World of Warcraftrecently announced the Wrath of the Lich King expansion is coming to the Classic servers. Wrath of the Lich King brought players to the frozen continent of Northrend, where they faced off against the Lich King and his undead Scourge on the roof of the world. The expansion was among the most beloved inWoWhistory, and itsannouncement alongside its brand-new Dragonflightexpansiongathered almost as much excitement.
Game Rant participated in a group interview withWorld of WarcraftClassiclead software engineer Brian Birmingham and principal system designer Kris Zierhut about Wrath of the Lich King Classic’s grand return. As members of the original Wrath of the Lich King team, Birmingham and Zierhut are as passionate about the development ofWorld of Warcraftas they are knowledgeable. The developers shared some of the most difficult parts of resurrecting Wrath of the Lich King, and talked about the future ofWorld of Warcraft Classic.
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The Obstacles of Bringing Wrath of the Lich King to Classic
One of thegreatest challenges for Wrath of the Lich King Classiccomes from its coding. Consolidating the data from Classic, Wrath of the Lich King, and retailWorld of Warcraftinto a singular experience is a complex endeavor. According to Birmingham, it requires importing the code from VanillaWorld of Warcraft,Burning Crusade, and Wrath of the Lich Kingand aligning it with past and present Classic and retailWorld of Warcraftversions.
“We’re dealing with six different version formats and trying to ensure the changes that happen in one are appropriately reflected in the correct place in the version we release later. That is a challenge we are grappling with by documenting the changes and thinking about which versions make the most sense to use.”
According to Birmingham, thein-gameWorld of Warcraftmapsare some of the most complicated parts to convert. “[The world map] system changed significantly over various patches,” he said, “We built all these systems, and then later refactored them to make them more cohesive.” The data from the maps from various eras ofWorld of Warcraftare all different, and streamlining it was an unexpected challenge.
Likewise, spells have been formatted and reformatted several times over the years, and ironically, Zierhut was the one who did much of the spell script formatting for retailWorld of Warcraftin the past. “And we’re going to have to do it again!” he lamented, “Now, we have the Lich King version that never got fixed.” Wrath of the Lich King was the first time abilities had unique spell scripts attached to various difficulties of spells, but the ever-growing complexity of theWarcraftcode means they needed to be re-written to function with the game’s engine.
Wrath of the Lich King Classic will set class balance to where it was at the end of the expansion’s lifespan, like it did in its previous releases. This ensures all the classes — especially the wildly-overpoweredDeath Knight hero class introduced in Wrath of the Lich King— will operate on their intended power levels.
One of the most difficult decisions World of Warcraft had to make was what to do withthe existing Classic servers. When it was developing Classic, two camps of players emerged. “There were people who wanted to go back and progress through the expansions again,” Birmingham explained, “And another group who just wanted the original game as it was. We want to ensure we preserve the promise to both of those groups.”
Because of this, World of Warcraft Classic is keeping the Vanilla server frozen in time, while progressingall theBurning Crusadeserversto Wrath of the Lich King when it goes live. Of course, the Vanilla Classicservers will continue to relive events with Seasons of Mastery to ensure it does not become stale, andWorld of Warcraft Classiccould consider doing Season of Mastery servers with other Burning Crusade and other past expansions if there is a demand for it.
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The Future of World of Warcraft Classic
The scope and complexity ofWorld of Warcraftvaries greatly with each expansion pack, and Wrath of the Lich King is no exception. What may have started as a simple Vanilla legacy server will continue to grow in scope as Classiccontinues to exist. This begs the question as to thefuture ofWorld of Warcraft Classic.
“Classicis definitely releasing content faster than the original game did,” Zierhut said, “On the other hand, we wanted to release content this fast. We just couldn’t do it.” In a lot of ways, the releaseschedule Classic is able to keep is closer to whatWorld of Warcraftwould have wanted, which ensures players grow bored with a lack of content to explore. However, at its current pace, Classic will eventually catch up to retail, or at least reach expansions with less nostalgia surrounding them.
Ultimately,World of Warcraft Classicowes its existence to fans, and according to Zierhut, fans will decide its future. “This whole project has been community-driven–this whole project came to being because the community demanded it,” he explained, “So what does the community want to see next?”
“Do they want to go on to Cataclysm? Do they want to go to Pandaria? Are there features from future expansions they want to see brought back? Are there features they absolutely never want to be seen brought to the game at all? We have our own opinions, but the opinions of the community will help us make better decisions.”
Wrath of the Lich King Classic is only coming because there was a demand for it; had players not shown interest, it may not have existed in the first place. Though there was little questionWrath of the Lich King Classic was a beloved expansion, some that came after, like Cataclysmand Warlords of Draenor, had less-positive reviews. From what Birmingham and Zierhut said,World of Warcraftwould consider skipping certain expansions if there was not a demand to run a Classic version of it.
Regardless of its future,World of Warcraft Classichas been a rousing success in the past and present, and Wrath of the Lich King promises to provide players yet another nostalgic, retro MMO experience. Though Wrath of the Lich KingClassic won’t have to worry about surprising its fans, it will still have big shoes to fill if it will live up to the original release. Players won’t have to wait for long —Wrath of the Lich King Classic will probably release this winter, meaning the beta is likely to begin during the summer or fall.
World of Warcraft Classicis available now on PC. Wrath of the Lich King Classic is scheduled to release in late 2022.
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