STACK August 2016 Issue 142

70 / 106

(
ven if you don't play video games,
chances are you’ve heard of Blizzard’s
behemoth, World of Warcraft. Present
in everything from South Park episodes to viral
YouTube videos, your nan probably knows what
WoW is; she might even play it. A massively-
multiplayer open-world title, its elements of PvP,
PvE, crafting, magic, lore and mateship have
come together to create the most popular paid
MMO on the planet, with over 10 million active
players.
Legion is WoW’s sixth expansion. Set for
release at the end of this month, players all
over the world have already had a glimpse of
the new content that’s to
come through the beta, but
we won’t know exactly how
many more players will be
pulled back into Azeroth until
the expansion launches in its
entirety.
On a press trip to the
States in June, we went
hands-on with Blizzard’s latest
WoW content drop. We also
had the opportunity to chat
with lead game designers
Cory Stockton and Julian
Morris about exactly how
much work goes into creating content for a
game with such a dedicated player-base.
“Legion is an expansion that we had been
talking about ever since [Mists of] Pandaria ,”
says Cory. At Blizzard, the team puts a lot of
thought into the story development around
expansions, especially how they tie-in and
connect with not only the main game, but also
each other.
“When we started Pandaria, we really tried
to look at WoW expansions as more of a long-
term situation. Burning Crusade was definitely
going to happen after a while, but then doing
Lich King was the next great thing to come
along,” he laughs. “We did that and then we did
Cataclysm, and there wasn’t a lot of connective
tissue between them, and I think that’s
something we saw in the team that needed
fixing.
“So, as Pandaria was progressing, and we
had characters like Garrosh [Son of Hellscream,
A lot of thought goes into
the story development on
the expansions
C orrupted Blood was a debuff cast by Hakkar the Soulflayer on players during the
Zul’Gurub raid that was supposed to only last for a few seconds and remain solely
in the raid. What actually happened? The debuff glitched, got carried out of the raid
and into the rest of Azeroth, and wrought absolute havoc.
In September 2005, the new raid was released, and the new boss had a damage-
visit GAMES FEATURE
70 AUGUST 2016
GAMES
World ofWarcraft has been a video game icon since its launch way back in 2004.
Now 12 years old, Blizzard Entertainment’s MMORPG shows no sign of slowing
down. Five expansions have been released with the sixth due this
went hands-on over in Irvine, California, and spoke with Cory Stockton and
Julian Morris on our travels. Words: Alesha Kolbe
A
LEGIONof its
OWN
The
Corrupted Blood
Incident