World of Warcraft Dragon Flight
All in all, Blizzard has managed to put a good mix of new features, familiar old features, and a lot more freedom into the game with Dragonflight. The new Evoker class, the ability to fly to the new islands almost immediately, and the revamped flying style also offer much-needed challenges. It’s great that your other characters also benefit from what you’ve unlocked with your main one. This way you can fly immediately with your alts and don’t have to grind everything over and over again. The whole thing is so well put together that this could be the best expansion since Wrath of the Lich King.
World of Warcraft has been online for eighteen years now, but it’s still incredibly popular. The latest expansion, Dragonflight, is about dragons and flight. With this, Blizzard hopes to appeal to both existing players and veterans. In addition to the new areas, the expansion also includes a new Heroclass and new abilities, including dragon flying that have been given a spectacular makeover. Does this offer enough challenge and fun to return to the world of Warcraft?
Millions of players
Despite the game’s age, it is still played by millions. By 2022, it will have 5 to 8 million subscribers worldwide, of which 700,000 to about 1.7 million are active every day. A few weeks ago the ninth (!) expansion was released: Dragonflight. As the name suggests, this edition is about dragons and flight.
Number of players
An important part of the current players are from China, around 3 million, and it is questionable whether the game will still be available there in 2023, because Blizzard has not yet managed to renew the 2008 agreement with the Chinese Netease. Blizzard is now negotiating with other parts. The official data on the number of players has not been known since Blizzard stopped disclosing them in 2015. They may be higher, because there are also players who mainly play WoW Classic.
So World of Warcraft has been around since 2004. That’s an eternity in the gaming world and there are few games that are still hugely popular after that long. Popular now is relative, because WoW’s heyday seems to be behind us. Between 2007 and 2011, between 10 and 13 million players were active. Especially after Warlords of Draenor, since 2014, the number of players has decreased significantly. At the same time, competing game developers will be jealous of the millions of still active players.
The challenge for Blizzard is therefore to maintain the existing core of regular subscribers with continuous improvements and new content and a new major expansion about once every two years. A new storyline beckons, but more importantly, a new country to discover, including a new one competition and/or class. And, of course, new unique features or interesting gameplay styles to try out.
Many old-timers take a look when a new expansion appears, but most of them disappear again after the so-called honeymoon phase, during which everything new has been tried out. Often something completely new is introduced, which then disappears in a later expansion. Consider for example the garrisons of Warlords of Draenor and, to a lesser extent, upgrading your Heart of Azeroth in Battle for Azeroth. Even the choice of four alliances in Shadowlands and associated zones it was original on the one hand, but also restrictive on the other. Although you could enter the other zones, attention was only on one of them.
New and as usual?
Dragonflight is back to normal – a new island for everyone and you have a lot of freedom where to send your characters. The series of campaign missions it is not extremely long and therefore easy to walk. Also, now it’s much more attractive to be with you alt start, because this takes advantage of the things you already have with you principal they unlocked.
With Dragonflight, a new race and a new class have been added: the dragon-like Dracthyrs of the Dragon Isle have awakened after thousands of years. They are available to both the Alliance and the Horde with the new Summoner class. This is a so-called Hero class, so you start at a higher level: 58. This class offers some unique properties and can also fly. However, you will also find various dragons on the island that you can quickly summon. Unlike previous expansions, you can then fly to the new area almost immediately. That promises something, but does Dragonflight deliver enough for both existing players and veterans looking back nostalgically on the days of The Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King?
Focus of this review
World of Warcraft is a huge game with many deep layers and a storyline that has been in development for decades. It’s the first time in a long time that we’ve submitted this game to a review on Tweakers. It’s impossible to discuss all the details, so we’re focusing on the major changes to Dragonflight and especially how interesting this expansion is for both existing and veteran players.
