World of Warcraft - Cataclysm
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http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/cataclysm/
Just watched the trailer, and looked into the announcements. Perhaps there is going to be an overall engine upgrade? -
I know nothing about said engine upgrade. But based on what I saw graphics wise, maybe a not so major one, making things more efficient.
Worgen look teh awesome though.
In my opinion, the more changes they make the better, and its looking like blizz may be trying to do it. -
QUOTE (Tom @ Aug 24 2009, 12:44 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>just because they have multiple teams does not mean they don't tax the same resources. way to be dicks about it.
If making a new expansion is taxing the other teams resources for Diablo III and Starcraft 2, then the day to day running of WoW would cripple the entire US infrastructure.QUOTE (Andrew @ Aug 24 2009, 02:43 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>My question is:
What do you do if you want to start a new character?
Sounds to me like they'll have to give people flying mounts earlier, or do something else to help people get up to level 85 nice and quick-like. Cause getting around looks like a bitch.
Somehow I doubt it will be any more a bitch than before. Just those PvP enabled zones are going to be so much worse that all the higher level characters are back on Azeroth (Is it sad that I got confused when FF underlined this as a misspelled word so I was trying to 'correct' it?) raping all the lowbies. Unless they're restructuring that as well. -
QUOTE (Erling @ Aug 24 2009, 06:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Somehow I doubt it will be any more a bitch than before. Just those PvP enabled zones are going to be so much worse that all the higher level characters are back on Azeroth (Is it sad that I got confused when FF underlined this as a misspelled word so I was trying to 'correct' it?) raping all the lowbies. Unless they're restructuring that as well.
It just looks like some of the major cities are getting a cosmetic overhaul that could affect possible paths through areas. If it takes 7 more minutes to get inside Iron Forge because of a giant ravine full of lava, that's going to make questing take longer. I'm not saying it'll be harder, just that travel times might increase if they fuck with the terrain everywhere (which is what it looked like to me). -
From what I've read, to counter the changed terrain and return of high level chars the devs are fixing the questing system.
No more shitty running to some random zone that has quests spanning 10 levels (desolace?) to make some gap or finish out a level. It will flow more like Outland and Northrend, where the quests go from one to another and are designed to be somewhat easy to find. -
QUOTE (Governor @ Aug 25 2009, 11:58 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I was under the impression that leveling was hella fast now anyway. It seems possible to me that they would make it even faster in the early levels to negate any negative consequences of the changing landscape.
This was my thinking. Phil seems to be on the same page too.
Pretty soon they are just going to start you at Level 85 with purples and a flying mount. -
trailer looks pretty cool, but that is an old disease long cured.
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QUOTE (Gachi @ Aug 29 2009, 08:12 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Thankfully the level cap is only raising up 5 and not 10.
I also love this. -
QUOTE (Gachi @ Aug 29 2009, 08:12 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>This looks like a really good expansion... Thankfully the level cap is only raising up 5 and not 10.
/2 [trade]: WTB moar talent pointz -
i may just have to do that, and get my bum off the private servers
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QUOTE (ohh heeeey baaayee baaayee @ Sep 2 2009, 12:25 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I heard this update has 80% more graphics than the leading brand.
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QUOTE (Andrew @ Aug 24 2009, 12:43 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>My question is:
What do you do if you want to start a new character?
Sounds to me like they'll have to give people flying mounts earlier, or do something else to help people get up to level 85 nice and quick-like. Cause getting around looks like a bitch.
Oh, like non-epic flying mounts moving at 150% speed instead of 60%?
And non-epic flyers being available at level 60?
...That was the last content patch into the game.
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Responding other random stuff in this thread. As has been witnessed with Wrath of the Lich King (dynamic shadows anyone?), Blizzard has opted for an incremental graphical upgrade process for WoW. This has been mentioned in a few different web-articles over the past year. They have said they view going the way of other MMO's and doing a "flip a switch" huge graphical update to the game and having to then maintain two clients so as not to leave half their player base in the dust is a non-option.
So they'll continue to incrementally improve baseline graphics as the system specs of people playing the game on bottom tier of systems continues to gradually improve... And add other neat bells and whistles like shadow effects as time goes on. If they stick to what was mentioned at the WoW Tech panel in 2007(3 con's ago now), basically, if your system specs puts you in the bottom ~2% of WoW players, "it's probably time to upgrade" if you want to continue to play when they bump things up a notch graphically.
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They're revisiting the old world to make quest chains and other things flow in the old world like they do in Outland and Northrend. They've learned a lot a lessons since Vanilla and they want to go back to apply them on to content they view to be using obsolete methodologies. The "Cataclysmic return" of Deathwing giving them an opportune chance to do just that.
Speculation side: The Direct TV feed had one of Blizzard's exec saying that their next generation MMO is just now entering Prototype stage, so it is likely to be at least another 4 or 5 years out from release. WoW will have been a commercial release for 5 years as of November, which has historically been near the planned end point of most MMO development life cycles where active development of new content is concerned.
Blizzard currently has nothing in the MMO Genre to fill the gap between now and their next MMO title, and they don't want to simply give up their throne at the top without a fight. So the best solution for them is to go back and essentially do a "relaunch" for WoW and reset things to reflect how they would design an MMO today, without needing to deal with as many skeletons from 2004 and before. Basically they're trying to bring all of the game up to their present day standards...
Rather than having people trudge through Azeroth(no matter how quickly) which is designed to standards from 5 years ago, and hope that the experience doesn't sour people to the game before they get to the shiny new stuff. If they want the game to last another 5 years, they have to make the game continue to be appealing to new players.
Another side benefit is that some of the ideas they might have kicking around for their Next Generation MMO might be getting opportunities to be at least partially implemented/tested within WoW. Something that can give them invaluable feedback on how to approach some new things they're playing with, even if it comes at a slight cost of being called uninspired on the new one because people have seen a flavor of it in WoW already by then. Blizzard has never really been about being exceedingly creative/innovative per say, their strength has always been in doing amazing implementation of ideas and making it "fun" after all. -
QUOTE (TheDeamon @ Sep 2 2009, 11:11 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Oh, like non-epic flying mounts moving at 150% speed instead of 60%?
And non-epic flyers being available at level 60?
...That was the last content patch into the game.
--------------
Responding other random stuff in this thread. As has been witnessed with Wrath of the Lich King (dynamic shadows anyone?), Blizzard has opted for an incremental graphical upgrade process for WoW. This has been mentioned in a few different web-articles over the past year. They have said they view going the way of other MMO's and doing a "flip a switch" huge graphical update to the game and having to then maintain two clients so as not to leave half their player base in the dust is a non-option.
So they'll continue to incrementally improve baseline graphics as the system specs of people playing the game on bottom tier of systems continues to gradually improve... And add other neat bells and whistles like shadow effects as time goes on. If they stick to what was mentioned at the WoW Tech panel in 2007(3 con's ago now), basically, if your system specs puts you in the bottom ~2% of WoW players, "it's probably time to upgrade" if you want to continue to play when they bump things up a notch graphically.
-------------
They're revisiting the old world to make quest chains and other things flow in the old world like they do in Outland and Northrend. They've learned a lot a lessons since Vanilla and they want to go back to apply them on to content they view to be using obsolete methodologies. The "Cataclysmic return" of Deathwing giving them an opportune chance to do just that.
Speculation side: The Direct TV feed had one of Blizzard's exec saying that their next generation MMO is just now entering Prototype stage, so it is likely to be at least another 4 or 5 years out from release. WoW will have been a commercial release for 5 years as of November, which has historically been near the planned end point of most MMO development life cycles where active development of new content is concerned.
Blizzard currently has nothing in the MMO Genre to fill the gap between now and their next MMO title, and they don't want to simply give up their throne at the top without a fight. So the best solution for them is to go back and essentially do a "relaunch" for WoW and reset things to reflect how they would design an MMO today, without needing to deal with as many skeletons from 2004 and before. Basically they're trying to bring all of the game up to their present day standards...
Rather than having people trudge through Azeroth(no matter how quickly) which is designed to standards from 5 years ago, and hope that the experience doesn't sour people to the game before they get to the shiny new stuff. If they want the game to last another 5 years, they have to make the game continue to be appealing to new players.
Another side benefit is that some of the ideas they might have kicking around for their Next Generation MMO might be getting opportunities to be at least partially implemented/tested within WoW. Something that can give them invaluable feedback on how to approach some new things they're playing with, even if it comes at a slight cost of being called uninspired on the new one because people have seen a flavor of it in WoW already by then. Blizzard has never really been about being exceedingly creative/innovative per say, their strength has always been in doing amazing implementation of ideas and making it "fun" after all.
I heard there's air outside now. Best check that rumor out. -
QUOTE (fd ASS SALT @ Sep 2 2009, 11:05 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I heard there's air outside now. Best check that rumor out.
I haven't logged into WoW in over 3 weeks, I think I've got that covered.
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