Classic WoW will be a lesson in nostaligia vs reality

[Laqweeta]

Light years ahead



Light years behind.

[Kryos]

Vanilla is the art of slow progress with little but important rewards - it's like old movies that have slow story telling and only have little action, but the action is meaningful and stays with you for a long time.

Vanilla is Jurassic Park 1 and current WoW is Jurassic World. In Vanilla/Jurassic Park 1 you care more about the story, only few creatures and the action and visual effects are concentrated toward the end. But that way you enjoy them even more. It doesn't become a meaningless blur of little rewards.

[Monster Hunter]

Well, progressing forwards with more QoL changes and streamlining has surely done the game good thus far.




I've never said it was a single factor, in actuality it's a combination of things that have together had a massive impact on WoW over the years, and they keep excacerbating the issue with every iteration.

Progress dosnt mean qol, you can progress in the wrong way, then progress through the right way.

[Castration]

OP seems to be gone for good, he can't handle it.

[Maudib]

So maybe there are even 4...10...100s of kinds of WoW players? Although I doubt the product is for all of them...like..what about the kind that hates BfA, has no urge to play Classic but wants a WotLK server?

They'll have to wait their turn, the "I can't wait for TBC" kind of players are next in line.

[MidnyteTV]

But that's the thing, subs have been plummeting because current WoW is anything but good.

Also, anecdotal evidence, "REE IT'S ONLY NOSTALGIA, IT HAS NO REDEEMING FEATURES AT ALL" etc etc.
Think I've seen this exact post about 400 times, and I think the same amount of people as last time actually care about it. Which is zero.

I would disagree with this slightly.

WoW as a game has actually gotten better, with some features being less popular than others.

However, starting in 2010, there was a vast expansion in overall PC game quality that had driven WoW players away from the game. You also have to factor in burnout.

I love WoW. But I cannot play it anymore due to RL. The game itself didn't really disappoint me enough to quit.

So unless we get truly honest data on why people unsub, it's all speculation.

When it comes to Classic WoW. There's a very vocal minority that may have a lot to answer for if it is not a success.

[Arrannin]

We will see. I just posted the same to different thread - I was thinking the same as you do. Until I played Blizzcon demo - and it was fantastic to play something that was harder and more challenging than todays stupidly easy BFA. It might be not about memories but about content that makes you try hard to achieve something. We will see.

[Shigma]

People be like:

[Velshin]

You have a point. My brother and his best friend are like that, to a degree. Especially his friend. Playing old games just because they're old and nostolgic never made sense to me, but it doesn't have to... people like what they like.

This thread isn't an attempt to critisize people for what they like or prefer. It was written with a certain type of person in mind: the kind that bash modern WoW by using Classic as an example of everything they think went wrong with WoW.

While I agree that nostalgia play a very big part yes but it is not all about nostalgia same goes with the one who told you about some players who prefer older system and older games. I for one yes prefer the old FF games and the newer updated mechanics not always good for me personally. I enjoy open world map and check cities and talking to npcs while newer FF games doesn't have that all the time and instead of big world map it gives you this tunnel corridor mini map holding your hand about what to do next. Another example is Dark Souls series I always prefer the first Dark Souls even though Dark Souls 3 is more polished and cleaner. I just don't enjoy it as much as 1.


My point is newer things doesn't always mean they are better products at all and it is not just about nostalgia.

[buurton]

The whole idea of Classic just being about Nostalgia is stupid.

[Sutingu]

They're just hyped because they buy the incorrect hype spread by nostalgic idiots that classic was good.

But when/if they actually play it they will hate it because it's absolute garbage compared to modern games. Every major flaw of BfA is present in classic, only ten times worse.

I have access to the beta. I am preferring it over this POS expansion BFA. I missed having the mass amount of abilities and needing to make macros. Classes have been dumb down so much its actually unreal. I started in WotLK so classic is a new start for me.

[Specialka]

I have access to the beta. I am preferring it over this POS expansion BFA. I missed having the mass amount of abilities and needing to make macros. Classes have been dumb down so much its actually unreal. I started in WotLK so classic is a new start for me.

In Vanilla/Classic, dungeons and raids are the thing that are dumbed down.

[Gungnir]

I would disagree with this slightly.

WoW as a game has actually gotten better, with some features being less popular than others.

However, starting in 2010, there was a vast expansion in overall PC game quality that had driven WoW players away from the game. You also have to factor in burnout.

I love WoW. But I cannot play it anymore due to RL. The game itself didn't really disappoint me enough to quit.

So unless we get truly honest data on why people unsub, it's all speculation.

When it comes to Classic WoW. There's a very vocal minority that may have a lot to answer for if it is not a success.

Firstly, the bolded part is EXTREMELY subjective. Also known as a "personal opinion".

Secondly, the one metric you can follow is the fact that the more they streamlined the game and made it less effort/time/skill required and more of a themepark skinnerbox MMO, the less subs they got.
The argument of "people are getting older and can't play longer anymore" is inherently a flawed argument aswell, as the average age of WoW players back in Vanilla was mid 20's, and they already had families and jobs.
Not to mention that, for example Venruki, people have been making videos or sat on their streams discussing that they thought Vanilla was just nostalgia, that it was just a fad, but when they started playing it they've been pulling 12 hour leveling stints and having to "force themselves" to hop off.

There's clearly something that has been lost over the years in the general quality and feel of the game, but I think far too many people have forgotten this over the years.

[Sutingu]

In Vanilla/Classic, dungeons and raids are the thing that are dumbed down.

Having a 4 button rotation is dumbed down.

[BenBos]

The OP is wrong.

I play board wargames - dozens of them - and my preferred one at the moment was launched ... 37 years ago...

Computer gamers have such a hard time to understand that “new” or “graphics” is not always “better” overall.

I think nostalgia - as such- will play a very limited role in coming back.

I simply think Vanilla WoW has been proven an incredible success and it will show this over the next few years.

[Pendragon]

I can tell how much of an insufferable know-it-all you are based on this post alone. You're dead wrong, though.

Regards,
2004 WoW vet who is currently playing Classic BETA after playing on private classic servers for a long time.

[sirethas]

While the classic lacks the dynamic gameplay, the complexity dungeon and raid encounters, it has something which retail lost and it's sense of community.
WoW was gaining more and more players and blizzard tried to make the game for everyone, to be accessible for biggest variety of players and that's what hurt the game the most, it lost it's MMO-RPG identity. Nowadays it's mostly a solo game while you link your achiev or being judged by RIO score for mythic+. It's very difficult to belong somewhere because whole world is connected, people you part with will become forgotten and your only community is often just a Guild which often doesn't provide a lot of social aspects.

Yes, Classic is miles behind in class design, class balance and raid/dungeons design but it is true to it's identity.

[Gungnir]

The OP is wrong.

I play board wargames - dozens of them - and my preferred one at the moment was launched ... 37 years ago...

Computer gamers have such a hard time to understand that “new” or “graphics” is not always “better” overall.

I think nostalgia - as such- will play a very limited role in coming back.

I simply think Vanilla WoW has been proven an incredible success and it will show this over the next few years.

I don't think it's necessarily PC gamers.
I've been a PC gamer my entire life and I still play AD&D pen and paper with my friends, and do Street Fighter 3 LAN tournaments.

I think it's a certain behavioural quirk that's been popping up in a lot of younger generations, where everything has to be brand new and shiny to be "good".
Of course, this is just a theory, but I've yet to meet anyone that's 30+ with that kind of priority.

[nodlimax]

Let me give you a small lesson in terms of "Nostalgia" vs "Reality".

Over 20 years ago there was a game called "Master of Orion 2" which is and was one of the BEST turn based 4x games ever created. It had some flaws when it came down to diplomacy and late game space combat. Still it is an amazing game and to this day from time to time I boot this game back up to play it again. There was a Master of Orion 3 which was garbage and I'm not even going to talk about that game.

I want to focus on the actual reboot of Master of Orion which was released in late 2016 (about 20 years after MoO2). They tried to stick with the formula of the classic. However they wanted to improve on certain mechanics and evolve things to fix problems MoO2 had. The intention was good but in the end the execution was poor and made the game experience worse overall. Visually the modern MoO obviously looks great and the UI also works pretty well, but mechanically and in terms of game play it is worse than the 20 year old game.

If I had to pick between the two most of the time I'd go for the old game instead of the shiny new one. It doesn't mean the new title was completely awful. It just means that the older game was more enjoyable. "Evolving" a game doesn't necessarily always mean it becomes better. Even in nature whenever creatures or plants evolve you can get evolutionary dead ends.

When I look at WoW:BfA I see a well polished game. I see decent storylines and video sequences. It is pretty okay playing through that content the first time. However as soon you reach the endgame and the focus changes for you and your character the heavy flaws begin to show themselves. Crafting is poor/useless. Class mechanics are shallow and boring. The whole titan forging thing is just gambling turned to the extreme. LFG/LFR have literally destroyed any sense of community that has existed in WoW.

Also how many people actually read quest texts these days? With the whole quest helper stuff you just take all available quests and then go where the markers are. Back in Vanilla you had to read quest texts to get a sense where you need to go because the quest texts contained very relevant information. Today if the quest helper doesn't provide me with right or sufficient information I have to check wowhead because the quest texts usually are just fluff...

Btw. please note that I'm not saying Classic is superior to modern WoW in every way. It's a matter of preference. Also just to make one thing clear. To me the best version of WoW was during The Burning Crusade. So if they ever release a BC server I'd be very happy. I will play Classic though just for fun and as long as I can enjoy it that will be fine as well.

[Gungnir]

Let me give you a small lesson in terms of "Nostalgia" vs "Reality".

Over 20 years ago there was a game called "Master of Orion 2" which is and was one of the BEST turn based 4x games ever created. It had some flaws when it came down to diplomacy and late game space combat. Still it is an amazing game and to this day from time to time I boot this game back up to play it again. There was a Master of Orion 3 which was garbage and I'm not even going to talk about that game.

I want to focus on the actual reboot of Master of Orion which was released in late 2016 (about 20 years after MoO2). They tried to stick with the formula of the classic. However they wanted to improve on certain mechanics and evolve things to fix problems MoO2 had. The intention was good but in the end the execution was poor and made the game experience worse overall. Visually the modern MoO obviously looks great and the UI also works pretty well, but mechanically and in terms of game play it is worse than the 20 year old game.

If I had to pick between the two most of the time I'd go for the old game instead of the shiny new one. It doesn't mean the new title was completely awful. It just means that the older game was more enjoyable. "Evolving" a game doesn't necessarily always mean it becomes better. Even in nature whenever creatures or plants evolve you can get evolutionary dead ends.

When I look at WoW:BfA I see a well polished game. I see decent storylines and video sequences. It is pretty okay playing through that content the first time. However as soon you reach the endgame and the focus changes for you and your character the heavy flaws begin to show themselves. Crafting is poor/useless. Class mechanics are shallow and boring. The whole titan forging thing is just gambling turned to the extreme. LFG/LFR have literally destroyed any sense of community that has existed in WoW.

Also how many people actually read quest texts these days? With the whole quest helper stuff you just take all available quests and then go where the markers are. Back in Vanilla you had to read quest texts to get a sense where you need to go because the quest texts contained very relevant information. Today if the quest helper doesn't provide me with right or sufficient information I have to check wowhead because the quest texts usually are just fluff...

Btw. please note that I'm not saying Classic is superior to modern WoW in every way. It's a matter of preference. Also just to make one thing clear. To me the best version of WoW was during The Burning Crusade. So if they ever release a BC server I'd be very happy. I will play Classic though just for fun and as long as I can enjoy it that will be fine as well.

Wish I could give you some form of internet cookie for this.
Newer doesn't necessarily mean better, there's a lot of nuance and character that gets lost once you try to start ironing out the quirks that on paper might look minor, but the more you take away, the more you take away of the games character that you once grew to love.

I'm big into arcade fighting games, ever since Street Fighter 2 released.
Still to this day, SF3 is the best in the series by far. There were so many nuances to the game, so many variables you could work on and get better at, things that have been chipped away over the years to make it more "streamlined and accessible". Hell, even if you played Q which was by far the worst character on the roster, if you got good at playing him then you could really go far simply due to the amount of things you could use to your advantage.