Update: WoW: Warlords of Draenor Pre-Order Bonus is an Instant Level 90

[Steven Bogos]

Update: WoW: Warlords of Draenor Pre-Order Bonus is an Instant Level 90

Blizzard is also testing a feature that will allow players to purchase additional level 90 character upgrades.

When Warlords of Draenor, the latest expansion pack for World of Warcraft was announced, one of its major selling points was the one-time ability to instantly level any character to level 90. Well, I've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that you'll be able to use the level 90 upgrade as soon as you pre-purchase the game, which should give you plenty of time to be acquainted with the class. The bad news is that it looks like the level 90 upgrade will be a pre-purchase bonus exclusive.

If you do miss out on pre-purchasing the game, or you wish to use the instant level 90 upgrade on multiple characters, Blizzard said that it is testing a feature that will allow players to purchase additional upgrades for a fee, similar to how a paid race or faction transfer currently works. It should be ready by the time the expansion comes out.

"We'll have more information to share later-including details on our character-upgrade plans for Asian regions where players don't buy expansion boxes-but you'll start seeing pieces of the process soon on the PTR, so keep an eye out," said Blizzard.

Additionally, if you pre-purchase the digital deluxe version of the game, you'll get your exclusive pet and mount as soon as you payment is processed.

Blizzard said that the Warlords of Draenor closed beta test will start Soon™, although an official release date for the expansion has yet to be announced.

I should note that it may have just been an awkwardly-worded blog post, and we have reached out to Blizzard to confirm whether or not the level 90 bonus will be exclusive to pre-orders.

Source: Blizzard [http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/12426481/]

Update: Good news everyone! Blizzard has confirmed to us via e-mail that the level 90 boost will be available to everyone who purchases the expansion at any time before or after its release, not just those who pre-purchase.

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[FogHornG36]

No, this is good, so instead of having a game that you would want to play, you have a system, that you can pay money, get max level, and then you don't have to play anymore.

 

[Baldr]

Hmm, I don't agree with the reasoning for paid level 90s service. It would cost $95 ($15 Battle-chest, $15 Mists, $40 Warlords, $25 character transfer) for a second account 90 without the service, a high price tag not many people would be willing to pay. You drop it to $40, then you have more people paying, which is not exactly a good thing. I noticed they added a new in-game shop mount today, usually it like every 6 months, but the Fey dragon was only a couple months ago.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

You mean I can pay money to have the game already finished for me!? Sweet! If there was one thing holding back gaming, it was the fact I had to actually play the game. The fact Blizzard has enabled me to simply throw money at them and have the game finished for me really opens up my schedule.
-Edit-
I thought it was pretty clear I was being facetious but I based on the responses from people quoting me, I guess not. People are so sensitive.

 

[Nilanius]

This has to be the stupidest crap I seen from Blizzard to date. It's as though they conveniently forgot what gaming is supposed to be about. What makes a game a game. What's the point of playing a game if you can just toss money at the developer and have them instantly take you to the end of the game?

Imagine if other games did this. Legend of Zelda. What would of happened if you were suddenly given every item, had max hearts and skipped over the journey to fight Ganondorf? Is there any reason to play the game anymore? What about Super Mario Brothers? You jump from the starting stage to the Bowser end fight. What's there left of the game? Something more modern? What would Fallout of been if you exited the vault and was given all the weapons and ammunition you need to kill the master?

Gaming is about the journey, the adventure to the end. Gaming is supposed to be fun and exciting, and even a challenge. All MMO's, save for WoW now, have players still login, and level up and play the game, as far as I know. But wait, for a modest fee, Blizzard will let you turn a freshly rolled level 1, into a level 90 in an instant.

WoW can no longer call itself a game with a straight face. There's nothing game about it anymore. Games should be about getting from point A to point B in order to get to point C, and so on. But Blizzard, no, Activision, seems intent on destroying the MMO market altogether by rewarding the lazy who then filter their views to other games, which begins dragging the other games down. I would not call being given a free ticket to the end of the game from the start, good news. Not even in the slightest. This is setting a bad precedence for MMO's. There is another word for it too. Paying to cheat. When you shorten the game by nerfing xp needed to level up, create some badly written story based on another's work (Come on, CSI... Rambo, Indiana Jones?) and then just saying "Give us money and you can skip all this crap we did", you stop being a game developer, and become a seller of a few minutes of fun, which will be over just as soon as you get it.

Games are about setting goals. And to reach the goals, requires a journey. You cut out the journey, there are no goals. That's like having a race car track, and the moment the cars pass over the start line, you declare the start line is also the finish line. And that is just pure stupidity.

 

[Elamdri]

This has to be the stupidest crap I seen from Blizzard to date. It's as though they conveniently forgot what gaming is supposed to be about. What makes a game a game. What's the point of playing a game if you can just toss money at the developer and have them instantly take you to the end of the game?

Imagine if other games did this. Legend of Zelda. What would of happened if you were suddenly given every item, had max hearts and skipped over the journey to fight Ganondorf? Is there any reason to play the game anymore? What about Super Mario Brothers? You jump from the starting stage to the Bowser end fight. What's there left of the game? Something more modern? What would Fallout of been if you exited the vault and was given all the weapons and ammunition you need to kill the master?

Gaming is about the journey, the adventure to the end. Gaming is supposed to be fun and exciting, and even a challenge. All MMO's, save for WoW now, have players still login, and level up and play the game, as far as I know. But wait, for a modest fee, Blizzard will let you turn a freshly rolled level 1, into a level 90 in an instant.

WoW can no longer call itself a game with a straight face. There's nothing game about it anymore. Games should be about getting from point A to point B in order to get to point C, and so on. But Blizzard, no, Activision, seems intent on destroying the MMO market altogether by rewarding the lazy who then filter their views to other games, which begins dragging the other games down. I would not call being given a free ticket to the end of the game from the start, good news. Not even in the slightest. This is setting a bad precedence for MMO's. There is another word for it too. Paying to cheat. When you shorten the game by nerfing xp needed to level up, create some badly written story based on another's work (Come on, CSI... Rambo, Indiana Jones?) and then just saying "Give us money and you can skip all this crap we did", you stop being a game developer, and become a seller of a few minutes of fun, which will be over just as soon as you get it.

Games are about setting goals. And to reach the goals, requires a journey. You cut out the journey, there are no goals. That's like having a race car track, and the moment the cars pass over the start line, you declare the start line is also the finish line. And that is just pure stupidity.

You're totally not understanding who this is for. This is for people like me for example who quit playing WoW during like Wrath of the Lich King.

Lets say I was really excited about Warlords of Draenor and wanted to pick it up. Back when I was playing WoW, I had about 3 characters that I ran pretty consistently.

Well now that presents a problem because if I want to play those characters in the new expansion, I have to basically level up 2 of them (since you get 1 boosted for free) to level 90 in order to play the new content.

That means I have to play through HOURS of content that nobody is playing anymore.

Or I can toss out however much they're asking for and immediately be at level 90 and be able to do all the new expansion stuff with everyone else without having to grind my way up there.

Whether it's worth it or not depends on Blizzard's price point.

 

[Elamdri]

starting a game in which you already have one of the highest possible ranks and a lot of skill points to put into your skill tree and ability tree might end up with you putting most of your points on skills you thought were good for your playstyle, but turned out to be impractical for you in the end.

so this can go wrong for players who wanted to get into world of warcraft with this expansion as an entry point.

respeccing is trivially easy in WOW

 

[Vaccine]

Inc hate train.

I like it, I have always hated leveling and would rather spend my time at end game.
Some people like leveling, that option is still there, then there are people like me who see leveling as a "How many levels till I can actually play?" system, both have a purpose, both are good.

 

[MCerberus]

Ummm... wasn't letting everyone doing this one of the big selling points of the expansion?
Now it's preorder only?

 

[Elamdri]

starting a game in which you already have one of the highest possible ranks and a lot of skill points to put into your skill tree and ability tree might end up with you putting most of your points on skills you thought were good for your playstyle, but turned out to be impractical for you in the end.

so this can go wrong for players who wanted to get into world of warcraft with this expansion as an entry point.

respeccing is trivially easy in WOW

but may it have "ruined" the experience for an user and thus soured his motivation to continue this game?

I mean, I suppose it's possible, but every RPG has a learning curve, and only the most inexperienced of players go into a new RPG not knowing this.

Not to mention that in WoW you can generally get through most content with a cobbled together build and gear, it's only really the 5-man and above content that actually requires you to be able to do more than breathe and push buttons.

Not to mention that they'll still have 10 levels to "Figure out" how their character works anyway.

 

[Terminate421]

People are just hating this because it's WoW.

I'm honestly liking the free 90 because here is the thing:

I don't want to level another character all the way to 90

I have:

A Worgen Deathknight
A Human Hunter
A Human Paladin
A Pandaren Monk (Probably not going to play on him again, Alliance)
A Blood Elf Mage
A Pandaren Warrior (Horde)

All at 90. I am fucking done. But this free 90...I could use it on one free class. Or A Pandaren Hunter, because the other classes I don't have are not on my interest right now.

 

[Kuala BangoDango]

You mean I can pay money to have the game already finished for me!? Sweet! If there was one thing holding back gaming, it was the fact I had to actually play the game. The fact Blizzard has enabled me to simply throw money at them and have the game finished for me really opens up my schedule.

Kinda reminds me of some of those Asian browser games where you can just click on the name of the quest and your character will auto-run to the quest location, auto-fight all the mobs needed, auto-pick up the loot till you've acquired the correct number of pelts, then auto-run back to the quest giver and turn it in. The only thing the player has to do is come back to the computer occasionally to click the next quest/npc name.

You're basically just paying to watch a movie of your character playing the game (or for free if f2p).

 

[UltimatheChosen]

You mean I can pay money to have the game already finished for me!?

To be fair, reaching level 90 is not finishing the game. In fact, WoW actually begins at the level cap-- the leveling process is essentially a overly long and poorly designed tutorial. (Poorly designed in that it doesn't teach you what to do at endgame and actually instills a lot of bad habits that you'll have to unlearn.)

 

[Elamdri]

starting a game in which you already have one of the highest possible ranks and a lot of skill points to put into your skill tree and ability tree might end up with you putting most of your points on skills you thought were good for your playstyle, but turned out to be impractical for you in the end.

so this can go wrong for players who wanted to get into world of warcraft with this expansion as an entry point.

respeccing is trivially easy in WOW

but may it have "ruined" the experience for an user and thus soured his motivation to continue this game?

I mean, I suppose it's possible, but every RPG has a learning curve, and only the most inexperienced of players go into a new RPG not knowing this.

Not to mention that in WoW you can generally get through most content with a cobbled together build and gear, it's only really the 5-man and above content that actually requires you to be able to do more than breathe and push buttons.

Not to mention that they'll still have 10 levels to "Figure out" how their character works anyway.

but going from level 90 to 100 is a hard ***** to get to, more than just leveling up from 0 to 10.
the sensation of leveling up that reels you into a game would take too long and people would just quit.

on the other hand, this may the most sensible thing to do since wow can be pretty addicting.

You don't think people would end up burning out going from 0-100 in what is going to probably be a barren wasteland? I'd certainly rather go 90-100 than 0-100