So I’ve been playing WoW again, on a new character. I’m pretty sure people who are playing it right now can relate. TL;DR, it’s a whole new ballgame – at least until you hit Outland again. This post by Spinks pretty much nails it. Trying to enjoy all this new content as a level 80 in full epixxx doesn’t work. You have to roll a new alt to get it. To relearn it. Because everything’s different, from the way skills and talents work to the zones and quests (a comfortable mix of something old, something new, something borrowed something blue). Even the lowbie instances have changed – I ran the daily on my level 20-something priest, got Stockades and ran into… Hogger. He’s the end boss.
I could imagine some folks not interested in grinding 1-60 again might be a little annoyed right now, and I’m guessing come Cataclysm, the 80-85 grind and early life as 85 will probably be a little…uneventful. The game’s done a bit of a backflip from the metagaming epeenfest that Wrath became, to a complete new experience of discovering lore and getting excited about the little things again. So far I’m loving it, and it’s sheer brilliance on Blizzard’s part. The game needed this. A complete overhaul, from the ground up. Simply slapping another tier of content for 80+ might have kept the core happy for a while, but sometimes a game isn’t about the game, and more about the world. 4.0.x and Cataclysm looks set to reimagine the universe, which suits me just fine. I was getting tired of grinding epix/xp/rep/whatever, and welcome a return to a more innocent time of exploration, immersion and simple wide-eyed discovery.
