WoW 2.0: What Blizzard MUST Do & How It WILL Happen

[MoanaLisa]

I agree mostly with the video. God, now I'm agreeing with streamers...well, stopped clocks are right at least once or twice a day.

The point about using the world is a good one. If you stipulate the game has a couple of components for PVE: 1) the world & 2) instanced dungeons, islands, and raids, the design feels upside down. Too much of the latter, not enough of the former.

This was a deliberate choice of the developers including Ion "Yep, leveling is quick and easy and won't delay you from raiding" Hazzikostas. I think it's perhaps the correct choice for a standalone game as they seem to now design expansions but exactly the dead wrong choice for an MMO that supposedly has a persistent world. Over the very long run the game is healthier for having that world where characters supposedly live and travel to adventures.

[rrayy]

It's almost like everyone in this thread didn't even bother to watch the video before having an opinion, SHOCKER. If you watch it, he's not calling for WoW 2, he's explaining how expansions handle the feel of a WoW 2 and how one's like Cata, as bad as it was, change the entire world layout, and that future expansions need to make the entire world usable, rather than just putting world quests in every zone and calling it a day, and how those calling for a revamp of graphics and other systems don't fully understand how the engine and all the systems work, and that it's not as simple as going "we're going to move to unreal."

Sprry, I don't bother with what youtubers say because their sole motivation is to say what ever gets the most clicks and therefore money. There is absolutely ZERO sincerity behind anything they say.

[Musta]

Please watch the video before spamming bullshit. thanks.

[Oakshana]

We are already in WoW 2.0. It's been slowly happening over time since Cata. The massive pruning, the talent tree changes, all the new models, introduction of Mythic Raids and dungeons... It just wasn't a new release like EQ2. It was a subtle change that happened over the last few xpacs.

[oathy]

Wow 2 Electric Boogaloo should never happen. Wow is like the Simpsons at this point. Just let it go.

Just think of the Trails of style though
hehe when I hear WOW 2 mentioned think straight away of EB.

[kaminaris]

Holy crap he is almost spot on with the exception of:
1. I would still like to get new engine WITHOUT new graphics. I fully understand what that means, he doesn't need to remind me.
2. Don't bring tier sets, bring back tier visuals tho in a way Trial of valor worked: Ensemble tokens.

But yea I agree with most of what he said especially:
1. Yep to player housing, not tied to expansion.
2. Guild houses Yep, we really need this.
3. No, no gear sets, make it gear with special effect
4. Fresh UI - good lord someone actually understand that current UI is insult to usability.

[Gadzooks]

Extremely good video from BellularGaming.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mwVv6e0ovM

Very worth watching, especially if you're interested in what could come.
Interesting to see how Classic wow gets compared to what blizzard needs to get back to.

Please Note- I am not affiliated with this Youtuber at all and by no means am posting this to drive traffic to this video.
I watched the video and shared it here as it's an EXTREMELY good video and discusses a very meaningful topic that we're all curious about what happens with wow.

It's a good video, Bellular usually puts a lot of effort into his stuff, but he needs to make up his mind - the video before that was "Shadowlands leak is awesome and this is how it's going to happen" (even though that leak is nonsensical, and doesn't even delineate how an expansion will happen when everyone dies in the last raid tier of 8.4, and then a year's drought...and then they wake up in the Shadowlands? Uh?), now he's all in on "WOW 2.0 has to happen, and is, here's how". He's getting a little iffy with his speculation, really.
And a 4th version of wow just sets them up for more demands for servers covering each era - so how long until they're maintaining 4 different versions of retail, because you know there will be those players who demand cata/pandaria content. You can't revamp the whole world, and just take away 15 years of content. Well, they can, but they'd lose a lot of customers.

- - - Updated - - -

We are already in WoW 2.0. It's been slowly happening over time since Cata. The massive pruning, the talent tree changes, all the new models, introduction of Mythic Raids and dungeons... It just wasn't a new release like EQ2. It was a subtle change that happened over the last few xpacs.

Pretty much, it started with WOD. That's when they started the current frameworks that they're using - the class pruning and making everything build/spend/crit, the mission table, WQs, story campaign, and everything else. I fully expect 9.0 to have all that. Warfronts may not come back, or islands, in their current state, but they're gonna reuse the systems, just watch. They're what scenarios evolved into.

The one thing they need to calm down on is spell clutter. I was watching a video of Palace fights recently, and the spell clutter is INSANE, between the clutter the bosses spew out, and the clutter from the players, I don't know how anyone navigates at all. You can't even really tell what's going on, unless you watch the announcements from addons. Do people even look at the mobs? Or do they just stare at a row of icons, to know when to press them? That's how it was feeling when I quit in WOD, and it wasn't half as bad as now. You used to be able to look at the mob's animation for hints at what they were doing, now, you barely see the mob, under all the spell FX. And with classes being in the shape they're in, I can't even begin to imagine trying to play.

[Kralljin]

Yeah, he's a broken record by now.

There are a handful of things in that video that i question / disagree.

On the topic of world content, he totally avoids any specific details, while he says that this is intentional, it also omits the fact that Blizzard constantly tried to put enganging world content into the game.
And they've failed repeatedly.

Trying to make content sound appealing is one thing, making actually appealing content is another.
Island expedition / warfronts also did sound nice on paper, reality is another story.

As stated, Blizzard isn't exactly good at creating world content, whether that's an issue of the current design of WoW or that the current devs cannot create good content is open for debate.
What is however certain is that Blizzard excels at creating good instanced content and i'd rather have Blizzard put a focus on content that is actually good.

Regarding mounts, yeah, fuck that idea.

I don't want to ride a certain mount because it has an OP effect, i want to ride my mount because it has an appealing look, decent riding animation or i take in pride in the mount itself due to its source.
This would basically repeat the mistake of the Waterstrider, where a certain mount is much stronger than others if a given effect turns out to be more powerful than others.


As far as character progression is concerned,
how about we just take a step back and make the game more simple?
Instead of trying to come with alternate power progression system (like Artifacts), the power of progression of your character is just gear, get rid of this utterly insane gear inflation that is going on and simply put gear itself back into the focus of progressing your character.

Character progression in WoW used to be so simple and since Blizzard went completely bonkers with handing out loot, they've been scrambling to fix character progression as a game system.

[Doomchicken]

Character progression in WoW used to be so simple and since Blizzard went completely bonkers with handing out loot, they've been scrambling to fix character progression as a game system.

I'd argue that in some respects they've been too stingy with rewards. For example, islands are SO much better now that you can roflstomp them and actually get rewarded for them, where as before you could struggle street a mythic island which was way more ineffecient than doing a normal island and gave you no extra chance of rewards. A lot of the time you wouldn't even get dubloons for them. People actually do PVP islands now too, which is usually way quicker and can be more fun than doing normal/mythic islands.

Warfronts is the same deal, who in their right mind would want to do more than 1 warfront a month after you get the quest reward just to get LFR level gear? Especially with how long they take and how little AP they give, it's not enticing to ANYONE.

[Drusin]

WoW 2 is not happening. And Blizzard doesn't need to get back to anything now that they do have classic.

Welp, post 2, /thread

[Kyux]

Absolute BOSS level info and tbh.. Blizz should hire him for think tank operations alone. The guys smart, funny, and knows his shit

I'm a fan of Bellular but that isn't true. I recently watched his analysis of the "leaked" Shadowlands screenshot. He rushes his videos and doesn't stop to think and analyse properly. He could have read any of the threads on MMO-C about it and found counters to his points. For example he didn't acknowledge Sylvanas' face on the ships or the barricades facing towards SW in that screenshot.

He's smart, funny, and presents well but he presents his analysis as in-depth when it's not. Imho he needs to slow down and critique what he's seeing and reading, and perhaps read a bit more. Still like his work though.

OT: I think WoW 2 is VERY unlikely. I think WoW survives because people are just hanging on to 10-15 year old accounts. If they made everyone restart they'd risk losing those players. But then again, they might gain some. Who knows. I personally doubt we'll see a WoW 2 soon.

[Revamp Man]

Extremely good video from BellularGaming.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mwVv6e0ovM

Very worth watching, especially if you're interested in what could come.
Interesting to see how Classic wow gets compared to what blizzard needs to get back to.

Please Note- I am not affiliated with this Youtuber at all and by no means am posting this to drive traffic to this video.
I watched the video and shared it here as it's an EXTREMELY good video and discusses a very meaningful topic that we're all curious about what happens with wow.

Haha
Hahahaha
Hahahahahahahaha

This video is 95% click bait and 5% regurgitated bull that he tries to spin with his "I'm in the industry now" crap just like every other video he published in the last 4 years

[HulkSmasher]

I love the idea of an infinite progression system like he described.

[Drusin]

On the topic of world content, he totally avoids any specific details, while he says that this is intentional, it also omits the fact that Blizzard constantly tried to put enganging world content into the game.
And they've failed repeatedly.

What I want to know is, was there ever engaging world content to begin with besides pvp hot spots? I played since BC and I don't recall any "engaging world content". Yeah I went and did dailies because gold and rep but engaging? Fuuuck no, I'd rather do other shit that's just what I had to do, no different than having to farm AP.

- - - Updated - - -

I love the idea of an infinite progression system like he described.

As long as it only applies to the 'item of the xpac' (neck, weapon, whatever) I'm cool with that but I personally want *forging gone. I want there to be ONE best item for each slot again and once I get each one for each slot I'm done gearing.

[munkeyinorbit]

Extremely good video from BellularGaming.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mwVv6e0ovM

Very worth watching, especially if you're interested in what could come.
Interesting to see how Classic wow gets compared to what blizzard needs to get back to.

Please Note- I am not affiliated with this Youtuber at all and by no means am posting this to drive traffic to this video.
I watched the video and shared it here as it's an EXTREMELY good video and discusses a very meaningful topic that we're all curious about what happens with wow.

The video is behind the times. We are already in WoW 3.0. WoW 1.0 ended with the death of LK. WoW 2.0 was Cata to when sargerad plunged the sword into azerith.. Wow 3.0 Was after that.

[Luxeley]

I agree with his theory about how a WOW II will be an on-going process and evolve over time. But the idea this is a good video (outside the production quality) is ridiculous. The current WOW game engine does greatly limit what Blizzard can do and can't do. Where is the breakaway environment, currently in GW2 and featured in the defunct new MMO Everquest II, the tech exists? What about armor dyes, currently in Gw2 and many other MMOs? What about a 40man BG without "massive" lag? What about an updated combat system? The fact Belluar says WOW isn't limited by the game engine is just plain dumb. Not saying Blizzard needs a Real Engine for WOW, but the game engine does need an overhaul at the very least, so they can do more and program faster.

[pinkz]

i do not believe there will be a WOW 2 there would be too much player base division

retail wow players, imo, alot would not be able to walk away from the collection meta it is now: mounts, pets, tmogs, achieves, along with invested personal attachment
classic wow players, want that to always stay classic and separate even if blizzard adds TBC or Classic+ which would create more division. Classic WOW influencer's are saying already that they want completely TBC separate 1-70 if blizzard goes that route. classic + still on the fence

[kaminaris]

i do not believe there will be a WOW 2 there would be too much player base division

retail wow players, imo, alot would not be able to walk away from the collection meta it is now: mounts, pets, tmogs, achieves, along with invested personal attachment
classic wow players, want that to always stay classic and separate even if blizzard adds TBC or Classic+ which would create more division. Classic WOW influencer's are saying already that they want completely TBC separate 1-70 if blizzard goes that route. classic + still on the fence

Nothing stops blizz from importing old assets you know? Including your collections

- - - Updated - - -

I agree with his theory about how a WOW II will be an on-going process and evolve over time. But the idea this is a good video (outside the production quality) is ridiculous. The current WOW game engine does greatly limit what Blizzard can do and can't do. Where is the breakaway environment, currently in GW2 and featured in the defunct new MMO Everquest II, the tech exists? What about armor dyes, currently in Gw2 and many other MMOs? What about a 40man BG without "massive" lag? What about an updated combat system? The fact Belluar says WOW isn't limited by the game engine is just plain dumb. Not saying Blizzard needs a Real Engine for WOW, but the game engine does need an overhaul at the very least, so they can do more and program faster.

Fully agree, we want new engine not for graphics as he claims but because limitations of current one. So either new engine or complete overhaul of existing one, especially event system as it is total garbage. As well as UI revamp.

[SoulSoBreezy]

I wanted to like this, but the points sum up to the most upvoted comments you'd find on Reddit or MMOC while providing no substance. I say this a lot - it's easy to rally people behind the idea of wanting change and improvements, but that unity utterly falls apart when talking specifics. Bellular played it for the clicks and didn't contribute anything to the conversation. I'd be a lot more interested if he just spoke for himself and talk about what HE wanted, in detail.

Off memory, he asked for professions to put the player economy first. And that's it.
Make the world relevant. And that's it.

It's the 'safe' approach because from experience, as soon as you get into specifics the audience will grab onto that by the balls and drag it down. But the challenge in designing forward in an older game like WoW comes from changing one system while respecting the other systems, which are also changing.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

I love the idea of an infinite progression system like he described.

Infinite progression has one big problem though. With infinite progression, you're expected to put in maximum per week time on it.