Returning to retail WoW

Returning to retail after playing World of Warcraft for years than quitting the game is like opening a time capsule of virtual memories. I began playing WoW at the end of The Burning Crusade. I leveled up a stable of characters, both horde and alliance, on multiple servers. I had toons that I raided with, competed in PvP with, and some that I only created to play with friends with no real goal in mind.

Looking at my toons was like opening a time capsule, except they were all a lower level than before!

My character list grew as the WoW expansions did, I leveled from 70–80–85 while being aware of the game slowly evolving the entire time. I was completely ok with this until one day, I wasn’t. I quit playing during Cataclysm and left my characters frozen in Warcraft time until I would return at the release of WoW Classic in 2019.

Logging into some of my toons was like opening a portal to days of WoW past.

Between content changes, new gameplay mechanics, and my ego I thought that the game became broken and was not fun anymore. That may have been true, or maybe I was putting too much pressure on myself to clear content that I didn’t have the time or skill to complete.

The above is the age-old question I ask myself during every game I invest serious time into. Is the game not fun because it’s broken, or is it not fun because I put too much pressure on myself to do well? I was hyper-critical at level 85 about the game getting ‘too easy’. Ironically I was not able to complete the game’s most difficult current content and ultimately got upset at myself about not doing “good enough”.

Justiku exploring new lands after returning to the world, of warcraft.

Now I see that I get the most enjoyment out of WoW when I play it to enjoy the content, not try to be the best in the world/server/guild. No matter how super cereal I was about clearing content in WoW; my favorite parts of the game have always been the social elements and the exploration of the world, I was just too busy trying to complete the top-tier content to notice.

The first screen-shot I took after starting WoW classic on release day.

That was until in 2019 and the launch of WoW Classic where I rejoined on release day, (re)installing classic and retail. As I played both versions of the game I realized WoW lore, world exploration, and amazement are my favorite parts of the experience. If those elements get boring to me I will probably stop playing WoW and put more time into other games, but at the moment I still find the world and lore intriguing.

This is why classic and retail are a perfect pair for me, I can switch between enjoying old and current WoW content at my leisure.

Enjoying the Dark Moon Faire in Classic WoW.

Now I have a 60 shaman in Classic on Rattlegore (Horde) and I’m currently leveling my once level 85 paladin, now level 38 paladin, back up to level 60 in retail on Staghelm (Alliance). Both experiences are different and in my eyes they juxtapose each other and provide what the other doesn’t. Classic is more focused on leveling, grinding, and difficult to assemble team-based encounters. Retail seems to be more about easily finding a group to do the things you want, regular introduction of new lore and features, and the occasional “WTF” reaction to some of these features.

Features in the game have changed as much as WoW’s design. Hard to believe this is now Org.

When it was only retail, many like myself criticized the game’s choices moving forward because we couldn’t continue playing the game we enjoyed. Now you can play the retail or classic version of the game, yet in classic, some people think the game does not match the Vanilla experience they remember. This could be because of choices with the patch implementation or it could be that ‘overly critical about the game’ feeling I talked about having during cataclysm.

Now one does not have to choose whether to re-experience the nostalgia of Classic WoW or to follow the ever-evolving retail WoW saga This is why I feel retail and classic are a good option for WoW players who can’t make up their minds, we can now experience the old and new renditions of WoW at our own leisure.

I ran a random dungeon and all I got was this wicked awesome tricorn cap.

Some may never be satisfied with Wow’s difficulty and mechanics, and those folks will always have other games they can play. If you are a fan of the lore of the Warcraft series I feel both retail and classic give the ability to play whichever game style you’re feeling at the moment, and I find that a lot of fun. After all, fun is what the World of Warcraft Games is all about.

You for retail or against it? Fan of Classic or think they are butchering Vanilla? Classic and retail the perfect pair for you? Let me know what you think in the comments below, on Twitter @biddlesan, or my streams at twitch.tv/biddybaybee