- Blizzard Entertainment has shared its design philosophy for creating an authentic "classic" World of Warcraft: Forever experience
- The studio says there are four design pillars it uses to build on the vanilla
- However, since the game is releasing in 2026, there's a challenge in balancing the game's look, with Blizzard saying, "We need to hit that vanilla era for the long-term sustainability of this game"
The World of Warcraft: Forever team at Blizzard Entertainment has shared its design philosophy for creating an authentic "Classic Plus" experience, while still finding that "good middle ground" for a modern audience.
In an interview with TechRadar Gaming, where the team also addressed the controversial inclusion of the new Skyborne race, it explained that it's important to stay true to the "vanilla" WoW experience many fans of the MMO are familiar with and that there are four core pillars it sticks to while working to expand it.
"The philosophy is largely to take the original 'vanilla' WoW world and building on top of it in a way that stays true to the core design, pacing, and tone of the original game," Blizzard said. "We keep it classic by adhering firmly to our design pillars when we consider any new change we introduce."
These pillars are: Nurture and Protect Social Experiences, Approachable and Familiar, World as the Main Character, and Journey before destination.
"Those pillars were developed as we have been playing different versions of classic over the years and have a firm basis in Vanilla WoW," the studio explained. "That said, we don’t tend to think in terms of 'is this classic' as much as we simply weigh decisions we make against those pillars and if the idea doesn’t support them, we don’t do it. It’s kind of another way to say the same thing, but the distinction is somewhat important."
As important as it is to retain that "classic" feel in WoW: Forever, Blizzard has also implemented modern visuals, such as new lighting effects and rendering, that add to the immersion; it explained that "one big challenge" it had was "finding a good middle ground" with assets by finding the right balance between the vanilla and newer look you'd find in the retail version.
"The goal here is not to create assets that look like they were made in 2004; it's also not a goal to create assets at the fidelity level of modern WoW," Blizzard said. "We need to hit that vanilla era for the long-term sustainability of this game. Getting specific about what vanilla era means, it could have existed in Vanilla, Burning Crusade, or Wrath of the Lich King.
"This is a game we are releasing in 2026, and we've made a lot of changes to lighting, rendering, and other aspects of the engine, and we ideally want to find a level of fidelity that feels like it fits with our 'WoW as you remember it, not as it was' approach, but also looks good alongside some of those older assets and works best with the new technology updates."
In the same discussion, Blizzard also confirmed it's monitoring real-money trading (RMT) in WoW: Forever, and is working to mitigate botting issues that could result in permanent bans.
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