5. Content
So then we talked about content, and our belief was that in addition to the existing vanilla WoW content, we would introduce new and expanded zones, new dungeons and raids, a new race, new Class updates, new reputations, new Professions content, new Items & Rewards, new Legendaries, and more! All with a persistent Level 60 cap… at Launch.
It is fun to revisit these slides now because even though we were confident we could do this, we didn’t know for sure. No. We were standing up in front of you and the rest of the Blizzard leadership team. These were the things that we were saying we could do. And we were pretty sure.
Holly Longdale: No. No. It was very much like– “Oh, hell no.” And honestly, this wasn’t that long ago. They just actually pulled a rabbit out of the hat, and this was a situation where we’re like, we’re gonna invest in you; we’re gonna get you the help you need, you know?! (public laughs) And they killed it, they smashed it, and it just– we had no idea it was gonna become what it has become. It’s become more than we could have planned for, just in how it feels. It’s amazing. So yeah. But I appreciate you going with at least the appearance that you believed it.
Clay Stone: As long as I looked confident in the room. Our belief was that the reveal of what we consider to be this dream content lineup at BlizzCon 2026- we were calling our shot- would deliver a reimagined vanilla-era WoW with new content and graphical updates set in the original world, where social experiences remain central, and the journey is the focus over the destination.
Classic+ would feature a living world with frequent large updates, creating a horizontally expanding evergreen classic Azeroth. This was that summation slide that I talked about.
Holly Longdale: That was the hell no part. They did it!
Clay Stone: So as important as that was, we also had to be able to communicate to the Blizzard leadership team how this is gonna fit into our whole ecosystem? We’ve already got Classic, we have already got Modern, and so what I put together were these Pringles cans. I’m not the best at PowerPoint, but I was able to make these shapes. I don’t know if you have got Pringles in Australia. I don’t know if they put–
Holly Longdale: Do you have Pringles? (crowd says: yes) Sorry!
Clay Stone: Okay. Alright. Good. Thank you. But what we essentially communicated was that Classic would continue. It would be its own thing. Classic would live on, and it would be as it was. And then, of course, we had the modern game with the modern team forging the best-in-class modern MMO with the World Soul Saga, and this new game would sit right alongside them as a new vanilla era forever.
But the pitch is that it would be this brand-new third pillar of our ongoing ecosystem. And it is all available for one subscription, by the way.
Holly Longdale: Sales pitch!
Clay Stone: (smiles) Which, of course, brings us to World of Warcraft: Forever and where we are today. We’re currently in beta. Hopefully, many of you are playing our Beta right now. We just had a content unlock. I think it was this morning.
Holly Longdale: It’s insane. In our recorded history of Blizzard, there’s been no beta bigger than this, and people are playing it like it’s Live. Like, we make changes, we fix stuff, like I don’t regret that change. But it’s beta, so it’s kind of what we do. We kind of break stuff, fix stuff. We’re delighted, and I don’t think we were ready for this kind of engagement. We hoped. You always hope. You always hope you get that lightning-strike moment. You never expect it; that’s like, don’t do that to yourselves. But this is magic. Absolute magic.
Clay Stone: It’s been a fun ride already. Let’s take a minute, and we’ll talk about World of Warcraft: Forever, and then I want to show some really cool stuff that I don’t think much folks have seen. So we started, of course, with the original map of vanilla Azeroth, and as we revealed at BlizzCon, we have added to that in a whole bunch of different ways by expanding the world out.
Holly Longdale: MS Paint art. You know it’s legit when MS Paint has been used. That’s real developer graphics.
| NAVIGATE - PAX AUSTRALIA 2026 - WORLD OF WARCRAFT: FOREVER KEYNOTE TRANSCRIPT | ||||
| 1. Intro | 2. Classic Releases | 3. WoW Mythos | 4. Dev Pillars | 5. Content |
| 6. Riverglades | 7. Idea | 8. Enemies | ||
