That was one of the reasons why I lasted this long.
Can’t say the lore of SL engages me in the slightest, but at least had hoped that with the final chapter of this campaign, we would at least get any sort of interesting tease for the future. Or at least some clarification regarding why should I care about any of the current story cliffhangers.
Instead, we got more of the same “wait and see”.
Wait and see what Sylvanas truly wants.
Wait and see what these sigils actually mean.
Wait and see what these “First Ones” really are.
Wait and see Anduins fate.
Yeah, at this point the time investment thrown to “wait and see” on story improvement or explanation, has surpassed the payoff for doing such.
I just think they needed one of the two.
Either you deliver an engaging story that allows me to overlook the nefarious game systems, or give me some content that I can focus on to ignore the narrative.
As of now, I feel that they are failing on both fronts.
There is little else to grasp at in order to excuse why I’m throwing money at them every month.
So yeah, I think that it’s time for a break.
PS: The only bit that has me still interested, is the novel about Sylvanas. If only because I’m curious as to how they plan on stitching together the arch they’ve so thoroughly crapped all over in these two last expansions.
Well… as a cinematic, it was a nice character beat.
As the end of a campaign storyline, it was disappointing. I’ve been hanging around to see if they actually go anywhere with the story, seems they just want to drip feed us so we keep coming back.
If this was a book, I would want something that made me want to turn the page. Something to keep me interested. The whole premise of Shadowlands is that Sylvanas and the Jailer want to break the machine of death for …reasons. We were told back in BFA that there was a ‘morally grey’ reason behind the burning of Teldrassil.
Right now, its just a trail of bread crumbs. If Shadowlands was a book, it would have gone on the DNF pile because the author couldn’t commit to moving the plot forward.
The current story is like something a child would tell.
There was this lady called Sylvanas who did something bad, except it wasn’t really bad. Another lady called Tyrande and got mad and got her dads shot gun out the cupboard. Then her Mum said she shouldn’t be angry and took the shotgun away. AND theres this really awesome guy who is like really bad and he did some stuff and his brothers don’t like him any more. He’s going to the magic cave of awesomeness to do some cool stuff. AND THEN there were dread lords and they looked cool and stuff. AND there’s another really cool guy that we go in and rescue and he’s got magic powers, he’s going to help us make new badges for all the guys that don’t like the bad guy and… if I write really big I can fill up the page and hand in my homework.
There is very little depth to any of it, and its a shame because Blizzard in the past have been capable of telling a decent story. It’s never been Tolkien level but its been OK,
I am quite sure she could. So could you or I. And so could the Blizzard writers. This plot isn’t the result of an author’s coherent vision. It’s a company product. And something went wrong within the production here. But what we see is just the result.
You don’t need to be a mechanic to know if smoke is pouring out of the engine of your car there is something wrong with it. If you’re enjoying the story, then good for you. I’m pleased someone is getting something out of it!
As to whether I could do better, I believe I could. I also believe the majority of those on the writing team also could if left to their own devices. I wouldn’t bother commenting if I didn’t think they were capable of more.
Superficial comprehension does not make someone qualified for good writing.
Shadowlands plot is new plot. Just like Warlords of Draenor were new plot. You know, meaning of “new” means it’s not “same old”, which means it’s meant to be explored.
You are not exploring anything, you are just stating it’s bad because it’s bad and then you get people saying stuff like this:
Which of course is a clear sign that someone is translating a story that is unable to understand on their own level and then claims something like this:
Most people will trash something that they do not understand, this is not an exception. I mean, it would be all great if you people are joking but sad truth is that you are not.
Good thing the task was not to have good writing, but better writing than what we have. That’s a pretty low bar.
Apart from that you didn’t engage with or understand what I was saying at all, so try again. Or don’t,
Here is the thing: This is mass entertainment. When many people don’t understand it, it’s not doing what it is supposed to do. It’s supposed to cater to those below average intelligence as well. So even granting your point, that’s not a defense of the writing quality in their chosen field.
I am not going to engage into things that I am just going to waste my time with.
What do you mean this is mass entertainment? I am not paying nor playing this game for millions of people. I do that for my self. Story doesn’t have to cater to anyone and I think they do quite good job of what players see. I mean, it cannot be more easier than of what they are doing already. It’s completely another topic while players just pick up quests and never read them.
So what are you saying? It is a good story, and that is easy to understand. But you are telling us that we don’t understand, so… we don’t understand something easy and obvious. So are you just saying that we are the chosen few who are too stupid to understand even that? Are you calling us liars, that actually do understand, but pretend not to for some reason? Or are you saying that it is a good story on the surface, but we are making it way too complicated, which makes it bad? Or is it something else?
Sorry, but I guess your argument is either too obvious or too complicted for me to understand, or something like that.
I think the issue here is that people understand way to much what’s happening.
It honestly doesn’t take much to note that they’ve mishandled the plot.
Or to see the numerous telltale signs that point at its poor quality.
I’m no expert on storytelling, but there are signs that signal if a story is good or not.
And right now, people are trashing something they do understand and by most metrics the current writing in WoW is bad.
They have introduced concepts and characters and not fully explained or explored them, with a subtle wink ‘trust us, we know what we’re doing and this will pay off …eventually.’ They have taken the mysterious, demystified it and utterly neutered it at the same time.
Good writing show’s you the tip of the iceberg and lets you engage with it, theorise and want to know what’s below the surface. It doesn’t pull in a load of outside entities to solve the power creep problem you have made for yourselves over a number of ill thought through decisions. Nor does it rely on publishing a compendium of lore to support an ever growing universe, because the only solution to moving the plot forward you can come up with is to blame another alien entity.
Compare Voldemort to the Jailer for a moment. Whether or not you like Harry Potter is irrelevant, it tells a coherent story. We learn about him from whispered tales, everyone is terrified even to speak his name. We hear about the terrible things he has done and plans to do if he returns to power. He literally does nothing but exist in book one and yet, he is a convincing villain. You know without a shadow of a doubt, the guy is bad news. Later on, you hear about his back story and meet him face to face. All the while even Dumbledore treats him as a credible threat.
The Jailer, stands there and looks menacing. We hear that he’s done some stuff in the past and was stripped of his power for it. We don’t get details, we don’t know motivations. What happens if he does destroy reality and remake it, is that a bad thing?
WoW doesn’t need ASoIaF level political scheming and intrigue and yet they are implying that is what is going on with Dread Lords and whoever pulling everyones strings this week.
We understand what is happening, and a lot of us care about the story we’ve been invested in for years. We want, I want the writers to be putting out their best work and tell something that is self-contained and coherent. Instead, they are struggling to keep it in one place and because of mechanical restrictions in game you either have to play multiple characters or you have to do hours of grinding and resetting to access the entire thing.
I am glad that you recognized that having a proper argument is something smart people have and you have yet made none.
It’s not waste of time when I am making sure that you know I am not wasting it on you.
I agree and I agree with bolded part specifically. I just don’t think that retconning is bad thing. At least not always. Blizzard, in my opinion, so far has done retconning to enhance the meaning of story.
What do you mean “people”? It’s like you people are completely unaware of wide spread toxicity that has become a norm on internet. It is not exclusive for World of WarCraft community. It’s literally everywhere on internet.
And now, by people, I have to assume that everyone who is vocal on internet, means everyone is right just because people in masses are talking same thing? No. WRONG.
Right is right even if no one is doing and wrong is wrong even when everyone is doing it.
If I am going to apply that “People” logic, then guess what? People are not going around everyday to say how they enjoyed something and I am sure if they do, they do it with close friends. That doesn’t mean that everything that exists about this game is what you read on forums, youtube comments, reddit etc.
It would be very dangerous for health of the game to not speak here and there that what Blizzard has done so far is great and I’m quite sure that they are aware that it’s not ideal because it’s not.
When you venture into an unknown land, which in this case is a realm and it’s called Shadowlands, it’s completely logical that a lot of it becomes unknown, including characters you meet.
I want to know what is Sepulcher. I want to know what Sylvannas is planning. I want to know what happens with Thrall. I want to know what happens with Jailer and Covenant leaders. As far as I see it, mystery is still there but I just don’t expect answer right now.
No?? Well, I mean yeah, in YOUR opinion. Have you ever played Mass Effect? The game doesn’t give you the tip of the iceberg but it does make you interested in what’s happening and you work your way through campaign to figure out “what caused the trouble”. I don’t see much difference in that regard in World of WarCraft.
Because of multiverse, plot can move into any direction, hence why it’s great and not why is bad.
Okay, now let’s go back to Legion when Sylvannas became Warchief. Someone “WHISPERED” to Vol’jin to make her warchief and he said it was LoA but he sensed a much more DARK PRESENCE behind all of it and then there are quests, which made that obvious during Legion and then during Battle for Azeroth and now, when you play Night Fae campaign it’s made clear who that is which was Mueh’zala and Jailor. I am not sorry for this spoiler but this is evident that you just trash the game because “Hey, everyone else is doing it”.
I believe it was you who initially referred to 'people bashing something they don’t understand.
I did start taking apart your reply as a response but it got tiresome. If you enjoy the story, again, I say good for you. Suggesting that people are criticizing the story because ‘everyone else is doing it’ is just a lazy response. It seems to me that you don’t like the fact people are taking the time to criticize something you like and as an aside, the responses on this and other threads I’ve followed have in general been far from toxic. That is a word that has been bandied around so much, it’s now losing meaning.
Back to the topic in hand, there are ideas in this expansion that could work well if properly executed, sadly they haven’t been.
I don’t believe the writing staff set out with the intent of putting out bad content, but right now they are. It’s the problem when the writer and the publisher are one and the same entity. If this was a book, both beta readers and a content editor would have easily picked up where they are letting things slide, where they are keeping things hidden that shouldn’t be, where the pacing is off and where they are telegraphing things far too much.