Blizzard drew back the curtain for the next chapter in World of Warcraft in a develops livestream Tuesday, and it’s all about dragons. The appropriate title Dragon flight the expansion will unleash players on the Dragon Isles and let them roll like a new playable dragon race called the Dracthyr. And of course, you also ride some of the kites.
World of Warcraft: Dragonflight focusing on Azeroth’s drag aspect which in turn will help the game’s heroes take on the evil ones. Dragon Isles, where much of the action takes place, will be divided into four zones, and the developers said exploration will be a key focus of the expansion. To that end, players will be tasked with becoming dragon riders and making use of four new drake mounts to navigate around the world.
Here is the trailer:
Some of the dragons can transform into humans on a whim, and these are called Dractyr. This new playable breed makes exclusive use of a new Evoker class to perform long-range attacks and healings. Unlike the game’s existing races, however, they will not have access to other classes. With less overall customization comes a more focused movement set.
“[Evokers are] able to use their wings to push people away, they are able to blow fire out of their mouths, they are able to hit people back with their tails, ”leading combat designer Brian Holinka told Polygon.
Blizzard also revealed that Dragonflight will see changes such as the game’s “biggest renewal of the talent system to date”, improvements to HUD and new craft and profession systems. At the start of the livestream, game director Ion Hazzikosta was honest about it some of the problems the game has had since Shadowlands released in 2020. Community feedback during this period led the team to “re-examine some of the assumptions and the basis for World of Warcraft about things like character investment and core networks versus alts or how procurement should work or the appropriate role of friction in our systems, ”he said.
In the past few years, WoW has faced stiff competition from the explosion in popularity around Final Fantasy XIV. In addition, with dissatisfaction with Shadowlands the game’s era has also played out a bit under the cloud of abuse and abuse that hangs over Blizzard’s past a lawsuit filed by California regulators last summer allegations of gender discrimination and harassment, including by some of the MMOs former “star” developers.
Dragon flight does not have a release date yet, but Blizzard is currently signing up for the expansion beta test. The study also announced Lich Kings Peace will be added World of Warcraft Classicfree for existing subscribers, sometime later in 2022.