Has WoW gotten "too" family friendly?

[Doombringer]

I'm sorry, but "WoW was dark, it's a baby game now" is just hilarious on many levels.

I mean, what's dark? The Path of Glory being paved with draenei skulls is pretty dark. Alexstrasza being subjugated and turned into a dragon-making-machine to create aerial units is pretty dark. Malygos imprisoning, corrupting and presumably raping Keristrasza is pretty dark. Sylvannas dominating Anduin to force the Jailer's will onto him... that's kinda dark.

Tarjin the Blind going on about his days-long fight with a dragon in the heart of a volcano, to the point where the dragon expired and lava still flows from the eye-sockets of its skull to this day... which he keeps next to him at his little mountain hovel? That's kinda dark.

Razagath and her broodmates being imprisoned for a few centuries simply because they disagreed with a mandate from the gods... but now they're the bad guys because Alexstrasza thought eternal incarceration was somehow better for their mental state... kinda dark.

But Warcraft isn't Warhammer dark and never will be.

[Clone]

Ah yes MUCH darker then current wow, old wow was super serious and dark, meanwhile current wow is baby game.

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"Nowadays wow as it progressed"

Bro this fucking happened in vanilla, back in vanilla it was exposed that the demons had influenced the scarlet crusade, what are you on about trying to pretend this is a "new thing" this was ALWAYS a thing, even the the earliest days of wow, what the fuck are you on about?

If you are gunna cry about how wow was so much better back in the old day and they changed it, maybe actually know what you are talking about, cause it has ALWAYS been that way.

Like bro did you do the stratholme dungeon IN VANILLA!?
From vanilla wow, and THE COMICS.


Like dude, you couldn't have completely destroyed your own argument any more, speaking that you don't even know the lore of the game you complain about, thinking this was somehow a retcon later into the games lore, and not something in from day 1. You're entire argument falls apart on the basis this is not "some new development" this is how the game has ALWAYS BEEN.

Seriously, I am tired, but this made me auidbly laugh, cause there is no way you could have been ANY more wrong.

That's the TBC cinematic, and a single shot in an otherwise pretty violent cinematic.

Nice try.

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The big bad blue demon in WC3 was defeated by being hugged by a bunch of bright blue fairy spirit things called "wisps"... It's always been pretty family friendly.

It's called suicide bombing.

[Zodiark]

1. nevermind this is all just gibberish that is almost entirely wrong as usual
2. Bad day? Razageth is a primalist, the people who ally themselves with galakrond and his ideals? the guy who canabalized fellow dragons and raised them into undeath through old god corruption?
Yeah no just misunderstood bad day...


also I wanna laugh at the "most demons in old wow had red skin" you mean only some. Infernal? red skin I guess, oracles? dreadlords? voidwalkers? where is their red skin? Archimonde? The only ones who had red skin were the doomguards, and even then many had brown, felguard also had red skin sometimes, and later in tbc, the eredar but even then only sometimes.

Bro come off it. Go google Warcraft 1 and 2 demons. https://wowwiki-archive.fandom.com/w...ile=Demons.jpg

The majority of the color is RED

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That's the TBC cinematic, and a single shot in an otherwise pretty violent cinematic.

Nice try.

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It's called suicide bombing.

Glad someone else agrees.

[RoKPaNda]

Dragonflight is literally full of Pixar crap ripoffs. If you quested through this expac you can’t seriously tell me it wasn’t intentionally dumbed down to some dumbdumb friendly pile of happy rainbow sunshine friendship land. It’s nauseating, especially the voice acting. My god every time I fly over one of those Instagram river raft world quests and hear that blood elf talking about “fluffy animals” I lose 10 brain cells

Was WoW ever any different? (Spoilers: No) - The only thing different is that the production value is a lot higher than it used to be. You can very easily see this in real time as Classic progresses and you can see that WoW has always been this way.

[Shadowferal]

[FelPlague]

Bro come off it. Go google Warcraft 1 and 2 demons. https://wowwiki-archive.fandom.com/w...ile=Demons.jpg

The majority of the color is RED

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Glad someone else agrees.

Bro in warcraft 1 and 2, doomguard were the ONLY demons, also your complaining about "modern wow" and saying vanilla wow was amazing, are you saying vanilla wow was baby game now cause it made demons no longer red skinned?

[Nohara]

I don’t mind a bit of a lighter story, the world doesn’t need to be on the brink of an apocalypse all the time. However, I do feel they’ve gone a bit too far, especially Horde and Alliance relations. Now I don’t mean the ability that players can group up with the other faction, but simply the tone within the game. Both factions have always lived on knives edge, every truce or collaboration was always just a tiny event away from a new conflict, but these days the faction differences feel like a distant memory. The game should still emphasize you’re playing a game where you choose a faction that is a sworn enemy of the other faction. Now it’s a bit like a Mortal Kombat game with no lethal strikes allowed and a fistbumb after every match.

Something is not quite right.

[CaptainV]

The problem with trying to make the game too gentle is that by removing the "war" in warcraft you basically took away teh heart of what the game was always about, conflict.

Not what makes us united, but what divides us and always keeps us apart.

The factions had purpose because they were 2 seperate groups of people with seperate cultures, one built more around a mish-mash of tribal society and broken civilisations trying to find a future while another was a utopian nightmare where everyone was united under one banner but not necessarily given the same level of equality.

Its also something I long wanted but I have waited forever to see the Alliance be the villians and by now imho its too late, you cant really have teh alliance be evil because the setup for it exists but theres no reason to drive it anymore.

It would be a fun theme to have the Lightforged and generally just the Alliance go full Dystopian and enforce authorotarian rule over everyone allowing the Horde to be seen as the actual oppressed for once instead of always being the red faction bad must go attack the stimky humans that are annoying.

Instead, have the Alliance do some shit, we saw the Horde bomb Theramore and destroy Teldrassil, the Alliance didnt even destory Undercity, the Horde did.

I want to see the Skyfire 2.0 lead by Sky Admiral Rogers literlaly go full Vietnam and burn Thunderbluff to hell.

I want to see the Dark Irons by Moira's hand go full ham on their agenda of empirical rule and start violently expanding into the Horde territories within the 3 hammers kingdoms.

I want to see the Lightforged go on a literal holy crusade to purge the undead to the point even fellow humans and regular draenei question their intent.

I want to see the savage night elves truly be savage and violently attack and kill horde villages making examples in revenge for TEldrassil with the black moon army.

Did I get that?

I got Sylvanas is nasty and everyone is justified in hating her.

Saurfang is a really cool bro and not everyone is evil in the Horde!

This is where BFA failed, and where really, they needed a "Morally grey" story where all the good guys temporarily get shafted/injured/exiled and leaving the antagonistic factions within the horde/alliance to really just go crazy without anyone to stop them, like Gallywix going full meglomanic corporate capitalist or Magatha Grimtotem taking over the Taurens and turning htem evil Tribal for a while.

While the Alliance gets equally crazy people like Turalyon going full Zealot or Genn finally snapping and going on a Worgen Warpath.

[Aliven]

But Warcraft isn't Warhammer dark and never will be.

It could tho, i love some parody like Warhammer, especially 40k.

[Efcharisto]

I'm sorry, but "WoW was dark, it's a baby game now" is just hilarious on many levels.

I mean, what's dark? The Path of Glory being paved with draenei skulls is pretty dark. Alexstrasza being subjugated and turned into a dragon-making-machine to create aerial units is pretty dark. Malygos imprisoning, corrupting and presumably raping Keristrasza is pretty dark. Sylvannas dominating Anduin to force the Jailer's will onto him... that's kinda dark.

Tarjin the Blind going on about his days-long fight with a dragon in the heart of a volcano, to the point where the dragon expired and lava still flows from the eye-sockets of its skull to this day... which he keeps next to him at his little mountain hovel? That's kinda dark.

Razagath and her broodmates being imprisoned for a few centuries simply because they disagreed with a mandate from the gods... but now they're the bad guys because Alexstrasza thought eternal incarceration was somehow better for their mental state... kinda dark.

But Warcraft isn't Warhammer dark and never will be.

Seems pretty important to note that aside from the whole, "lava still flows from the eye-sockets of its skull to this day which he keeps next to him etc..." everything you just mentioned is either from an era back when the game still had more darker/edgier elements, or isn't even that dark.

Being imprisoned for a centuries because of philosophical differences is not dark.

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It could tho, i love some parody like Warhammer, especially 40k.

Eh... I don't think it could, or even should ever be Warhammer dark. But a bit closer wouldn't be so bad.

They definitely need to get back in that heavy metal spirit for the game though.

[Palapop]

There's nothing wrong with beautiful sceneries, taking the time to stop and admire the view, listening to fascinating stories and heartfelt moments. The problem is more with the characters, their voices, dialogues and appearances. They are being very much catered to young audiences and lack the rugged attitudes that used to characterize WoW. Take the Draenei, for example. They are light worshippers that are usually categorized as the good guys of Warcraft (not taking into consideration the Manari and Lightforged). Did Maraad sound like a little girl when he narrated Lords of War? Did he spare us the gruesome details? No, he was a badass. Now, we're talking about freaking Dragons here. They are supposed to be one of the most fearsome creatures in all of fantasy. And here they are depicted as no more than jolly lizards. That is stripping away a lot of what made Dragons what they are. I don't share the same view for the Pandaren, for example. They fullfil their fantasy as they should, asiatic martial artists. I don't find them silly in the slightest. Sure, MoP felt a little foreign for the Warcraft scenery, and a little bright for the franchise, but it did provide what it was based on - asian mythology. Now, i bet there are good dragons in real world mythology, but the awe and wonder of the creature is probably not stripped away with FFXIV humanoid appearances, juvenile voices or shallow, over-friendly dialogues.

This 10000000%

MOP also had its dark spots.

Ripping old Gods' still beating heart from chests?

Pandaren slaves?

Mantid invasion?

Jinyu slaves?

MOP feels like a horror game compared to Dragonflight lol

ESPECIALLY the voice acting is beyond bad.

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I don’t mind a bit of a lighter story, the world doesn’t need to be on the brink of an apocalypse all the time. However, I do feel they’ve gone a bit too far, especially Horde and Alliance relations. Now I don’t mean the ability that players can group up with the other faction, but simply the tone within the game. Both factions have always lived on knives edge, every truce or collaboration was always just a tiny event away from a new conflict, but these days the faction differences feel like a distant memory. The game should still emphasize you’re playing a game where you choose a faction that is a sworn enemy of the other faction. Now it’s a bit like a Mortal Kombat game with no lethal strikes allowed and a fistbumb after every match.

Something is not quite right.

Imagine night elves seeing orc and going /hug after burning their home and civilians?

Ah no! But it was Sylvanas who gave the orders! They were simply following orders!

/sarcasm off.

[GratsDing45]

Such a funny sentiment. I got into WoW as a 12 or 13 year old when I went to my friends house and his dad and mom were no lifing WoW, this was during later Vanilla/early tbc I think. He showed us the dance emote and how he was playing with other players in Zul Furrak , we laughed and it was all magic to me. It changed my life and I went home and asked my parents if they could get it for me. They did... It wasn't easy to convince of course...

If that isn't family friendly I don't know what is.

[salate]

As long as there is a first pack in Nokhud Offensive… And such packs always appear in instances every xpac, I’d never call it “too friendly”.

[Efcharisto]

If that isn't family friendly I don't know what is.

Something that doesn't have literal massive hulking abominations with their organs exposed made of the stitched together corpses of those that likely met their ends violently.

I'd say something like that more closely fits the definition of family friendly.

Just because you have your parents to thank for being introduced to WoW as a 13 yr old, does not mean everything about that game was family friendly back then.

Some of WoW has always been family friendly obviously. But your argument isn't a good one.

[Zodiark]

Bro in warcraft 1 and 2, doomguard were the ONLY demons, also your complaining about "modern wow" and saying vanilla wow was amazing, are you saying vanilla wow was baby game now cause it made demons no longer red skinned?

I never said vanilla was amazing good attempt at trying to twist my words though. All I said was that Vanilla WoW had a darker theme. WoW has retconned many things since then and that one of them was that demons took on different appearances to coincide with that. Demons in Warcraft in general were always stereotypically depicted as red in color to compare them with demons. This is why Eredar are largely various shades of red in color with Archimonde being an outlier.

Why did I bother to mention any of this in length?

Because it showcases how blizzard constantly retcons things and re-spins the narrative to suit their needs. Story be damned. So now we have Dragons regularly ferrying us around and Dragonkin who want nothing better than for us to help them relocate some pesky bee's and frogs. Why not make happy volcanoes that spit rainbows instead of skin-melting lava. We can get the spirit of Bob Ross to come help do some of the writing because in WoW there's no more mistakes, just happy Accidents.

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I don’t mind a bit of a lighter story, the world doesn’t need to be on the brink of an apocalypse all the time. However, I do feel they’ve gone a bit too far, especially Horde and Alliance relations. Now I don’t mean the ability that players can group up with the other faction, but simply the tone within the game. Both factions have always lived on knives edge, every truce or collaboration was always just a tiny event away from a new conflict, but these days the faction differences feel like a distant memory. The game should still emphasize you’re playing a game where you choose a faction that is a sworn enemy of the other faction. Now it’s a bit like a Mortal Kombat game with no lethal strikes allowed and a fistbumb after every match.

Something is not quite right.

I agree lighter storylines are fine they help break things up and make the game charming. A ray of sunlight. That's fine. My whole reason for making this post was to bring up the conversation of weather or not WoW has added too many rays of sunlight to the point that it's blinding.

With regards to your other point I suppose that depends on how you look at the game and Warcraft lore in general. I played some WC1 and 2 but wasn't super into them. They were fun but something was always a bit off or missing for my tastes. Then came WCIII Reign of Chaos. That's when I got really into the Warcraft thing. I read and re-read that damn booklet that was included with the game many times. I even drew out pictures of some of the characters. For me WoW was a chance to explore the world of Azeroth not so much because I cared a fig about the whole conflict between the Horde and Alliance. I knew they had philosophical and moral differences but to me those things always just got in the way of the game and the real threats that Azeroth faced.

Almost like the two sides were intentionally put at odds with each other to distract them from the fact that nefarious machinations were brewing just beneath the surface.

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Something that doesn't have literal massive hulking abominations with their organs exposed made of the stitched together corpses of those that likely met their ends violently.

I'd say something like that more closely fits the definition of family friendly.

Just because you have your parents to thank for being introduced to WoW as a 13 yr old, does not mean everything about that game was family friendly back then.

Some of WoW has always been family friendly obviously. But your argument isn't a good one.

Yeah I would have to agree. I am glad some kids got into WoW by seeing some of it's lighter side. That's great but it doesn't showcase the whole game and the many Darker sides. Just because a character can do some dance moves doesn't mean the whole game is like that.

I'll give you another example. I play some older JRPG's one of which Breath of Fire: IV has a rather dark storyline. A princess is captured and tortured some real body horror stuff where they basically turn her into a god of sorts just so she is immortal so they can go on torturing her indefinitely thus raising her anguish to unimaginable levels never felt by a mortal so that they can then use her as ammunition for a weapon that transforms your pain into a destructive blast that literally bathes the area it hits with Hex energy corrupting any and all life as they swim in a sea of shadows and tortured mutated souls and creatures.

Meanwhile as a side game my character can go into a little beach and do some fishing while pseudo-island style music plays in the background and I have to jig my line in tune with the rhythm in order to catch the fish...

[FelPlague]

I never said vanilla was amazing good attempt at trying to twist my words though. All I said was that Vanilla WoW had a darker theme. WoW has retconned many things since then and that one of them was that demons took on different appearances to coincide with that. Demons in Warcraft in general were always stereotypically depicted as red in color to compare them with demons. This is why Eredar are largely various shades of red in color with Archimonde being an outlier.

Why did I bother to mention any of this in length?

Because it showcases how blizzard constantly retcons things and re-spins the narrative to suit their needs. Story be damned. So now we have Dragons regularly ferrying us around and Dragonkin who want nothing better than for us to help them relocate some pesky bee's and frogs. Why not make happy volcanoes that spit rainbows instead of skin-melting lava. We can get the spirit of Bob Ross to come help do some of the writing because in WoW there's no more mistakes, just happy Accidents.

Dude, I literally do not care because of the constant moving of the goal posts, you say something, it gets corrected, you move the goal posts to the point you can still be right, and deny you were wrong in the first place.

the scarlet crusade in Original WoW and how they tortured victims in public and in some cases secretly. While trying to maintain an air or chivalry all the while showing a very cavalier attitude and even blatant disregard towards their fellow human beings.
Nowadays as WoW has "progressed", they basically got off the hook by the writers making them have been controlled / influenced by demons the whole time. (those poor pawns).

the fact you praised how back in the day the scarlets were dark, and then ruined later in wow when they were retconned to be controlled by demons, when the fact they were controlled by them from the very start, no retcons, is just the perfect example of such.

[Khaza-R]

Was WoW ever any different? (Spoilers: No) - The only thing different is that the production value is a lot higher than it used to be. You can very easily see this in real time as Classic progresses and you can see that WoW has always been this way.

There's no way anyone actually read Vanilla quests and thinks this. Especially Horde ones.

Jin'zil's Forest Magic
Hearts of the Pure
Seeping Corruption
Nothing But The Truth

I guarantee there's nothing like those quests in Dragonflight.

[ryklin]

There's no way anyone actually read Vanilla quests and thinks this. Especially Horde ones.

Jin'zil's Forest Magic
Hearts of the Pure
Seeping Corruption
Nothing But The Truth

I guarantee there's nothing like those quests in Dragonflight.

There was a (not a quest, but a vignette kind of thing) where you had to dissolve baby gnolls in acid and turn them into slime monsters to gain alchemy knowledge in Thaldraszus.
Granted, this specific event was actually removed from the game in 10.0.5 due to complaints and replaced with basically a censored version due to it basically being about killing babies for no real reason.

[Le Conceptuel]

due to complaints

y tho /10chars

[username993720]

There was a (not a quest, but a vignette kind of thing) where you had to dissolve baby gnolls in acid and turn them into slime monsters to gain alchemy knowledge in Thaldraszus.
Granted, this specific event was actually removed from the game in 10.0.5 due to complaints and replaced with basically a censored version due to it basically being about killing babies for no real reason.

Of course they did. -_-
Let's listen to some kids' concerns instead of believing in our creation.
The censoring in this game is getting worse and worse - from curse words, to naked bodies and to quests like these. It will eventually cease to be Warcraft and will end up being babycraft.