Shadowlands doesn't feel like Warcraft

[Dhrizzle]

I feel like you might be projecting a little, buddy. But feel free to point out where I've mispresented your arguments.



There's a big difference between laying out the cosmology as a background of the universe for people to read up on if they're interested and actually sending the player to "attack" the pillars of that cosmology. That being said, a lot of the things laid out by Chronicles have already been retconned by the current story team so the comparison to Tolkien's universe doesn't really work that well.

We're not "attacking" a "pillar" of the cosmology, we're defending a neighbouring plane that happens to be the destination for the souls of the dead.

The Tolkien comparison wasn't meant to say it is exactly the same thing, WoW is closer to a comic book universe where many people work on it over many years (although Tolkien wasn't averse to the odd retcon as he merged his greater mythos with the stories he used to tell his children.) I was pointing out that most people are familiar with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings which are fairly grounded fantasies but that doesn't mean the things described in the Silmarrilion aren't equally valid despite being much grander with abstract concepts given forma and a more spiritual angle to some of the ordering of the world.

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The point of what? "Feeling Alien" is the point of a new expansion? How so? So, I played Kingmaker and the expansion is Kingmaker expanded and made better in the same mold. I don't want the Kingmaker expansion to feel like "A mobile game" I want Kingmaker+++ in an expansion.

Shadowlands feels like a cheap mobile game now, imo.

In what way? The core gameplay is the same as it pretty much always has been, the graphics are to a higher standard, the major pillars of gameplay like dungeons, raids, battlegrounds, arenas and a large open world are still there. Closest thing to mobile-friendly gameplay is the missions table and if anything that is much less important than it has been in the last few expansions.

[Dystemper]

It is just a bad expansion as was BFA. The current dev team is terrible. Activision is terrible and is controlling blizzard more and more. Shadowlands barely feels like a MMORPG at all.

[Chromell]

I still cannot put my finger on the major issue why I am no longer playing despite really wanting to come back, but I am struggling when it comes to interest. I haven't played for 3 weeks, and I don;t intend to return yet. Hopefully I do, but if this is the end for WoW for me, then its sad because I never planned to stop or showed any indication I was going to, I just one day didn't want to log on, and here we are three weeks later.

That kind of feeling has hit me before, but not just in games. I've felt the exactly same on series I was following, one day I simply did not watch a following episode and that was it. Our routine impacts big time on our hobbies, or it could be that your interest in WoW has waned, which could really happen to anything.

[Sunslayer]

We're not "attacking" a "pillar" of the cosmology, we're defending a neighbouring plane that happens to be the destination for the souls of the dead.

The Tolkien comparison wasn't meant to say it is exactly the same thing, WoW is closer to a comic book universe where many people work on it over many years (although Tolkien wasn't averse to the odd retcon as he merged his greater mythos with the stories he used to tell his children.) I was pointing out that most people are familiar with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings which are fairly grounded fantasies but that doesn't mean the things described in the Silmarrilion aren't equally valid despite being much grander with abstract concepts given forma and a more spiritual angle to some of the ordering of the world.

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In what way? The core gameplay is the same as it pretty much always has been, the graphics are to a higher standard, the major pillars of gameplay like dungeons, raids, battlegrounds, arenas and a large open world are still there. Closest thing to mobile-friendly gameplay is the missions table and if anything that is much less important than it has been in the last few expansions.

In the way that M+ has no loot progression. The fact that Raids no longer have tier set bonuses, no reason to Raid. Now, I just PvP. In Legion (Didnt play much BfA as I hated it) I raided, did Rated PvP and tons of M+. They have made the game feel so boring and pointless outside of PvP due to how awful gear is. Gear is how we progress in WoW. Imo, this is by far the worst expansion to date. I played all of WoD; say what you will but at least the classes were fun and that made the game fun for me. Shadowlands Class design and balance just sucks. I dont want to write a novel but I could easily write thousands of words about how much of this expansion just sucks. It feels like they had such a small staff when creating SLs.

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It is just a bad expansion as was BFA. The current dev team is terrible. Activision is terrible and is controlling blizzard more and more. Shadowlands barely feels like a MMORPG at all.

10000% agree. Cant stand the new direction this Dev team is taking.

[heartless8604]

No new race or class for the 2nd expansion? BFA added what, 12 races and Legion gave you a class. Chill.

They didn't add a single one. They altered a given race, slapped a play requirement on it and called it "new". Stop being suck a massive fan boy and stop sucking their dick. The game fucking sucks now. Nothing new is added without requiring you to farm exalted rep do 1.8 billion dungeons and farm 2 trillion raptor assholes. And even then it's not new. It's just the same shit you already have slightly changed.

You do know WoW STILL has the worst character customization of any modern game. Fucking cellphone games have better character creation.

[Relapses]

In the way that M+ has no loot progression. The fact that Raids no longer have tier set bonuses, no reason to Raid. Now, I just PvP. In Legion (Didnt play much BfA as I hated it) I raided, did Rated PvP and tons of M+. They have made the game feel so boring and pointless outside of PvP due to how awful gear is. Gear is how we progress in WoW. Imo, this is by far the worst expansion to date. I played all of WoD; say what you will but at least the classes were fun and that made the game fun for me. Shadowlands Class design and balance just sucks. I dont want to write a novel but I could easily write thousands of words about how much of this expansion just sucks. It feels like they had such a small staff when creating SLs.

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10000% agree. Cant stand the new direction this Dev team is taking.

Blizzard made the fatal flaw of not designing the expansion around your very specific needs as an individual player. Have you tried sending a passionate e-mail addressed directly to Mr. Hazzikostas? It sounds like your opinion is important enough for billion dollar companies to bend to your every need so I'm sure he'll be excited to hear from you!

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You do know WoW STILL has the worst character customization of any modern game. Fucking cellphone games have better character creation.

Good thing people like you keep the their fingers on the pulse of the playerbases' real problems: The fact that there isn't a slider for the size of your female Troll's boobs.

[Dhrizzle]

In the way that M+ has no loot progression. The fact that Raids no longer have tier set bonuses, no reason to Raid. Now, I just PvP. In Legion (Didnt play much BfA as I hated it) I raided, did Rated PvP and tons of M+. They have made the game feel so boring and pointless outside of PvP due to how awful gear is. Gear is how we progress in WoW. Imo, this is by far the worst expansion to date. I played all of WoD; say what you will but at least the classes were fun and that made the game fun for me. Shadowlands Class design and balance just sucks. I dont want to write a novel but I could easily write thousands of words about how much of this expansion just sucks. It feels like they had such a small staff when creating SLs.

All complaints that have been levelled at other expansions, Blizz always change stuff and some people like it and some don't, I still don't get how it resembles a mobile game though, the gameplay is still WoW even if you've fallen out with the model of gear progression and decided the class design isn't to your liking.

[Venziir]

They didn't add a single one. They altered a given race, slapped a play requirement on it and called it "new". Stop being suck a massive fan boy and stop sucking their dick. The game fucking sucks now. Nothing new is added without requiring you to farm exalted rep do 1.8 billion dungeons and farm 2 trillion raptor assholes. And even then it's not new. It's just the same shit you already have slightly changed.

You do know WoW STILL has the worst character customization of any modern game. Fucking cellphone games have better character creation.

Well aren't you adorable?

[Stormwolf64]

Previous expansions all added new places and creatures, but they brought existing elements there as well. You would find the classic races of Azeroth building settlements there, you'd see murlocs, goblin towns, human castles and so on.
Shadowlands doesn't have any of that. It's all completely different to the point where it feels like I'm playing some chinese knockoff of wow.
Even the loading screen looks more like something out of Narnia and that movie sucked.
Also, the fact that they added a bunch of existing characters that just sit in a corner in Oribos doesn't help.

This is my main gripe with the expansion and wanted to ask if anyone feels the same way.

It is in the same vein as warlords of draenor. Something interesting at the time, but ultimately pointless to the wow universe as a whole.

[Razorice]

Considering we are in another plane of existence Shadowlands shouldn't feel like World of Warcraft to begin with?

[AtomR]

In my opinion I think they missed the mark on the opposite direction then the OP complains about. We are traveling to places that aren't even part of the typical "physical existence". It was supposed to be something transcendent, something that represents life after death, with all the banal things of physical existence behind it. Instead you find exactly the same thing you found in any new continent you visit. Settlements and populations looking for resources, civilians training, hunting wild life, even the existence of wildlife seems mundane. I thought if anyone could have come up with a new reality and new "way of life" that isn't just a rehash of common life it would have been blizzard. But they either didn't want to or couldn't make it. I am enjoying the Shadowlands because it's something new to do, but it's far from one of the best expansions. And with now 4 characters levelled and geared up (which is unheard of for me at this point in an expansion) I feel content will run out very quickly.

I mean even the way the story was told is badly glued together. You hit 60 and 4 new dungeons unlock that SPOIL the story of the covenants. When I got to De Other Side, I wondered what did I miss? How did Bwonsamdi get here and why is he talking like it's continuing a story that I didn't play. Same for Spires of Ascension. It starts immediately by outing Devos as the traitor. And the story we play while levelling in Bastion has us look for the traitor, and I certainly guessed who it was from the shadowy silhouette in the cutscenes, but we didn't matter of fact find the traitor. But it just points to a badly planned experience where the release of content didn't happen as it was originally planned. If there was something Blizzard was/is becoming expert on is telling a story and this expansion was just a couple of steps backwards.

[Kumorii]

They dropped the ball by making each of the shadowlands "races" be their own thing. They should have been variants of the existing races.

Blue skinned and winged Dwarves
Sickly looking pale Orcs
Horned and hooved Night Elves
Red eyed and fanged Goblins

It wouldn't have required major changes and could have kept them looking both uniquely "shadowlands" but still part of the setting as a whole.

Pretty damn sure people would complain about them being lazy if that were the case. Although I do agree with you, would be cool if it was.

[AtomR]

It is in the same vein as warlords of draenor. Something interesting at the time, but ultimately pointless to the wow universe as a whole.

Preciselly. It feel like WoD in many ways. Including how the activities didn't offer any reward. the empty bags of WoD are back with a vengeance.
We play torghast for a couple of drops that become pointless quick. Callings offer you gold. The anima redirection, queens conservatory, mission command table and teleport network is just pointless content due to the fact it rewards nothing. There is no true value for gameplay progression in 90% of the activities you have to do. Farming anima for vanity items? What is this? A free-to-play mobile auto play RPG?

[Stormwolf64]

Preciselly. It feel like WoD in many ways. Including how the activities didn't offer any reward. the empty bags of WoD are back with a vengeance.
We play torghast for a couple of drops that become pointless quick. Callings offer you gold. The anima redirection, queens conservatory, mission command table and teleport network is just pointless content due to the fact it rewards nothing. There is no true value for gameplay progression in 90% of the activities you have to do. Farming anima for vanity items? What is this? A free-to-play mobile auto play RPG?

You're talking gameplay elements i meant plot relevance.

[AtomR]

You're talking gameplay elements i meant plot relevance.

I know. I added those gripes.

But indeed. This feels like we're going to come in, fix this stuff and go back to azeroth with no impact.
However I read somewhere that in one of the next patches we're going to "learn" that time moves slower in the shadowlands and we'll eventually go back to an Azeroth where many years have passed while we fixed the broken veil. I don't know how factual this is but THAT has got me curious for the future of the storyline.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

But indeed. This feels like we're going to come in, fix this stuff and go back to azeroth with no impact.
However I read somewhere that in one of the next patches we're going to "learn" that time moves slower in the shadowlands and we'll eventually go back to an Azeroth where many years have passed while we fixed the broken veil. I don't know how factual this is but THAT has got me curious for the future of the storyline.

Don't believe everything you read online.
https://www.wowhead.com/news=316889/...t-swapping-tim

In a past interview, some hints were dropped that time worked differently in Shadowlands, which led to speculation that when we return from the Shadowlands, there is a huge timeskip coming in a future expansion. Ion clarified this, saying that time is perceived differently in Shadowlands, like a dream where you sleep for six hours but in the dream state you experience events covering a wider range of time. It's not like every day in the Shadowlands is equivalent to five days in Azeroth. "Don't read too much into the timey-wimey-ness of it."

[Stormwolf64]

It is funny how similar this is to FFXIV's shadowbringers expansion. Players go to a different realm to fix issues before they go back.

[huth]

Well aren't you adorable?

Wrong, too. Kul Tirans are a full-fledged race even if lore-wise they're "just" humans.

And most of those games with "better customisation" have it at the cost of far less individualistic races, since that would make the customisation way more expensive to do.

[Dhrizzle]

Preciselly. It feel like WoD in many ways. Including how the activities didn't offer any reward. the empty bags of WoD are back with a vengeance.
We play torghast for a couple of drops that become pointless quick. Callings offer you gold. The anima redirection, queens conservatory, mission command table and teleport network is just pointless content due to the fact it rewards nothing. There is no true value for gameplay progression in 90% of the activities you have to do. Farming anima for vanity items? What is this? A free-to-play mobile auto play RPG?

How is it anything like a free-to-play mobile auto play RPG? It isn't free, it isn't on mobile and it doesn't auto play. I've seen a lot of clueless people throw out "mobile game" because they don't know what they're talking about and think "mobile game = bad" with no context as to why, but this absolutely takes the biscuit for a nonsense comparison.

[belicus]

How is it anything like a free-to-play mobile auto play RPG? It isn't free, it isn't on mobile and it doesn't auto play. I've seen a lot of clueless people throw out "mobile game" because they don't know what they're talking about and think "mobile game = bad" with no context as to why, but this absolutely takes the biscuit for a nonsense comparison.

You're being disingenuous here as it's pretty obvious what he means. This expansion is very grindy for very little reward. Even the campaign quests are made to not give you rep with the faction this time around, as an easy example.
Mobile games generally implement grindy mechanics to encourage you to pay to skip the grind. WoW is implementing the same kind of mechanics to artificially extend its playtime so you pay more for the subscription, which is just stupid. This is bad because nonmobile gamers are accustomed to staying around for interesting gameplay so they feel cheated when Blizz puts in a mission table instead of, I dunno, Warcraft 3 skirmish games in WoW.

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In my opinion I think they missed the mark on the opposite direction then the OP complains about. We are traveling to places that aren't even part of the typical "physical existence". It was supposed to be something transcendent, something that represents life after death, with all the banal things of physical existence behind it. Instead you find exactly the same thing you found in any new continent you visit. Settlements and populations looking for resources, civilians training, hunting wild life, even the existence of wildlife seems mundane. I thought if anyone could have come up with a new reality and new "way of life" that isn't just a rehash of common life it would have been blizzard. But they either didn't want to or couldn't make it. I am enjoying the Shadowlands because it's something new to do, but it's far from one of the best expansions. And with now 4 characters levelled and geared up (which is unheard of for me at this point in an expansion) I feel content will run out very quickly.

I mean even the way the story was told is badly glued together. You hit 60 and 4 new dungeons unlock that SPOIL the story of the covenants. When I got to De Other Side, I wondered what did I miss? How did Bwonsamdi get here and why is he talking like it's continuing a story that I didn't play. Same for Spires of Ascension. It starts immediately by outing Devos as the traitor. And the story we play while levelling in Bastion has us look for the traitor, and I certainly guessed who it was from the shadowy silhouette in the cutscenes, but we didn't matter of fact find the traitor. But it just points to a badly planned experience where the release of content didn't happen as it was originally planned. If there was something Blizzard was/is becoming expert on is telling a story and this expansion was just a couple of steps backwards.

I can understand this pov and I think it resonates a bit with my initial "chinese knockoff" sentiment. It's different from previous stuff, but not in a "wow, this is so out there" way. It's different in a very banal way, as in we're seeing new races in new places, doing pretty much what the old ones were doing.
We're seeing fairies doing nature stuff in Ardenweald, and I'd rather see night elves doing nature stuff in Ashenvale... or even in Ardenweald for that matter. It's uninspired.