I've played about 50+ hours of the World of Warcraft: Forever beta, and wouldn't you know it, I'm going to be playing a lot more when it comes out November 4.

Earlier this week, Kris Zierhut, principal game designer on World of Warcraft: Forever, said that the game would have a release schedule that's a "little more laid back". Rather than the blisteringly fast eight to 10 week schedule of Season of Discovery, Forever'll aim to release major updates once every four months or so.

This is honestly music to my ears—I've been impressed by retail WoW's blistering pace and its seasonal structure, even if there have been some rocky, bug-filled patches in the past; and it's certainly something I've praised before, especially in contrast to other certain MMOs that have been coming to a standstill.

But I've been playing WoW… well, for a long time, but I've had a consistent sub since Dragonflight, and I've been able to see the arc of Blizzard whipping up its schedule into a proper roadmap. Which did pull the game back from the brink, true, but three expansions in and I'm just sort of exhausted.

There's always some new bar to fill, some new doohickey to collect, some new reputation track to chew on, and it all moves so fast that if I, say, have an off-week to go play another game, I feel pretty lost. 0 came out in August) it also has a ton of interim stuff to flood out your schedule every three months, rather than four.

Source link