A View From the Road: Screw Warcraft IV

[oliveira8]

A View From the Road: Screw Warcraft IV

Why can?t an MMOG be a proper chapter in a continuing story?

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There is one argument that still manages to resonate with me, and that's because it's more a matter of personal preference than anything else: "What if I don't like MMOGs?" That's a perfectly valid point, and I can see how the change in genre might be a point of contention. If you love Real-Time Strategy games, but would rather not touch a Massively Multiplayer Online game with a twenty-foot pole, then some feelings of bitterness would be rather understandable.

My counter-argument to that would be to ask them if they care about the story or the game. Take the Legacy of Kain series, for example. Most of the games in that series had very yawn-worthy gameplay, but the story was so great that who cares? You aren't playing those games for the experience, you're playing those games so the plot will continue.

If someone told me that they don't want to play WoW for the story, then I'd tell them that they're obviously not that enveloped by the story if such a minor obstacle is keeping them from experiencing it.

Tell me did you waste hours/days/months/years to level up and gear up your character in Legend of Kain series? Did you had to prance around hours looking for 4,9,24,39 other people to follow you in dungeon XXX in Legend of Kain series? Did you pay 30? every 2 months to play Legend of Kain series?

Is the answer: "no" to all these questions? If so...That is the worst counter argument ever....don't compare a MMO to a single player game. Please...just don't.

It's not a minor obstacle...it's the damn Wall of China and the only thing that can help you cross it is a rusty spoon.

 

[Yokai]

Because the Warcraft series ended the moment Blizzard chose to ignore nearly every major plot point and lore from earlier games for the purpose of adapting the franchise to a MMO gameplay, and in addition making it wholesome family entertainment, filled with comic relief and pop culture references at every turn, as opposed to the dark, brutal, Warhammer-inspired game world of Warcraft 2 and its subsequent expansion.

It has heavily degenerated into something that parents use to babysit their kids, and 13 year old asian girls to giggle over as they dress up their night elf druids in matching seasonal clothing.

It has become, in short, an abomination.

Thank you. I'm glad someone gets this. While agree with Funk's response in that the WC series always had comic relief, one of the main issues with WoW is that the comic relief, along with many other elements that appeared in the switch to an MMO, effectively break the fourth wall nearly all the time. The holiday events, the LFG chat, the Blizzcon NPCs--these and many other things have made it virtually impossible to take the game seriously.
Perhaps WoW is quite capable of advancing the Warcraft story--and from what I've heard (never got a character past 40) it does a relatively good job of this. The problem is that it's buried in all of this out-of-character, out-of-context MMOG fluff. Maybe this is unavoidable, given the genre, but at the end of the day, it's still preventing one from fully appreciating the storyline that began with Orcs and Humans. I know many WoW players, and none of them play it for the story. They play it for the loot, the raids, the PvP. Few WoW players who haven't played the original even have a grasp of what the story is all about. Illidan and Arthas aren't a power-hungry betrayer and a corrupted champion of good, just a hard raid boss and a super-hard raid boss. That's all they read into it. It's just all too muddled.

 

[Gongon]

I don't get all the fighting over whether you need to have played WoW in order to enjoy an RTS sequel to the Warcraft universe. All the games in the franchise could be played and enjoyed without playing any of the previous games. Warcraft 3 was the first game for (I dare say) a sizable chunk of the playerbase, and still, I bet they enjoyed the game without knowing every bit of backstory from the various previous games, or even from the multitude of novels.

If Blizzard ever gets around to make another Warcraft RTS game, you don't HAVE to have played the previous games in order to get any enjoyment from the story. Instead, they will fill the game with small hints and old references, as a tribute to all of us old players who started with Orcs and Humans and is acquainted with the lore.

As far as I'm concerned, WoW is Warcraft 4, 5 and 6 (or something along those lines), but I do not feel the need to play the latest incarnation of the game (Wrath), and I shouldn't need to in order to enjoy the next game.

Now, for something entirely different. Why MMOs won't have the same impact as a single-player game. Whereas the story itself can be superb and well written, it means nothing (to me) unless there is character interaction between me, as the players, and various NPCs/party members. To me this is why the KotOR games were so damn good. In the first game you could actually kill off several of you characters at various points in the game. The overall story wasn't what drove me forth to finish the game, rather the interactions I had with the other meatbags, finding out what made them tick, how I could manipulate them or help them was what made the experience for me.

This is also why I no longer find so called "Thempark MMOs" that interesting anymore. The player interactions doesn't mean diddly squat. Rather, give me an MMO where there is meaningful interaction between players, and you can actually make an impact on the world. I know this won't happen in WoW or TOR, and it will probably be the reason I won't thoroughly enjoy TOR. Still, I'm hoping I'm proven wrong.

Cheers.

 

[HK_01]

Um, no, just no. Can anybody actually tell me the story behind World of Warcraft? If yes, I'm very surprised. When I played, all it was was a series of quests that I did not care about because I only wanted the XP. Seriously, if they base the story of Warcraft IV on the events in WoW at least 80% of the people won't understand anything.

 

[Fenixius]

Something important to note is that as much as we may or may not like this, Funk is pretty much right. War4 will occur much, much later than the events of WoW. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if they never actually continued the Warcraft series.

But what I mean is that... there's no use arguing. It's an exercise in futility as far as Warcraft is concerned. It's been done already. We're never going to change the past. Oh, and you were talking about, The Old Republic? It's done too. They've decided. So debating about that wouldn't help, either.

...that said, what we MAY be able to do is decide if, or at least find a better 'how' for MMOs to express a story in the future. Just keep that in mind. The focus of discussion should be on whether or not MMO's are a good vehicle for telling a coherent story at all.

And in my opinion, Yokai, above is totally right.

Few WoW players who haven't played the original even have a grasp of what the story is all about. Illidan and Arthas aren't a power-hungry betrayer and a corrupted champion of good, just a hard raid boss and a super-hard raid boss. That's all they read into it. It's just all too muddled.

Also, Funk, I meant to thank you before for your tendency to comment in your own thread. Not nearly enough authors on this website and others actually respond to comments or rebuttals of their writings.

 

[Vlane]

An MMO isn't a bad way to continue a story, its just a dumb way. Why would I want to pay $50 three times for game plus expansions and then on top of that a monthly fee, it just seems stupid to go on like that. Rather pay one time and continue a great storyline then all of that cost.

You don't have to play WoW for three months. You can get to lvl 80 within your free month and there you have your story.

Buying WoW and the addons is probably even cheaper than a normal console game.

 

[Vlane]

Personally I'd like to see a WC IV but I can live with WoW telling the story.

 

[Vlane]

Um, no, just no. Can anybody actually tell me the story behind World of Warcraft? If yes, I'm very surprised. When I played, all it was was a series of quests that I did not care about because I only wanted the XP.

Are you retarded? No honestly are you? You say that you want a story yet you don't care about the story the game wants to tell.

 

[JakobBloch]

ok... A couple of points that needs to be made:

Firtly: Don't go into economics as an argument. That has nothing to do with the discussion.

Secondly and this is aimed at Byers: You do not have the end all know all right to abitrarily decide what warcraft is. It is something different to all of us. Now as for lightening up the univers a bit I don't think that is a bad thing. Comic relief is prevailent in most all games Warhammer included (arguably the darkest setting I can mention offhand) goblins, snotlings, orcs, chaos dwarves (they may be dark but they look bloody silly), halflings and of course Blood Bowl (warhammer 40k is however mostly devoid of comic relief with the possible exception of orcs) but I digress. Warcraft needs the same comic relief. In WC2 it was the click adventures on unites that gave some fun moments. In WC3 it was also a silly panda and so on. Comic relief is part of allmost all creativ storytelling. It may often be little things but I believe you will be hard pressed to find any big piece of storytelling (big as in a lot of it) that does not have at least a little comic relief. Now the stories in WoW ARE dark... at least a lot of them are. While your rank and file quests might not reflect it offhand the longer chains surely does. Take as an early example the defias brotherhood quest chain that leads into the deadmines and tells the tragic story of Edwin Van Cleff? It tells a story of corrruption, money, rightiouse anger, rebellion and ultimately the fall of a man driven into banditry. This quest opens the lid on the corrupt natur of stormwinds nobility. Or what about Thralls investigation into the warlocks that he has let back into the horde by necesity? Then there is the quests in the plaguelands of which there are many. The story about the princess of Ironforge (BRD in general is a very dark place not only in lighting but also in mood). The Scarlet Crusade, the scurge, the (socalled) true horde, the silithid, the twillight hammer and so on and so forth all organisations and creatures bent on domination or destruction. Then there is the whole great alliance between the... well alliance and the Horde that is breaking up with skirmishes at every turn. All of this and I havn't even gone to outland or northrend yet. Oh darkness looms at every turn in the world of warcraft.

Thirdly: The story of warcraft is not one story but many. There is as I said the defias brotherhood story, the earthmother story line, the storyline with titan artifacts, the princess imprisoned in the crystal storyline, all the stories and lore about the trolls in STV - I could go on and on. This is the great difference between MMO and many other forms of genres. In MMO's there are ususally a lot of stories and several storylines that has little or no effect on each other. The overarcing storyline is different in different stages of the game. These stages are harder to see in Vanilla WoW but are much easier in the ekspansions.

Forth...ly?: If you do not care about lore or storylines there is little to be gained for you in this article or in this discussion.

Fifthly: Having LFG and holidays break the fourth wall for you is like saying that clicking units does the same. It is interface. It is how you communicate with other players (note the word players) It is how you communicate with the game. That is not breaking the fourth wall. To break the fourth wall the game world has to address you the player or realise that it is in fact a game. I am sure there is some NPC somewhere rambling about how we are all controlled by the great metal finger in the sky and that would in fact be breaking the fourth wall. The holidays by the way is integrated into the setting so calling that breaking the fourth wall is also silly. They may take inspiration (or downright copy) the holidays of the real world but when they give a reason for them in game that holiday is in fact a part of the world and not a "wallbreaker".

Now as for name plates like killerzzz, bullcow and IDoYoMama.... well there is little else to be done then go to an RP server. While this does not remove the problem entirely it does give a lot of relief.

Sixthly: Don't generalise. It is nice a fine that you never read quest or that none of your friends do. It is all nice and fine that you never stay behind to see the scripted events that happen when you turn in a quest. It is fine that you play the game for the bling bling just like your friends. It is however not fine that you therefor assume that everybody does the same. Personally I find that offensive as I do infact read all quests I do (baring dailies and repeatables which I generally only read once) and I stay for all the scripted events (unless I miss that there is one). I have friends who do the same and some that are even more fanatical about it, hunting down every scrap of lore and story they can find. If you were right WoWwiki would give you no information other then how to beat bosses and how to get to them.

Right... I think I have offended enough people now. As it will probably be weekend when you finish reading this I would like to wish you a good weekend. Enjoy

/jakob

 

[Sven und EIN HUND]

While playing WoW I, and no-one else, ever payed much attention to the storyline of most of the quests... However, I did take time to observe the unfolding plotline when I was playing it.

 

[HK_01]

Um, no, just no. Can anybody actually tell me the story behind World of Warcraft? If yes, I'm very surprised. When I played, all it was was a series of quests that I did not care about because I only wanted the XP.

Are you retarded? No honestly are you? You say that you want a story yet you don't care about the story the game wants to tell.

Good question. I think not. I never said I wanted a story for WoW(because it would be impossible to make it involving and atmospheric since you can't change anything and everybody around you will have done the same thing; plus, the presentation is lame(haven't played the add-ons and got bored after level 30, maybe it becomes more interesting later)). Until I stopped playing, I haven't found as much as a thread of a storyline even though I read the quest descriptions and what the people said to me. So, no, I don't want a story for it, it'd be too confusing to build Warcraft IV on what happened in WoW, that's what I said if I remember correctly.

 

[Rack]

I only played WoW for 300 hours so I never really got to see any exposition, but can something so diluted really be considered a continuation of the story? If the sequel to Shenmue were printed on the back of cereal packets one word at a time over a period of 50 years amidst thousands and thousands of stories about Ryo eating breakfast could it really be considered the conclusion?

 

[Credge]

I don't understand the article.

Are you suggesting that people only want WC4 because of the story or are you suggesting that there's an argument that WoW isn't actually a part of Warcraft lore?

I haven't heard any of these things.

What I do hear, mainly because I make the argument, is that WoWs approach to the lore is drastically different from that of Warcraft and people would like to see a more traditional story telling style. Warcraft takes the third person approach with either you being a general (WC1 and WC2) or you playing as a character in the story who also has control over other units as well (WC3).

The majority of Warcraft fans, that is, the fans of the RTS, don't want to run around as one character in a large world doing kill and fetch quests. They want to play an RTS.

 

[Byers]

Those tiny comedic lines found in Warcraft 2 were easter eggs it took roughly 5 billion rabid button pushes to reveal, not integral quest chains woven into the final zone of the game concerning the Lich King's agent, the mullet-clad "Dr Terrible" that you have to defeat in a mini game of whack-a-mole.

Clearly you see the difference here.

The dark moments in WoW were akin to Simba mourning his father's passing in the Lion King.
The dark moments in Warcraft 2 was basically all of it. And manly, brutal events, like the warchief Gul'Dan opening a portal to hell and being torn to pieces by the demons he looked to control. Or Orgrim Doomhammer seizing the throne by decapitating his predecessor and banishing his children.

People have cited enough of the comedy even from WCIII, yes, it wasn't promeninent, but still there, A LOT.

In WoW, from square one, in every starting area, quests involve getting the head of the main bad guy for the zone. Or their ear. Actually, one of the low-level dwarf quests is gathering a lot of kobold ears. How about playing as Arthas with the mission objective of kill 100 of your own men and turn them undead? Duskwood where you hear the tale of Jitters and how he left an artifact at a family farm and ran as the Dark Raiders killed the family, women and children? Lots of "avenge my family" quests. Tirion, where you help him redeem his son from the Scarlet Crusade, only to watch him die? Or ghost girl in Darrowshire(?), where you talk to ghost aunt and bring still living uncle to tears?

Or maybe I just read the quests too much... I don't know.

I keep naming Warcraft 2 as the darker, more brutal part of the franchise, and people keep trying to refute my points, using examples from Warcraft 3. Is there some kind of reading comprehension thing going around? Unless you're old enough to have experienced Warcraft 2 in its prime, when the gameplay was as cutting edge as the story was grim, and the cartoony graphics a product of the technology at the time rather than a conscious design choice to lighten the mood, I'm probably not gonna be convinced by your arguments.

Anyway, the quests you mention, gather heads, ears, toenail clippings, et cetera, are pretty standard fare in every MMO. The original WoW had a higher amount of these than the later expansions, as it tried to do things a little more by the numbers rather than radically carving its own path. And for all of these quests you name as dark, there are ones that take you going through boar poo, or tagging lizards with mechanical scorpions.

WoW really does try to do drama when they feel the need. It's just that it falls a bit flat when they don't really have the balls to stand by their convictions and make the game world a thoroughly more mature place, in fear of alienating the part of their player base that enjoys the silliness and amusement park aspects of it. (of which there are many, even if they're over 18).

Played and loved WC2, thank you very much. Just as I played and loved WC3. And I'd much rather have a game world that tried to go its own root rather than just ape the GRRR GRIMDARK world of Warhammer. I'm fine with moments of levity in my games, and I don't think having a quest where you sift through Talbuk poo makes, say, the Darrowshire quests any less sad, or that the Mimiron fight has a pop culture reference to Voltron undermines the fact that you're dealing with both a physical embodiment of insanity that's influenced many of the pivotal moments in Azeroth's history AND an envoy of the gods that is on the verge of making the call to eradicate Azeroth once and for all.

There's plenty of dark stuff in WoW, and even the fun-poking rarely gets in the way. Look at the Shade of Aran fight in Kara - he's a spirit that has been driven insane from years and years of post-mortem torment at the hands of his son, he freaks out if anyone in the raid has Atiesh, and yet he still manages to drink to restore mana in the middle of the fight, joking about mages complaining about the same thing.

Well, the WC2/WC3 remark was directed at someone else, as is evident from the quoted material.

And I'm sorry, I can't in any way manage to feel immersed in a game that at every turn tries to remind the player of its own place in pop culture, tongue so firmly in cheek that it's giving itself a mouth sore. It's like one of those bad sitcoms that once every blue moon tries to do a serious episode about racism or some relevant topic, falling so flat it makes you want to gouge your eyes out just to make the pain stop.

I've played WoW on and off since release, and I have yet to feel any love or attraction to what they did with the tone and story of the franchise.
It is, however, the only MMO on the market that gets the updating it needs for people to never run out of things to farm do.
And as in all things Blizzard do, the gameplay mechanics and controls are impeccable, unlike most MMOs.

 

[Obrien Xp]

To the argument over your characters not being the "main" characters in teh story, or an mmo not being able to tell a story.

Look at GW, your character is the hero of legend and whatnot, the missions progress the story and your character talks.

WC3 was good, it set the stage for WoW but, its time is over. If you want Wc4 just play EEIII. Trust me, its the same game almost.

 

[John Funk]

The characters in WoW are good, but Are they stronger because we knew them from the instruction manuals and playtime of Warcraft 1-3? Could you build an MMO-only cast from quest givers and the occasional AI support that would be memorable over the course of, let's say, the ever popular RPG trilogy?

Maybe?

Many of the major players in WoW nowadays were introduced in WoW, not WC3 - Garrosh Hellscream, Varian Wrynn being the big names. But then there's Tirion Fordring and Saurfang, both of whom manage to be obscenely popular amongst fans (and pretty awesome) despite having never appeared in a WC game before.

WoW mostly retells what is already there without changing much to existing story lines--I mean not much has happened to the main characters in WoW, they basically just occupy where they left off in the Warcraft series--but the Cataclysm will have to be part of Warcraft canon, no doubt about it.

For most of Classic WoW, I agree. But that changed when we hit Outland and started tangling with Vashj, Kael, and Illidan. And especially with WotLK, as they're going out of their way to focus on renewed Alliance/Horde hostilities, with Thrall and Jaina getting swept up in the conflict.

It just irks me that I can't enjoy good Warcraft lore in my beloved RTS fashion. I spend a decade burning that midnight oil, micro managing my way through the games on the hardest difficulty, unbeknown to me that the next five years of story line, that I sweated out and grew bald because of, will vanish off into the land of the MMO. It's like if George Lucas decided to make the final Star Wars movie a five minute internet flash video. It may be the story line, just the presentation of it is rubbish. You can't just say to me that there is too much content in WoW for an RTS. True it might take a decade to get all that story into that format, but I'll keep buying Warcraft RTS games regardless of how old it gets.

Too much content for an RTS? Probably, given all the myriad quest lines in every zone, but the point of the matter is that WoW lets them build and explode Azeroth from the ground up, square foot by square foot in a way that an RTS could literally never do. I can totally see why they opted to continue the story in an MMO - it lets them flesh out their world that no other genre really can.

A MMO is a very crap medium to get a full blown story. Unless you experience it for the first time when it was new, there's a big chance that you will never see it.

How many people that joined TBC/WotLK got to see the end of the full questline involving Blackrock Mountain? Not that many.(Theres plenty of raids in wich you can solo but there is plenty of bosses in the old raids that require alot of people or certain classes.)

And theres always the OOC idiots T-bagging XXXX character.

Hell in vanilla WoW you only got reconnected with the main storyline of the RTS in the latter levels and Naxxramas. The rest just felt like a recap. TBC was quite...off in everything. Only in WoTLK you got a full immersion of the game story line.

Playing WoW to see the end of a story that you started to "watch" in the old RTS Warcraft games is just a big "NO".

The fact that you have to raise a character from 1-80, equip it with the best gear, enter a half decent raiding guild, pay 30? every 2 month it's not a good payoff as a RTS game that costs 50? and you can just cheat your way to see the end. The MMO you have to be on constant playing, than in the RTS medium were you can just pop up the game and revisit the story, without having much trouble.

World of Warcraft is not Warcraft 4. Just because you mention that possibility you deserve to get slapped all the way to the moon Funk....TO THE MOON!

Edit: Also would like to mention that a big section of the article was a comment on how good the story writing is, not how good the storyline works in a MMO.

I think that an MMO absolutely works for telling a story, and that Blizzard has only gotten better at it through the expansions. Even in Classic WoW, though - look at the buildup to AQ, investigating the hives, finding the mind-controlled priestess, fighting the Emissary and then learning all about the Twin Emperors / C'thun? Could it have been presented better? Of course. Was it still rather well-crafted? Yes indeed.

Re: Your last two points - WoW is WC4 for the purposes of moving along the storyline of the world, because that's what Blizzard wanted it to be. It is the next installment of the story. That's really not up for debate, I wouldn't think.

And I think commenting on how good/effective the writing is was rather necessary - it was an example to show that story can be told through what you do in a quest, rather than just the text when accepting/turning the quest in.

The problem in this thread lies... somewhere around this post -here-.

But you were never the main character in WC1-3, either. You were the commander, but the story revolved around Arthas/Jaina/Thrall/Sylvanas/Furion/Illidan, as it still does. We're now the foot soldiers fighting alongside the heroes.

No, you were NOT the commander. That was just an abstraction so the game could be presented with those champions as units on the field. In terms of Lore, it was Arthas/Lothar/whoever who commanded the troops, not you. Because if you were -literally- Arthas, you'd... have to be Arthas. It'd be more Dynasty Warriors than Command and Conquer. They would have made the Xbox/Xbox 360 Kingdom Under Fire games about 10 years too early. Which isn't the game Blizzard wanted to make.

Fair enough, I'll concede that point.

[Snip]

...I blinked, he formed a pact with the Legion, and oh, I can't actually go and experience this content anyway, since noone's going to group up with me to do it, because they're all at the endgame of Wrath of the Lich King.

The reason for these issues is that while the MMORPG -can- be used to tell a story... it's not used very well. And I believe the reason for -that- is because most people don't play the MMO for the story. They want to have fun, and do some quest, and kill some stuff! Find some more loot! Not root around in some stupid fantasy kingdom.

That's for nerds.

I object because I -am- a nerd, and they're ruining my fun.

--Fen


Note: John Funk's article here -must- be read simultaneously with Alexander Macris' article, Why Do They Need Sequels [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/publishers-note/6617-Publisher-s-Note-If-They-Are-Persistent-Why-Do-They-Need-Sequels], featured here at The Escapist on 12th October 2009.

I'll address your concerns here separately. Yes, it's true that there's a lot of padding that's ultimately irrelevant to the larger stories of Arthas/Illidan/etc, particularly pre-BC (when they hadn't moved to address those particular stories yet). But just because they weren't tying up stories of pre-existing characters doesn't mean that they weren't telling a story of their own.

As Horde, you run into the Silithid in the Barrens, and that quest chain would continue all the way leading up to one of the 40-man raids, Ahn'qiraj. Or, you'd get hints of the Burning Blade conspiracies against Thrall, you'd see the political schisms with the Grimtotem Tauren, etc. You played a Blood Elf; their first twenty levels are all about story, and gaining entrance to the Horde.

Alliance-side, one of the very first quests you do as a human leads you to tackle the Defias Brotherhood, which is the driving chain all the way through... pretty much the entire human story. You learn about how the nobility of Stormwind screwed over the masons who rebuilt it after it was razed in the First War, how they were bitter and angry and Edwin Van Cleef rallied them together. Then you end up finding out how the Defias were involved with the abduction of an "important diplomat" who turns out to be the missing King of Stormwind, you get assistance from Jaina Proudmoore in tracking the abductors down. And then at level 60 you find out that Onyxia was behind the whole thing. Oh, and Varian Wrynn (the King of STormwind) is now back in his throne, and his abduction plays a huge part in his character.

No, these aren't the plot threads from the previous games, but they are plot threads nonetheless that help flesh out the world in a way an RTS could literally never do.

Yes, it's true that because of people moving on from content, it's difficult to see the high-end stuff, particularly in BC (you can 3-5 man most of the old 40 man stuff)... but that's why 10-man modes exist for WotLK. Once people outlevel WotLK content with Cataclysm/the next expansion, it'll be much easier to go back and do Icecrown Citadel than it is to do Sunwell.

Then Wraith came out, (spoiler) at the end of WC3 Icecrown was a war torn battle field covered in elf, naga, various undead bodies, a bleeding Illidan (who I thought died), and in the center was a big icy spiral stair case to where a throne sat. Even in the menu of WC3: Frozen Throne they show a distant picture of it, and it's a crappy ice tower. Sudden in the expansion Ice Crown became this massive fortress that looks like it's made from shiny Terminator parts and all his undead warriors look like they got platform shoes.
I could argue about more complicated aspects of WoW storyline (? Wargs? Catacylsm? O My!" but I think I've confused enough people.

I don't think that having people who don't care about the lore themselves around you should negatively impact your own enjoyment of it in any way. (And from what we've seen of Icecrown Citadel in 3.3, I think the citadel was actually built around the ice pillar after the fact.

So what of Warcraft fans 1.0 like me?

Despite my devotion to the series, I was unable to make the move to the MMO for the simple fact that the genre didn't appeal to me.

So now what is the reprieve for fans like me? That, as you suggested, there may one day be a Warcraft 4 where everything that occurred in WoW is summed up in a five minute intro?

That sounds quite unfair...and thats the problem that fans like me have. We feel that we are being punished in a way for not making the leap to the MMO...

Well, that is admittedly more of a "Well, that sucks, but..." situation. I do hope that they'll make a solid recap effort whenever they get around to making the next RTS. Personal preference is personal preference, though.

Ah, the MMO writer is here to tell us that an RTS series can't go through the next story because an MMO did it. Forgive me, Mr Funk, but I'm sceptical.

At the very least, if there is a Warcraft IV, it will have some way of looking back over WoW lore in the opening introduction, or explain it on the way. If not those things, then it will have a huge manual. If not that, then it's probably going to play through those stories anyway. Or the final, most predictable option - Blizzard will simply require that either people buy WoW or buy a DVD/device explaining the lore for as much cash as possible.

I, personally, would enjoy the actual game in any of these ways - as long as it's an RTS.

I'm not sure what you think my point is here. I think there WILL be a WC4 eventually, and it WILL continue the story they've been setting up. It's just that for the purposes of relating the tale of this world, it'll be the fifth entrant in the Warcraft series. As far as narrative elements are concerned, WoW IS WC4; being an MMO doesn't disqualify it from advancing the series' story. If the first games were singleplayer RPGs or platformers or whatever, the point would be the same - an MMO can be a valid entrant in a narrative.

Um, no, just no. Can anybody actually tell me the story behind World of Warcraft? If yes, I'm very surprised. When I played, all it was was a series of quests that I did not care about because I only wanted the XP. Seriously, if they base the story of Warcraft IV on the events in WoW at least 80% of the people won't understand anything.

I think we've found your problem Yes, I can tell you the story in WoW. It would take a rather long time, and I do need to start working at some point today. But just because you refused to actually put the quests in context isn't a failing of the game, it was your choice entirely.

Thank you. I'm glad someone gets this. While agree with Funk's response in that the WC series always had comic relief, one of the main issues with WoW is that the comic relief, along with many other elements that appeared in the switch to an MMO, effectively break the fourth wall nearly all the time. The holiday events, the LFG chat, the Blizzcon NPCs--these and many other things have made it virtually impossible to take the game seriously.
Perhaps WoW is quite capable of advancing the Warcraft story--and from what I've heard (never got a character past 40) it does a relatively good job of this. The problem is that it's buried in all of this out-of-character, out-of-context MMOG fluff. Maybe this is unavoidable, given the genre, but at the end of the day, it's still preventing one from fully appreciating the storyline that began with Orcs and Humans. I know many WoW players, and none of them play it for the story. They play it for the loot, the raids, the PvP. Few WoW players who haven't played the original even have a grasp of what the story is all about. Illidan and Arthas aren't a power-hungry betrayer and a corrupted champion of good, just a hard raid boss and a super-hard raid boss. That's all they read into it. It's just all too muddled.

I'll give you the Blizzcon NPCs, but you can leave LFG and trade chat. And what's wrong with holiday events? I think they give the world character and make it seem more like... you know, an actual world with its own festivals and the like, rather than a place where they tell a story.

Sure, there are people who play WoW that don't care about the story, and who click through quest text just because they want the money/XP/loot. Just like there are people who couldn't give a rat's ass about the storyline in WC3, they just want to play some DotA or have a challenging RTS experience. Just because there will be guildies in my raid when we face down Arthas in front of the Frozen Throne doesn't mean I won't be going "Oh man it's freakin' ARTHAS" and having a loregasm myself. It shouldn't invalidate your own enjoyment of the matter.

I only played WoW for 300 hours so I never really got to see any exposition, but can something so diluted really be considered a continuation of the story? If the sequel to Shenmue were printed on the back of cereal packets one word at a time over a period of 50 years amidst thousands and thousands of stories about Ryo eating breakfast could it really be considered the conclusion?

You say diluted. I say they're telling different parts of the story. Sure, the Abercrombie quests in Duskwood don't have anything to do with Arthas, or the Defias brotherhood, or whatever; they're about a creepy hermit tricking you into building his abomination for him. It's still a story, and helps flesh out the world more than anything else.



Okay, I think that's all the major rebuttals/counterpoints I had. Phew. Did I miss any?

 

[Crossborder]

They could make an rts/whatever about what happened in WoW. I definetly want Kael to be awesome again, though.

 

[Nuke_em_05]

Snip

snip

I keep naming Warcraft 2 as the darker, more brutal part of the franchise, and people keep trying to refute my points, using examples from Warcraft 3.

Whether or not severed bloody head icons in your inventory bag happen in every MMO or none, that doesn't make them "less mature".

You started out trying to argue that moving to MMO made it "less mature", and we're pointing out that it started out in the RTS. You seem to agree with the idea that it at least started in WCIII. So, actually, WoW simply continued the downward spiral started in the RTS games with WCIII.

Again, this is about WoW continuing the plot of WC, not what direction the franchise has gone in "maturity".

If you want to play Warhammer, play Warhammer. Don't expect the Warcraft franchise to conform to Warhammer.

 

[HK_01]

Um, no, just no. Can anybody actually tell me the story behind World of Warcraft? If yes, I'm very surprised. When I played, all it was was a series of quests that I did not care about because I only wanted the XP. Seriously, if they base the story of Warcraft IV on the events in WoW at least 80% of the people won't understand anything.

I think we've found your problem Yes, I can tell you the story in WoW. It would take a rather long time, and I do need to start working at some point today. But just because you refused to actually put the quests in context isn't a failing of the game, it was your choice entirely.

True. What I was trying to say is that an MMO can't really grab me because of a lack of good and interesting presentation. It's just not interesting enough for me to actually try to follow the storyline(not to mention that it's probably complicated).
I stopped playing quite early on(my highest character was on level 33 or 34), but I still think that I should have found at least an indication of an overall storyarc by then, but I didn't, only seperate little stories for each area I explored and quested in.

Edit: Somehow I messed up the quote, but I don't get how. I'll try to fix it but I think it's understandable.

Edit 2: Fixed

 

[Nuke_em_05]

Then Wraith came out, (spoiler) at the end of WC3 Icecrown was a war torn battle field covered in elf, naga, various undead bodies, a bleeding Illidan (who I thought died), and in the center was a big icy spiral stair case to where a throne sat. Even in the menu of WC3: Frozen Throne they show a distant picture of it, and it's a crappy ice tower. Sudden in the expansion Ice Crown became this massive fortress that looks like it's made from shiny Terminator parts and all his undead warriors look like they got platform shoes.
I could argue about more complicated aspects of WoW storyline (? Wargs? Catacylsm? O My!" but I think I've confused enough people.

Actually, it isn't that sudden, the game acknowledges that time has passed in the game world. The introduction to Wrath reads:

It has been five years since the heir apparent to the throne of Lordaeron disappeared into the frozen wastes of Northrend; five years since Arthas' unholy union with Ner'zhul gave rise to one of the most powerful, twisted, and evil beings who ever walked the face of the world; five years of uneasy, foreboding silence. Still, the sweeping darkness many feared would spread outward from Northrend's shores never came... until now. The Lich King has risen, and his forces are on the move. As the prospects for peace darken and the clouds of the coming storm fill the skies, the heroes of Azeroth rally beneath their battle-worn banners to face the Scourge once again. Soon the world will learn what it means to incur the wrath of its one true king....

Five years is plenty of time to have constructed Icecrown Citadel and the surrounding structures.