I just wanted to write down a few more thoughts on Classic Cataclysm. While I'm not planning to play it, I guess now is the time to have opinions on it. I was particularly inspired by Wilhelm's recent post on the subject, in which he explains how he kind of came around to looking forward to Classic Cata, and how he feels he probably didn't give the expansion an entirely fair shake back in the day due to being off to a bad start for a number of reasons.
As for me, I'm kind of surprised how charitable I feel towards Cata (and therefore also its Classic version) in hindsight, especially compared to Wrath of the Lich King. At first glance, this simply doesn't make sense, because as far as I can tell from my old blog posts on here, I actually got more enjoyment out of Wrath than out of Cata, not to mention that Cata was when I originally gave up on WoW.
I think the difference is that while Cata had plenty of disappointments in store for me, Wrath - while more fun in some places - actively annoyed me in others, and there's a big difference in sentiment between "well, they tried but it was kind of disappointing" and "are they actively trying to piss me off or what". It struck me at one point that many of the things that felt bad about Cata were not really the fault of any of Cata's new features, but simply the result of changes originally made in Wrath of the Lich King (such as the addition of the dungeon finder or the push towards only caring about the latest raid tier).
I guess this explains why I had rather strong feelings about not wanting to play Wrath Classic when it came out, while Cata evokes more of a "probably not, but maybe?" I do remember quite liking some things about Cata back in the day.
Then again, looking back at that list also makes it kind of clear that there isn't really any reason for me to go back for those features. Rated battlegrounds and endgame as it was at Cata's release were kind of heavily dependent on being in a guild, something I no longer have in progressive Classic, plus they were also the kind of things that while I enjoyed them at the time, I'm not sure I'd want to go back and do them all over again. The rated battlegrounds in particular ultimately ended like all my organised PvP ventures, with me stepping down since my lack of skill was just holding the rest of the team back. As for the dungeons and raids... they were pretty fun at launch from what I remember, but I'm not sure they were fun enough for me to want to pick things up again and level a character through Northrend and the 80-85 Cata zones (which I remember being very tedious to repeat).
As for the other three items on the list (transmog, the revamped levelling zones and archaeology), those are all things that I can do just as well if not better in retail. Archaeology in specific is vastly improved in retail compared to how it was at Cataclysm launch. I remember when every dig site only contained a few digs before it was exhausted, each dig only gave a tiny number of fragments, and you only got skill-ups from surveying up to skill level 75 or so (out of... 515 I think?), at which point your only way of making any further progress was through combines. That whole process is so much more well-balanced and fun in retail now, so why would I want to play an all-around worse version of it?
I guess the main draw of Cata Classic is going to be for people who've been having a good time in Wrath with guildies and friends, because Cata will bring more things to do in a similar vein and there's no reason not to continue. In that scenario there's really no reason to hate on Cata just for the sake of it. However, it is yet another step further away from original Classic, so I also can't blame anyone for deciding that this is the point to jump off the train.
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I'm pretty mellow about Cataclysm these days. If folks want to play the Classic version more power to them, but it isn't for me. My nostalgia is the pre-Cataclysm world, not reliving Wow's expansion history. That said, I will keep my characters around in case Blizzard ever links the appearances between the two systems.
ReplyDeleteTwo things still stand out to me from Cataclysm. One is my strong dislike of Uldum once you get past the Ramkahen quests and basically become Harrison Jones's sidekick. I think I've only ever finished that chain once.
The other is Blizzard discovering yet again that players will work around Blizzard's game decisions to arguably their own advantage. When the game launched you had to discover a dungeon entrance in order to be able to queue for that dungeon in the finder. Enough players were avoiding finding certain dungeons that were considered too hard that Blizzard quickly removed that restriction in order to fill the queues properly for all the Cataclysm dungeons. I was the person that found the entrances so that I could do them all, but I was amused that someone had the foresight to figure out this strategy so that they could get only the dungeons they wanted. :)
Oh man, I'd completely forgotten about the dungeon queue dodging thing! I just always tried to discover all of them as soon as possible and thought it was a pretty neat system to ensure you didn't end up in a place that was completely strange to you. I'm always reminded of it when I go to certain places and stuff like "Discovered: Grim Batol entrance" still pops up.
DeleteOddly enough Cataclysm was probably when I got most heavily invested in WoW, and for me what is even more odd is that I spent most of my time at the cap doing PvP for gear. Blizzard ticked me off by being terrible to their employees, so I haven't really contemplated subbing since all that stuff came out. Now that MS has bought Activision, I guess I can pretend they are now a new company?
ReplyDeleteBut I don't have much urge to go back for Cataclysm, I still feel like I played it to death even ten years on. Also, with hindsight the pre-Cata era is simply a better game to me.
I did miss out on Legion, so I may go back and check that out in a few years. I was slightly tempted to check out Lich King, I missed the era where that was the endgame and with hindsight that was apparently the biggest the "good version" of the game ever got. I guess I still could for four or five months.