So World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth ended on an interesting note, with long time narrative character Sylvanas Windrunner revealing herself to be…a bit of a douchebag, to be honest.
The story of World of Warcraft has definitely ramped up in recent expansions, so it’s no surprise that Shadowlands feels a little more ‘WHAT HAPPENS NEXT’ rather than ‘HERE IS THE NEXT BADDY’.
The cinematic trailer does an excellent job of carrying the story forward, with Sylvanas D-bagger heading to the seconding Lich King (Bolvar) and messing with his special hat:
So it turns out that if you destroy the magic helmet that controls the undead, you open a portal to the afterlife. And thus, Shadowlands main hook is revealed – we’re going to see dead people. An official statement from Blizzard offered the following:
World of Warcraft players entering the fabled Shadowlands will find the realms of the dead in upheaval. Under the normal order, departed souls were delivered to a realm appropriate to the lives they led, but now, all souls are being funnelled into the Maw, where the most wicked are damned to suffer for eternity
…Like I said, sounds spooky. Don’t just take my word for it, check out some of the gorgeous visual styles present in the gameplay/feature trailer:
It’s a fairly pared-back expansion trailer – Blizzard has learned to maybe not spotlight ‘major’ features prior to release, in case the scope of the release changes. Instead, we have a hard and fast look at all the gameplay content to expect – and good lord are those some sexy zones.
As a long-time Darksiders fan, I am a huge lover of all things gothic and stylised. It looks like Shadowlands aims to bring players to a very morbid – but fun – new world, with gargoyles and vampires abound.
There is also an interesting little detail that hasn’t received a big focus – a fairly massive level squish to a max of level 60 once more. Each expansion did make a massive point of adding more levels to the game for players to earn – getting into the triple digits and all, but Shadowlands promises to “introduce a new levelling system, meant to provide a meaningful sense of advancement with every level achieved.”
This means that current max-level characters will begin Shadowlands at level 50 and work toward the new level cap of 60 – a little bit of Deja Vu for all the players who remember doing this a long time ago.
There will of course be new raids, new dungeons, all the standard stuff that a long-time WoW player should expect…but a neat new feature that has my interest piqued is definitely the Tower of the Damned.
Apparently inspired by roguelike games, the Tower of the Damned is promised to be a ‘highly replayable’ experience, with ‘ever-changing halls and chambers’ where you can ‘do battle with the minions of the Jailer, Torghast’s vile ruler.’
Basically, sounds a bit like the WoW Devs have found a way to incorporate Diablo III’s Nephilim Rifts into the game, creating some kind of ‘endless’ (or at least modular) dungeon to create and ever-changing challenge. Though I am deep into the World of Warcraft: Classic experience, this does have me interested and wanting to know more.
Also, far more importantly – new hairstyles will be added to the barbershop for your character. That’s what we are all here for right?
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands will be available on or before 31 December, 2020
Known throughout the interwebs simply as M0D3Rn, Ash is bad at video games. An old guard gamer who suffers from being generally opinionated, it comes as no surprise that he is both brutally loyal and yet, fiercely whimsical about all things electronic. On occasion will make a youtube video that actually gets views. Follow him on YouTube @Bad at Video Games
