How Can WoW Move On From Shadowlands?

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You know what, let's just pretend Shadowlands never happened. Not literally, but, as far as lore and story goes. Let's memory hole the whole thing.
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[@BellularGaming]

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[@localshaman]

One of my favourite aspects of WoW was theory craft and predicting what's coming next based on what's been teased... aaaand SLs really did kill that for me. It's obvious now it doesn't matter what they set up because they can just drop threads and rewrite things on a whim in the heaviest ways possible. Just killed any and all enthusiasm for it.

[@drayle71]

ye they basically said 'we don't need to consider what came before and we can just do whatever and non of the story up until now matter and even this story doesn't matter as we might just retcon it at some point'. So if everything that has and will be done can be retconned on the fly why should we the players care

[@cassiodalcin]

Essentially they've managed to create a Lore version of Borrowed Power

[@MrWrl101]

Yeah not thrilled by the new expansion DRAGONFLIGHT not hyped by that at all.

[@ramgami-7122]

Basically this. I think they misunderstand just how many people follow the lore and story of the game even if they aren’t playing. The lore is most certainly an important aspect of a ROLEPLAYING game. Come on, I just don’t understand how they can drop the ball THIS hard.

[@cmerk100]

They've done that multiple times by now, and each time has basically made the lore more confusing and less interesting. The current massive rewrites and changes to lore just are finally pushing the lore with its cement shoes into the ocean.

[@simonholmes6473]

"It would be too difficult for players to digest" is Blizzard for, "We know it was shit."

[@OTGSoxxy]

I figure it was more lawyer-speak for "I can't badmouth our deeply-flawed product, because Bobby and the board don't want even more negative press".

[@vannthybun2546]

They can totally retcon Shadowlands into never happening, I can’t think of a single person who would complain about that

[@danielgibson3422]

As many people like to put it, just peg the whole thing on N'zoth who sent us into madness or something lol.

[@Mediados]

Definitely, you can't just write the story on from here. Shadowlands has to be literally taken out of the story so the cogs run smoothly again.

[@Reinoud1992]

Revealing that SL is N'zoth's doing would be super interesting and I would accept that in a heartbeat. What they also could do is that Zovaal was just a lying machine which took credit for all kinds of things which it actually did not do.

[@liaevans4483]

Dragonflight leak showed the infinite dragonflight as villians, they could totally swooshswoosh time magic retcon it all "Haha woops deleted the jailer"

[@GioFan201051]

But like... just delete the Jailer or everything Shadowlands? Because a lot of things happened, mainly the Sylvanas and Anduin stuff. How would they retcon their story arcs?

[@aster4jaden]

I'm going to go with yes, Blizzard basically bent the Lore of the entire Warcraft Universe for Zovaal. That was a mistake that has left a massive stain on Warcraft because now we can't have concrete Lore in Warcraft, due Blizzard now being willing to pull the "Unreliable Narrative" whenever they want.

[@ThePolarpop]

They should legitimately come out and address it publicly 4th wall breaking like "we fucked up doing that and we promise to not do it again" so that they can be held to it for a long forseeable current time and people feel more..secure in the lore tracking again

[@MrDraehl]

Biggest thing that would bring me back would be a *non-timed* Mythic+ mode. Really miss the 5-man dungeon days of Dire Maul, Heroic Arcatraz, etc. where you really had to coordinate CC, focus fire, etc. Just not a fan of being rushed through dungeons though and would prefer more of the difficulty be placed on the damage, health, and fight mechanics rather than rushing.

[@hurpdurpgaming]

Hit the nail on the head my friend

[@marcohoehener463]

Exactly my thoughts. I havent even tried mythic runs because i hate just rushing thru a dungeon...

[@jake_with_the_BIG_snake]

THIS!!!!

[@Runescapevidproducer]

100% this. Not a big fan of the ‘speed running’ genre.

[@Skauwg]

YES! One of my biggest wishes. Blizz pls.🤞

[@DFalco-nz5tl]

"... Your legacy is at an end. Begone, then, Arthas Menethil. May the last whisper of your name fade..." It cannot be memory holed because it is the start of the new world (of warcraft) order. Shadowlands is the prologue for the new narrative and everything to come MUST be in the context of the jailors plans. The writing staff has made it perfectly clear that the old lore is dead now, they killed it, and their new story is all that exists and is all important.

[@nezunskyfire292]

And money is on that the story is going to suck space goat testicles. BFA and Shadowlands proved that the current dev team cannot write a good story.

[@martinivanov1319]

might the last whisper of the name world of warcraft fade too

[@JunkyKreeg]

That horrible monolog Sylvie delivered to what was left of Arthas always felt like a big middle finger to me. "Eff your old Lore and forget about it, this is the new cool stuff you should like " kinda vibe.

[@itzi7868]

I don't know why people are so bothered about Arthas's ghost not getting a story telling handjob.. No, I guess I get the point, it could've been a nice send off, but if you want to stick to a consistent story telling, both Arthas and Sylvanass deserve to be shit canned, because they're both monstrous pieces of shit, with one destroying all of Lordaeron and almost all of Quel'Thalas and the other slowly becoming like him, doing all kinds of Undead Spicy Memes. but more on this other point, about Old world of warcraft not mattering and the New being the only one that exists and is all important?... Yeah, of course they do that?... I mean Do you want them to just stick with the old and not do anything new instead, or not follow on other things that the old lore never got to get to? That's just, Story telling. You can't have a story constantly told with the old stuff, old characters tend to die and frankly they Should Stay Dead, because that's how you advance a story like this and one that especially goes on for as long as Warcraft did, otherwise you run the risk of blue balling the audience for literal decades, or, if you keep bringing older characters back what happens then is whatever story and drama you had devolves into a Saturday morning cartoon, in which story is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is for the story to exist as a vehicle to find any and all excuses imaginable in the realm of story telling, so they can advertise the merchandise of everything that is most popular and is most likely to sell for the most money, which, is usually the Older stuff.. Characters like Illidan, Arthas, Grom, Guldan, etc., these kinds of character are Far more in the fan favorites than anyone else. I'm not a fan of Shadowlands, I dropped it like less than a month after starting it and the story was so disjointed and all over the place that, none of it felt like it mattered and it turned out that it didn't, because their attempts to salvage whatever it was they had was equally shit, but this point about the old story being discarded just sounds retarded to me.. Characters like Arthas are Dead and they should Stay Dead and honestly, the delivery of that line was good, but it's 12-14 years too late on its delivery, because that should've been the send off in wotlk, that is story wise a good way of remembering the legacy of Arthas, this initially noble knight that devolved into a path filled with revenge that caused him to forget what it was he initially set out to do, leading him eventually to wanting to become this invincible king, who wanted to create the world's strongest army by raising its best champions in undeath. It's very poetic that of such an invincible foe, so little remains after all the dust settled that his soul was only flickers.. I don't like how they did it though, but the imagery of what they were going for is not lost on me, it's a very fitting end for Arthas as the Lich King.

[@malphasblackwing420]

My biggest complaint is that Blizzard writing is completely unpredictable and random now… They didn’t just rewrite the lore to make Zovaal the single smartest character in the entire expansion … they rewrote the lore to essentially make Zovaal the core villain of the entire Warcraft universe as if they planned him out for years and years even though it’s obvious they pulled this entire expansion out of their butts… Even Warlords of Draenor was planned out a little bit…

[@TaliesinMyrddin]

Most annoying thing for me is they had an easy out by doing the 'death is inevitable, he just had infinity to wait until enough things went his way' approach where Zovaal isn't actually that smart, just incredibly determined and long-lived, but instead they iron-clad confirmed in lore that he was somehow behind the Legion too. It was way more interesting to think of him as an argent of circumstance and patience than a master planner who just got shoehorned in.

[@malphasblackwing420]

@@TaliesinMyrddin Absolutely They wanted us to love the villainous ZOVAAL THE JAILER so much they turned him into the most boring bad guy in the entire franchise…because we were forced to believe he was “rEsPoNsIBlE fOr EvErYtHiNg” I am so obsessed with WoW lore that it is a staple of a vocalized conversation with me that I will eventually bring up Vol’jin or Sargeras or etc etc But honestly they fucked up the lore so savagely that I love WoW lore a bit less and that’s quite a failure

[@TaliesinMyrddin]

@@malphasblackwing420 It's weird, cuz I personally, and I know I'm in the minority, like the overall story of Shadowlands and the idea of the Jailer behind behind Odyn and the Lich King - that was hinted at back in Legion - and even the dreadlords, but they shouldn't have tied him into the Legion to the point he somehow knew Sargeras would stab Azeroth years before it happened. Hopefully moving forward we can get some good story back and if the Jailer is ever brought up again it's just to have characters slowly realise he was making himself out to be behind more than he actually was.

[@phil6844]

It just feels like none of the lore matters anymore because it could change on a dime and just ignore or retcon anything they want to make it fit. I know retcon has always been a thing in wow it just never felt like it was this bad before.

[@ThePolarpop]

Its always been small details not the entire giant "A plor" and everything around it of an entire expac in every way lol

[@phil6844]

@@ThePolarpop very true. Just sad what’s happened to this game honestly.

[@TheJatonEffect]

It's never going to feel like Warcraft again for me. Most of what made the world feel so alive to me was wondering about the mysteries of the Titans and the Legion. Once those were answered, I was curious about things like the Shadowlands and all of that. And everything was instantly negated the moment the Jailer was responsible for everything ever. Curtain pulled back, can't unsee, etc. It all feels cheapened. I don't think that excitement will ever return.

[@Zanzibawrr]

i can only speak for myself, but i can no longer get invested into the lore. every time any character dies, i will think about shadowlands. every time any kind of cosmic aspect of the game is introduced, i will think about shadowlands. the cat is out of the bag and it can't go back in unless they pull some sort of universal reset.

[@Mediados]

I'd say pull out good old N'zoth and eat the cat.

[@victorwilliams357]

They don't care about the foundation of wow , they just want to make up their own nonsense. Shadowlands is just the opening of the curtain on their shitty lore.

[@ThePolarpop]

@@Mediados i feel bad for the cat becauze u forxed this into metaphors :(

[@Mediados]

@@ThePolarpop Hey he started with saying the cat can't go back, but it can't stay either. Only one option left.

[@AmperahGaming]

@@ThePolarpop being one with the dreamer seems like a better fate than having to endure the coming content drought

[@wdf70]

The only good thing that came out of Shadowlands is that the hole above Icecrown is now closed and we can pretend it never happened again. Here's hoping that lorewise they seal off the shadowlands (because people are still gonna be allowed to level up there :P) and we never go near it ever. By showing us the afterlife in the Warcraft universe then all mystery is gone. "What happens to people who die? What about Paladins who give everything to light such as the crusader in Icecrown? All those raid bosses we killed? Lol, they're in shadowlands as special fuel that powers said shadowlands and without people dying the whole system falls apart."

[@AmperahGaming]

I can’t check atm, but is the sky over my beloved northrend normal again?

[@noahvburk585]

@@AmperahGaming Idk if it is right now but it should be, in 9.2.5 otherwise my guess

[@codyackley9522]

I mean...can we just have it be that after we defeated N'zoth we fell into a coma, and the Shadowlands was just a huge coma/fever/void nightmare? The last remnants of the horrific visions from the corruption we endured in order to defeat N'zoth? Could even treat the better parts of the expansion as prophetic visions, like everything we learned about the cosmos is just a huge metaphor for what's to come in Dragonflight and future expansions...I'd be down with that. Then we wake up, seemingly because Azeroth is waking, and go on our way to the Dragon Isles. Is it a cop out? Sure. Would people be okay with it? I'm betting a lot of them would.

[@a1pha_star]

That’s too easy and Blizzard doesn’t do anything that makes sense.

[@eltonazevedo1361]

Nzoth should being happen long ago as he is the weakest of all old gods that were in azzeroth. Lol 😂

[@ViewtifulDevil]

Shadowlands has irreparably damaged any interest or faith I could have in the series overarching narrative. All of Shadowland's plot points, both big and small, retcon (or at least recontextualize) almost every facet of the lore for the worst and it shows that nothing is set in stone. The rules of the setting no longer hold any weight and can just be retconned into a different "greater narrative" at any time. Wow is certainly no stranger to sweeping retcons, but a lot of it was done in service of fleshing out and tweaking early events to better fit the storyline once WC3 and WoW got the overarching plot of Titans and the Void got rolling. Shadowlands did the same with pretty much everything, but only to better fit the narrative of The Jailer, much to the detriment of the stories that came before and after his introduction.

[@ThePolarpop]

I see hear and feel this so much and often that it further proves blizz really needs to address this in real life 4th wall breaking reality and put themselves on the chopping block. Vocally and publicly admit they should never do anything of the sort again, massive mistake, etc. Basically get it in writing for people to have any goodfaith or trust in it again

[@baraomagus9132]

shadowlands should be retconed and i think we should ask for that in game i just hate how they insisted on destroying wow lore trying to make shadowlands relevant.

[@TheKingRiku]

I mean yeah it is. Lore and theory-crafting were my favorite parts about the game. Other than a "it's all a N'Zoth dream" there is no way I could ever care about it again.

[@nathanbrammer8471]

I used to be really into the lore, but SL killed that.

[@thetreeofwoe2304]

There is that invisible spider in Firim's cave that you can only see when you're dead, who basically says he is manipulating Firim and how easily it is to manipulate him, and that we're not able to comprehend yet what the spider and his kind are...so apparently there is some other secret race behind the scenes controlling things.

[@CelticShaman.]

Memory all of it. They can either do it elegantly and come up with reasons why none of it happened or I'd even be perfectly fine with them saying 'hey guys we need you to all pretend this didn't happen, we're not going to address it again in a future lore, just forget about it' and that would be more than happy to do so. My biggest problem with the shadowlands is not even how convoluted everything got it's that Warcraft afterlife is just Life 2.0. bury it and forget about it.

[@coolman6666]

I think the biggest thing that shadowlands showed us is that Ian's team can't produce good content. The last two expansions were failures, whether it was that the team was inexperienced/understaffed or if Bobby was putting too much pressure on the team with little resources, it hurt wow's reputation tremendously. They would need a Legion/Wrath expansion to get anyone to care anymore and I don't feel like dragonflight could be that. I hope to be proven wrong but shadowlands proved me right.

[@kaakrepwhatever]

The problem with Legion is that even though they pulled out all the stops and made an amazing expansion with lots of stuff for everyone to do, the playerbase never recovered from the debacles of wod and cata. They need to stop counting on being able to fix something next year if too many people quit over it, because they don't come back.

[@Nuttrex]

@@kaakrepwhatever the issue is they tried doing shit nobody asked for shit like adding extra and extra and extra when the game was already perfect

[@sardonicspartan9343]

@@kaakrepwhatever legion was incredibly popular.

[@Noriaela]

@@sardonicspartan9343 At the end it was popular. People just seem to want to forget how dogshit Legion was at launch.

[@ThePolarpop]

@@Noriaela legion was also amazing at launch compared to SL it really was just 95% the lego imbalance/rng feeling imo

[@stephaniephouotrides2435]

the fact that the Jailer was a robot ruined the entire thing for me. fire Daneuser

[@DiamondOrPoor78]

I don't know how Bellular always makes these smooth transitions into the sponsor, like they are soooo good and cleanly done!

[@Shiirow]

he has better writers than Blizzard.

[@SygMan]

They pigeon-holed the whole "oh Garrosh wasn't your fault Thrall" in a stay a while and listen moments. Real eye rolling moment there.

[@DarkScreamGames]

well what do you want, a long questline where you get a garrosh shaped skull belt cosmetic? stay a while and listens are solid

[@ardwick8096]

I think they can make Shadowlands work but they really, really need to start answering questions in the damn game. It doesn't need to be main plot material but they need to give us quests where we, the characters, try to work all this stuff out. I mean, we're in this world. We're known. We're heroes and we can't just walk up to Odyn and say "Yo, what the F is up with Helya? Explain yourself?" Or go up to Alexstraza and convince her to clue us in on some things? We don't interact with the main characters on any significant level and they piecemeal tidbits of information that is often times completely useless in the big picture sense. We just spent two years in the Shadowlands and our characters have not, even once, in two years, after working our asses off for the covenants went "Hey, explain to us in great detail, what happened with Zoval that made you imprison him? And that whole Maw place...what was it before you sealed it off? Oh, and why are we only dealing with you five, but there are infinite afterlives? What's up with that?" I can suspend my disbelief easily, but they are asking me to completely let go of it to follow along in this "story".

[@Mr.Robot90]

No.

[@howardhavardramberg7160]

that intro is the biggest understatement in wow history

[@Baromanthefool]

I sorta just want to feel like a dude in a big field just doing my thing again :P ... i feel too big in these zones! ... would be nice to back on home turf and just doing quest that are base on a chain that is just a story of a Orc avenging his fallen warband, or a Dwarf finding his forgotten burred treasure.... just good ole fashion large quest chains that just tell a story that doesn't lead to some super explosion or break the universe realities ...

[@connorkenney6938]

Absolutely. Old world quest chains that tell a more local story involving greater world events.

[@ThePolarpop]

I feel u but lore wise i feel like us as the PCs are so fuckin insanely past just helping a random orc avenge a basic fight or something sadly lol. Rip

[@michaelkovalsky4907]

Truth, one of my favorite quest chains (prior to it being greatly reduced/removed) was in Duskwood where we had to collect the equivalent of this lightforged or light infused metal to make a weapon to kill this undead. It was a genuinely tragic story in a way. Likewise the story with the paladin that is buried in Duskwood who, iirc, killed his family since he became corrupted and then couldn't live with himself over it. Simple stories with real human aspects is what's best

[@brandonreece601]

In short, you just want a good, classic, hero’s journey grounded in something at least partially relatable. Respect.

[@TheNacropolice]

@@brandonreece601 pretty much, I can’t remember half the epic universe destroying quests from recent history. The basic tales though? Yes. Even the one in Icecrown where we traverse the world to try and find a way to save an Argent Crusader from succumbing to the plague and how he purposefully isolated himself far from others felt great. Like it was a good mix of “you’re not just a regular adventurer anymore, but you’re still mortal and you still care”

[@DeltaDragon79]

I think, for me atleast, what Warcraft is losing or has lost is the air of mystery and identity. The more lore they flesh out the less mysterious the universe is and the whole Afterlife/Cosmic ambiance really made it feel more like a trippy sci fi thing rather than high fantasy.

[@riddert4966]

Agreed, the whole game used to be a mystery but these days people are already figuring out easter eggs during beta testing...

[@thunderleg6605]

WoW is so far down on my list of games to play, that I doubt I will ever return...

[@nezunskyfire292]

I think they should just memory hole ALL of Shadowlands. Even the good bits. There's too much negative sentiment around the entirety of expansion to try and bring out the good bits. Especially with the god-awful FanFiction tier story writing of the main plotline.

[@WhatIfTheories]

Tough question. For me SL tainted WoW forever. I never want to go to any of it's zones again or remember any part of it. I want a wipe that it ever happened. Where as I still go to BFA zones, I still enjoy Island Expeditions and wish they would build on that feature instead of Torghast. I'd say the good thing is that SL is so detached from the rest of the game you can act like it never happened and move on. At least I hope. So that way the healing can happen.

[@dvklaveren]

Yes, we can actually retcon it. Release a different medium (that isn't a book) that retells the story competently. Animation, hearthstone campaign, something else completely. It is actually not that hard at all to retell the story from BFA and Shadowlands. It's creating the media that represents the retelling that's the hard part

[@ThePolarpop]

Yoooo if they put a lot of money into a SERIOUS decent length/multiple animated retelling atleast itd show theyre committed to fixing the lore issue they created lol

[@tharifus7219]

Honestly at this point I feel they can come out and say bfa and SL is non cannon, and nobody would give a fuck. Might save the game

[@Ponyj0]

Battle for Azeroth was the battle between community and the devs. Shadowlands, the death and afterlives. Pretty much the death and afterlife of the lore and a good majority of the game's playerbase Dragonflight will attempt to mend a lot of what's been broken for years but it will never fully heal what they've done with Shadowlands. Will the flight of past and new players come to WoW for this next expac? Very hard to say.

[@JeffreydeKogel]

Back when I started playing WoW in early 2005, I absolutely loved by the lore and worldbuilding of the game. This interest kind of reached its peak for me with WotLK, and then slowly diminished after Cata. Then BFA came along and beat the lore half to death, and Shadowlands proceeded to outright bludgeon it into oblivion. Now I'm left with little to no investment in the lore and worldbuilding of WoW, which was a big part of what kept me playing all these years. I can only hope that Dragonflight will be better in this regard, but my hopium supply is running dangerously low at this point.

[@OspreyRed]

WoW will never be the same again. The writers broke the lore. The design team insisted on forcing unfun mechanics on to the players for years and refused to listen to us. They had the most loyal fan base of any game in the world, and they took it granted and used them rather than appreciating it. People got tired of it and moved to other games. I started to watch the video, got a few minutes in and realized I don’t care anymore. I am completely apathetic towards Warcraft now.

[@benwazeh]

At least it cured some addicts like me for good

[@88walka]

No the most loyal fan base which in my opinion is the dumbest is the madden NFL fans

[@bainebloodhoof1140]

You don't care, that's why you watch videos about wow?

[@bainebloodhoof1140]

@@benwazeh It cured you yet you're still here watching content about it? I don't know about that one chief.

[@benwazeh]

@@bainebloodhoof1140 Well if clicking on a video with a clickbait title, not even watching it going straight to the comments to see if the circus is still going is addiction, then I am addicted I guess. I admit I enjoy watching the trainwreck from time to time, see people get hyped and deluded a few months later. Yeah you don't know about that one.

[@NomadicAssassin]

I've seen them retcon near entire books, I think they could retcon shadowlands if they wanted to.

[@jakob6120]

pretty sure it's the other way around regarding "time" in the shadowlands. salanar the horsemen said in legion that for him it's only been a few days since he and the death knight player met because he's been in the shadowlands all this time while it was actually several years for the dk because they were on azeroth.

[@yoowii5955]

he wasn't in the shadowlands he was in the veil. yep, another retcon.

[@fuckeadito]

iirc in the interwiev where they talked about time working different in the shadowlands the example they gave was about spending a couple of months there only to return to azeroth and find years had passed. it was the reason why some ppl were speculating there was going to be a time skip after shadowlands

[@AnnaBananya]

I'll never forgive them for Shadowlands and the absolute desecration of all the lore. I no longer care about Warcraft as an IP. They can piss off.

[@MarcusMuhgee]

But they’ve desperately proclaimed that shadowlands was “the best the game has been in years”

[@kaakrepwhatever]

They can't even admit to themselves that they made the slightest error in judgment, let alone to their paying customers. They are still blaming unreasonable expectations of the playerbase for refusing to accept what they see as the most perfectly designed game that could possibly ever exist. Danged casuals, it's all their fault.

[@Shiirow]

@@kaakrepwhatever if they are not blaming the players for leaving, they are blaming afrowasabi for Denuser & Co.'s narrative fuck ups.

[@MeakisTV]

Memory hole it byt bringing back n'zoth and say that we lost the battle in nyalotha or that it didn't happen. N'zoth's gift was never cleansed and we are under his control. Shadowlands is an illusion/dream.

[@nezunskyfire292]

All of this. I will not accept any other answer from Blizzard, but even then they'd still find some way to botch up this retcon like every other one lmao

[@robinpimpin190]

The only thing I still want for WoW is Vol’jin to get what he deserves. He got done dirty since he became Warchief. Him appointing Sylvanas when he was dying tainted his short rule as warchief even more.

[@stormstrider1990]

Since Vol'jin is the new Loa of Kings, I'd like to see him return as Talanji's advisor. I don't know how long it takes for Wild Gods to recover in Ardenwield, but it shouldn't take too long with the anima flow now fixed.

[@Prawnsly]

@@stormstrider1990 The problem is you remember and care about the lore they wrote in BFA much more than they themselves do. I guarantee they've forgotten all about Vol'jin.

[@NekhiaTaylor]

Fever Dream...brought on by Nzoth that covered all of Azeroth and the Shawdowlands event was a mass hallucination

[@Philiptanzer]

I think it needs a new bad guy who was pulling the Jailer's strings all along and was actually the reason for the legion forming and the Lich King and pandas and everything else. But make sure to not give it any personality so we understand just how powerful it is and detached from mortal concerns. Then everything will be perfect.

[@gscgold]

someone told me that they want to keep covenants going after shadowlands, I don't know if they were trolling me ? I really don't ever want to ever see covenants after shadowlands is over..if fact I never plan to ever go there again, I'm not leveling any alts until all the older xpacs are max level 60

[@kingpingaming4503]

I drop in every once in a while to show support for Bell and the boys, but yeah...my interest in WoW is shot. BFA buried my love in the ground and SL just dumped a mountain pile of shit on top of it.

[@csr2120]

Gamers always fall for the NEW & IMPROVED hype before an xpac release but in the end, same crew same story same game.

[@khalidmohammed8980]

@@csr2120 that’s called marketing

[@TheRationalist.]

@@csr2120 That and all the streamers and KZbinrs shilling for it . Never forget that even bel was shilling shadowlands so hard before release. They were a huge part of that.

[@bainebloodhoof1140]

You still support a creator who mainly covers wow? Yeah sure, you're not addicted or anything lmao

[@kingpingaming4503]

@@bainebloodhoof1140 if you watch their podcasts they talk about a variety of gaming topics. Been unsubbed for over a year, and don't even have battle client installed. The crew makes good content, WoW doesn't. As simple as that.

[@David_J.E.]

At this point I just watch this content for Michael and Matt. Id be willing to try WoW again if I thought there was seriously improvement. But nobody in my friend group is willing to give that same generous charity and I don't play MMO's to solo or do stuff with rando's, so it looks like my time with wow is completely in the past. Im not that upset tbh.

[@ThePolarpop]

Fairly similar spot here on all fronts. If dragonflight lives upto its promises in meaningfully shown ways im down to try it but my friends arent. So even if i return itll probably be a lot more casually.

[@_ill_gil]

New players: Shadowlands story is difficult to digest. Old players: Shadowlands story is difficult to digest. Hardcore players: Shadowlands story is difficult to digest. Semi-casuals: Shadowlands story is difficult to digest.

[@Optitius]

Blizzard: OUR Shadowlands story is perfect. Adapt your reading!

[@Eristasa]

I call bull on the bioluminescence thing for the water. Has to be azerite in some shape or form which is causing the titan construct to wake up.

[@MrMedukneusha]

I like how "most replayed" overlay allows me to skip the ad.

[@Arackanox]

Just f*ck everything about Shadowlands for what it did to beloved characters, the story and the lore overall. This could have been the absolute golden expansion with all of the WoW afterlife' potential for storytelling filled with dead legacy characters interacting with new characters and events, all molded into an amazing adventure of true interesting cosmic stuff. Instead we got this and by the Earthmother does it leave a horrific taste in the mouth.

[@brianarnold1170]

All this talk about how WoW can fix its self in 2-3 expansions and I just keep thinking does it have 2-3 expansions left? I think we have to face it We will never get something as good as legion most likely nowhere ever close.

[@BaldChimpanzee]

Shadowlands being entirely a dream which we all woke up from is better solution than anything Danuser can come up with

[@FracturedPixel]

In my head cannon, everything after Legion is an old god nightmare

[@einsiedler6052]

Yeah - moving on and forgetting about it is one option I thought was viable. Doesn't feel right as player but if they really play this out with care (as in not "suddenly throw some huge cosmic threat in our way, we should have known of and cared about instead of going back to play with stone keepers and dragons...") it could work. Ironically they even have had a certain character that would be optimal to deal with this stuff - Me'dan. They could use him, Medivh or even Elune to build some background story where they are trying to stabilize the cosmic forces and undo the damage the jailor did. They would seek some help from us now and there, little support missions for their big agenda in the background. That could establish some kind of universal "Council of Tirisfal " that takes all the big stuff out of our hand while being there, establishing itself. And then one day, they could call for our aid vs a big cosmic thread - why not. We had that often in the past, Argent Dawn, Circle of Cenarius, Shamans, Army of the Light... Their knowledge, experience, weapons, tools against the enemy and we to wield it at their side. Classic WoW narrative design. But that would take time and lots of background plots where they are introduced and expanded. Could also serve as a universal hub for new races/places that seek help at one point introducing them for some much later expansion. Lots of possibilities!

[@Khadharphak]

You know how good an expansion is when you have to treat it like a toxic ex, change the locks, get a new phone number and pretend they never existed

[@malthus0016]

torghast with cosmetics only would be amazing to take forward as a new mage tower. the roguelike elements are genuinely fun

[@Ijustpooted]

Yo what’s happening with your glasses Bellular in the beginning there 😂

[@nickmessner700]

Literally the only thing they need to do to fix Shadowlands lore is this: We finish the last quest in SL, some big dramatic cutscene starts, every 10ish seconds the screen gets covered with a huge red eye. In the very last moment the illusion fades with a booming beautiful voice telling us to wake up, this time the red eye doesn't go away. We awake in N'zoth's chamber in Nyalotha. Azeroth has awoken partly, enough to reach out to us directly and pull us out of the horrific vision we've been trapped in. She ejects N'Zoth from her crust and he flees into the great beyond to report to the void lords. Then we do Dragonflight and they don't fuck it up because if we're gonna take Hopium we may as well overdose.

[@EdBurke37]

If I had it my way 10.0 would start with our characters waking up at the end of BFA to find Patrick Duffy in the shower.

[@highlordsilverhand1228]

Amazing, captivating and insightful video Michael !

[@shirethe]

did square space help inform you on your transitions? its almost an art form

[@BriHawk67]

They can just do the 'ol (and I mean really old) Dallas/Bobby Ewing thing. We wake up and the whole Shadowlands thing was a dream.

[@Ogk10]

Bad taste? If you puke and they lick it up and puke it back into your mouth... yeah you can call it bad taste.

[@mattemattics5667]

“Can we pretend it doesn’t exist?” Yes.

[@Kazsdor]

After Shadowlands I am hopefully never playing the game again, Blizzard fucked up too many times in a row for me to ever trust them again, at least with WoW.

[@tuskybarn]

If Anduin steps back and Turalyon does his thing, that smells a bit Garrosh-ish, uh oh.

[@Skollshorties]

If there's one thing I at least had a good time with in Shadowlands? It was the development and new art for Thrall. I love that he's over Garrosh, got to meet his mother, and is back in the Doomplate. Very much happy with what they did with him here.

[@Deadsticle]

I remember spending time with Thrall as he fussed over what weapon to collect to save his friends from hell and thinking "I wish Garrosh fucking skinned you."

[@jefflarrabee1128]

@@Deadsticle agreed lol. "this weapon isnt as good as an axe" stfu, youre wasting time thrall!

[@martinivanov1319]

@@Deadsticle yep very dumb quest. the lore is a joke nowadays

[@Deadsticle]

Lol I can't stand the Brokers. Having to report to them made the Maw and Korthia even worse for me.

[@lableak4165]

The intro of dragonflight Anduin wakes up in bed and shadowlands was all a dream.

[@TaliesinMyrddin]

The cosmic lore and war story is fine, what's not fine is Blizzard deciding "we should redo the Titans but on a bigger scale", introducing the lightest hint at the concept in 9.0 and having us visit their workshop in 9.2. The patches may have been slow, but there was no build up like the Titans had. If they take at least five more expansions to set up a fully cosmic war/going to more realms - one for each force and, importantly, how it connects to mortals and Azeroth as opposed to a whole expansions et in those realms, it could be as interesting to players as the concept of going to the Twisting Nether was pre-Legion.

[@cerebralisk]

I'm assuming the dreadlords are going to be relevant in that the Scarlets are relevant to the situation in Lordaeron and there's no reason to assume that they're not still pawns of some dreadlord.

[@billbillinger2117]

They shouldn't memory hole it, they should learn from it and keep it there visibile as a reminder of how badly they can screw up a concept. Too many problems these days are dealt with by " out of sight, out of mind" rather than to process and learn from the mistakes. When history is memory hold it is doomed to repeat.

[@Mr.Robot90]

What an idiotic statement, I read it in Ion Hazzikostas voice. Lore is the soul of WoW and SL destroyed it. If they want to learn from mistakes they should fire Steve Danuser and never allow anyone to fuck things up again like this. And of course a retcon which deletes not only SL lore but also BfA would be the best thing for WoW. They should make the content from those expansions available through Chromie under the name "shit that never happened". And start the lore after Legion.

[@mugglescakesniffer3943]

I wish that they had more secrets and chests and puzzles. And more hidden and clickable things that do things.

[@4ohf]

Personally speaking, shadowlands kills any remaining interest I had in the lore. That said, my interest was killed when it was announced, I'm just not into the direction they chose, and then they went and made it kinda shit. I kinda feel like that meme: Man lost last bit of hope he didnt know he had ...

[@draega570]

Easy: the same way any business moves on from a product that caused temporary decline...roll out the next model.

[@nuricakar9238]

04:00 They will be the New Alleria and Turalyon of the story

[@krisdevos3231]

I left as Nathria came out and came back for 9.2 and really enjoyed Zereth Mortis. The lore of this expansion didn't phase me too much. I actually really enjoyed the scenery.

[@nikkosyiaps4282]

Crap. Fell for the smooth ad transition. GJ.

[@Hadesillo]

Can we do the Med'an thing to a whole expansion's story?

[@totally_not_a_troll]

I'm still waiting for the beginning of Dragonflight showing our characters waking up from a N'zoth nightmare.

[@DagothDaddy]

I think they could easily frame it as he wasn't talking about any singular threat. Something like "Oh he saw into the future and knew all these various new threats were arising."

[@gregoryshinn9805]

Thanks for the video

[@tableslam]

LOL Michael has become self-aware with these ad segue lines

[@BobJones-xc3ty]

All of shadowlands was simply Yogg-Saron driving us mad, it never really happened.

[@Ch405m4n]

Can we forget about Shadowlands? That's easy, we already forgot about that huge sword, that is stuck in the Azeroth. ... Oh what am I saying. What sword?

[@BlockMasteryTV]

Bellular has the best ad segways of the internet, no cap

[@corbin_4738]

When it a machine breaks down, it can get all jumbled up. They showed the Jailer as a machine breaking down. The big evil could have been Sire Denathrius, but the Jailer simply wasn't aware of who the big threat was. He started acting irrationally towards the other Eternal Ones, which is why they got rid of him. That had the unintended consequence of saving the Jailer from the world soul of Argus. The Jailer thought he was the one controlling everyone, pulling all the strings, etc etc. He didn't realize Sire Denathrius was playing more of a subtle game. Sure, he would "help" the Jailer. At times, he did. But at other times, the Jailer was unknowingly competing with Denathrius (back to the world soul - Denathrius planned to stop the Jailer since he was having visions). To my knowledge, we are still unaware of what happens to Denathrius. He got put away into his sword, but the Dreadlords flew away with that sword. Denathrius probably wanted to rule all of Shadowlands, but the Jailer sought to save the universe by destroying it and remaking it - honestly not an entirely unheard of concept in fantasy, but it is quite a boring trope. I personally think part of 9.2.5 (or make a 9.3) should be told almost entirely from the Jailer's perspective. From when the highlights of when he betrayed (or gave up) his duties as Arbiter to the highlights of everything leading up to his demise. Would help the player get a better understanding of who he was and why he did (or didn't) do the things he had. But, that is just an effort to maybe not completely shut an entire expansion out, but simply salvage it as best as possible. WoW is developing a track record of not fully completing storylines and expansions. Make them break that record.

[@please_recharge]

Good video, watched it all already.

[@Tempestni02]

Will shadowlands drag wow down? Does a bear shite in the woods?

[@bjartusen]

Only thing i'll do in shadowlands is grinding mounts/pets and stuff like that, as soon as all my toons are leveled up to max

[@WhipDarling]

I'm just playing through it now. The music is outstanding! The rest.....not so much.

[@nicholasjackson1854]

man I want my warchief back😢

[@ratatoskrnuts6354]

I hope some of the SL characters hang around in some way. Like Lady Moonberry, I really liked her as a character. I'd also really like to get the Faerie model as a Balance Druid form

[@pohja4552]

No SL characters are not allowed. Only denathrius.

[@Mr.Robot90]

Lady fucken Moonberry, you must be really special.

[@ratatoskrnuts6354]

@@Mr.Robot90 thanks 😊

[@wolfy1933]

They could easily make Shadowlands disappear. Make it a long vision of N'zoth and it's done.

[@davidlafond1906]

The sad thing about shadowlands is that the stuff that had no real connection to the old story was decent, the stories of the zones as you leveled and stuff like that, but the stuff that was supposed to connect it to the rest of the wow lore made no sense at all and it was almost like you were playing a whole new game, until they tried to connect it to the rest of the game, and that made it shitty

[@Pixx2266]

Call me old-fashioned, but for me Warcraft is Blackrock mountain, Blackwing lair, An'Qiraj, Black Temple... I stopped playing mid Cataclysm and I dread coming back to retail because the game changed so much and so much has happened. I'm happy in my classic bubble ^^

[@DifunctedReble]

The number of alley-oops the community is throwing them and they look at it like it isn't the right moment is sad but not unexpected.

[@jarcuadanantus28]

So I just noticed it now...but the chains on Zovaals arm/wrist things? How the fuck are they holding him? There's no strap on that piece of metal. What is even holding them on? It looks like his arms would just slip out.

[@orange-micro-fiber9740]

Doomed to drag it down? It already has. There is so much faith in Blizz lost. My friends list is full of former die hards.

[@Smokie1523]

they SAY time works differently in the maw, but we, the heroes, spent a shitload of time there and saw nothing major change so far, so... yeah..