WoW vows long-term commitment to improving new player experience in Midnight, Last Titan, and beyond

Modified Feb 06, 2025 16:45 IST

WoW's executive producer, Holly Longdale recently opened up to the community about what they can expect in 2025 (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

Whether you’re a fan of Retail WoW or Classic World of Warcraft, 2024 was a pretty successful year. Holly Longdale, the executive producer for Blizzard Entertainment’s hit MMO, recently dropped a blog post talking about where the game went in 2024. Holly also hinted at what was on the horizon for 2025. She discussed both the Classic and Retail versions of the game and teased content that’s on the way.

While there was some focus on the new player experience, it wasn’t the only thing Holly spoke about in her blog post. There’s just so much to World of Warcraft, that it can be daunting for players just coming into a game that’s 20 years old.

While we already know there’s quite a bit coming in 2025, Holly elaborated on some interesting things for the community.

WoW had a successful 2024, but 2025 is going to build on that for new players and veterans alike

After looking back at 2024, and the impressive content that dropped for Classic Servers and Retail Servers for WoW, Holly Longdale chose to focus on the future. Both versions of the game have content to look forward to, such as Mists of Pandaria Classic, coming later in the year. Major updates for the Retail Servers, such as 11.0, are scheduled for 2025. The reveal of the Midnight expansion is also on the way.

Whether you've played for two days or 20 years, the player experience in World of Warcraft matters (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

As a veteran World of Warcraft player, I’m very excited to see the commitment to an improved new player experience. It’s been improved in the past, such as with Exile’s Reach, but even that doesn’t teach everything a new player ought to know. It’s certainly a good start, though.

Holly Longdale did point out that player experience isn’t something they can just fix overnight. Instead, it will require updates and changes across the next two expansions — Midnight and The Last Titan — and perhaps even beyond:

“We know that being truly welcoming requires a lot of work around our new and returning player experiences in modern WoW. We are committed to that work, and we will be making some improvements in Midnight and The Last Titan. I’ll be honest—this will be a long-term, ongoing journey, as the game evolves and changes with each expansion. There is no quick fix, but we are here for it.”

This is a great idea, and I’m curious to see how they can possibly improve the new player experience, as there’s simply so much ground to cover. Holly also highlighted that they want to make improvements for everyone, and the new features they add teach quite a bit about how they can improve.

While I don't know for sure what awaits in the future, I'm hopeful for it, that's for sure (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

It’s not just about updating the new player experience, though. Holly wants to improve the community as well, through social features like housing — which is incredibly exciting.

In the blog post, she stated that they’re looking at improvements to how players connect with each other — whether it’s the friend list, group finder, or finding better ways to integrate external social platforms that the community already use.

What makes WoW such a great game is how it grows and adapts. No expansion and no update is truly perfect. There’s always a lesson to learn, and it’s clear that the team is trying to consistently improve the game not just for long-time players, but newcomers as well.

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Edited by Abhishek Manikandan