Blizzard interview focuses on Wrath and the changing player experience

by James Egan Aug 24th 2008 at 12:00PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Classes, Expansions, Game mechanics, Interviews, MMO industry, PvE

As the Wrath of the Lich King expansion gets closer to release, World of Warcraft players have a number of questions about how the game experience is going to change for them as the title moves forward. Co-lead designer Tom Chilton and producer J. Allen Brack spoke with Oli Welsh from Eurogamer at the Games Convention in Leipzig, about where the Blizzard title is now, and where it's heading.

The interview touched on how Blizzard will handle instances in the Death Knight starting zone in Wrath of the Lich King, with Brack stating that instances won't actually be used. Rather, a player's environment will shift between different world states dependent upon quest progression. Other highlights of their talk include the design aspects of the hero class, faster leveling, and whether new players can really have the same experience that drew so many gamers to World of Warcraft years ago. Be sure to check out the Eurogamer interview for the full story on Wrath of the Lich King, particularly the Achievement system and how Blizzard feels about its growing competition.

One of Azeroth's millions of citizens? Check out our ongoing coverage of the World of Warcraft, and be sure to touch base with our sister site WoW Insider for all your Lich King needs!

Tags: blizzard, classes, competition, design, dual-box, eurogamer, expansions, fantasy, game-mechanics, games-convention, gc, hero, hero-class, instances, interview, interviews, j-allen-brack, leipzig, leveling, oli-welsh, pve, quest-progression, quests, recruit-a-friend, tom-chilton, world-of-warcraft, wotlk, wow, wrath, wrath-of-the-lich-king

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

SgtBaker said on 12:07AM 8-25-2008

"It's actually not instances. What we do is we have different world states, and depending on what quests you've completed, it changes what world state you're seeing. It's also broken up between Horde and Alliance... because until you finish that quest, we don't really want the Horde and Alliance conflict muddying what's going on. The Lich King doesn't care for PVP."

Right, so I'm going to be placed in completely different state of the world and all my friends are in some other state that makes it impossible for them to interact with me? And I need to grind a bunch of quests to get to them?

I hope this isn't used too extensively, because it makes playing with friends really hard unless you follow their progression curve closely. Can anyone in Beta explain how this really works and how extensively this is used?

Breck said on 11:43AM 8-25-2008

James Egan should learn to read. The part about instances was in reference to the Death Knight starting area only. It in itself is a series of instances. No one else can go there, just new Death Knights. As you progress along the quest chain you are placed into new "instances" that reflect the respective changes indicated in the quest story. The only other people you can see during your Death Knight starting quests are other Death Knights of your own faction that are at the same level of progression. Once you have completed the entire quest chain, you are placed into the "regular" world with everyone else.

Traditional dungeons or "instances" still exist and still function in the same manner as they always have.