It's been a few days since BlizzCon, and I've had some time to gather my thoughts on what Blizzard announced for WoW Classic. I managed to watch it all live, and even kept up with my two brothers via Discord who also play WoW. I have to say that it was a lot more than I ever expected!
World of Warcraft: Forever is the name of the next project, and while it's massively on the nose in name, it really does encapsulate how much Blizzard wants the community to know this is going to be the main focus of the Classic team for the foreseeable future. I went in with somewhat low expectations overall, I had preferences for what I wanted, of course, but even something like a SoD re-do would have been fun for at least a month or two, it was more so a case of how long the fun will last, as opposed to will or will I not like it, as I tend to like pretty much anything related to WoW.
Honestly, I don't really want to just sit here and write everything that is coming, but I was not expecting anywhere near the amount of content that ended up getting announced. I was also not expecting it to be such a far departure from Classic Era. Blizzard have said Forever is Classic+, but I think in design it falls very much as a sort of middle ground between Classic and Retail, which on Blizzards part I think is incredibly smart and forward-thinking. They'll now have 3 vastly different versions of WoW that will appeal to entirely different groups (as mentioned by Holly, there is very little overlap between Retail and Classic). Once the newness of Forever wears off, I expect it to have a very dedicated player base, with the Classic purists likely to be moving back to Classic Era or Anniversary after a month or so, which I think is totally okay.
In terms of content, it's a huge amount of things. Multiple new dungeons, new raids, new zones, expanded original zones, updated graphics, new systems like camping and a lot more. All the info is out there if you want to find it, or you can check the video below. The biggest thing for me was their intent focus on "horizontal progression" and the levelling journey itself. Again, this massively separates it from retail WoW and will give Forever its own identity and community. As someone who has never really partaken in the rat race of retail WoW's vertical progression, or cared about having the best gear/stats, this is hugely exciting to me. This excitement grew even more once I realised we were getting a roleplay option again in the new "realmless" system they have, which was totally missing from anniversary. Roleplay realms/communities are always my favourite way to play an MMORPG.
I've seen a lot of discourse over the new elf race the Skyborne, but personally, I think it's a fine addition. I'm not huge on them being a neutral race, and I've never been a massive elf person, but I can totally see why Blizzard have done it the way they have. I'd say it's pretty common knowledge by now how massively popular Blood Elves were at release, and Blizzard purposefully put them on the Horde, as they realised the Horde needed a "pretty" race for balancing reasons. Likewise, I think this time around, they've just given both factions the pretty elf race from the start because they know if they stick it on one faction it'll likely cause similar issues.
I've seen people ask why they didn't just do High Elves and Blood Elves for each faction, but personally, I prefer this. It's a brand-new race, with new lore and stories to tell, and most importantly, they're designed to be distinct and to be in WoW Forever. In my opinion, Blood Elves wouldn't really make any sense in the context of Forever, as their entire reason for existing was designed around the story for the TBC expansion, specifically Kael'thas leaving for Outland and joining with Illidan. It wouldn't really make any sense to just throw them into Forever without any of the lore or story beats surrounding them. Skyborne on the other hand have a dedicated story, with a unique starting zone that fits into the world of Forever. You can also make them look pretty much like Blood/High elves anyway, so I think the entire "issue" has been blown out of proportion (as the internet tends to do). Similarly, I saw a lot of hampering for Ogres, but that's a lot of work for a race that let's be honest, barely anyone would actually play long term. As mentioned, Blizzard learned quite quickly back in vanilla that the more monstrous looking races tend to not really be played at all in comparison to the prettier humanoid looking races. I could see Ogres in the future, but having them on the Horde and a pretty elf race on Alliance would not have been good for the game, and I'm sure Blizzard knew that.
I'm even more surprised by the fact that WoW Forever is included in the sub fee just like Classic is. After seeing all the information and content coming, I was fully expecting a box cost much like how retail gets with expansions, but they're only charging for the elf race and its relevant starting zone. I've also seen a lot of complaints about this (I think it's time for me to stop reading places like Reddit and forums, because they seem to just be non-stop whining & negativity), and I don't understand the complaints. I think this is so much better than a hard box cost, and people going in expecting all of this just in the sub fee in 2026 were being massively naive. Furthermore, I'm fully expecting an in game shop similar to retail WoW as well, especially if the plan is for new content to come in at a regular cadence. Ultimately, this is the reality of game in 2026, like it or not.
I did find it weird how we got literally zero mention of the future plans for the other versions of Classic like MoP and Anniversary, but I fully expect some news in the near future regarding those, as I can understand them wanting to fully focus on Forever for Blizzcon. I do think it's pretty clear we won't be getting WoD Classic, or that surely would have got a mention on the weekend, and it seems even WotLK anniversary is up in the air now, we will see in the near future, hopefully.
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