WoW Classic is getting Mists of Pandaria servers next year, and Blizzard is "staying true" to the 12-year-old MMO expansion "pretty much across the board"
Nov. 13, 2024“I can’t think of any real diversion points that we’ve talked about or made a decision on”
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WoW Classiccontinues on its journey to revisit the MMO’s 20-year history by introducing Mists of Pandaria Classic servers next year, and Blizzard promises they’ll be pretty dang faithful to the original.
Those minor changes are a bit of a theme to WoW Classic expansions, though how sweeping they are depends on the expansion itself. For example, Wrath of the Lich King Classic initially said goodbye to Dungeon Finder on launch before bringing it back – you also had more inclusive character options. Given the chance to speak to Blizzard before the Warcraft Direct, I ask what we can expect from Mists of Pandaria Classic.
Software engineer Kevin Vigue tells us Blizzard’s approach to WoW Classic balances what players want to see and where the devs think the game is going, though some lessons have been taken from Wrath of the Lich King Classic.
“With Mists of Pandaria, I don’t know if there are really any of those decision points that we’re making right now in the same way that we were for Wrath of the Lich King,” he says. “I think that, when we proceeded through Wrath of Lich King and then listened to player feedback about ‘we actually do want LFD for this version of World of Warcraft,’ brought that in, then proceeded on to Cataclysm.
“That set a pretty clear course for what we’re going to be doing with Mists of Pandaria, and that’ll be staying true to what was in the original Mists of Pandaria, pretty much across the board. I can’t think of any real diversion points that we’ve talked about or made a decision on.”
As a result of that, Vigue says you can look forward to the full set of queuing for dungeons and scenarios alongside all the other good stuff like challenge modes and raids.
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While Blizzard has dabbled with Mists of Pandaria’s content just earlier this year inWorld of Warcraft: Remix, it looks like WoW Classic’s take will be less experimental and more faithful.
Back to the Warcraft Direct, that’s not all you’re getting for WoW Classic. Following fan feedback, Blizzard has revealed that 20th Anniversary Edition Realms will offer Classic era fans a fresh start to WoW, including hardcore server options – both of which will continue through content updates simultaneously. After that, non-hardcore servers will eventually progress from vanilla to Burning Crusade, the MMO’s first expansion.
Thankfully, while you’ll have to wait for Mists of Pandaria Classic, you’ve got the new Anniversary servers to enjoy until then.
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Iain joins the GamesRadar team as Deputy News Editor following stints at PCGamesN and PocketGamer.Biz, with some freelance for Kotaku UK, RockPaperShotgun, and VG24/7 thrown in for good measure. When not helping Ali run the news team, he can be found digging into communities for stories – the sillier the better. When he isn’t pillaging the depths of Final Fantasy 14 for a swanky new hat, you’ll find him amassing an army of Pokemon plushies.
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