Flying in old-world Azeroth
by Allison Robert 
May 10th 2009 at 12:00PM
One of players' most frequently asked questions since BC emerged has been when -- or if -- Blizzard plans to make flying mounts usable in classic Azeroth. It's an attractive proposition due to the sheer size of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, and how convenient it would be to take a fast flyer to places that aren't well-served by flight paths. CM's and developers have said that the programming and time required to "retrofit" the old world to be usable by flying mounts isn't worth it, and that they'd rather spend developmental resources on new content.
A player who got irritated with all the begging -- and someone who I can only assume has access to GM powers on a private server -- decided to take an aerial tour of several zones in Azeroth in December 2007 to document the territory Blizzard would have to redesign in order to make flying mounts feasible. It's a really interesting look at how Blizzard exploited perspective and line-of-sight in order to make buildings and zones appear bigger and more built-up than they actually are, and there are a few places in the video that I haven't seen even on websites dedicated to the "secret places" of Azeroth. I'm not sure why this video hasn't popped up previously but it doesn't seem to be tagged or categorized in any way, so that might be why. Check it out; flying in Azeroth would be great to see these things, but there's no denying Blizz would have a lot of work to do.
Filed under: Machinima, Odds and ends
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
Arbitur May 10th 2009 12:13PM
Name of the song in the video?
Jay May 10th 2009 12:15PM
Conjure One - Center Of The Sun (Solarstone's Remix)
Meg May 12th 2009 4:32AM
Yep - sounds like Poe to me!
Gameleon May 10th 2009 12:18PM
GM powers on a private server? What about the Wowmapviewer utility from www.wowmodelviewer.org?
Keyra May 10th 2009 3:20PM
Damn...beat me to it. That is exactly what this is, which is why you don't see the harbor in SW (as the map viewer only works pre-3.0.1).
Sonicandtails May 10th 2009 3:37PM
No, if you read it, this video dates back to 2007. There was no harbor.
ChanceC (XBL: NoPantsChance) May 10th 2009 4:00PM
The game files are actually older than that, regarldess of when the video was shot.
That tower and those ruins you see at ~5:16 are what was north of EPL before Quel'Thalas was added in The Burning Crusade. In other words, if you started in Tirifal Glades swimming east and swam all the way around to The Hinterlands, you would have passed those ruins. I did it a loooong time ago and got chills when I saw that they were representing the Blood Elves up there.
onetrueping May 10th 2009 10:26PM
Actually, that tower is still there. The blood elf zone is actually instanced, and not accessible by the coast. Something about keeping out all the people who didn't buy BC.
Suzaku May 11th 2009 10:22PM
It's not instanced, it's just on the same server and same map files as Outland and the other new BC zones.
The only way to access the valid Quel'thalas area is by entering it legitimately through a load screen, since it's a seperate map and server from Eastern Kingdoms. If you try and swim around, you still see the same old area with the same old tower from befor BC.
That's why there's no load screen when teleporting directly between Outland and the BE/Draenei zones, and you at least used to be able to see the arrows for party members in Outland on your minimap when you were in Isle of Quel'danas, etc..
Chuck May 10th 2009 12:27PM
That is a LOT different than what I expected.
Now, even though i'd like it, i'd rather get new content... Or even new content for lower level players entirely. Like, new ways/areas to level up.
Huzzajansi May 10th 2009 1:46PM
not gonna happen - blizz said so
PeeWee May 10th 2009 2:27PM
Not likely going to happen. Why? Behold:
* Quests give ~30% more XP.
* Each level requires less XP If I remember correctly, roughly 20% less.
* +10% XP boost from heirloom shoulderpads
(the 40 emblems you need takes but a few days to farm)
* +300% XP boost from Recruit-a-Friend.
Blizzard eased up on the levelling process for this very reason, to not have to worry about old content any more. They want you out of Azeroth and into Outlands as quick as possible (that's why you ding 58 as DK when you've completed the quest series, if you've killed enough mobs), and from there to Northrend. If you go for Northrend, and leave Azeroth at 58, you only have to complete Hellfire Peninsula, Zangramarsh, Terokkar Forest and roughly half of Nagrand to ding 68 and move on. You don't have to set foot in Shadowmoon Valley, Blade's Edge Mountains or Netherstorm to get there, and with all classes I've tried this with so far (DK, shaman, hunter, warrior, druid) even most group quests are soloable nowadays. I had some problems with the Overlord in HP, as well as the stone giants there. As for the rest, roflcopter.
Sumanai May 10th 2009 12:22PM
It's not only Blizzard that "exploits" line of sight and perspective when map building. It's been used for a long time to save resources and make maps "lighter" in many games. No need to model and skin what isn't supposed to be seen in normal gameplay.
GryphonStalker May 10th 2009 12:47PM
Indeed, there is a reason the old world is the easiest for PCs to handle.
Umrtvovacz May 10th 2009 2:42PM
That is exactly it. If you don't have to ever see it, it don't need to be here. If you use any mod that increases how far you can scroll your vamera, you can see those "glitches" too, even on a live server. And because in BC and WotlK you can se everything everywhere, by flying mounts, it's much more PC-eating.
http://umrtvovacz.blogspot.com/
Arashikou May 10th 2009 7:03PM
Also, shamans can chain-Farsight their way into a lot of these areas players were never meant to visit.
my2cents May 10th 2009 10:05PM
Yeah I was about to say the same thing about Far Sight. Sometimes when I'm bored I hop on my Shaman and explore Azeroth via Far Sight. You can see pretty much everything seen in this video. It also used to let you see into "Old Ironforge" but that has been fixed. Sadly, you cannot do the same thing on a Hunter because with hunters you can only use Eagle Eye to "hop" once, wheras on a Shaman you can visually hop to a far away spot, then hop from there to another, and so on.
Tremelizzer May 11th 2009 10:36AM
@my2cents:
Nope, you can use Eagle Eye just like Far Sight. You only need have macro like this
/cast !Eagle Eye
Note the exclamation mark before spell name.
Lionhearte May 10th 2009 12:23PM
Maybe if Blizzard had more than 40 people working on WoW they could have more time to do stuff -.-
Gessilea May 10th 2009 12:42PM
I've hear this argument a lot too, but there are reasons why you don't want to just throw more people at a problem. First, you don't want to hire just ANYONE who knows how to use a keyboard. You want to find the best people you can.
Second, not only do you want to find the best people you can, but you want them to be able to work as a team. Ultimately, there's a finite number of people who can work on a single vision. Ever noticed how meetings with five people are a lot more productive than meetings with ten people? And more than ten it starts to get impossible to do anything?
As you get more and more people, you have to add more and more middle managers to keep everyone on the same track. Then you have to hire managers to keep those managers on the same track. Then all of the sudden you don't have a community of people who are all invested in a single project, you have an army of managers. This happens anyhow, but it's always good to keep it to a minimum.