The Most Hated Zone in WoW

[@GothTk14]

I had an outdated graphics card at the time and all I saw down there was a white void, still gives me nightmares

[@Evi_Media]

Emerald Weapon from ff7 became my first nightmare of underwater zones thats never gone away

[@marytichelaar7225]

I don't understand why this place has such the reputation that it does, I've played this game and I played this area and I've enjoyed exploring it thoroughly! Honestly it's just a underwater zone with plenty of interesting places. Honestly people just need to give this zone another chance.

[@kyleellis1825]

I think part of it was that from vanilla-wrath, water sucked unless you were a druid, undead, or Warlock. Can't remember if shamans had a water breathing or not. So when Cata happened and melee classes without charge kind of had a bad time, it ruined the experience for many who where brave enough to even try it..

[@thomasrinschler6783]

@@kyleellis1825 All characters were given water breathing and faster swim speed in the zone like 5 minutes in.

[@kyleellis1825]

@@thomasrinschler6783 That doesn't counter any of the problems I listed. The issue with melee is being just above or below a enemy and not being in the hit box for attacks. charge locks you on for combat. It's frustrating for like half the classes to experience due to that.

[@Chicken-x6q6d]

@@kyleellis1825Shammys did have water breathing and water walking but unlike the other classes it required a reagent to cast them, this requirement did eventually get removed but I can’t remember if it was Wrath or Cata.

[@kyleellis1825]

@@Chicken-x6q6d I knew they had water walking. Couldn't remember about the breathing. Unless i'm forgetting a class with another water breathing, only 3 classes and 1 race would have any fun doing water content until Cata. Once cata hit, at least everyone else wasn't drowning in 15 seconds.

[@Thalarion]

the whale shark still gives me thalassophobia

[@TheScoundrelsCantina]

Never understood the hate for it. The abyss scares the hell out of me in general but I enjoyed it all despite the thallasophobia. Great zone! Funilly enough I enjoy scaring myself with the deep sea a lot except in Subnautica XD

[@zytha2890]

there's def some cool moments like that its just the zone is so boring idk how many times i fell asleep trying to do this zone when it originally came out it peaked at the introduction and fell off the rest of the way

[@ValensBellator]

I loved that zone! It was such a unique experience. Never understood the hate for it.

[@zytha2890]

if you have trouble falling asleep at night this zone is for you that's where it comes from

[@AkiRa22084]

@@zytha2890 I don't get it.

[@Daimando]

Ironically, Vashjir turned into my favorite zone of Cataclysm due to the environment and yes, the underwater mechanic.

[@Sumppa]

environment cool, Underwater not cool.

[@harleyscape2223]

@@Sumppa Opinions are like assholes.

[@Stirredy]

Best Cata zone.

[@Izelor]

Honestly, it's not that bad. You spend like 1-2 levels there and you leave. Mount Hyjal is fine, but it's more of the same stuff we're used to. At least in Cata Classic I know that most people will avoid Vashj'ir with a passion, so it will be an easy leveling area.

[@mistahanansi2264]

This was always my 2nd favorite of the Cata zones, and 81+ starting zone of choice. I always wondered Blizzard didn’t make more underwater zones like Vashj’r… I never knew people had complained about it, or that it had the nickname “worse zone in WoW”. A shame, I always enjoyed myself there…

[@Khantia]

Yeah... the fact that WoW wasn't built for underwater combat is the biggest turn off. And reworking the game to handle it better would be a herculean task... - The animations are stupid. As if things are just walking mid-water, instead of swimming (while attacking and stuff). And that instant rotation of the whale... ugh >.< - The ground effects, as mentioned, would need to be castable in 3d space, while you're swimming. And to be honest, WoW graphics, at least from that time, look quite dated. But that's another topic altogether.

[@SJ-ym4yt]

7:45 ”where the ground is bone dry” hmmmmm

[@dion8895]

Unless the UI/combat in a game is designed so that "underwater mode" is as comfortable as any normal gameplay, any underwater part is just going to be a less favored experience. Everything to like about Vashj'ir is esthetic, yes it's beautiful and yes you can enjoy the lore or whatever; but gameplay comes first. And the underwater gameplay in WoW is just not an enjoyable experience, so if everything else about a zone is 10/10 that zone will still not be an enjoyable experience.

[@AlexeyFilippenkoPlummet]

Idk how it "most hated", this has always been my absolute favourite zone in WoW. Beautiful sceneries, underwater experience and even the journey through a giant creature veins as if you're a microbe to cleanse it of naga - it was epic.

[@GiveMeThatLetter]

That actually makes a lot of sense now. The underwater combat system is basically non-existent. If they had an actual built-in combat system specifically designed for the area, I think the only thing people would have hated about the zone was that it gave them the heebie jeebies.

[@ecogreco]

I love Vashjir and the concept of an underwater zone. One reason why I resent the WoW community is how they complained about the zone, and that caused blizzard to abandon any more underwater zones. Of course there are compromises while being underwater, but it's really not all about gameplay. It's about adventure and exploration.

[@thebghero]

One of my favorite zones in WoW. I had no issues getting around or orienting myself.

[@Frostgnaw]

4:14 that's the worst thing about being in open water irl. You are capable of getting attacked from the left, right behind or from in front, but only on the X axis. Being in water opens up the possibility of up and down attacks. It's much more overwhelming.

[@kyleellis1825]

Dark Shore, Thousand Needles, Wetlands, Swamp of Sorrows, Dustwallow Marsh, and the vile reef (expanded into the sunken part of STV) should have all been leveling zones with far more under water content as prep for vashjir.

[@erickchristensen746]

Tech limitations of the time. Also money, wasn’t until wrath that blizzard rained in the crazy big bucks.

[@kyleellis1825]

@@erickchristensen746 I'm talking about Cataclysm revamp, which is right at the height of them having big bucks.

[@LihoShammy]

I think there are a few valid reasons why people hate Vashj'ir. 1) The underwater combat. WoW was not built around this concept, and Vashj'ir showed it. It wasn't a huge deal for ranged classes, but melee could oftentimes struggle to actually hit their targets due to the inclusion of a Z-axis. This was particularly bad for Warriors, whose Charge could oftentimes have very finnicky movement even on land, which was a problem exacerbated underwater. 2) The length. Despite Vashj'ir only taking about two levels, it was by a significant margin the longest zone in the game to quest through. Not only was it big enough to be divided into three separate subregions, significant portions of the zone also took place underground or inside of those big shell creatures. All in all Vashj'ir is about twice the length of Hyjal, even though they give the same amount of levels. 3) The lore. While the story of Vashj'ir isn't neccesarily bad, it's ultimately completely inconsequential. The stories of the Naga, the Battlemaiden and of Neptulon end up completely unresolved due to the Abyssal Maw getting scrapped, and the plotline of Neptulon being captured ended up getting retconned out of existence entirely by Blizzard later on. Compare this again to Hyjal, whose stories about the elements and the Twilight's Hammer are not only integral to the plot of Cataclysm as a whole, but it also brings back important plot characters such as Cenarius and acts as a set-up for the stories of the Molten Front, the Firelands raid and even the Twilight Highlands. 4) Actually leaving Vashj'ir. When you arrive in Vashj'ir, you are essentially stuck there until you finish the zone. That is, until you learn that you can swim up all the way to the surface to find flight masters connecting you back to the mainland. But the problem is, these flight masters are never addressed, they're in a region the quests never take you to, and they're not even visible on the minimap unless you swim to the surface. This means you just have to happen to find them, and because of that a lot of people don't actually know these flight masters exist. All these factors combined, for a lot of people Vashj'ir is an incredibly long zone with clunky combat, with an unresolved and pointless story, that actually traps you there until you finish it. No wonder people claim it as the worst zone in WoW.

[@ginocrededio7421]

I loved Vashir 🤷‍♀️ … Tbf I played a hunter so all the combat was just pretty great for me

[@Paul-se2hs]

It's not even that I hated it, I just couldn't enjoy it because of thalassophobia, I'm actually okay with open bodies of water, but seeing the color change due to depth and depth in general just freaks me out, even on a video game somehow.

[@blackwolves6925]

Idk i personally love the zone, i went back, just re-level, but i forgot how to do the quest line to get back there since we got more underwater mounts.

[@whataboutart]

I quit World of Warcraft during the Cataclysm expansion and if somebody asks me now to name one zone from that expansion, I would immediately think of Vashj'Ir. In fact, from my memory, the only zone that I enjoyed playing through in that expansion was Vashj'Ir.

[@tristanmattwig8541]

Never understood the hate for it. It's quests were really cool and it was beautiful. I never had that many bugs with combat plus if there were it's not that big of a deal it's just questing. There was also a lot of land fighting like inside the vashjir wild gods (the Eldritch looking things). The zone was also MASSIVE. It was made of three mini zones. I was really hoping we would get another underwater zone with najzatar because the najzatar we got was gorgeous but it didn't hold all the splendor that it deserved. Zinashari was beautiful and we didn't see much of the naga capital. I hope Blizzard gives us another underwater zone!

[@MageSkeleton]

Very good video. in my opinion, They would want to add more quests for horde and alliance and not give the players that "Vash Jir buff." There are so many different ways players can gain underwater breathing and so many ways and places where blizz can just put "air bubble clams" and "air pockets" that really what they need to do is increase the experience rates by x4 and make EVERYTHING you find in Vash jir exclusive to the zone and valuable up to and including uncommon items that would sell for ten gold, and "ingredients" that can be cooked to sell for 50-100g each. And maybe do this thing where you can get some cooking recipes from the depths in certain places and loot tables, but primarily in the other zones. you should be able to get a 40 slot "bag" as a drop. Bonus points if Blizz adds a special "flee" mechanic similar to how enemies will run from you at low health, but actually break combat from you but retain the amount of health they lost until a full minute has passed.

[@evage99]

I didn't realize I had thalassophobia til I leveled in Vash'jir the first time. The whale sharks still trigger the shudders. >.> I love ocean aesthetics and scenery, and the vast scale of things is impressive. I don't mind revisiting it now and then, though it scares me a bit. It was an ambitious and impressive feat for the designers, I think they pulled it off nicely despite the challenges of creating such a huge and diverse place.

[@1un4cy]

Some of the whole point of vash'ir was the reworked underwater combat update. But then they completely scrapped the underwater update without changing vash'ir, leaving it incredibly janky if you aren't fighting on the ocean floor.

[@verilyveronica8430]

Yes I refused to adventure there after doing the zone twice.

[@OMGBEARS]

I always had a fear of the deep ocean. I hated, hated, HATED Vash'jir. I hated being stuck in there (until someone told me about the FP on the island) I hated the swimming bit, but it still wasn't anywhere as rage inducing as Nazjatar nearly a decade later.

[@valecrassus7835]

The thing that disappointed me the most is that when you hit the decision point to choose between Hyjal and Vashj'ir, Vashj'ir is talked about as if it's going to be a big Horde vs Alliance zone. I pictured something like a giant Stranglethorn Vale with deep water areas surrounding/beneath it. Even with the speed boosts and fast water mounts, a solid 10 levels of underwater combat is/was too clunky in WoW for it to be enjoyable. Cataclysm was a litany of bad decisions in game design, and they mostly doubled down on mistakes made in Wrath that should have been fixed.

[@beddospecht8381]

As soon you got the underwater speed walk the zone was very nice. i enjoyed the quests a lot

[@JasPlun]

It was one of my favorite zones and the story was great as well. I hope they do another water zone in the future.

[@shirrenthewanderer414]

This is my favorite Cataclysm Zone, and I love it. I know most people don't care for flying/underwater because those don't show up in raids/pvp, but those are for people who just want to game to be about numbers and statistics. This... is about ADVENTURE!!!! THIS.... is what games are SUPPOSED to be about. It's the only cata zone where it's not just, "go over here and do this thing, and go over there and do that thing".

[@DrewPicklesTheDark]

For me, zones have two metrics. Atmosphere and questing. For me a bad zone needs bad quests and bad atmosphere, like vanilla Blasted Lands for example. Vashjir might have a bad questing experience, but it's S-tier in atmosphere so it's far from my least favorite zone. In a way it's like vanilla Azshara, bad questing but beautiful (though the reason the questing there is bad is the lack of i, more so than the combat and such).

[@TommyDaGreatest]

Back in WoD when I came back to WoW, this was one of the zones I leveled in. Or at least, that was the plan. But tge mobs attacked from all directions which annoyed me and I had a storyline somewhere else to explore. Then I got into Pandaria and started doing quests there... And suddenly I was doing MoP content and WoD content instead. Still didn't finish this zone, but it's on my to do list because I loved the atmosphere. I can see the irritation of being attacked from everywhere though. A map like this with less mob density should work.

[@Lamsan02]

Say what you will but the music nailed it. It simply felt like underwater music, without being the millonth iteration of the same music with trumpets historically used in any underwater level in Genesis games or Final Fantasy 7.

[@Myrdden71]

I didn't hate it, and it was beautiful, but I'm used to obvious camps that are quest hubs, obvious roads or paths, and this wasn't so easy to find in this zone. It was super easy to just get lost in unless you kept checking your map constantly. Other than that, I liked it.

[@firebender9010]

This area is one of my favorite memories from playing WOW It stood out way more than the mountainous area another portal led to. I wanna know who made it so I can play more games they made because it's very likely they've left blizzard by now

[@MSinistrari]

I mostly remember it being cumbersome to get around the zone which while annoying doesn't really make it a hated zone for me.

[@terry9819]

It's the best zone, the buffs/seahorse made navigating it fine and running along the sea bed was amazing.

[@backcenter2]

My fav leveling zone

[@Etienne_H]

They should just make the player automatically swim to the same height as the enemies underwater, that would fix this combat issue.

[@Basteal]

Vashj'ir was fun, and if you didn't like it you could just avoid it while leveling. I do forget how the rep worked in Cata though. Maybe it was 'mandatory'.

[@boxoid5230]

Bro as a kid that giant whale gave me legit reoccuring nightmares 💀

[@Okan195]

Leveling from 40 - 60 in retail here was a blast. Idunno about the hate, but I enjoyed questing here

[@disgruntleddude]

The extra axis of movement and the 'busy-ness' of the zone as well as the confusing layout induces sensory overload in my spectrum-placing brain. They shouldn't have gone to all the trouble of making the zone only to scrap the raid tier, though. It left a massive plot hole that ended up resolving itself offscreen which is always poor story-telling. Should have instead turned the raid into two hour of twilight dungeons made by a b-team or something.

[@swtorfan6756]

I LOVED this area when it was live. If I run anything CATA on alts, I almost always pick this one.

[@sleazysid253]

If you enjoyed this zone, you never played OG Vanilla and understand what under water quests did to your mind.

[@Chicken-x6q6d]

I must be in the minority as I rather liked this zone, reminded me of those Jules Verne stories I used to read as a kid. It also had a lot of colour which was nice. The zones I hated the most were old world ones like Desolace which were bleak and had disgustingly long corpse runs. That said, as much as I enjoyed Vash’jir, it’s not a zone I find myself going back to just to hang around there.

[@Infernal_Elf]

Land crabs aint able to appreciate the deepness of Vashj'ir. Thoughts from an actual Norwegian sailor and WoW fan

[@Raintiger88]

I only did that zone on my Druid. I didn't really hate it, but I never did it on any other toon.

[@jarlfisk]

Best F zone ever in wow! ever! Love it was SO GIANT! It was scary!

[@ColCoal]

Vash was great I always skipped Zhuhai when leveling in cata.

[@metal_monocle7334]

One of thé best zones ever and quite possibly the most unique, but all the basic plebs complained so now we’ll keep getting elf forests and plains

[@Me_Myself_and_Eye]

Hats off to you for always trying to play up old wow graphics

[@SimonRobeyns]

it wasn't the worst it just didn't 'work' well in the sense of you go there and never have a reason to come back and most people who min-maxed already didn't feel the need to go there

[@markup6394]

People are lazy, thats why they didnt like the zone. Players would only do the most effective things that would get them through the zone, rarely bothering to look around, let alone pay attention. Personlly, I liked the zone, and the only reason I picked Hyjal over it was the XP gain got increased so you only needed to play through one of the two zones, and Hyjal simply had the advantage of being very well connected to the other zones and transition was really easy.

[@gscgold]

And here we are getting ready for Cata Classic..kinda blows my mind they even considered doing Cata classic since that's the very expansion that prompted the guy to ask if they ever considered having a server as it used to be and the famous "you think you do but you don't" comment.

[@TheMonk3613]

This zone really brings the Fear out and I am Hungry for more.

[@TheFaaborg]

the zone is 10/10 because of "By Thrall's balls!" but seriously the zone is beautiful

[@fandyllic1975]

I found Vashj’ir interesting and not nearly as bad as most people. What I didn’t like was the forced intro scenario.

[@DannysDome]

Litterally the best zone ever made, completely love it :D Good quest, beautiful views, great music and I dont dislike the water movement at all

[@TatsuyaWow]

it the best immersion zone that ever had in wow go underwater trying to survive get get speed boost after doign some quest get mount and there you explore , save demi god inside learn about the naga and so on

[@sonicartzldesignerclan5763]

I just started the video And i didnt knew i was there already once i felt like a ton of memorys as form in ptsd dropped in my head. I dont know why But i hate such underwater level. I Just hate it. I always felt like the people who said : " Oh i like that zone " Were the same people who didnt was raiding or anything Rather just play the game for the vibe.

[@josephteller9715]

Cataclysm hype. They invested tons into the graphics and failed on the mechanics and interface for the zone. So many classes get screwed over by how standard effects work (Mages, Pallies, Shamans, Warlocks, etc.) because of the trashing of the way area effects work and how distance is portrayed rather than functions. Add in a convoluted set of plotlines that go nowhere and which force you into specific pathing (a regular problem in WoW from Cat onward) and you loose autonomy on your questing on top of already having lost autonomy of your character design in Cataclysm already. Just not worth the effort.

[@SeventhSwell]

Like I've always jokingly said, it's the zone so bad even Blizzard didn't finish it. Still, it wasn't that bad, and I enjoyed it for the most part.

[@MrCoreygeorge]

This zone made me rage quit Cata, which is sad because skipping Cata lead me to skipping MoP

[@rocky98a]

This zone gets so much hate, but honestly for me it was way more fun than any Legion/BFA zone.

[@TyyTheFlyGuy]

One of my favorite zones. I actually dislike pretty much everything else about that expansion besides this zone as the world was ruined.

[@one_eyeddd473]

It looks untextured why did they givw it such lil detail. Oh shit the inside of crwature is cool

[@gubigubigubigubi]

The zone was good honestly but just being underwater automatically makes it fucking terrible.

[@zytha2890]

Yes This zone was fucking TERRIBLE idk how many times i fell asleep trying to level when it was released it was so boring and i REFUSE to ever do this zone again when i play cata classic im not going to vash'jir the only cool thing about the zone was the introduction to it it was all downhill from that point it quite literally peaked at the introduction and fell off the rest of the way

[@blackhawkcz1895]

Almost feels like the hate is made up so many people love the zone.

[@baloonfart8082]

I enjoyed it. Some of the craziest adventures I ever had were in this zone.

[@_Shisui.-pd5vt]

i like it because i like sea and underwater questing

[@TrampyPulsar]

It was too long for what you got out of it. Thematically amazing, but cataclysm was hardly a sandbox experience so there was no reason to revisit after you did the main quests, its honestly a big problem with a ton of WOW zones really.

[@cheebee9684]

Babe wake up!! New vaulty WoW video just dropped!! 🗣️🗣️🗣️

[@Lonewolfz24]

I loved this area when it came out ... but I only play druids =P

[@arkomblago2222]

Cata was so promising and started strong.

[@naturestudies8040]

No vashij was neat, the worst zone is definitely azshara

[@robakers7837]

Vashj'ir is by far the most fun zone in WoW history. Anyone who hates it is dumb.

[@NathanMays-sm5pe]

This zone gave me thalassiphobia

[@SenkoVT]

As druid this zone was actually okay ... but other than that - no thanks

[@calmuellerWAR]

Funny, this was the only zone I enjoyed in Cataclysm

[@Prince_Of_Fish]

i liked Vash'ir but i can accept that my views may be biased.

[@midas1108]

I hated Silithus way more than Vashj'ir.

[@StrikerZero6]

Tried it on retail, never touching the zone again, so many bugs including invisible, untargetable mobs due to the cache folder filling up over and over

[@zorlac4884]

I loved Vashj'ir I thought it was magical, my laptop at the time didn't love it though XD

[@bhe8336]

This was my fav zone from cata

[@Cjeska]

It's actually my favourite zone in the game.

[@plastikloser]

I was on a pvp server and it was very annoying and janky to fight in. The pve was fine though

[@pandaronxd9882]

Sure the ones that have thallasophobia might complain a lot its actually frightening them i have that fear too so its not a zone for me 😅

[@1ove1ess]

The worst zone? Of course not. The most hated? Maybe. I mean, God forbid asking of a WoW player to adapt to something remotely innovative.

[@simonlopresti]

Not looking forward to this zone, gonna just dungeon grind prob

[@Xsifilad]

I freaking love Vasjir!

[@carloago8305]

My all time favorite zone. No joke.

[@Reaperofwind]

It had its own charm .

[@mikemcmahon3118]

Dood i love this zone is was so unique way better than deemholm and all that

[@ermelloth8632]

Love the zone. Especially hunting Poseidus)

[@Nialei3]

I really liked Vash’ir