Pig & Whistle Tales - A World of Warcraft Podcast

The Future of Classic WoW Through a Modern Lens

• Gabriel • Season 4 • Episode 70

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Ever wondered why WoW Classic's re-release hasn't ignited the same passion as its original debut? Join me as I uncover the lukewarm reception, diving into player concerns about server activity, the intimidating leveling grind, and the impact of paid boosts. We also explore the latest in-game happenings, from Kordak's elusive world boss location to the exciting Wrath Time Walking bonus event and the intense Shadow Pan Showdown brawl. Get ready to embark on a journey through Azeroth, filled with insights, speculation, and community feedback that sheds light on the current state and future of Classic servers.

This episode also opens a discussion on inclusivity and accessibility in gaming, using World of Warcraft as a compelling case study. We examine how features like customizable character options and colorblind modes enhance the experience for all players, and debate the role of quality of life changes, like dual-spec systems, in reshaping gameplay without upsetting traditionalists. We further explore whether certain features in Classic WoW are mere adaptations or drawn from the retail version. Tune in for a thought-provoking conversation that highlights the importance of understanding diverse player needs and fostering a welcoming gaming community.

Hope you all enjoy and hope you relate to any of these stories. And I will speak to you all in the next episode!

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Speaker 1:

Music. Thank you, hello, and welcome to the Pig and Whistle Tales from Azeroth. As always here at the Pig and Whistle Inn in Stormwind, I go through a variety of subjects with regards to World of Warcraft, so grab a bottle or a pint, sit back and enjoy this episode. We'll be looking at more classic bits and bobs. I'm going to be giving my thoughts on it and seeing what other people are thinking of it at the moment, and there is a lot that people think of it at the moment. But, yeah, as always, we have the weekly news. We have Kordak is your weekly world boss for the week. He is located within oh my god, I was going to say the waking shore for a moment. He is located within, not found dracis. Why am I thinking of dragonflight? Um zones, why is dragonflight suddenly popping up into my head? I've been doing it for a couple years now, so you know. That's probably why. Um, let's see, you have ringing deeps, you have ashkahet, you have hello fall. The first zone, the first zone you want to go? No, that's the city. You know what it's in the first zone of the new land. How I'm? I've completely blanked. I have completely blanked. I don't know. My brain has just not functioning and given me the name of that first zone, so apologies for that, but that's where he is located within the first zone.

Speaker 1:

The bonus event for this week is Wrath at Time Walking. This means that you can do Wrath Dungeons and get Time Walking badges in order to buy new Wrath current or gear. Now, this new gear that has been put into the wrath time walking is new mounts, pets, weapons, armor, many different things, so you can actually go there and get some new bits and pieces. You don't have to save it all because you've bought everything from the previous time walking badge vendor. We also have shadow pan showdown as your brawl for the week. This is essentially a 6v6 and you have to kill the enemy team's boss before they kill yours, as well as pvp the enemy team at the same time. It's quite cool. I like it. It's certainly a different take on arenas. Um, I think it's very much worth testing it out and seeing how it goes. We also have void bound and tyrannical actual mythical fixes for the week. Void bound a ad will spawn, simply kill it and you get a nice buff, very simple and tyrannical. The bosses and the mobs that they spawn have increased health and damage. So bring a talent build that can accommodate for that.

Speaker 1:

So I want to start off with this post. Is it me or does WoW Classic re-release seem like a failure? Okay, it seems that the re-release of Classic doesn't have the same hype that the original Classic did and a small fraction of the player base. Um, I was on the one of the pvp servers today and there were only 10 layers. That is insane. Back when classic came out, it had multiple servers. That, uh, with that many layers, just seems that, like blizzard should have done something different, because this isn't it. Why does it? What does everyone else think? Now, this is quite a tame like comment, don't you think? I think this is a relatively tame forum post. Guess what People have flagged it. People have flagged it on the forums and I don't see why. I'm guessing this is people who play classic who don't like the idea that it's a failure and, to be honest, like I've been saying, it is somewhat of a failure because they have screwed over other servers like classic era servers. Um, but yeah, let's see. Some people will reply. I agree, definitely feels like fresh servers are finished before they took off.

Speaker 1:

There's a couple reasons for the failure, but the biggest one is that we're all tired of the monotonous level grind and only three weeks to get to molten core that is. That is simply unrealistic for most adults. Kind of is uh depends on how long you can play. If you can play for a couple hours each night, um, which is the sort of average uh you get, then probably, yeah, it's unrealistic to have them couple hours and get to level 60. If you want to raid, and certainly if you want to gear as well, um, adding a pair boost or paid boost is the only way to get hype going. Otherwise these servers will probably just get merged with era eventually.

Speaker 1:

Paid boost no, that shouldn't be ever in classic even I'm against that. I understand paid boosts in retail and stuff. If you really want to just skip everything, I think that you, in order to get a paid boost, you need to already have levelled a max or a character to max level. In order to unlock the opportunity to even pay for a boost, I think you need to have actually played the game first. So I'm not sure why he's saying that, but it is what it is.

Speaker 1:

The sad thing is, with the classic era sort of merge, I think he's right. I think these will just get moved into sort of classic era and get put into TBC and then Wrath of the Lich King and stuff like that, and I don't see these becoming much of a thing. They'll just do the same thing that they did. Well, this year, in five more years time it's like oh, you want classic, classic, classic. We hear you like here you go, um, let's keep going. So the thing fresh servers would have the same hype as initial classic launch is just plain foolish thinking. Yes, I do agree. Should they have done anything else? Sure? Um? Yes, it is stupid. Firstly, because classic wasn't released for 15 years when they released classic. So 2004 was obviously world of warcraft's release and they released classic in 2019. So 15 year gap is obviously a massive jump, rather than just oh, we've played classic um in 2019 and 2020, so let's re-release classic in 2024, like just over or five years after the initial release of classic.

Speaker 1:

I don't think it's a very good idea. I think that you lose a lot of your nostalgic values from doing that. In my honest opinion, um, especially when you already have classic era there, um, don't think it's a failure at all, though there are thousands of people playing the game at any given time of the day. There are a lot of people playing, yes, but how many of these people are going to make it to max level? How many of these people are going to raid? How many of these people are going to be doing end game content consistently, like dungeons, scholomance, stratholme, etc. Etc.

Speaker 1:

I think the player base will drop off dramatically, um, after about a month or so, which is sad because classic deserves the player base and the servers to be up and running, lively and stuff. That's what classic thrives off of, with people actually talking to each other and stuff like that. But sadly I don't see it sticking around. I really don't. I think this will eventually become very dead realms and, it's sad to say, I genuinely think that I would love to be proved wrong, because I think that Classic has always had potential and still always will, because there is a fan base for it and the nostalgic value that wow has, just from people leveling in 2004, 5, 6, whenever, and even the simplicity nature of it. I think it has a sort of charm to it. I think that it's very good to keep going and I hope that it does well, but it's tough to see the player base sticking around for it. It really is tough to see. So I'm sad about this, but that's my honest opinion. But this is ridiculous. Why is this flagged for? Like bad like. Why is this flagged on the forums is absolutely ridiculous.

Speaker 1:

I don't think people like to hear these sort of um, kind of harsh realities of it. I really don't think so. I think classic players certainly don't, because when you talk to someone about classic and it's like oh yeah, I play like classic retail and all of the wows and stuff and I prefer retail, like you know, they seem to get very defensive and it's always the case. Now, this isn't everyone, but when have you ever seen someone go, oh my god, like this is ridiculous, go play this version of wow, like, go back to classic or whatever? I don't see anyone doing that in retail. Um, whereas in classic you always say, oh my god, go play retail. Like, yeah, I, I will. I do enjoy retail.

Speaker 1:

Retail is in a very good spot at the moment. You know, I and I don't think they like the idea that classic is a lesser version of retail, of the original product, and that's the sad thing. Um, because it is, let's face it is, classic has less player base than retail. Same with classic cataclysm stuff like that. I think if you add up all of the classics the hardcore classic era, the fresh servers, classic cataclysm, I think you have a bigger player base on retail and I think it's not even close. So I don't think they like that reality that people enjoy retail more than they do classic, and it just seems ridiculous that this has been flagged. Uh, I don't get why. It's absolutely ridiculous because he's asking a genuine question, um, or and just stating his opinion. That's all it is. It's a pin. It's his opinion at the end of the day.

Speaker 1:

All right, let's move on to the next one. So this one is a bit different. Uh, I'm really not going to linger on this for long. Um, so can we go back to male and female, not trolling here want to have a legitimate conversation and I welcome people who have difference differences in opinions, but I personally think the idea of renaming male and female to body type one and two is just really dumb. I thought over over time I'd get used to it, but every time I go to create a new character I shake my head and go man, how stupid. What is Blizzard thinking? The shirtless buff dude is obviously male. The skinny, scantily clad woman wearing a bra and underwear is obviously a female. Let's end the madness and revert this change. Thank you, okay, firstly, who the fuck cares? Genuinely no one cares.

Speaker 1:

All right, it matters to some people because some people might want to. You know, they might think that they're a woman, they might think that they're a man, you know, whatever. And seeing this sort of thing in a game really gives them hope and, you know, makes them feel good and comfortable. For someone like this person and myself, I couldn't give two shits. I genuinely couldn't. This guy shouldn't as well. Okay, it's not affecting his health. It's not affecting his mental well-being, it's not affecting his gameplay. Okay, make the damn character. You hover over body type one and body type two for about two seconds. All right, you hover over it, you click the body type and then you simply make your character. You literally don't think about it otherwise. Okay, that's all it is. It doesn't matter. But to some people it really does and it means a lot to them, so why wouldn't you keep it?

Speaker 1:

So the example that I'm going to make here is colorblind mode. Okay, now it's different, obviously, but colorblind mode in classic never existed back in 2004. When the re-release of classic was happening back in 2019, people wanted hashtag no changes. Okay, this is what some people wantedizzard kind of listened to it and kind of didn't. What blizzard did, though, was add options into the game, into the options menu, that allow people who are colorblind to change the colors of the game and be able to view world of warcraft in the best experience that they can. Absolutely amazing change something that should have been done, like in classic, no matter what, and you know people should be okay with this and you know say, yeah, this is fine, this isn't going to affect me, but it will help those who obviously need it. But people weren't. People were really upset that they were changing something in the options menu for colourblind people. Like, how ridiculously stupid do you need to be to complain about something like that? Genuinely, how ridiculous do you need to be to say, oh, my god, we shouldn't have colorblind mode in the options because it wasn't in original? Wow, like, are you stupid? Are you thicken the skull of something? This is so that people who are colorblind have a better experience playing the game.

Speaker 1:

Not not only you deserve to enjoy the game. Other people do, and other people have certain limitations, whether they're colorblind or have any sort of disability, and it's ridiculous. People need to just understand that it doesn't affect them and it doesn't affect their mental well-being, it doesn't affect their health, their. But sometimes people need these things in the game to either one feel comfortable playing the game or two enjoy the game Like, and it's ridiculous. This guy needs to just accept that this is how it is, it's not going to change now, it's not affecting him in any way, shape or form, and he needs to just get over it. Just play the game. It's that simple. It might not affect you, but some people might think this is an amazing change and really find it comforting that blizzard might be listening to that sort of thing.

Speaker 1:

Instead of male and female, you have body type one and two again I couldn't care about it, I, I couldn't, I couldn't care about it, I couldn't, I couldn't care about it at all. But some people do and people don't understand that. People cannot understand that and I don't get why. It's absolutely ridiculous. But yeah, anyways, we'll move swiftly on from that one. I just thought that I wanted to disagree with that one real quick.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so dual spec is not a quality of life change. Alright, dual spec is a massive gameplay change that, while it could make it easier to respec, it is absolutely not just a quality of life change, as I've heard people trying to say. An example of quality of life change, as I've heard people trying to say, an example of quality of life change is something like we added the key ring so that all your keys are in there and no longer take up inventory slots. Okay, that's already in classic, so I don't know what you're on about. Um, a quality of life change for respeccing might be reducing the cost or just allowing it to save your bars between specs with no other changes whatsoever. Pretending that just copy-slash-pasting dual-spec into classic vanilla is just a quality-of-life change or claiming that it has no downsides at all is straight-up dishonest when it has an impact on the of vanilla itself, oh no, the gameplay of vanilla will be I, instead of casting frostbolt and pressing scorch and fireball the entire game. You know, oh my god, what a turnaround. Okay, firstly, it is a quality of life change. Anything that is quality of life means that it makes it easier in the game to do something. So, whether that be change specs, change classes, race, whatever it might be in the game, do quests, more profession, like levels, you know, whatever then it is a quality of life change.

Speaker 1:

I cannot tell you how many times I went in classic to respec to from my pvp spec, into my raiding spec, into my farming spec is insane. Okay, I play mage about the entirety of probably around 506, about 1,000 gold. Okay, and that's being generous or like very reserved with my guess. Okay, I probably spent about 1,000 gold respecs in classic, okay, and that was for raiding, that was for pvp, that was for farming mobs and like, getting gold and stuff. I spent that much gold respeccing. Okay, this is a massive quality of life change because if I had this, I wouldn't have spent nearly as much. I would have spent probably 500 gold, if that, you know, and that might be respeccing my frost, because I wanted to aoe, I wanted to do a mara one pool or zulfarac, like aoe farming or some some shit like that.

Speaker 1:

You know, that is a quality of life change because it makes it so much easier and I don't have to worry about getting gold. Okay, I do not have to worry about that at all, like, if I want to do multiple different things within classic, which, let's face it, it's tough to pay for talent changes. It really really is in classic. So, yes, this is a quality of life change. It is a big change, but it is quality of life. Okay, that is it. It is as simple as that is that? It makes everyone else's life in classic easier. Very simple, and this one. This is what I want to end it on. This is really weird. So just admit it blizzard. Okay, what are they admitting? What? What do you guys think? You know, I'll give you a couple seconds, but what could they be admitting? Let's find out. We are taking ideas from turtle.

Speaker 1:

Wow, all the add-on developers for the looking for group tool weren't you. They may judge you, but i't, I won't judge you. Blizzard, it was a good idea, okay, okay. So, um, okay, yeah, my brain. So, looking for group yes, they added it in classic and it's a very simple iteration of it. I think it's a very good iteration and it works with classic. I like it.

Speaker 1:

Now, looking for group has been in wow for a very long time okay, since 2008 actually. So this is the looking for group that we got in wrath of the lich king. You know where you sign up for your dungeon. It puts you in the dungeon group teleports you to the dungeon, that sort of thing. This is a doled down looking for group tool. Okay, this is the looking for group tool that is in bfa or legion when you're searching for mythics, um, but just a very simple version of it. And yes, people have made add-ons and stuff previously for when classic came out, you know, when classic came out, people did do a Looking for Group add-on where anyone who put Looking for More it would keep a record of it so you could see what groups were going and stuff like that.

Speaker 1:

But they aren't copying anyone. The people who have copied from WoW are the people that you've mentioned there. Wow are the people that you've mentioned there. Turtle wow, like are literally a byproduct and a different game to world of warcraft. They are people who have copied the main base of the game and are adding their own different things to it and elements.

Speaker 1:

But wow had looking for group before. Turtle wow was even a thing, okay. So it's absolutely crazy that people think that they're copying something from someone. Now, don't get me wrong. They have done in the past hardcore wow, for example. It was copied from the community. The community were the ones to introduce hardcore wow into like world of warcraft with the add-on and this obviously got turned into an actual game mode within world of warcraft.

Speaker 1:

So I think, yes, they have copied some things, but they're looking for group tool, like, really, are you being that stupid? No, they didn't copy it, let's face it. They just put a very simple iteration of it from the retail wowW version into classic. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less. Very simple. Okay, I've got to end it there. Thank you all very much for listening. Do check out all of the social medias down below, as well as Etsy. Constant stuff happening over there, constant stuff being put up on the shop. But thank you all very much once again and go with Valorfriend. Goodbye all. But thank you all very much once again and go with our friend. Goodbye all. Thank you.