Why Nobody is Excited for Cataclysm Classic (A Rant)

you know at BlizzCon 2023 you could have heard a freaking pin drop in the room when cataclysm classic was announced our journey to we'll continue into cataclysm classic in 2024 the classic Journey started with you as a love letter to the wow Community we asked what you wanted you responded to us and we listen now I wasn't at biscon personally I was at an event over that weekend so I don't know what it was like in the room but just judging from the recording a lot of people really were not that excited which is something to be fair that we all could have predicted cataclysm classic yes there is people out there that want to play it of course there's people that want to play it but the overwhelming majority of players have no interest in this version of World of Warcraft whatsoever there's some hype but compared to TBC Wrath of the Lich King and even season of Discovery cataclysm classic just just doesn't really resonate with people and I know that for a lot of you guys you're probably sitting there wondering why because a lot of people watching this video right now you probably never played cataclysm back in the day you probably don't know why so many people for the longest time thought that cataclysm was Wow's worst expansion now in regards to content and everything that you know cataclysm offered to us as an expansion it seems cool I mean you got a big dragon blowing up the planet and stuff it's got a good premise it's got some cool content coming out wargan goblins these new areas raids and so on but what was the reason people had for not liking cataclysm back in the day and what is the reason why today why are so many people not interested in cataclysm classic and that's what I'm hoping to answer today before we jump in though of course have to thank this channel sponsor zygor it's world of warcraft's ultimate add-on for leveling gold making achievement farming pet collecting Mount collecting you name it it does everything check them out down in the description below so I've got got seven reasons why seven things that I have you know collected from my own thoughts and from my own memories of the expansion because I did play it back in the day seven things that I would say are the reasons why people are not really into cataclysm classic and why they're not that hyped for it the first point and this is probably one of the weaker points which is why I'm saying it first but for some people out there it might actually be one of the major reasons why they didn't like cataclysm but it's the fact that the expansion destroyed the world that we had fallen so much in love with the premise of cataclysm is Deathwing has popped out of deep home he's causing chaos tsunamis earthquakes volcanic eruptions and so on and so blizzard got it in their mind of taking calor in the Eastern kingdoms and completely revamping these old zones and so calor and the Eastern kingdoms would be brought up to sort of a modern standard of questing and content and so on and so forth zones were going to be reworked quest lines were going to change memorable characters were going to be forgotten new characters were going to be added you know calor and Eastern kingdoms like the OG like two continents from classic wow are kind of like sacred to the World of Warcraft player and although it was exciting at first to this idea of Deathwing sundering the world and you know creating all this change across the two continents everyone was excited for that back in the day myself included I mean come on but once it was you know like once this idea was experienced for the first time the second time the third time you know leveling up alts and stuff it quickly felt like a downgrade and we're going to come back to this but it felt like the world that we knew and that we loved had just been broken and not broken from like a lore perspective like broken by Deathwing like it was broken in that what was special about it the memorable characters and the quest lines and the things that made us fall in love with Azeroth that had been destroyed and it had been replaced with very linear quests very simple characters and a leveling system that really was just designed to get you to level cap as quickly as possible this was the time when blizzard was sort of changing things up they were removing group quests from the level up content they were removing the necessity of needing to use maybe professions to help you well not necessity it's not like you need professions and classic wow but having you know Alchemy and having those extra potions to help you when you're questing in the Barons or you're doing that agaman Mills family crypt quest line and terus fall Glades but you know whatever you can probably conjure up some examples in your head you know it was relevant it was useful it was handy to have those things in cataclysm not so much everything was just kind of nerfed into the ground like I said I'm going to come back to this point several times but cataclysm really broke the world it broke what was special about it let's move on to the second thing though the second thing is that the endgame zones in cataclysm from vasher to mount hael to the Twilight Highlands they were all disconnected and this is something that blizzard learned from like this was an experiment they had never done this before you know in past expansions TBC Wrath of the Lich King whenever a new expansion came out there was a new continent that we got to explore and all the zones were connected and so and so forth blizzard decided to do something different with cataclysm where they were going to have all the endgame zones separated and be in different corners of the world and this was an interesting experiment but blizzard has never done anything like this since because a lot of people did not like this they didn't like how oh man you know if I want to go from Twilight Highlands to mount ha I got to go through these portals I got to do this I got to waste my Hearthstone and go back to Stormwind or gramar whatever it was annoying it was frustrating there was a lot of travel time between the different zones everything just felt disconnected it was just not a it was a it was an okay idea now there's nothing objectively wrong with adding more zones into the game I think it would be cool for Classic Plus down the road for example for blizzard to add new zones into Classic Plus or finish zones that were just completely well not completed like like ajara orthus for example but don't make these the end game zones these should have been questing zones and the end game stuff should have been condensed into an area a continent an island and so on and so forth this is a lesson that blizzard learned from experience and from cataclysm and it was a reason why a lot of people did not like the like the layout or the Zone layout of the end game at endgame if that makes sense the third thing and I'll keep this very brief but in regards to cataclysm the the lore was kind of confusing let me ask a question right now very simple question what was deathwing's plan in cataclysm like not what was his plan you know to bring about the hour of Twilight like everybody knows that but what was he doing to bring about the hour of Twilight what was he doing personally the only thing that Deathwing does lorewise if you really think about it is he pops out of deep home and he Sun ERS the world then he flies around and lights zones on fire and then he summons ragnaros in the whole Mount hael area for the Firelands raid if I remember correctly and aside from that that's pretty much it he's just kind of flying around just lightting zones on fire just waiting for his raid to come out where you know he flies up to worm rest Accord and then you got thall and he blasts him with a giant golden dinner plate and then we jump on his back and we kick his ass maybe I'm just forgetting you know cuz it's been obviously a very long time but looking back at cataclysm it just kind of seemed like the villains were there and it was just we were kind of just hopping from raid to raid but the the villains didn't really seem to have like a like a plan or like a like a well laid out we're going to do this this this and this to bring about this conclusion it was just more like here are the villains they're trying to bring about the hour of Twilight whatever that means and however that's done and we got to stop them but this was something in Wrath of the Lich King as well like the lore was a bit confusing in Wrath too but that's a video for another time I remember talking to my friends about this even back in the day like what is Deathwing doing like lorewise you know this is when I was really into World of Warcraft lore personally reading the books and reading the shattering and stuff or maybe it's called the sundering I don't remember it was the warcraft book that came out at the time and um I was just a bit confused but maybe that's just a personal point from me and my friends at the time the fourth reason why a lot of people did not like cataclysm is because of how early game focused it was now for someone like me like I'm an alah holic I love leveling in World of Warcraft it's my favorite part of the game I know I'm in a minority when I say that I know that most people are really more focused on the end game and stuff but cataclysm was mostly focused on the early game which is not necessarily a bad thing but here we go the problem was that the early game experience that we got to have in cataclysm was of a lower quality experience than what we had before now some people would argue the contrary they would say oh no the storytelling was better and the quests were like you know better laid out and stuff and you're right but that's what made it boring once you've gone through silverpine Forest once or twice or three times you know the story you've seen gash call Sylvanas a [ __ ] you have you know gone into Gil naus with the Forsaken and fought with them you've seen who was it Godfrey when he shoots Sylvanas in the back of the head you've seen this linear Story play out over and over and over whereas in classic wow you know what came before and this is I mean I can make a whole video on this subject alone but you really had the idea of the story was not linear it just kind of took you wherever you wanted to go you made your own path you made your own adventure you weren't being led from quest to Quest to Quest and so the thing is is that cataclysm put all this focus on the early game and yet the early game felt like a downgrade from what we had before and this is not some personal opinion that I have I mean it is a personal opinion to be fair but this was a genuine criticism that a lot of people had of cataclysm back in the day there was even the fact that the LevelUp experience felt less satisfying because the world had been nerfed it had been made a lot easier I mentioned earlier in the video that blizzard had removed almost all of the group content from the game there was still some here and there you can find some in cataclysm like the derold quest line where you you know do the D hold Quest but to be fair you can solo all of that as a hunter I remember doing that back in the day like there's still group content but it's very few it's very far between the world is not challenging anymore you're just kind of running through it even when it comes to Talent points in cataclysm They removed most of the talent Point like I I don't know the word for it like potentiality in the game in in World of Warcraft Wrath of the Lich King You've Got What 70 Talent points that you can play with I don't even remember off the top of my head but the point is in cataclysm you have whereas you would think that you would get 75 Talent points the level cap going from 80 to 85 no blizzard actually nerfed the whole Talent system and in cataclysm you're only going to have 41 Talent points you're only going to be getting a talent point every other level so the leveling was faster it was more linear it was more boring it was less rewarding it was less engaging and so like even though there was all this emphasis put on like the early game to make it as great as possible for a new player coming into the game but it actually had the opposite effect like the opposite effect occurred with cataclysm and people found the new early game well kind of boring very boring in fact maybe the first time you go through it it's fun but after that first time I'm telling you it's dull but you know some people feel that way about classic wow too so to each their own the fifth point was the introduction of a lot of groupfinder content this was something that really hurt the social element of the game during cataclysms lifespan and it was something of great controversy that still kind of exists to this day you can find threads where people still talk about this on the forums and on YouTube videos and stuff the the introduction or rather the making the game revolve very heavily around looking for group and later on looking for raid and so people have a sour taste in their mouth when it comes to cataclysm because of those two things it was sort of like cataclysm began sort of the death of the MMO like the whole massively multiplayer element and it started to introduce this idea of being a singleplayer World of Warcraft player where you didn't need to get into a guild where you didn't need to interact with people you didn't need to go out and make friends in order to conquer the world and people really did not like that the six point going back to the whole LFR thing we have patch 10.2 the dragon soul raid now for those that don't know the dragon soul raid that patch patch 4.2 was the longest lasting patch in world of Warcraft history patch 4.2 lasted get this I I didn't even remember it was this long it lasted from November of 2011 until myths of Pandaria was released in September of 2012 I remember doing the whole hour of Twilight raid I remember doing it on LFR doing it on normal this was the time when for me personally I really got deeper and deeper into role playing because there was nothing to do in World of Warcraft for months the game was completely stagnant it was completely dead nothing was happening the raid had been raided pvpers were bored nothing was going on and people were pissed off about this cataclysm you probably are starting to understand as this video is progressing that like there was a lot of reasons why people had a sour taste in their mouth in regards to cataclysm because of so many lackluster things going on with this expansion it's kind of like the lfg or rather the lfd the LFR crap it just has cataclysm you just associate the word with this very sour time in World of Warcraft history a time of controversy a time of boredom but really everything has just been leading to this the seventh point is very simple and it's just simply the fact that cataclysm is not really considered wow classic it's not considered classic World of Warcraft the OG Golden Era of the game cataclysm is when the game went on full decline which is when people in droves began to leave World of Warcraft and the reason why the the the big fundamental reason as as to why people do not consider cataclysm to be classic World of Warcraft Golden Era wow and such it's really subjective but I think it boils down to this based on comments that I've seen here on nxm or on forums and stuff or even in game I think it really just boils down to this simple fact cataclysm is a completely different game to the game that came before it in the events of Wrath of the Lich King if I remember correctly blizzard was purchased by Activision and during you know cataclysms development blizzard got a completely different design Philosophy for cataclysm compared to what they had for vanilla wow TBC and Wrath of the lichking and you'll see what I'm talking about like I was talking about it at the beginning of the video but when you start playing through the world you're going to see how blizzard has nerfed the social element of World of Warcraft in cataclysm you're going to see how there's less group content there's less of a need for trading with your fellow players there's less of a community element you're going to see how the world feels more linear it's more boring and dull you're going to see how everything just seems to be designed to just get you on a linear path that takes you to endgame as fast as possible that way you can start consuming the new raids and whatever the endgame content is you got to play it to really understand it for those of you guys like me who played back in the today you probably know what I'm talking about but when cataclysm came out it felt like a completely different game from the game that we had played you know previously in Wrath of the Lich King TBC and especially vanilla cataclysm was a full departure from like the vanilla design philosophy if you go and watch like the behind the scenes videos of classic World of Warcraft meaning vanilla wow back when blizzard was developing it back in like 2003 200 too and they're talking about that development and what their design philosophy was for the world and questing and leveling up and group content and so on and so forth it is radically different compared to cataclysm it's a completely different mindset with less of the community in mind with less challenge in mind with less RPG adventure and so on and just kind of more convenience more ease more uh like like it's kind of like one of the things of cataclysm it was like blizzard wanted to make the game more easy to get into and you know easy for a new player to just jump in and fall into Azeroth and you know get to endgame and start you know pvping and stuff and yet it had the exact opposite effect to what blizzard intended people preferred the old world they preferred the old way of doing things they did not like this very linear qu I could go on and on about this the point is I'm just going going to end it here cuz this video is really freaking long the point is is when you play cataclysm classic you will see that it is a huge departure from like what you have played before in Wrath of the Lich King and a TBC I'm sure there's more that you know I could have thought of but you know I'm just sitting here I just got a couple of notes on a piece of paper I'm just ranting out of my ass at the moment maybe I'm getting some things wrong I don't know leave your thoughts down in the comment section Below guys but this video is just to try to help some of you guys that are sitting there a little confused as to why you know why that BlizzCon room you know was so dead silent when they were announcing cataclysm classic because really no one gives a damn about cataclysm classic and maybe there's some people that do but compared to wrath TBC and especially vanilla it ain't nothing it ain't nothing

Channel: Nixxiom

Views: 107,327

Keywords: world of warcraft, cataclysm classic, wow classic, classic world of warcraft, world of warcraft cataclysm, cataclysm blizzcon, Blizzcon 2023, cata classic, the war within, season of discovery

Id: 6GhDNVuuHvY

Length: 19min 53sec (1193 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 16 2023