World of Warcraft 2? Ion Hazzikostas Talks About the Future of WoW with GamesRadar+

Live Posted 12 hr 44 min ago by Anshlun

Ion Hazzikostas

Theoretically, at some long, distant point down the line, that may be a question we grapple with seriously But, for the time being, we have a huge, vibrant, and growing player community that we're excited to serve.

We're constantly tearing out some old foundational system and replacing it with something that will scale to support our new server architecture, to support new graphics pipelines, to support new aspects of multiplayer interaction that the original game couldn't have imagined.

When we have this vibrant world full of millions of players, our priority is to keep serving them as best we can – to keep extending those journeys, the worlds we build, and every step along the way, we are making the improvements that we think suit the modern audience best.

Ion Hazzikostas

testament to the amount of change that's happened and the amount of evolution in World of Warcraft over this time.

Technically, it's the same game now turning 20. There's been a tremendous amount of diversions in evolution over time, and that's only going to continue.

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Modern (Currently on The War Within)

Classic Era

Classic Progression (Currently on Cataclysm)

Classic Season (Currently Season of Discovery)

Classic Hardcore

Classic Fresh (Will run at least until The Burning Crusade)

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Comment by SneakybeakyTldr: no it's not happeningComment by skullcanWould be nice if we didn't get those kinda of bait tittles.Comment by WylerI've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by AsherrTheRedeasily my favorite part of the game is how much it has changed over the years, never too much, just a little bit at a time. Not enough to be abbrasive but pleanty to keep things feeling new and intresting, even if they dont always get it right.Comment by KcoplinThere can't be a WoW2. There is too much to consider first.

A sequel to WoW implies something different compared to the original, and its not always a graphical upgrade. Will the classes be the same as original WoW? Will the races be the same or different? Would we even be in Azeroth this time? Would there be factions or none at all?

And no, I can't see a way for players to transfer all our data from old WoW to Wow2. I don't know of any MMO that does that. Not to mention once WoW2 is up and running, all the development will go to it, leaving WoW on permanent maintenance mode. No more updates. No more patches. No more content. Worse case scenario, they might even pull the plug.

Anyone who thinks there's a chance of a WoW2 is delusional.Comment by RaynuruMost people just scream for a "Semi-Realistic" looking WoW when it comes to WoW 2.
The stylized world of WarCraft would loose its charme and character when they go "realistic".
Just annother "real looking" MMORPG among the masses, and not all of them stand the test of time in terms of appeal.

Also i fear that many of the playable races would get cut, boiling down to maybe 5 per faction which would be a damn shame.

WoWs playable race variety is one of it biggest strong suits.
There are way to many MMORPGS out there where you can be an Elf, a Human, a Dwarf (or any other version of Human with Skin Color)
But in World of WarCraft, you actually can be an undead, a troll, a walking Bull, a sly fox, a dragon, even a bear and LOOK like one.

It's not just a Human wearin,g for example, a cow tail and cow ears while the rest looks like the generic pretty boy / girl human.
Even our Werewolves look like actualy Werewolves which could bite your face off (they just could use some tails..maybe).

Yes the Cities could be bigger, maybe with Housing a rework is coming as well. Maybe some Earthen Tech that can help with that.
Like some people allready said we are playing WoW 2 allready.

I would say when the Graphic upgrade dropped, WoW (1) turned into WoW (2) in a way, but that is just me.
Personally i am looking forward to many more years in the World of Warcraft with all its charme, and all its horror.

Sincerly
RayComment by ExtremelyCrustyTLDR: Typical Ion responseComment by ChaxtonI'd rather play a semi-functioning game that I can still enjoy over a shoddy sequel that exists purely to attempt paying back the funds wasted on development. What was that one knockoff PuBG game that tried making a sequel, failed miserably, and lost its original playerbase entirely? Whatever that game was, that's what WoW would become if WoW2 happened.Comment by OCoyneI've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by glassleoI've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by ClinoclaseHoly clickbait BatmanComment by DoctorDaveWoW2 will be all hunters.Comment by SlickWillyI registered and made a profile just to comment that WoW is basically an example of my favorite philosophical quandary/paradox: the Ship of Theseus.

To wit: if a board on the sailing vessel breaks, it is replaced, but we call the ship by the same name. Over time, every board on the ship has broken and been replaced, meaning that none of the orginal material that made up the ship still exists. But we still consider it the same ship. So in what does the name reside?

WoW has changed so much, bit by bit, over the years, because of both the players and Blizz, we should ask ourselves if we haven't already played and passed "WoW2."

Other commentators have already made basically the same remark in their own words but I never miss a chance to talk about the Ship of Theseus. :)Comment by umbranos123I've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by Kestevavild"World of Warcraft 2? Ion Hazzikostas Talks About the Future of WoW""By the numbers Ion Hazzikostas is the worst game director in MMO history"https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/2492858-By-the-numbers-Ion-Hazzikostas-is-the-worst-game-director-in-MMO-historyComment by markdallI've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by ZerogravitiI've said for years that we already played WoW 2 - it was called Burning Crusade.

We're currently on WoW 10.

Like he said, they've been constantly updating the game. Not sure what they would do with a "WoW 2" that they couldn't just do with current WoW.Comment by Kcoplin

Are you serious? After a decade of failure by Ion Hazzikostas management, leadership and "vision", he still won't step down, and still denies fresh mindset to save the franchise? Comment by WraiythBesides the technicalities of what really constitutes a WoW 2 there is a significant portion of the playerbase that has played the game for literally more than half their lives at this point and have strong ties to their collections, memories, characters and everything else that's integral to their in-game legacies. The idea of a WoW2 in the sense of a genuinely new, separate game is never going to be logical.

What I AM interested in though is what the future holds in terms of where the story will take us down the line without "jumping the shark", and I know many people - justified or not - feel that at various points in the last few years this has already happened with whatever retcons or new characters that have been introduced.

I'm not a huge story nerd but I do like to follow the threads of what's going on as we play through these expansions. It feels like this current 3-expansion arc has the potential to be somewhat "final" in terms of some large part of the storytelling that's been going on for the past 20 years. How Blizzard will approach continuing to tell engaging stories and developing further expansions beyond the universal scale threats/cosmic entities we seem to be heading towards currently is very interesting to me.

As with a lot of long-running stories this escalation of threat levels/power isn't out of the ordinary but how do you rein it in or switch that direction without people becoming bored? Looking forward to finding out.Comment by RaZz0r65Well then how about you optimize your game then blizzard your big open world events cripples the whole zone it's in.
Mythic raid bosses with lots of adds like brood twister completely tanks fps regardless of in game settings or hardware.
Raiding with over 20 people in the raid makes the whole raid be a laggy mess once again regardless of hardware.

Some GFX settings flat out don't do what they are supposed to do, like dropping render scale cuts your FPS in half instead of increasing it for some reason

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