Paul Sams: "We will not pull the rug out from under them"
by Matthew Rossi 
Jan 22nd 2010 at 11:00AM
This is interesting to me on a couple of levels: the first is the long time between the original idea that World of Warcraft would get an expansion a year and the actual time (more than two) that it took for The Burning Crusade to ship. It seems that over time they must feel they've gotten more proficient at the development process since Wrath of the Lich King and now Cataclysm seem to be getting ready to ship even faster. You can read the excerpt from Sams at gamesindustry.biz (which requires creating a new account) as well as a full interview with Sams and executive producer Rob Pardo.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, News items, The Burning Crusade, Interviews, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Tridus Jan 22nd 2010 11:08AM
They're more experienced now. BC was the first expansion. Cataclysm is the third. You can expect the developers to be better at it the third time around.
Plus, there's likely less in terms of internal systems changes that are needed at this point.
Ryan Jan 22nd 2010 11:17AM
Your right, but its still nice to know that blizzard is in full control of their game.
Peepo Jan 22nd 2010 11:19AM
No new classes to add, and only 5 levels of content.
Netheral Jan 22nd 2010 11:38AM
But two new races. Wanted to add that because you said "no new classes" like they weren't doing anything to balance that. (Heh, new class, balance... I crack myself up... :'D )
n1nesp1ne Jan 22nd 2010 11:43AM
They are also redoing 60 levels of content, so I wouldn't say "5 new levels of content" is accurate. Besides, those 5 new levels appear to take place over only a couple fewer zones than the 10 levels in BC or WOTLK did. There is also an entirely new progression system (Path of The TItans), as well as a complete redo of the talent system.
Tyr Jan 22nd 2010 11:47AM
@peepo
I think they have their hands full with redesigning most of the old world. That's plenty to work on :p
Peepo Jan 22nd 2010 12:49PM
YES!!... MY FIRST VOTE DOWN!... WOOT!...
no, i'm not saying this expansion will stink or be lacking in content, but i think not adding any new classes (and attempting to balance it, because i think we can all agree DK balancing was/is really rough) and not adding new classes to each faction will save some headaches and development time...
i don't think they'll be as much "new" content as "revamped" content... without having a programmers background, i suspect that blizz has been working on revamping vanilla wow for awhile (while attempting to make flying viable there) and now they can finally implement it, using the cataclysm as an excuse to smooth over the stuff they weren't able to make work with flying...
*puts on poop shield*... fling away!...
Artificial Jan 22nd 2010 1:46PM
@peppo: "only 5 levels of content" makes no sense at all. I could easily add 20 levels of content by making 20 quests, one for each level, or I could add 1 level of content but give it 100 quests. If you're intelligent, you'll admit that there latter case is more content, if you're an idiot, you'll say, "but that's only 1 level of content". There's no such thing as "a level of content", so saying "only 5 levels of content" makes no sense. What you posted is not so much wrong as just utterly meaningless.
SaintStryfe Jan 22nd 2010 2:35PM
Personally, the lesser level cap doesn't bother me. I don't really care to level. Let's admit: in BC, we all rushed leveling our max-level characters. Most of us were 70 long before we saw, say, SMV or Netherstorm. Most of us never saw Icecrown or Storm Peaks before 80.
Leveling is the process by which most players get to the game they want to play: the End game.
Peepo Jan 22nd 2010 3:14PM
@ Artificial
i think if you're intelligent we can all agree that 5 levels of content is going to be far less (i would say about half?) then there would be for let's say 10 levels of content as they've done in the past... 10 levels of content would be northrend or outlands... it's not beyond the realm of rational thought to think 5 levels of content would be 1/2 of that, provided blizz doesn't mess with the xp per quest, so yeah barring them revamping the whole xp situation and making quests with less xp and harder to grind to 80 (which blizz seems to be headed in the opposite direction with xp boosting gear and xp giving bgs), it will be about 1/2 the quests and content then the 2 previous xpacs... but woot! on 1 quest per level, let's start the altathon...
my only point was that maybe it's taking them less time to produce the expansion because the expansion is including less new stuff and more revamped old stuff that they've been probably working on for a long time and now have the chance to really implement it...
Chris Anthony Jan 22nd 2010 6:32PM
@Peepo, Blizzard has said more than once that we should expect leveling from 80-85 in Cataclysm to be roughly equivalent to leveling from 70-80 in Wrath, in terms of volume of content and time commitment.
jaynitan Jan 22nd 2010 7:28PM
one thought and i am spitballing here but maybe they have more money more personel more experience and a solid proof that ppl will buy the expansions.
Also they had years to work on ideas for various expansions. I would expect that at this point they are working on the post cataclysm expansion as Cataclysm is winding down into Alpha and soon Beta stages. Cataclysm was probably 30% finished when Wrath shipped.
timmy! Jan 22nd 2010 11:17AM
It means their holding off releasing the expansion until SW:TOR is released in Spring 2011, so they may crush them as well.
Phil Jan 22nd 2010 12:15PM
Whether that is true or not, I fully intend to play SWTOR. As much as I love WoW, I will pick up SWTOR first most likely
Mystery Jan 22nd 2010 11:21AM
I would expect them to take more time after all the changes to Death Knights and people up in arms.
However this expansion doesn't have as many new mechanics as of yet that have been released and may not take as long to fine tune.
Bubsa Jan 22nd 2010 11:20AM
More proficient? Taking care into quality?
That's one side of the argument. The other would be that they're not doing this, in the slightest. Patch 3.2 didn't look like more than 5 minutes was spent in it, (whereas 3.3 on the other hand definately gave the impression of time and care going into it, it has to be said). This side of the argument concludes that the expansions come faster each time not due to proficiency, but because of sacrifice of quality and quantity in order to ship boxes quicker for cash.
That's just another side of the argument, though.
Peepo Jan 22nd 2010 11:23AM
3.2 and 3.3 were patches not expansions though...
Mutak Jan 22nd 2010 11:41AM
It's hard to give your side of the argument any serious consideration when you look at the quality of the expansions as a whole. In terms of quality of content, BC was a huge leap forward from classic and WotLK was a huge leap forward from BC. There have certainly been missteps (Arena, DK balance, etc.) but those problems are no worse than the problems that plagued WoW at release. (No real PvP content at release. Warriors - virtually impossible to level solo, but also the only viable tanks for groups? Paladins going from terrible to op and back again every time a patch was released?)
Yes, some patches have more meat than others, but the overall quality of the game has only improved over time.
Tremelizzer Jan 22nd 2010 11:46AM
I'd like to see you 3D modelling that "easy-and-fast-to-make" Coliseum in 5 minutes.
uncaringbear Jan 22nd 2010 5:12PM
You can bitch and whine til the cows come home about all the bugs in each patch. I know I do it all the time. But I will say this - until you've experienced the EPIC FAIL from other game developers, Blizzard is a veritable god of quality in comparison. I'm not saying they couldn't improve their QA, but we have it good.