World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Classic preview

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Classic has officially entered closed beta and will be available for a few more weeks. I’ve been in since launch and have played various characters through an assortment of areas in the Wrath of the Lich King beta, and I certainly have some thoughts.

I feel it’s pertinent to mention I was in the original Wrath of the Lich King beta as well, and no matter how I think about the current retail game, I have a lot of fondness for this ‌point in time. But how does the current form of the World of Warcraft Classic expansion play?

Wrath of the Lich King was many World of Warcraft player’s peak of enjoyment

When I ask my friends when their favorite time to play World of Warcraft was, more often than not, the answer is Wrath of the Lich King. This was a huge new place to explore, bringing back Naxxramas for those who missed it.

The Ulduar and Icecrown raids were phenomenal (and home to Invincible), and the story was excellent.

Sure, it was still fairly focused on doing daily quests, but they were at least interesting at this point. It was a story where the Alliance and Horde were still at odds but had to try and put their differences aside for the greater good. Rather, to fight a greater evil.

Arthas Menethil became the Lich King in Warcraft 3’s storyline and had been building a horrific force of undead.

There were so many great upgrades going from Burning Crusade to Wrath of the Lich King, and it was a great time to be a fan. There were wild challenges like the optional hard modes for the Ulduar raids, culminating in getting the “0 Lights in the Darkness” achievement.

The expansion will start on the 3.3.5 patch, where many class balance changes went in. While this is great for many classes, I ‌worry that Naxxramas will be harder than it was in vanilla WotLK.

Only time will tell on that point, though. I very much felt that this was an authentic experience. Well, in most ways.

Dungeon Finder must be discussed for World of Warcraft Classic

The whole point of World of Warcraft Classic is to be a step back in time. The way the game used to be, before all the vast, sweeping updates and changes.

Players could experience the game the way fans did at the very beginning of the MMO, and I loved that as a concept.

However, like many, I played through vanilla, BC, Lich King, and the rest of the expansions as they happened. I love Classic as a concept, but I find it incredibly slow. It made me miss Retail WoW’s faster leveling, but I ‌love grinding in my downtime. I ultimately find myself conflicted.

So if these were supposed to be authentic representations, with only a few quality-of-life changes, why was the dungeon finder removed? It was the best part of Wrath of the Lich King!

Instead, Blizzard designed a new version of the dungeon finder. If I can be frank, I didn’t enjoy it. I like that you can queue up for a wide variety of things, that part I loved.

But more often than not, it didn’t give me the option to “request to join” a party. Instead, it would only let me invite another party to join me.

It wasn’t clear to me if I was doing something wrong or if the UI just needed adjusting. I don’t understand the decision to remove the original dungeon finder just because it doesn’t “feel” like Classic.

I thought the whole point was to have an authentic World of Warcraft experience. Wrath of the Lich King is when a great deal of change came to the game, which means quality-of-life improvements.

Lack of quest tracking/addons was infuriating for beta

I don’t mind there being no addons in the beta, but why did it not have quest tracking? That absolutely blew my mind. Keeping a quest guide up for whatever I was doing at the time did not sit well with me.

Blizzard initially said there would be no quest tracking in Wrath of the Lich King Classic, but that decision was changed. It has been years since I explored Northrend, so having to sit down and read every single quest or open Wowhead slowed my experience grinding down a great deal.

However, I can’t be too upset about this because it will be a part of the game’s eventual release, as well as it should be. This was another initial announcement that made little sense.

So, fans who aren’t in the beta, fear not. That change was reversed; it just wasn’t reflected in the beta.

Gameplay was enjoyable, exactly how I remembered it

While I had a few negatives in the UI/mechanics of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King classic, the actual gameplay part? That was great. There were a few bugs, but nothing that broke the game.

This was the best part for me. I appreciate that you could port in your classic character to play, but my poor level 46 mage is clearly not ready for Northrend.

Instead, I made a Paladin, Death Knight, and Shaman to explore the world.

I also appreciated having access to all the flight paths right out of the gate. When I ‌tired of leveling somewhere, I could just fly somewhere else and do something I enjoy instead.

Playing the game felt good, and I didn’t especially mind the leveling being slow. I expect that for classic gameplay.

Replaying the title was terrific, as it was just some of the UI and mechanics decisions that frustrated me. This was a pleasant experience while I wait on Dragonflight.

In conclusion

The gameplay is solid in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Classic, but some changes were disappointing. I am glad the full launch of the game will have quest tracker, but I won’t lie, I’m not a fan of the new dungeon finder. I could get used to it, but I’m not a fan.

Even though I’m not as active a World of Warcraft gamer as I used to be, if my friends come back to Lich King Classic to mess around and do some raiding, I could see myself jumping back in and playing. I have many fond memories attached to this expansion, and this might be the thing to get me back to being active.

Note: Access was provided by Blizzard Entertainment.