for obvious reasons. If you're comparing WoW's story to WC3 you're honestly just stupid.

I wasn't referring exclusively to wow, infact I was thinking of WC3 when I meant we all use to love the story blizzard writes.

[Nathanyel]

"back in the day", Blizzard game stories were often ridiculed for being too simple, too cliche. Not even everyone who played the game thought they were great.

Now they're trying storylines with longer setups, more nuance, but with arguable success either way. You simply find yourself in a different view on the story.

[beanman12345]

Warcraft lore has been pretty crappy since Warcraft 3 ended. In wow the writing has at best been serviceable, but there are other games and books and tv and radio programs and whatever with SO much better writing in them.

[Maljinwo]

Yet when they avoid putting Tyrande in Nazjatar, reasoning that she is busy in Darkshore, people start rioting.

No. Their reasoning is that "Tyrande and the Night Elves already had their revenge" and that they chose not to focus on her

Which is laughable at best
Sad at worst

[Segus1992]

I wasn't referring exclusively to wow, infact I was thinking of WC3 when I meant we all use to love the story blizzard writes.

Read the rest of the post. WC3 is not comparable.

[A Chozo]

As far as I know their lore has always been sketchy, in every game.

They are very good at creating new lore from nowhere. The start of the stories. But when it comes to expanding this stuff, they suck really hard. This is why the main storylines in WoW are problematic, but so many side quests are merorable. The side stories begin and end in a small time frame, so there's not enough time for any fuck up.

[Naiattavain]

lich king had the best lore written wise and everything was evolving around getting to defeat the lich king. after lich king ended blizzard just started rushing way too much on every expansion. chris metzen did a really nice job on evolving the story. when he was working there. chris was a genius at his job. i miss that guy.

[AbalDarkwind]

The Burning Crusade is where it started, and it started with the Sargares/Eredar retcon. That's when the term "lorelol" was invented. Now, while I think that retcon was, ultimately, a boon for the lore, as the Draenei relationship to the Eredar has been vastly expanded and mined, TBC showed that "rule of cool" was more important than developing coherent stories.

The reasons for attacking Illidan were incredibly murky, Kael'thas had a heel turn that wasn't explained at all, Vashj was just kind of there, Karazhan had practically no explanation until Legion...it was just a massive mess. Since then, we've had peaks and valleys in the lore, seemingly with every other other expansion, but TBC was the clear beginning of where lore started to matter less to Blizzard.

[Highelf]

The Burning Crusade is where it started, and it started with the Sargares/Eredar retcon. That's when the term "lorelol" was invented. Now, while I think that retcon was, ultimately, a boon for the lore, as the Draenei relationship to the Eredar has been vastly expanded and mined, TBC showed that "rule of cool" was more important than developing coherent stories.

The reasons for attacking Illidan were incredibly murky, Kael'thas had a heel turn that wasn't explained at all, Vashj was just kind of there, Karazhan had practically no explanation until Legion...it was just a massive mess. Since then, we've had peaks and valleys in the lore, seemingly with every other other expansion, but TBC was the clear beginning of where lore started to matter less to Blizzard.

I'm glad i'm not the only one that thinks the same about TBC Kara. While I love the design and fights of Kara it just kind of, happened.

[AbalDarkwind]

I'm glad i'm not the only one that thinks the same about TBC Kara. While I love the design and fights of Kara it just kind of, happened.

It makes sense now, after Return to Karazhan explained that it was a portal to all realities. Before that, though, we only had one line from Prince Malchezaar ("All realities, all dimensions are open to me!") to even hint at that, and even then, it could have been an ability intrinsic to him rather than Kara. The description from the quest line was "A Burning Legion agent is at the top of the tower. Stop him!" which, frankly, was a weak explanation for a raid, especially a famous location like Karazhan.

[McNeil]

They dig to much into the faction conflict which is where some of the worst lore stuff can come out. Characters start to behave differently all the time, we see random pointless drama, there never comes a clear winner out of it. Then they also start using big named villains that have been anticipated so much into rather underwhelming boss fights with a let down conclusion (Xavius and the Nightmare not getting their own expansion, Kil'jaeden dying on a random spaceship, Sargeras not doing anything yet is still defeated, Azshara and Nazjatar not getting their own expansion undersea).

Its not like WoW ever really had much amazing lore. WotLK was pretty great lorewise, the death knight stories are some of the best they've done and even Legion continues the quality of this class really well in their class order hall. I even would say Arthas has been done right despite people often calling him a cartoon villain, the only thing I would've done differently is having him redeemed at the end rather than just die. But redeeming would cause him to go in a coma or something so that there's potential for Arthas to return as a hero.

[huth]

The entire "the lore used to be good" thinking is a load of bull. No, it didn't. It's only been somewhat recently that they even started making an effort to keep things consistent instead of just writing by the seat of their pants.

Nothing happened to Blizzard, the community changed and upped their expectations to unrealistic levels.

[Zandalariprelate]

They turned warcraft into an MMO, that's what happened.

When you have an rts, or books or whatever being the main format of your lore, you can make it really interesting and good. You can have kingdoms rise and fall and you can have the point-of-view change often and even have them die.

But with the MMO, you are the POV for everything. You also can't lose and will always win(unless there's 2 factions, then you have a stalemate). Then out of nowhere, enemies who probably hate each other and care nothing for you... will now focus you and you will kill them for their loot. Their character development no longer matters, besides them meeting their end. You'll never see Illidan get his revenge on Arthas, or major wars between factions that don't involve the playable faction.

You also have to suspend your disbelief like crazy. For instance, Arthas and the Scourge swept through the most powerful kingdoms and only grew mower powerful. Deathwing fought in the War of the Ancients and annihilated thousands of mortals and demons alike and has grown more powerful. Old Gods were said to have fought the Titans and even killed one and even imprisoned are more powerful than mortal imagination. Yet you will kill them all, you who has a mortal body and will be reminded over and over that you're not as powerful as Thrall, Jaina or even a crippled Garrosh... killed literal god-tier beings... over and over again.

The lore became shit the moment that there were millions of POV's and they're all technically canon and can never really die for as long as the game goes on(that's some real bad plot armor) and the bad guys could never win.

Hands down, this comment is on spot about the reasons of the decline of the storytelling of warcraft in general