Continued from the previous post.
You CAN give an old race new models!
The World of Warcraft art style was chosen because it’s fantasy and cartoonish. This means it will still look good in another 10 years. They do go back to improve certain graphical things like lighting and water to make the game look current, but this art style will not change.
Ghostcrawler teases us by giving us a bit more information on the process of creating the new models. This process is a very difficult one for the WoW team because they have to provide the old races with the new facial animations and other cosmetic doo-dads that the Pandarens have, while still maintaining the same general look and feel that your character has had for the last almost-decade.
Due to the creation process, there is no ETA on the new models for the old races. However, when MMORPG’s interviewer joked about the important part being that his new Dwarf looks prettier, Ghostcrawler replied with: “It is coming, and the new dwarf is very pretty.”
(Author’s note: I am peeing my pants in anticipation of the new WoW model remakes.)
New PvP maps
Defense of the Alehouse is a Defense of the Ancients inspired battleground that was discovered by some players in the PTR. Since there is no private server for the team to put their in-development content on, sometimes players will run across content that is in game, but not even close to being ready to be actually implemented.
Ghostcrawler reminds players that just because they see it in PTR does not mean that it will be coming out soon. However, he appeases them by saying that there are some other new WoW PvP maps being worked on. They will most likely be out before Defense of the Alehouse.
Patch 5.3 will prepare the way for 5.4
Regarding the next patch, 5.3 will not be nearly the size or depth of 5.2. It will be much more like 5.1. It won’t have a new raid tier or a new PvP season.
5.3 will be the lead up to the Siege of Orgrimmar in patch 5.4. This means that it will provide the story for players to make sense of why they have to go into Orgrimmar and overthrow Garrosh in WoW 5.4. Ghostcrawler says that the players will see “…more and more of Varian bringing the Alliance together, pushing the Horde apart.”
Back even in the days of Wrath of the Lich King, the staff handled future content in a sort of “oh no, the players need something new” way. Now the team puts much more thought into it, having a vague idea of what will be coming forth in the next three expansions. They are aware of what the gameplay and mechanics will be as well as the story; knowing the story allows them to “sow the seeds” for big plot events to come.
5.2 and 5.3 were being worked on before WoW 5.0 even came out. This means that there will hopefully not be much time between the last patch of MoP and the next expansion. Ghostcrawler ends the interview noting that there will be a lot to talk about at Blizzcon.
