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World of Warcraft has a new player problem

Kneecap Jake

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World of Warcraft has a new player problem. I've played this game for so long that I have forgotten what is confusing to a new player, and what only makes sense when you've played it for hours. So I have brought ‪@jimofee‬ to try WoW for the first time. I will be guiding Jim through Classic and Retail, all in an effort to find out what the new player experience is truly like.

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00:00 I forced my friend to play WoW
01:06 New player tries Classic WoW
08:07 The Wetlands Run
11:43 Jim shows me a secret
12:38 Never be a WoW completionist
17:16 Jim understands the game more
19:05 Freakout at busy stormwind
20:01 Travelling the world for leveling
22:18 Classic Dungeon
27:30 The Guides Perspective of Classic
28:25 Retail Begins
33:22 It's getting confusing
36:01 Did I ruin the experience?
38:06 Ingame shop
39:08 Level scaling
41:31 Let's enjoy it
42:41 Back to dragonflight
45:44 Retail Dungeon
49:43 What does Jim prefer?

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20 Comments

@kneecapjake Creator 5 months ago (edited) Pinned

Do you remember your first time?

Episode 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AmNohLEX3U

Edit: Thanks for the amazing comments everyone, it's been a real joy to see. We are going to continue our journey and share it with you. It may take a while to put together, but we hope you join us in the next one.

@necrosyther 5 months ago

I remember my first character was a hunter, and I totally skipped getting a pet because I had no idea how, made it to lvl 20 and gave up

@oldschooldude8370 5 months ago

Being guided to IF through wetlands at lvl10 and dying over and over always stuck with me 😂

@gameusurper 5 months ago

34:34 "I might be wrong, but I feel like I'm missing a lot?"
Oh bro, you have NO idea.

@FalloutFM 5 months ago

He picked a night elf druid just like we did

@Iggypox 5 months ago

Rolled tauren hunter the first time a long time ago, didn' t know what to do so I stayed in Mulgore for more than a month thinking that was the whole game, A friend later showed me Orgrimar and the rest, loved it since day one.

@MoonlitMarch 4 months ago

Retail's simplifying of the leveling process actually achieves the opposite of what Blizz want. By making it so trivial and fast-paced, it ends up feeling monotonous and can easily lead the player to believe that that is World of Warcraft, and there's no point in bothering to keep going.

@BecomingMum 5 months ago

SO weird to watch a new person experience it when I've played through the starting areas so many times and instictivly know where to go! XD

@thebrains220 4 months ago

My very first was a Night Elf druid. I remember crying because of the timed antidote quest and I couldn’t remember where the guy to turn it in was and I was almost out of time and got stressed out

… I was 18…

@azaphakaylock2789 5 months ago (edited)

the funny thing is even though classic doesn't hold your hand (like at all) compared to retail which is hand holding at every corner, due to the nature of classic being a slower discovery based game its still way easier to play for a new player. in classic its totally fine to take a long time to do anything the game encourages you to explore and waste time in zones so you have LOTS of time to work out how the systems work, retail really doesn't give you time to do that its always pushing you faster which in it self is awful for new players to grasp

I DO think that wow isn't a good game to get into without friends, classic in a way is better at helping new players by catering to a more social way of playing, you always inevitably end up in a party or helping others in classic while in a zone so you naturally end up learning from more experienced players while retail doesn't really manage that ... at all

@mbarros3078 4 months ago

I think the big problem with retail is the fast pace. If you enter a dungeon with four people you don't know, you will not have the time to see what is going on. This is the reason why I really love "Follower dungeon". Sometimes I take more than an hour to end a dungeon, only to explore every corner and understand the story behind it. And this is why I love to do low level maps and dungeons and raids over and over. I always find something I wouldn't learn if only going with some "desperate running people".

@libercode9886 4 months ago

27:48 he would know about deadmines by the questchain, the questchain guides you there

@jimofee 5 months ago (edited)

T'was a unique experience with more stories to uncover in world of warcraft. Thank you all for the lovely comments! I will carry on as much i can!

If you guys want to see my perspective : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLscAiOgBkM

@ElMartilloBlanco 5 months ago

I understand the experiment here, but Exile's Reach just sucks because it erases all racial identity. You totally miss out on the Worgen experience if you don't go to Gilneas. You don't get the Undead experience if you miss Tirisfal Glades. Etc. Etc.

Basically, Blizzard could help improve the early-game vibe if they just straight-up deleted Exile's Reach.

@thanganbabp5570 4 months ago

it's a bit late now, but if you ever do something like this again. it might be more neat to tell a new player to read the quests and try to figure out where the quest is. most of what you need to know in classic, is actually present on the ui if you look for it. stats too, he could have just looked at the description. im glad he is having fun though

@PsychoWedge 5 months ago

you should do a follow up vid. you two guys are entertaining and it is interesting as a og player who recently came back after 14 years and is bewildered what retail has become. :D

@zergl1ng 3 months ago

As a new player, playing WoW feels like waking up in the middle of a pitch black room where sound echoes for what seems to be an eternity. You dont know what direction to go, if you'll walk into a hole, if you'll trip or run into a scary monster that'll eat you whole, but you're there and you just have to pick a direction and go.

@Rowrin 3 months ago

41:00 going from having to strategically pull every mob and dying to furbolgs in the starter zone in classic to mindlessly killing everything without thinking sums up the differences pretty well i think lol

@EhBoing 4 months ago (edited)

I had a similar experience trying to introduce WoW retail to my girlfriend. I despise the tutorial island leading into dragonflight, it's one of those things that looks intuitive and easy to understand as a long time player, but there's so much wrong with it. The oversimplification of gameplay at the start, leading into systems and ideas that are so intensely complicated to new players like profession quests, mount collections, characters you're introduced to that you have no connection to, even where you're supposed to be questing and killing mobs is confusing at first. It's an absolute nightmare, and it ultimately ended up overwhelming her and causing her to come away from the game with a negative experience.

It's so difficult trying to figure out the best course of action when introducing someone to WoW retail, or really any kind of WoW for that matter. I think if I were to do it differently, I would avoid Exile's Reach altogether, even though that is in some way influencing their opinion. It's a new player trap, especially to those who are a little more on the fence about MMOs or just don't have a personal connection to Blizzard or their roster of characters they've built over the years.

@MsSkullomania 4 months ago

I remember when I got into WoW retail wow was overwhelming because the world was soo big, there were soo many classes and many things to do ., I started playing classic wow instead and fell in love . With classic I was able to learn the basics and once I felt comfortable with that I moved over again to retail and had a much better experience