Say what you want about 3-D combat, Vashj'ir was such a visually stunning zone and the soundtrack is top tier.

It is a shame Vashj'ir was so hated since it has so much remnants of the Night Elf civilization that was blasted beneath the waves during the Sundering when the Well of Eternity imploded.

I personally loved vashj'ir it was only mildly annoying to traverse, but it was so unique that it felt so cool after 80 levels of the same thing over and over. The lore was great too.

If you are going to put Crystalsong Forest on your list, you should probably have mentioned Deadwind Pass as well.  If there was no Karazhan raid, most people wouldn't even know this zone exists.

It's such a shame that Vashj'ir was so poorly received, I really liked it.

Vashj'ir is the one of the most unique, experimental, and visually stunning zones in WoW and Blizz will never do another one like it because players were so mad about 3D combat

I actually liked Desolace in vanilla. It had this lonesome ambiance that was really cool to just chill out in. But yeah, the leveling cadence there was absolutely trash tier.

I loved Vashj'ir. The helpless and vulnerable feeling of the zone instantly hooked me.

7:57

Druids were the only ones who could get flying at 68. Everyone else was 70 when purchasing flying.

I wouldn't even call Crystalsong Forest a ''leveling zone'', its just there to keep all the lagg from Dalaran out from the actual leveling zones. They wanted to put the tournament there but with how much lagg Dalaran caused it had to be moved to Icecrown.

"Thrall's balls they're everywhere !"

Vash'jir was (still is) one of my favorite zones in the game with a sick storyline and funny moments

Azshara is night and day for me pre and post Cata.
Pre Cata it was one of my favourite looking zones but terrible to quest in due to lack of quests. Post Cata it was a great zone for questing due to the amount of quests but a horrible zone to look at due to the goblins messing it up :(

I liked the lore of Vashj'ir despite it being abandoned/having cut content.

11:08 “It left the player to find their own way around the world…” and I loved that! It was really engrossing for me to go exploring just to see what was out there, rather than because a quest told me to go there. In fact, most of these big, empty spaces were some of my favorites, because when I did discover something, it felt like an actual discovery, and there’s wonder and magic in that.

16:30 At launch, Silithus had NO quests. It was a completely barren zone. There were places clearly designed to have story beats around it but there was ultimately nothing in there. I remember sometime, probably mid December-January 04-05 wandering around on my midlevel mage, admiring all the weird stuff there and wondering what Blizzard had planned. I vaguely recall the area being actually completely blocked off from Un'goro like a big stone pillar or something just on the path up and you needing to do some trickery to get around it, but my memory could be faulty there.

I kinda liked zones without many quests like Azshara, Silithus, Deadwind Pass and Swamp of Sorrows. In retrospective its clear they ran out of time to further develop those areas but when you're a noob they feel like such mysterious places and the few quests that send you there always feel like being sent to THE far away desolate zone, the place so dangerous most people avoid doing any sort of traveling to but you've got no other option.

Azshara had that quest with you hunting down an elf and some demons for a guy in Orgrimmar, and it also had the Demon Hunter for the Blasted Lands quest chain. Swamp of Sorrows was also involved in the same quest chain and had the Sunken Temple quest chains for all classes.

Silithus had the build up (for horde mostly) of the bug quests starting out all the way from the Barrens, 1K Needles, Feralas, Tanaris and Un'Goro before you walk into the massive hives and towering nests in Silithus and you figure out those bugs are the world threatening enemy in Kalimdor just like the Scourge on EK.

vashjir was the best zone for me of all

sadly there never will be a zone like this :(

I have fond Vanilla memories of Arathi just because that sense of “danger” from the elite mobs added excitement to my otherwise lonely level grind…it made the world feel more powerful to me back then.

Honestly, even with having 0 contrent...
I still love Silithus.
Something about the atmosphere and feel of that zone gives me chills.

Even with the nerf to experience gains in Gorgrond, I just love the zone for it’s atmosphere. It feels so primal and wild, way more so than any other jungle zone in the game for me. The lack of a huge zone story plays in its favor for me, as it really adds to the sandbox nature of the zone.