Ideally, now would be a great time to be a World of Warcraft fan, considering the recent Gamescom reveal of the Midnight expansion scheduled for next year. There are many noteworthy Midnight features to keep an eye on, even outside of player housing, if that is not something World of Warcraft fans are excited about. This includes the new Prey system that allows players to defeat powerful mobs to get cosmetic rewards, the addition of the Haranir as a playable race, a third Demon Hunter spec, extra talent points and Apex Talents, and more. However, the reveal has landed poorly among some fans for a plethora of reasons.
Even though The War Within was and still is a rich expansion, with its third season beginning just a few weeks ago, it too was received poorly by some fans who didn’t like the direction of Anduin’s character or the fact that Sargeras’ sword was finally being acknowledged and then dropped. However, its reveal trailer amazed a lot of players due to the quality of the character models and their details, which set a high bar for any future World of Warcraft expansion. Midnight’s cinematic for WoW didn’t live up to the same standards, and combined with some other issues, one big cauldron of controversies is being stirred.
Why World of Warcraft’s Midnight Reveal Didn’t Stick The Landing
World of Warcraft’s The War Within campaign tackled a lot of character arcs and plot threads while also introducing the Earthen race, with several subplots taking place in the various new areas in Khaz Algar. Despite a general sense of going back to the start with Xal’athat being as much of a threat (arguably more) than at the beginning of the story, TWW set the stage for Midnight to drop an epic story. One of the main criticisms of the reveal so far is that Midnight’s Gamescom trailer featured plastic-y, less realistic models for the main characters, making it all the more apparent if compared to The War Within’s own trailer.
World of Warcraft’s Midnight Early Access is Reigniting an Old Debate
Another issue is that players can pre-order WoW’s Midnight expansion now, and the Epic version of it comes with a 3-day early access period. This is something that many longtime fans were unhappy with in The War Within, and it caused an uproar back then, so it can be all the more infuriating to see the same thing happen again now. The reason is that the early access makes the launch of a new expansion uneven across the board, which is seen as bad practice, especially when paired with a hefty pricetag.
World of Warcraft’s Playable Haranir Are a Controversy Waiting to Happen
Then, World of Warcraft’s playable Haranir also hit a sore spot. They were introduced with The War Within and almost immediately left behind, then they were datamined as playable characters but never came when it arguably made sense the most, and now they are tied to a story mainly focused on Blood Elves and the conflict between Light and Void. Not only that, but the general sentiment is that there were better options for a playable race, such as the newly reintroduced Amani Trolls, the Tuskarr, and the hyped Ethereals, which now seem unlikely to ever become playable after a big focus in patch 11.2.
World of Warcraft’s Midnight Expansion is Dividing the Fanbase
Finally, one could argue that the whole reveal was skewed toward Alliance as a faction, despite the cinematic taking place in Silvermoon. The new Demon Hunter spec in WoW’s Midnight creates an imbalance due to the addition of Void Elves as a playable race for the class, with no new option for Horde players. On top of that, the feature trailer’s housing segments were filled with Alliance characters and homesteads, which adds insult to injury for those unhappy with the decision regarding Void Elf Demon Hunters.
