Few words can be so ambiguous to their meaning as “classic”. Though it is generally understood as something “timelessly good” or “typical”, there are exceptions as well. I will certainly feel slightly offended if I hear one of my friends refer to something I did as “that is classic Kostas” and occasionally you may hear that something is “too classic” and you certainly know it is to be avoided. This ambiguity does not stem from the difficulty in understanding whether “classic” is “good” or “bad”, but at what exactly constitutes something as “classic”.
Enter: World of Warcraft Classic. For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about, I will pretend to give a-not-so-thorough description: it is the recent re-release of the initial version of probably the most famous and played MMORPG. MMORPG of course stands for Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game and just nod along and pretend you know exactly what I am talking about because otherwise my explanation will be bigger that this article itself.
Initially released back in 2004 as “World of Warcraft” by Blizzard Entertainment, WoW (for short) took the gaming world by storm, reaching a peak of more than 12 million active accounts and a total of more than 140 million accounts created over its lifespan. Going through several expansions and additions, the game transformed slowly through time, maturing and evolving. Though not so popular like at its prime, it remains at the top of its class, hailed by many (well, me for sure) as the best MMPRPG out there.
Perhaps it didn’t come as a surprise to many when last year Blizzard Entertainment announced that a “Classic” version of the game would become available this summer, which it did, a few months ago. It was a somewhat awkward reaction to the realization that a surprisingly big number of payers chose to play in pirate servers, not because it was free, but because that way they could avoid all the expansion and game updates of the past 15 years. Speculation gave and took at how the game would look and play, until upon release it was revealed that any WoW player with an active account could dive back into the game exactly the way it was 15 years ago. It is perhaps here that we need to discuss what really a “classic” video game is, why is it needed an what can be expected.
Certainly not the first, but WoW was one of those games that helped establish the pay-per-month model. Up until the late ‘90s, we were used to buying a video game as a product. You bought it, played it, and then you could even resale it. WoW was bought as primarily a service, not a product, though you had to buy the initial game installation discs and subsequent expansions. Then came the “bane” of video game world, the pay-to-win games, starting with those awful mobile games. WoW didn’t delve into this, but it did introduce cosmetics bought with real life currency. The model held.
What it did not hold, was the game subscribers base, which steadily declined. New expansions, a vast number of changes targeted at the game’s accessibility, made it retain its place at the top, but far from what it used to be. It is perhaps then that people started turning to private servers, where things where not progressing at the same pace.
At its inception, it was greeted with enthusiasm, an enthusiasm that was verified at the game launch and still goes strong. You might consider nostalgia to be a major factor for turning to a practically 15 years old video game, and it probably is. However, if you consider the game’s progress ever since, WoW classic is a video game atavism, a step back at the evolution of modern video games. Looking for Group, daily quests, and all the comforts available at the latest version, are just not there. The game is much less accessible, much less forgiving, much less polished and much more hardcore.
Thus, the question: why so popular? It is perhaps not seer nostalgia that drove millions of players rolling (sic) classic characters but the game’s old school value. It is a game with a begin, a rather large middle and an extensive end, but an end nonetheless. As one returning to WoW after a 10 years hiatus, I couldn’t but feel overwhelmed. Not because of the changes, which I got used to pretty quickly, like riding a bike after a long time, but because the vastness of the game destroyed any purpose for me. I could never see the end of it, whether it meant being a top PvP player of finishing the hardest raids and wearing the top gear.
Another content update will shortly arrive, and then another expansion and so on, until the time ends or Blizzard decides to cancel the game (or publish World of Starcaft perhaps?). But not with Classic. Though still vast, as I said, the game is finite. It has a story line you can understand and follow to its end. Levels, skills, gear, they have a maximum you can reach, well documented in countless game guides, FAQs and YouTube videos. Hell, it could even be an offline game, had it not been for it’s social and PvP aspect!
WoW Classic for me signifies a fed-up feeling of modern video game design, whether it is for constant changes or paying for cosmetics or simply to be able to keep playing. Of course, we still haven’t heard word from Blizzard and I do believe that re-releasing at least some of the game’s expansion is a possibility, perhaps giving the player the option of choosing how much… classic he or she wants to be. That will be a serious test that might prove me wrong, but until then, I believe WoW Classic is a throwback to what it is all about in video games: simple fun and a grand finale. Hey, perhaps a “classic video game” should be associated with “simple, no fanfares, the way it originally meant to be played”!
