The generally accepted ETA

[vastx]

Most people think we won't see Classic come out for 1.5-2 years. But why? The only thing that comes to mind for development is -

*Deciding which Vanilla build to deploy (or a version that's been tweaked to, I guess you could say, a generic Vanilla build)
*Compatibility with newer hardware and software
*Integration within Blizzard client
*Internal testing
*External testing

Really, the only thing in my mind that would take months and months is the first item. Just what do they want the initial release of a Classic client to look like. And I admit, with as many opinions, usually emotionally charged, floating around, that could take some time. But overall, 1.5 years? I just don't see it. Maybe it's a mixture of ignorance on my part and. I assumed it would be a cash grab on their part for that void between 7.3.5 and BfA.

But too many people are sticking to the 1.5-2 year frame and I'm inclined to believe it, but would like an explanation. What don't I understand?

[Maudib]

6-8 months tops... It's coming in a content draught alright... just Legion's and not BfA's.

[iamthedevil]

6-8 months tops... It's coming in a content draught alright... just Legion's and not BfA's.

That's hilarious.

[Riproarin]

Here is my prediction. Next blizzcon they will talk about their progress (remember they said they are implementing it on the current engine of wow). Blizzcon 2019 will have the release date, and it will be out 2020 sometime

[Nomads]

That's hilarious.

It's not a bad guess. 8-10 months is my guess. Look at the Classic forums on reddit. They have a good discussion on why this is the most likely case.

[pateuvasiliu]

Here is my prediction. Next blizzcon they will talk about their progress (remember they said they are implementing it on the current engine of wow). Blizzcon 2019 will have the release date, and it will be out 2020 sometime

There's no way it takes them 2 years. It'll be released in 2018.

[vsb]

They are rewriting it from scratch on top of current WoW engine (both client and server). It requires a lot of modifications of the current engine to allow two different game mechanics with the same code base, it requires review of the old LUA codebase and adaptation it to the new WoW client (remember how much addons are broken with each WoW release? WoW interface is just a bunch of addons really) or adaptation of the current interface to turn off a lot of unwanted modern features. I'm sure that they won't realase it for two years at least. And even then it'll be staged release to allow extensive testing with limited resources, so classic won't be dreadful pirate-like experience with half-working world full of glitches. I expect classic to realase between BfA and the next addon after BfA to fill the void.

[CosmicGuitars]

My guess is it'll be Nov 23rd 2019, the 15th anniversary of WoW and 25th anniversary of Warcraft as a whole.

This will also, incidentally, be when BFA's patch cycle has wound down and it's in it's content drought stage.

This thing isn't coming in the next year when they haven't even begun hiring for the team yet. They've announced it's begun development last month, that's all. It'll be two years, which is perfect both to fill the gap between BFA and what comes after, and to be timed perfectly to hit two major milestone anniversaries.

[brt2pp]

becasue it took them 4 years to introduce f-ing offline mode for their launcher ... if you think they are going to revive dead game, that won't work on current hardware that they are having in 8 months you are nuts

[ReVnX]

becasue it took them 4 years to introduce f-ing offline mode for their launcher ... if you think they are going to revive dead game, that won't work on current hardware that they are having in 8 months you are nuts

They claimed they already had a running building of current hardware on Blizzcon

[WowIsDead64]

Most people think we won't see Classic come out for 1.5-2 years. But why? The only thing that comes to mind for development is -

*Deciding which Vanilla build to deploy (or a version that's been tweaked to, I guess you could say, a generic Vanilla build)
*Compatibility with newer hardware and software
*Integration within Blizzard client
*Internal testing
*External testing

Really, the only thing in my mind that would take months and months is the first item. Just what do they want the initial release of a Classic client to look like. And I admit, with as many opinions, usually emotionally charged, floating around, that could take some time. But overall, 1.5 years? I just don't see it. Maybe it's a mixture of ignorance on my part and. I assumed it would be a cash grab on their part for that void between 7.3.5 and BfA.

But too many people are sticking to the 1.5-2 year frame and I'm inclined to believe it, but would like an explanation. What don't I understand?

It's not that easy. My opinion - they want to port Classic to new infrastructure, which means remaking everything, except art.

[Deleted]

i think the thought process for saying it will release in 1-2 years is because most of us belive they don't want to release it at the same time as BFA.

alltho my preferred release date would be as a bundle with BFA, so you have to buy the new game to play vanilla.

[Atherions]

Probably during one of the content draughts of BFA.

[Selastan]

At least a year. Most likely early 2019 if everything goes smoothly.

[ReVnX]

i think the thought process for saying it will release in 1-2 years is because most of us belive they don't want to release it at the same time as BFA.

alltho my preferred release date would be as a bundle with BFA, so you have to buy the new game to play vanilla.

I'm okay with that. But Blizzard will probably release Classic in a middle of a content drought and that would be a couple of months after 8.4 -ish. That would be 2 years

Man, I would give anything for a 2018 release

[VyersReaver]

6-8 months tops... It's coming in a content draught alright... just Legion's and not BfA's.

Than that little "graph" of your makes even less sense.

[Deleted]

I'm okay with that. But Blizzard will probably release Classic in a middle of a content drought and that would be a couple of months after 8.4 -ish. That would be 2 years

Man, I would give anything for a 2018 release

I would rather see them release it before BFA but with a prepurchase. then they would get all the subscribers or even more. And the community would be happy!

[natpick]

if an handfull of guys from the internet can get a private server up and running smooth in no time at all,why would it take up to 2 years for a billion dollar company to implement?makes no sense to me,it should be doable in months easily with the endless resources blizzard has.

[ReVnX]

I would rather see them release it before BFA but with a prepurchase. then they would get all the subscribers or even more. And the community would be happy!

Happy wouldn't even begin to describe it! But I have little hope about that

[Mushkins]

They are rewriting it from scratch on top of current WoW engine (both client and server). It requires a lot of modifications of the current engine to allow two different game mechanics with the same code base, it requires review of the old LUA codebase and adaptation it to the new WoW client (remember how much addons are broken with each WoW release? WoW interface is just a bunch of addons really) or adaptation of the current interface to turn off a lot of unwanted modern features. I'm sure that they won't realase it for two years at least. And even then it'll be staged release to allow extensive testing with limited resources, so classic won't be dreadful pirate-like experience with half-working world full of glitches. I expect classic to realase between BfA and the next addon after BfA to fill the void.

If so, why were there all these talks of running old clients on modern hardware?