Today at BlizzCon, Blizzard announced that the upcoming tenth, eleventh, and twelfth expansions to its ongoing popular MMORPG World of Warcraft, all three of which will be contained in a larger narrative called World of Warcraft: The Worldsoul Saga. The first of these will be entitled World of Warcraft: The War Within, and it’s coming next year.
During the keynote, Blizzard brought out WoW legend Chris Metzen, who recently returned as executive creative director of the Warcraft franchise, to announce the update. He called the expansion “the culmination of the first 20 years of our storytelling” that will “vector us into the next 20 years of adventure.” And boy, did what he announce sound massive, with Metzen unveiling an almost MCU-like setup for the coming years of World of Warcraft.
The tenth expansion and the first in the Worldsoul Saga, The War Within, will send adventurers inside Azeroth, to subterranean kingdoms, where Nerubians and an Allied race called the Earthen Dwarves await. We got the most details on The War Within, such as the promised return of former talking knife Xal’atath, new zones like Azj-kahet, Isle of Dorn, The Ringing Deeps, and Hallowfall, a new treasure hunting adventure activity called Delves, an account-unifying feature called War Bands, and new dungeons and raids.
The other two expansions had fewer details, but that’s fine for now as they’re both farther off. Expansion 11 is entitled simply World of Warcraft: Midnight, and will take place in Azeroth’s “Old World” in Quel’thalas, where Void forces have invaded and are trying to destroy the Sunwell and plunge the world into darkness. And the third part of the Worldsoul Saga, and WoW’s 12th expansion, will be called World of Warcraft: The Last Titan. It also takes place in the Old World, but in Northrend, previously the staging ground for Wrath of the Lich King. In this expansion, the titans return to Azeroth, and players “uncover a vast conspiracy” about the Titans and their intentions.
There are more details expected later at BlizzCon, but we did get one more taste of what’s to come in a gorgeous new cinematic featuring Anduin and Thrall discussing recent visions and a strange voice calling to them, before finally addressing the literal giant sword in the room: yes, the giant sword that Sargeras plunged into Azeroth at the end of the Legion expansion is finally getting dealt with. Anduin and Thrall note that the sword was clearly aimed at something…hinting at the adventure to come.
The current expansion, Dragonflight, has been met with enthusiasm from the community, especially in its new dragonriding mount system. Our own reviewer gave the expansion a 7/10 at its initial launch, calling it “a sharply-written and breathtaking experience for the first few dozen hours, but suffers from somewhat threadbare endgame options.” Notably, subsequent patches since have expanded that endgame. Patch 10.2, Guardians of the Emerald Dream, is planned to drop next week and will include a new raid, a new zone, and numerous new quests, items, events, and other updates.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.