Why classic appeals to a grumpy old man

[toffmcsoft]

So... Retail then?
You have that already.

Nope, retail is a garbage game outside of the Dungeons & Raids.
Everything else about retail belongs in a trash can.

[Aggrophobic]

Nope, retail is a garbage game outside of the Dungeons & Raids.
Everything else about retail belongs in a trash can.

But you're asking for just that: Classic with added improvements and content.
You already have that.

[Tiwack]

Time is not after you but nor does it wait for you.

[justandulas]

But you're asking for just that: Classic with added improvements and content.
You already have that.

a different take, and an alternate direction.

Not everything in retail is bad, but so much of it veered so far away from home that some of us would like just an alternate reality approach post naxx

[Mormolyce]

Meaningful game play exists when the following exists within a game:

1) A player has multiple paths of game play

2) Choosing a path of play offers a different experience from others.

3) This difference is compelling enough to make the choice enticing compared to other choices.

A clear example would be playing in vanilla vs now. Most of the choices you would make in that version of the game, are made for you by the game in the live version. Less choice, less opportunity for meaningful game play.

I don't think there's any reasonable way to claim that Classic has more paths of gameplay with different experiences vs. live. They expanded that massively in the various expansions, the biggest being MoP IMO.

[Eroginous]

I don't think there's any reasonable way to claim that Classic has more paths of gameplay with different experiences vs. live. They expanded that massively in the various expansions, the biggest being MoP IMO.

I should be more specific in what I mean by 'gameplay.' It's not an argument that later versions of the game offer increased numbers of game play modes and ways to enjoy the game. I'm specifically talking about the way your character plays in combat, whether small or large scale pve/pvp. The way you played your character in Vanilla was entirely different because a completely different set of choices were presented to you. Your path, whether you ran around with your entire character planned or not, would certainly look different from the path you would take now.

Believe it or not, I agree that there are things about the live version play experience which are better than in Vanilla. But at the same time, the things that made vanilla good, Wow popular, and Blizzard massively successful from Wow in the first place, are noticeably absent in Live right now. Despite all they've done to simplify and streamline the game. The efforts made every expansion to deliver something new and shiny to consume, displaced the value in all the previous content.

You have to see that, right? It's why you don't just go jump into a raid and clear 10m ulduar every week. If you raid, it's current teir or you belong to some niche community that actually does the content at level for valuable rewards. I actually preferred MoP to most other expansions, too. But, like all other expansions before and since, it's content was displaced by new shiny disposable content.

Most people don't like being told how to enjoy their game. When you drop something that compels people to participate, they will always burn out at some point before your game content upholds the expected value that probably came before to veteran players who experience it. Like I stated before, there's a lot more people who have played Wow (over 100m) than there are currently playing it. These aren't trial numbers who just decided to stop playing before buying, these are subs that actually bought the game in some form and subbed for at least one month.

That's a lot of money, a lot of people, and a lot of time invested into a company for such a small concurrent player base. Classic appeals to most people who are tired of the disposable nature and soul-less game play experience that is live Wow. Sure, live looks better than Wow ever has, plays smoothy, gives you easy access to the game by expediting or automating things you would have to spend legitimate chunks of time doing in Vanilla. That's the missing soul I'm talking about. RPG players loved Wow (the original intended audience) because it was very closely designed to be like the games they have played before. Talents, abilities that you train up to get stronger. having a road map to plan your character. Taking a moment to make an actual choice about how your character will play - a choice that will ultimately last until you decide to cough up enough coin to respec...

Do you see yet? People honestly want a simple online RPG experience. Live Wow is anything but that. It's not a grumpy old man thing. I've spent enough money on this game to have put a down payment on a car or a house. It's honestly too much for me to continue to invest in, and even classic Wow is a difficult choice for me RN. Not to stray too far from the point, live Wow lacks very little in the meaningful choices department. Sure, there are lots of choices and ways to play the game.

Very few of them are actually meaningful for anything longer than just a few months. This is what has killed the game.

[FAILoZOFF]

You are correct, Classic is really relaxing and chilled, compared to modern WoW theres no hassle anywhere. So cool.

[arkanon]

You are correct, Classic is really relaxing and chilled, compared to modern WoW theres no hassle anywhere. So cool.

One mans "relaxing" experience is another mans braindead, overly simple 1 button mashing grindfest.

[Muajin76]

Like many others, I played vanilla 'back in the day'.

I was under no illusions about classic. What people seem to forget is that a large part of the challenge of vanilla was simply not knowing what you were doing. Raids felt epic because you'd never been in a group of 40 people trying to play together to execute even the most basic of tactics (the idea of dying to Baron Geddon's bomb seems ridiculous now right?). By modern standards, these raids weren't all that difficult (I went on to main tank Heroic Lich King and comparing that to Raggy is just plain daft) but we got into those raids without 10 years of MMO experience behind us and it 'felt' epic.

Questing didn't feel as tedious, because we hadn't spent 10 years slowly becoming numb to the whole concept of questing (honestly, there was a first time you collected 10 wolf tails). The community felt more balanced because we hadn't learned how to judge other people yet, there simply wasn't enough information to fine tune your preferences and you tended not to care all that much about the fact the tank had cloth spirit bracers on in Deadmines.

Look, I could ramble for hours, but I won't. Suffice to say that 'newness' was a huge amount of the appeal and you can almost taste it when you hear the way people remember vanilla. They don't necessarily want the game itself back, they want the feeling of it all being new and exciting and epic. They want a time before we all got burned out doing effectively the same things for 10 years. Let's also be honest when we say that isn't happening.

So, why does classic appeal to a grumpy old man?

It's about attainability. These days I'm 40. I'm not the younger man that had all the time in the world for video games. As fond as my memories are, when I think about returning to retail it just all feels so daunting. I'm so far behind both in terms of character and knowledge, and even if I can just about scrape back into endgame on limited time, there will always be that steadily moving goalpost of 'the next expansion' looming ahead of me.

Classic feels like it has a fixed endpoint (eventually Naxx). I feel like I can just chill, take my time, divert from the path to go and pick a few herbs without the game's final point moving away from me quicker than I can get there. Sure, there will be thousands of people through Naxx before I get there, but I will get there. It won't have been replaced by something even further away. Noone is walking ahead of me constantly moving the carrot on a stick into the distance. The carrot is a fixed point and at some point I shall feast upon it.

Do I think classic is a better game than retail? It's certainly not as pretty, but it's been so long since I enjoyed retail that my opinion is likely not a balanced one. What I do know is that classic, for me (I don't profess to be the voice of the disenfranchised masses) feels like a game I can invest in again, even if I'm investing in much smaller amounts than I used to. Not because it's better, but because it's attainable.

If this means that I've turned into a 'lolz casual n00b' in my middle years then so be it, part of the joy of passing 40 is no longer caring about being called a 'lolz casual n00b'. I'll grumble all the way to Naxx.

I'm sure it also appeals to grumpy old women. :P

[ghays]

40 is not old man, ppl running world records at 34.

You’re only as old as who you feel. That why I stick to young chicks with daddy issues.

[gd8]

You’re only as old as who you feel. That why I stick to young chicks with daddy issues.

maybe try therapy instead if you're that stunted

[Grogo]

You’re only as old as who you feel. That why I stick to young chicks with daddy issues.

Otherwise known as the scientific term "douchebag"

[Lane]

Sometimes I think I'd like to see OG Naxx and then I remember what it'd take to get there. I'll watch videos. :P When my first character hit 60 back in vanilla I felt like that was the end of the game then too, so I'm content to quit there. The only legacy server I could see myself playing at length would be Wrath, I adored that expansion.

Firstly, Blizzard isn't micromanaging my gameplay anymore. If I want that Frostsaber I'll have to grind an obscene amount of bears and furbolgs but if I want I can spend 20 hours a day and getting it done in a matter of days, retail not once offers a player this option anymore. It's all about daily, weekly, monthly limits. Honour cap, Valor Point cap, fucking warzones cap, island expedition cap.

I was going to say this. Someone told me once that the Wintersaber grind was the worst rep grind in the game. Not even close. I've done it 3x; twice for myself (before account wide mounts) and once for someone else. I can get that mount in under a week, it's not a big deal. There's no way to do that for modern reps. It took me 3 weeks to get WoD flying solely because of the limited Tanaan dailies.

I often think dailies are the worst thing WoW ever did to reputations. Every day I don't feel like doing them I start doing the math in my head of how far it's going to delay my progress and then I begrudgingly end up doing them. Even just changing it to weeklies would make such a huge difference, I could bang them all out in a night and not have to worry about it for the next 6 days.

While i agree completely, there are quite a lot people who love exclusive, time gated content. They can now run around with their mage-tower skins that no one else can get anymore.

I hate limited/one-time-only events. They are my Achilles' heel. When Rift first came out and they had a new world event every 6 weeks with RNG drops that, at the time, you could not get any other way. I burned myself out to the point of quitting. I didn't want to miss out on anything, but I couldn't keep up with them.

I resubbed for the mage tower because of the exclusive skins they offered. How could I not want a flail on my paladin? Unfortunately, there wasn't enough time for me to get them all, which will probably nag at me forever. :P I would gladly give up the "prestige" I have for the ones I did get for them all to still be available.

[Cæli]

classic is certainly more pretty than retail, in terms of colors chosen. classic stranglethorn at night is much more pretty than any weirdly crafted new zones, it shows that they have new artists that didn't capture the wow essence.

[ghays]

Otherwise known as the scientific term "douchebag"

It really isn’t, but I’ll be nice since you obviously suffer from a moderate cognitive deficiency. Likely the result of some neurological disability.

- - - Updated - - -

maybe try therapy instead if you're that stunted

I’m not the humorless tool here. So perhaps you might want to try it yourself.

[gd8]

It really isn’t, but I’ll be nice since you obviously suffer from a moderate cognitive deficiency. Likely the result of some neurological disability.

- - - Updated - - -



I’m not the humorless tool here. So perhaps you might want to try it yourself.

you should reconsider your comedy career I assure you people only find you annoying

[ghays]

you should reconsider your comedy career I assure you people only find you annoying

Sure, humorless turds do. Actual people consider me moderately funny. But I get it, some of you here need to come at oysters like that to make yourself feel artificially important. Since you aren’t in the real world.

[tekkitan]

WoW Tokens are already in retail which shares a subscription with WoW Classic. I've already seen people selling WoW tokens in my server trade chat for gold.