World Of Warcraft’s Game Directors Says He Wants To Fix It’s Messy Lore
To say that World of Warcraft’s lore is extensive is a bit of an understatement. It spans nearly three decades in real world time and millennia in the game world that started with the original Warcraft real-time strategy games, evolved through multiple novels, novellas, and short stories from different authors, and continues to grow as Blizzard Entertainment releases more expansions for the long-running MMORPG.
With that in mind, it’s easy to see how new players can easily get lost and overwhelmed, especially since sources are scattered over various media, including the internet. Even WoW game director Ion Hazzikostas acknowledged it as a weakness of the game during this week’s Community Council livechat, saying that he’s talked about it with creative director Chris Metzen.
Hazzikostas believes that gameplay might not best way to get the entire story across or at least get new players quickly up to speed on what’s currently going on in the WoW universe. He cites Anduin Wrynn as an example, as he’ll be playing a central role in The War Within expansion that’s set to launch sometime next year.
“What was his journey? Where did that start? … What has he lost? Gameplay isn't fully the right way to get someone caught up there, but—in-game journals, the ability to view cinematics, things that don't require you to go to YouTube and watch cinematics there … it’s something we're definitely discussing,” the game director said.
“There's no specific plans to announce,” he added, “but that's the kind of thing we kind of want to move towards. Otherwise when creating new content, where possible nowadays, we have more tools at our disposal.” These tools include Chromie Time and using phases to allow players to revisit older timelines so they can delve into any loose ends in the current storyline.
I’ve followed the Warcraft lore for years now and have even read some of the novels, although I admittedly got only as far as Cataclysm when I took an “extended” break from World of Warcraft and have only picked up bits and pieces for the succeeding expansions. With new Worldsoul Saga multi-year story arc set to begin next year, I’ve got a lot of catching up to do and it’s good to know that the developers are thinking up ways to help ease fans into the new narrative.
