I don’t have any real experience with World of Warcraft. If you asked me what I expected to find in the game during my preview of the Wrath of The Lich King expansion pack with Blizzard’s Jeffery Kaplan, the game director for World of Warcraft, I would have ranked Willie Nelson somewhere between magical lizard shit and the Death Star. While Willie’s face doesn’t make it into the game he’s there in spirit by way of the new achievement system.
“We have over 500 achievements in the beta, by the time we ship we’ll have close to 700 I think. We’re really getting a lot of content in there,” said Kaplan. The purpose of the achievement system is to basically make players feel special in Kaplan’s words and reward them for playing the game in ways other than simply leveling up. “The achievements cross all aspects of the game from hardcore PvP arena achievements to total fluff achievements.” The names of the achievements, however, won’t really clue you in to the level of difficulty.
Kaplan cited an achievement named My Sack Is Gigantique as hardcore. “Players have buy a sack called the Gigantique from an NPC we have named Haris Pilton for 1200 gold.” While everything about the achievement screams fluff, Kaplan assured, “Twelve hundred gold is not trivial.” When I asked for an example of a fluff achievement Kaplan rolled out To All The Squirrels I’ve Loved Before. To complete this achievement, a play off of the Willie Nelson song To All The Girls I’ve Loved Before, gamers walk up to various woodland critters in the game from squirrels to prairie dogs and give’em the ol’ slash love emote. Kaplan demoed the process spawning a squirrel into the game, “Here’s Arthas the Lich King, a death knight, and a squirrel here and I’m about to love him.” And love him he did.
One of the more interesting things about the entire demo was the underlying statement that Kaplan can do whatever he wants within the World of Warcraft. When asked who was the Willie Nelson fan Kaplan answered, “I am. My dad loved Willie Nelson. I’ve seen him in concert a couple of times, the big Texas flag coming down and whisky river playing.” When asked if loving squirrels was a tribute to his father Kaplan answered, “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”
The Wrath of the Lich King will arrive when it’s goddamn good and ready.
“We have over 500 achievements in the beta, by the time we ship we’ll have close to 700 I think. We’re really getting a lot of content in there,” said Kaplan. The purpose of the achievement system is to basically make players feel special in Kaplan’s words and reward them for playing the game in ways other than simply leveling up. “The achievements cross all aspects of the game from hardcore PvP arena achievements to total fluff achievements.” The names of the achievements, however, won’t really clue you in to the level of difficulty.
Kaplan cited an achievement named My Sack Is Gigantique as hardcore. “Players have buy a sack called the Gigantique from an NPC we have named Haris Pilton for 1200 gold.” While everything about the achievement screams fluff, Kaplan assured, “Twelve hundred gold is not trivial.” When I asked for an example of a fluff achievement Kaplan rolled out To All The Squirrels I’ve Loved Before. To complete this achievement, a play off of the Willie Nelson song To All The Girls I’ve Loved Before, gamers walk up to various woodland critters in the game from squirrels to prairie dogs and give’em the ol’ slash love emote. Kaplan demoed the process spawning a squirrel into the game, “Here’s Arthas the Lich King, a death knight, and a squirrel here and I’m about to love him.” And love him he did.
One of the more interesting things about the entire demo was the underlying statement that Kaplan can do whatever he wants within the World of Warcraft. When asked who was the Willie Nelson fan Kaplan answered, “I am. My dad loved Willie Nelson. I’ve seen him in concert a couple of times, the big Texas flag coming down and whisky river playing.” When asked if loving squirrels was a tribute to his father Kaplan answered, “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”
The Wrath of the Lich King will arrive when it’s goddamn good and ready.
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