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  1. #21
    Ruined
    1. Ashenvale
    2. Azshara
    3. Thousand Needles
    4. Badlands
    5. Loch Modan
    6. STV
    7. Barrens
    8. Hillsbrad / Alterac
    9. Westfall

    Improved
    1. WPL
    2. Stonetalon
    3. Silverpine

    Overall I think the Cataclysm revamp did not age well after nearly a decade. Most of the zones they heavily touched look like complete shit. A lot of areas with heavy destruction feel stuck in a time bubble that no longer makes sense. Ironically many of the zones in Classic look way better because they don't have gimmicky shit jumbled all over the place.

  2. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by Yarathir View Post
    I thought this was about the 80-85 Cata zones.

    I really wanted to rant about Uldum being 50% Indiana Jones reference. God damn, Cataclysm was bad with its references..
    I think that wasn't even the worst thing. The worst about Cataclysm in my opinion was that they have to repeat over and over again this cringe inducing joke about Blood Elf males being girly. Like, I guess it is funny when you are in your teens but once you are an adult that one becomes super uncomfortable and homophobic as long as you are not one of those guys who use the term alphamale unironically, who are basically stuck in their teens mentally.

  3. #23
    Scarab Lord Frontenac's Avatar
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    Are we talking about the playing experience or the aesthetics of the zones? Anyway, as for playing experience I would say that all in all, most zones were made better. It was really a bore sometimes in Vanilla. Barrens was one of the worse, but Darkshore was close second. You were sent north, then south, then north again, returning to areas you already had cleared before. And all on foot. I also liked that each zone actually had its own storyline. Stonetalon was one of the most forgetable zones in Vanilla (Alterac was even worse). At least in Cataclysm, you were there for a reason, and the story was great.

    Now, for the look of the zones, that's something else entirely.

    Right:
    Felwood
    Southern Barrens
    Desolace
    Durotar (just for the Echo Isles)
    Dustwallow Marsh (bummer for Theramore, though)
    Winterspring
    Stonetalon Mountains
    Feralas
    Tanaris
    Thousand Needles (trading another desert region for a sea was a good trade off, even though I liked the canyon part)
    Western Plaguelands
    Silverpine Forest
    Tirisfal Glades
    Dun Morogh (for Gnomeregan)
    Redridge Mountains
    Blasted Lands
    Stranglethorn Vale
    Westfall

    Neutral:
    Azshara
    Moonglade
    Teldrassil
    Northern Barren
    Mulgore
    Silithus (was it even touched?)
    Ungoro Crater
    Arathi Highlands
    Hinterlands
    Eastern Plaguelands
    Searing Gorge
    Burning Steppes
    Duskwood
    Elwynn Forest

    Wrong:
    Ashenvale
    Darkshore
    Hillsbrad Foothills (On the playability level, that's an improvement, since it gave an area for the Forsaken to level in, but since I don't like the Forsaken aesthetics, the changes didn't impress me much).
    Badlands
    Loch Modan
    Wetlands (I don't like Menethil Harbour and I miss the Stonewrought Dam in all its glory)
    Swamp of Sorrows
    "Je vous répondrai par la bouche de mes canons!"

  4. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by Yarathir View Post
    I thought this was about the 80-85 Cata zones.

    I really wanted to rant about Uldum being 50% Indiana Jones reference. God damn, Cataclysm was bad with its references..
    Uldum is the most disappointing Cata zone for sure. Redridge was my most disliked for the same reason as uldum is bad. It's all just one big movie reference now. In classic the zone feels like it's the first real threatening zone with high level mobs, orcs and shadowhide gnolls with some spooky wizard in a tower and the fallen stonewatch keep. Post cata it's legit just one huge Rambo reference and it utterly kills that fantasy feel. Completely. Utter disappointment.

  5. #25
    Cata just hasn't aged very well. So many of the zones are linked to the Cataclysm itself and Deathwing's destruction. It's been almost 10 years and it's just super messy. Plus MoP onwards the quality of textures, models and assets has improved significantly. It's jarring going from any Kalimdor/EK zone to somewhere like Suramar or Boralus.

  6. #26
    Dreadlord Phaelia's Avatar
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    I loved Silverpine Forest. I almost always level through it.

    I also adore Vashj’ir. It’s criminally underrated. The music, the atmosphere, the story it’s all great. This is how you make a great Naga zone, not that abomination that Nazjatar is.
    ”I've walked the realms of the dead. I have seen the infinite dark. Nothing you say. Or do. Could possibly frighten me."-Sylvanas Windrunner

  7. #27
    The Unstoppable Force DeltrusDisc's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lane View Post
    Worst for me is Darkshore. They absolutely butchered that zone both figuratively and literally. Even if the questing were top notch (it's not) traversing the terrain is such a pain in the ass to not make it worth it. Frankly, I haven't really enjoyed any Kalimdor zone I've done as Alliance so far. They all range from mediocre to awful with several arguably not being much better than they were in Classic. There are still quite a few I haven't done in EK (as either faction) so I can't comment on those yet.
    While I too, really can't stand what they did to Darkshore, I can't help but also acknowledge it might be one of the better zones when purely looking at it from THE WORLD BROKEDED. It seriously looks like shit got ruined there. But it also is heart breaking to me because it was a favored zone of mine back in the day. </3

    As for me? EPL and WPL are two that really offend me. They made what used to be truly dark, mysterious, creepy zones into these goofy zones. While EPL is nice and easy to quest through, at the same time, it's just... silly. And WPL is just goofy feeling imho. I miss old Andorhal. I just remember when I first stumbled on it and that cool dead dude. Omg I thought I stumbled on a treasure trove of possible loot haha

    Ah, ignorance is truly bliss.
    "A flower.
    Yes. Upon your return, I will gift you a beautiful flower."

    "Remember. Remember... that we once lived..."

    Quote Originally Posted by mmocd061d7bab8 View Post
    yeh but lava is just very hot water

  8. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post

    The ones that stand out as being ruined imho are:
    1. Redridge Mountains
    Excuse me what?! That quest chain was absolutely amazing and made Redridge fantastic to quest in vs Classic.
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post
    2. Thousand Needles
    The zone was mediocre anyways, lots of gathering missions with tons of running. Only place you can go is up, but they only took a step to the left. Can't really complain.
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post
    3. Eastern Plaguelands
    Yeah, I think they just wanted to retell the story, just ended up being a poorly written anime.
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post
    4. Tanaris
    Surprisingly it was worse
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post
    5. Alterac Mountains (basically removed and next to no quests or lore there anymore).
    Funny you'd think if they remade the entire world then they'd remake a zone that has so much potential for being 1. New secret Gilnean base vs Hillsbrad 2. Secret Scourge base that raises fallen Alterac to fight for them that eventually leads to WPL. 3. Brings back Alterac and an actual Alliance hup to replace South Shore. But nope, just mountains.
    Quote Originally Posted by Resentless View Post
    6. Loch Modan
    Which blew my mind, they had so much to set up to make this a zone that rivaled Silverpine Forest, the best zone.
    It's basically unplayable.
    Last edited by lllBlackSunlll; 2019-12-21 at 03:28 AM.
    If curiosity killed the cat, why can't speculation kill you?

  9. #29
    I don't care what anyone says, but I really hated what they did to STV and The Barrens.

    Anywhere that had an annoying a** crater running through the center and required you to take some roundabout way to get to where you wanted to go was annoying and dumb. I don't know who thought it was a good idea.

  10. #30
    The only zone they "ruined" was Thousand Needles. I dislike what they did to the Barrens, but it wasn't ruined.
    Scheduled weekly maintenance caught me by surprise.

  11. #31
    I think Cata is a nadir of questing overall, actually.

    Every single zone has one (1) quest chain, and you cannot deviate from it. You will do the zone in the exact order that the devs determined. Sometimes they give the illusion of choice by handing you several quests at once, but you can't progress to the "next stage" until you've done them all, no matter how irrelevant some of them are.

    Fortunately Blizz learned from their mistake and fixed it in the very next expac (Mists), but unfortunately the old world is still stuck in that paradigm.

    Of the new zones, it's hard to say what was "ruined". Some old zones I like, some I don't, and some of the new zones are good (barring the above critique), and some are bad. The closest to one that is "ruined" is probably the Barrens - old Barrens had its flaws, but it was a sprawling zone with several storylines that sorta made sense but also had space to do their own thing. Splitting the zone in two and following up every thread, as well as introducing new ones, makes the new experience really crowded.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Of the new ones, Vashj'ir is my favorite. The *only* problem with that zone is the linearity, other than that it's an amazing zone (just remember to zoom in on your character so you're not totally disoriented by the 3D movement).

  12. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by Rioriel View Post
    Redridge #1 ruined? You’re fucking broken dude.
    Redridge was my favorite low lvl zone before.
    Redridge is my favorite low lvl zone after.

  13. #33
    Generally I'm not a fan of how Cata changed the old world. They took away a lot of atmosphere that made some of these zones in the first place, like making EPL so goofy, restoring WPL (it shouldn't even be named WPL then), flooding Thousand Needles, placing a huge volcano in Ashenvale, all the damage in Darkshore, and probably worst of all is that they halved the Barrens into 2 seperate zones. They also merged Alterac Mountains with Hillsbrad which is then turned into a dead zone. The quest pacing got a lot better, but at the same time the questing experience is also a lot more linear which makes this game feel like less of a journey.

    The one zone I am most indifferent with is Silverpine Forest. I always loved the classic version the moment I entered this spooky looking forest, and then scaring the shit out of myself when I first encountered a Son of Arugal. The story at the time was also pretty solid about Arugal summoning the worgen out of another dimension and cursing the humans of Pyrewood. I also loved the mystery of whats behind the Greymane Wall at the time.

    But the Cata version did great things with this zone aswell. There was a solid story that was heavily progressing as you went trough it, watching Garrosh call Sylvanas a bitch, fighting alongside her against the worgen liberation force, going into Gilneas and revive Lord Godfrey who actually gets to kill her. My one gripe is how much they turned a rather atmospheric forest into a warzone though, it feels like it took away the creepy atmosphere that it originally had.

  14. #34
    I love all the cataclysm revamped zones :O

    I don't understand the hate for thousand needles, I actually did it last night, and I did thousand needles on classic a few months ago and I absolutely love the new version, but hey ho.. opinions.

    I really did enjoy vanilla alterac mountains quests though so if I had to say one that was ruined i'd say that.

  15. #35
    The Insane Aeula's Avatar
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    In terms of visuals? Everything affected by the Cataclysm kinda got fucked up. But that was part of the theme I guess. I just don't like it.

    In terms of gameplay? Every zone got better. Classic quests were shit outside of class quests and longer questlines. Cataclysm was a massive improvement in every way. Took me playing Classic this year to realise that.

    Even putting up with meme quests is better than suffering through kill 12 and 12 mobs three times for minimal reward quests.

  16. #36
    I still prefer the orginal Lordaron // Forsaken starting zone, thats the big plus for Classic ( for me)

  17. #37
    Zones that stand out in a good way after revamp:

    Redridge Mountains
    Stonetalon mountains
    Westfall

    Zones I enjoy less after revamp:
    Ashenvale
    The Barrens

    The rest:

    They're either very neutral, or slightly above what they used to be. Overall, I firmly believe questing got a lot better. Stories are much more cohesive, and much less random fetch and poop quests. There were even some quests that drew laughs from me when they were still brand new. The Forsaken quest where you are turned into a quest giver stood out to me, it was silly, you didn't do anything other than read, but it was charming.

  18. #38
    I despise the changes made by Cata. It was gimmicky, overfilled with dumb pop culture references and tried so hard to be "dynamic" it actually got the opposite effect, having "active" animation stuck in time highlighting the static nature of the world. Countless quests were just Vanilla quest in which they added "we need to kill them again/we need to kill the son of the previous guy/etc.", and countless others were just jokes that destroyed the immersion.

    Also, the entire design went from "here is a world, let's add things in it" to "let's make a story and build the world around". So it felt like Vanilla was a world, while Cataclysm was a cinema movie set.

    I think that Desolace is probably the only zone that was actually improved, everything else was a downgrade.
    And I especially despise how they butchered STV.
    I always loathed the Cata revamp, so much so that while I tend to love leveling, I always rushed through the 1-60 content as fast as possible while looking away just so I wouldn't be too much exposed to this garbage.

  19. #39
    Being horde, I don't have too much opinion about the alliance aligned zones, but I despise in general the "closing in" between zones that restricts how you can move to get from zone to zone. Barrens is ruined - couldn't they have left it horde only? 1K is just wtf as they ruined all that was there and used the rest for their new quests. Tanaris was no better. Azshara lost its feel. Most others were also just plain worse. I could be neutral on Silverpine. And I really prefer the classic Orgrimmar...

  20. #40
    Old God Soon-TM's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Powerogue View Post
    I loved seeing Malfurion in that tornado.
    Meh, that was cool for about 10-15 minutes, then it got old incredibly fast. Levelling a lowbie Ally toon in Classic, I've come to realise how much better was the old Darkshore. Easily one of the most immersive zones in the entire game, along with Silverpine and Westfall of old.
    Quote Originally Posted by trimble View Post
    WoD was the expansion that was targeted at non raiders.

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