I thought last year’s Blizzcon schedule really shorted World of Warcraft and showed they weren’t so interested in it anymore. I think this followed a series of dev departures and promotion of Overwatch and e-sports in my mind. You hate to think the people making a game you love are bored by it, and don’t want to give it any promotion or thought.
2016 BlizzCon via MMO Champion
When this year’s schedule was announced, it felt like WOW was back in the game. Even though there are only two more panels, there are others that would be of interest to anyone– the Designcraft, Codecraft and Soundcraft panels–I’ve always loved that sort of “here’s how we built the game” information. I like know how things look to developers, and how they think.
I wonder if there was some cross thinking (I’m sure I read at one point there was some competition between WOW and Overwatch devs) and the Brawls and Mythic Dungeon Tournaments weren’t inspired by finding a way for the PVE player to play more competitively. I’m all in favor of that. There must be many more ways to allow play in groups, and to make competition and cooperation more fun.
Although Legion isn’t a favorite expansion, Blizzard has kept the updates and content coming as they said they would. That involvement lets an older game evolve and change as it should.