A Temporary Farewell To Azeroth

While I am fighting the urge to resubscribe to the World of Warcraft, I must bid it a short farewell.

I've had an amazing, AMAZING time playing WoW the past 10 years. I met so many truly awesome people on my adventures, many who I consider some of my closest friends. I will never forget the heart-warming moments of being a GM for one of the top 50 guilds on my old server of Dawnbringer back during Wrath. I will never forget leading casual raids where people laughed and made fun of people for accidentally running into a blob of goo and instantly dying. I will never forget the people that all-in-all made the game what it was: fun.

That sense of community doesn't seem so prominent in WoW anymore, and it saddens me so deeply. The game used to revolve around cooperation, and meeting new people. The world used to feel so alive because people actually interacted with each other. Things required a lot of effort, and it really helped to learn the game together with other adventurers, whether friends or strangers. I miss that. I find myself logging on and everyone is doing their own thing, not really wanting to be bothered. Things are easy to solo, and no one has patience for players who are just now trying to dive into WoW. The community has overall changed a lot. My YouTube videos regarding WoW content recently started to fill up with a lot of hate filled comments that were rude, bashful, and unappreciative.

I didn't play the game for the community that it has now.

So many people are quick to judge, quick to assault players doing something wrong, and Blizzard favors veteran players so much with powerful heirlooms that it discourages new players from even dipping their feet in certain waters (cough cough, PVP). The whole sense of reward while leveling has changed, and the player base for the most part is pretty cruel. And Blizzard just seems to be absent.

I miss the innovative changes to the game that didn't take away from the community, but built it up. AQ anyone? Where so many people were at the gates that it caused servers to crash? Not this Garrison crap where everyone AFK's in a fort dominated by NPC's.


To put it in short terms, I'm frustrated. Frustrated at what this game could have been versus what it is now. Frustrated that Blizzard seems to be giving up on a game that gave me 10 years of great memories, and contributed to almost half of my life. I refuse to come back to this game for an extended period of time until it starts feeling like I'm actually having fun, rather than just logging on to keep up with my "chores".