WoW: Wrath of the Lich King Classic Announced

Well, it seems Blizzard has finally let this particular cat the rest of the way out of the bag. Back in late March, I wrote about the fact that Blizzard sent out a survey to certain portions of “retail” World of Warcraft and WoW Classic’s player bases in an effort to gauge how the game’s community would feel about a Classic version of WoW’s 2008 expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. I interpreted this survey as evidence that such a version was in development and probably close to being brought to fruition.

It appears that I wasn’t too far off the mark on that front. During Blizzard’s lengthy Livestream that took place this past Tuesday, the real star of the show was the upcoming expansion for retail WoW, entitled Dragonflight. Even though the new expansion hogged the spotlight for most of the stream, certain high-ranking Blizzard personnel stated that they wanted to make sure that Classic players knew they hadn’t been forgotten. That was the context within which Wrath of the Lich King Classic was officially revealed.

Blizzard stated during Wrath of the Lich King Classic’s five minutes of fame throughout their Livestream that the emulated expansion will be released sometime this year, but that’s the most concrete launch window they’ve provided at the time of writing. If precedent about things like this is any indication, I’m reasonably sure the actual launch date will be leaked (whether intentionally or otherwise) at least a bit ahead of time. Until then, we can discuss what was revealed about this reanimated version of World of Warcraft’s most popular expansion.

First and foremost, one of the most prominent things present in the original Wrath of the Lich King was the introduction of the Death Knight hero class. Blizzard stated that Classic players will be able to create their first Death Knight as soon as Wrath of the Lich King Classic’s pre-patch goes live, without the original requirement to have at least one character sitting at level 55 or higher in order to do so. This means they’ve removed what could have been a rather significant restriction for more casual Classic players, which I think is nice to see.

Speaking of aspects of Wrath of the Lich King that Blizzard has removed though, that brings me to what may be seen as a less-popular decision. The panel of high-ranking Classic developers who announced Wrath of the Lich King Classic explained that they’re removing the Dungeon Finder system from the revived version of the expansion because they believe it goes against the game’s ethos. “It feels like how we envisioned Classic, Dungeon Finder is not a good fit for our community,” said WoW Classic’s Lead Producer Holly Longdale.

Just for the record, it was clarified that the Dungeon Finder system will only be removed from WoW Classic and not from retail World of Warcraft. One thing that makes me suspect this decision may not exactly be welcomed with open arms is the tone with which this clarification was made. Game Director Ion Hazzikostas said that if you want to just jump into Dungeon Finder and run some dungeons for any reason, “[y]ou can do that in Shadowlands. You’ll be able to do that in Dragonflight.”

Blizzard’s staff haven’t said much else in the way of significant announcements or alterations when it comes to Wrath of the Lich King Classic. The last noteworthy thing they discussed in detail is the fact that in-game barbershops will apparently have more available customization options in WotLK Classic than they did when the expansion was current.

It was also stated that barbershops will operate on gold-only transactions rather than requiring the use of real money. Whether or not players will be able to change their character’s gender at will at a barbershop (as is currently possible in retail WoW) wasn’t mentioned. All I know is that if in-game barbershops once required players to pay real money for the “privilege” of changing their character’s physical appearance in reversible ways, I’m quite glad to see Blizzard ruling that out in Wrath Classic.

There you have it, my friends! That’s a brief rundown of everything that’s currently known about the next step in the World of Warcraft Classic lineage. If you’re anything like me, you’re probably scouring the Internet for more information about Dragonflight rather than for information about this, but fret not. I’ll have a more in-depth article about much of what was announced about the upcoming expansion to retail World of Warcraft published in the coming days. Until then, do let me know what you thought of Blizzard’s announcement Livestream in this article’s comments!