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Blizzard Entertainment recently announced the release date for World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic's first major content update, Overlords of Outland. The update comes not too long after a brief hiatus in development, when the World of Warcraft developers temporarily ceased its work on the MMORPG after the State of California filed a lawsuit against Activision Blizzard alleging workplace abuse and discrimination.
The Burning Crusade Classic was generally well received following its launch this past June, but has also experienced some criticism. The expansion is a recreation of 2007's World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade. While players can indulge in the remake's nostalgia, The Burning Crusade Classic requires dozens of hours to progress through its ten levels. Similarly, an imbalance in the numbers between Horde and Alliance factions was met with criticism because it made completing quests and gathering resources substantially harder for the comparatively fewer Alliance players. World of Warcraft developers appear to be responding to such feedback, based on their recent development update.
In a post on its website, the WoW development team announced the Overlords of Outland update will go live on September 15. On that day, players will "be able to take on Prince Kael’thas and Lady Vashj in a pair of iconic raids, engage in a new season of Arena combat, and more." In addition to the expansion's first major content update, the World of Warcraft team also teased at another upcoming project. According to the post, they took inspiration from players' feedback, explaining, "We’re also working on something for WoW Classic players who’ve told us they’d like a chance at a fresh start, and will be sharing more on our plans soon." It appears more information is yet to come.
The update apparently stemmed from a series of questions that the World of Warcraft team said it wanted to address: "What are the biggest things we’re hearing are getting in the way of your fun, and what are the most impactful changes we could make to WoW today to fix that?" As a result, the post also included information on the 9.1.5 patch for fellow expansion Shadowlands, which is set to arrive in a week. The game developers said they included "long-asked-for" changes for the 9.1.5 update, such as new character customization options for certain races and greater efficiency in certain aspects of preexisting gameplay.
The announcement of the next phase will likely please those who have are experiencing the dreaded content drought since reaching the endgame and clearing all of The Burning Crusade Classic's current content. With additional raids opening, World of Warcraft players will have something new to aim for - and future content appears to be on the horizon, as well.
World of Warcraft Classic is available now for PC.
Source: Blizzard Entertainment