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BlizzConline (also known as BlizzCon 2021) has officially begun. This two-day event not only marks the 30th Anniversary of Blizzard but will also play host to all the latest news about its games. To keep you in the know, we’ll be rounding up all the announcements and reveals from the show right here.

Blizzard Arcade Collection Announced

Blizzard is bringing back some of its classic games with the Blizzard Arcade Collection. Launching today on PC and consoles, the collection features The Lost Vikings, Blackthorne, and Rock N Roll Racing both their classic and newly enhanced formats.

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World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Patch 9.1 Chains of Domination Announced

Patch 9.1 dubbed Chains of Domination will be coming to World of Warcraft: Shadowlands and bringing players to a new location called Korthia. With the new location comes new quests, a new 10-boss raid, an eight-boss mega-dungeon, and more.

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World of Warcraft – The Burning Crusade: Classic Expansion Announced

Blizzard continued its trip down memory lane with The Burning Crusade: Classic, an expansion coming later this year. Initially leaked by a press kit ahead of BlizzConline, The Burning Crusade introduces a number of new changes (apparently even more than World of Warcraft Classic)  and features including a level cap of 70, two new races, flying mounts, and more.

What’s more, the developers told IGN they’re not against making Wrath of the Lich King Classic if that’s what the WoW community wants.

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Hearthstone Forged in Barrens Expansion and Mercenaries Mode Revealed

At BlizzCon 2021 it was revealed Hearthstone is getting its very own Warcraft-themed expansion called Forged in the Barrens, and a new mode called Mercenaries. The upcoming expansion brings 135 new cards and will kick off the Year of the Gryphon. As for the new Mercenaries mode, Blizzard says it will feature roguelike missions and strategic RPG gameplay.

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Diablo 4 Rogue Class Trailer Revealed

Just in time for Blizzard’s usual quarterly developer update, we were given our first look at Diablo 4’s Rogue class with an eerily dark cinematic trailer. IGN interviewed game director Luis Barriga who went into more detail about the newly revealed class and Diablo 4’s PvP. We also spoke with art director John Mueller about mounts and riding around the world in style.

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Felicia Miranda is SEO Editor at IGN. You can find her on Twitter @FeliciaVagabond.

With today’s announcement of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic proving that Blizzard won’t shy away from making its old WoW expansions available anew, the question becomes: how far will Blizzard take Classic? Will we see Wrath of the Lich King Classic next?

Speaking to IGN in advance of BlizzCon 2021, executive producer John Hight and lead software engineer Brian Birmingham are clear that what Classic ultimately becomes will be determined by what the Classic community wants — after all, it was for the community that Classic servers were originally made, and it was also because of strong community that they opted to take the game into The Burning Crusade this year.

“We set the stage even when we announced Classic,” said Hight. “That was one of the questions I got on that fateful day at BlizzCon. At that point we already had plans, but we did want to see how popular Classic was going to be. And I think we’ve said it multiple times, but we were completely overwhelmed with how much positive reception we got… not only did they come in droves to play Classic, but they’ve continued to play, and it’s a vibrant community. We brag now that we have the two biggest MMORPGs in PC gaming. Of course we would go to Burning Crusade.”

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When asked more specifically how far Classic could potentially go, Birmingham affirmed that while Blizzard has nothing to announce for now, a possible Wrath of the Lich King Classic would not be off the table.

“We want to hear what the community wants,” he said. What people want to see is what we want to do. If people are excited about the next chapters, then we want to hear about that and start talking about it.”

Hight added, “If we have a good party going we want to keep the party going.”

The two were also clear that the current plan is for the original World of Warcraft: Classic, sans expansions, to keep existing perpetually as it is — at a minimum.

“There were people who when we did Classic, asked specifically, ‘We want the original version of the game,'” Birmingham said. “And we don’t want to take that away from them — we just gave it to them. So we want to make sure they still have that choice.

 “…What we definitely want to do is make sure that we are being true to people to say that there is something that is Classic and feels like that. Then there’s an open question: are there other quality of life changes that make sense to make there as more people move on to Burning Crusade? And we’re definitely interested in hearing community feedback about what we should do with that.”

Hight added, “We know a lot of people love that [version of] WoW, and they have been willing to level up, play for a while, and start that journey over again. We’ve certainly kicked around some ideas about how best to engage them and support them in that. As Brian said, we’re open to ideas. This is their community too.”

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic and details about the 9.1 patch for Shadowlands were leaked yesterday ahead of BlizzCon today, when they were formally announced. We also spoke with Hight and Birmingham about other Burning Crusade Classic details, including planned paid character boosts and cloning services, and changes to Burning Crusade from its original version.

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Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Blizzard is launching (well, re-launching, in a sense) its Burning Crusade expansion for World of Warcraft Classic later this year, and it wants to make sure anyone who wants to can participate immediately — even if they haven’t done the hours and hours of grinding required in Classic to get a max level character.

Speaking in an interview with IGN ahead of today’s BlizzCon 2021 announcements, executive producer John Hight and lead software engineer Brian Birmingham confirmed that Blizzard would offer some way to boost characters to level 58 (the level at which players can access The Burning Crusade content in Outland) for those who wanted to jump right into Burning Crusade without going through all of Classic’s content first — though they weren’t specific as to exactly how that boost would be obtained.

Hight suggested that while The Burning Crusade would automatically be made available to anyone with a World of Warcraft subscription “one option will also be to be able to get a boost” and that option “may potentially include some other cool stuff” — effectively hinting at some form of boost other than the usual paid boost available with the retail version of the game.

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Birmingham said that regardless of how it was obtained, it was important that getting that boost didn’t trivialize the accomplishments of Classic players so far. He said Blizzard wants to “honor the sense of accomplishment” that players who had already reached max level in Classic had. To that end, the boost will be limited: only one per World of Warcraft account, characters will be wearing level-appropriate but not overpowered dungeon gear, and the two new races introduces in Burning Crusade — Draenei and Blood Elves — cannot be boosted.

“We know for a lot of people this was their entry into WoW, and we don’t want them to feel like they missed out,” Hight said. “I think if we’d had the notion of a boost back then, we definitely would have used it. When we introduced it with Warlords of Draenor we saw a lot of people return to WoW.”

Character boosting isn’t the only Classic character service being added. Birmingham and Hight also elaborated on the process of bringing a character to Burning Crusade, or choosing to keep it in the original Classic.

Essentially, Birmingham explained, on launch day there will be two separate game clients in Battle.net: one for Burning Crusade, and one for Classic. When you launch one and select a character, it will ask you to confirm if that’s where you want that character to be, and then you’ll lock it in. The choice is per character, so different characters can go to whichever version of the game players want.

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But what if players want to play one character in both versions? Blizzard has accounted for that, and will be offering a paid service (the amount has yet to be announced) that will let players clone characters across both games.

“We want to make sure that you’re making a meaningful choice, that you’re actually making a decision of where you want to continue your adventuring, but we know that some people would prefer not to make that choice so we’re developing this new service for that,” Birmingham said.

Hight added, “It should be a conscious choice. If we just automatically did it, we could potentially be creating a bunch of characters that are there but nobody’s actually playing. It’s introducing a little bit of friction to make sure this is really what you want to do.”

Hight added that, based on player feedback and surveys, he expects most players will want to move on to The Burning Crusade — but Classic will be kept alive indefinitely for those who want to stay in that community.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic and details about the 9.1 patch for Shadowlands were leaked yesterday and formally announced today at BlizzCon 2021. IGN also spoke with Hight and Birmingham about other Burning Crusade Classic details, including potential plans for a Wrath of the Lich King Classic release in the future, and changes to Burning Crusade from its original version.

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Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

When it released World of Warcraft: Classic, Blizzard’s goal was to stay as true to the original World of Warcraft experience as was feasible. And while that’s still true for Burning Crusade, they…might be loosening up just a little.

Speaking to IGN ahead of the announcement of The Burning Crusade Classic at BlizzCon 2021 today, lead software engineer Brian Birmingham said that the team was trying to be a touch more flexible with how they approached Burning Crusade, to both give players a broader experience, as well as a better-tuned one.

“One of the things that we’re trying to do is move just a little bit more off of what we used to call, ‘No Changes,'” he said. “There was a big push in the community [with Classic] to make sure that we really were going to be true to the original. And I think we really did a good job of delivering on that with Classic. We do want to back off just a little bit [with Burning Crusade], and we’re kind of calling this, ‘Some Changes.’ We don’t want it to be dramatic.”

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Birmingham offered a few examples. For one, several bosses were bugfixed or nerfed in Burning Crusade, but players might be interested in trying their hand at fights in their far more challenging forms. For instance, Lady Vashj — the final encounter in Serpentshrine Cavern — was incredibly difficult to kill when she was first released, before a nerf made her more reasonable. But Blizzard will let her launch in her pre-nerf form so guilds that want a challenge can try their hand at that, before eventually bringing the nerf into effect.

The same goes for the M’uru fight in Sunwell, though Birmingham says that not everything about M’uru will be as it was when it was first released. M’uru received nerfs to both its health as well as a spell pushback ability that was devastating to guilds trying to kill it. The spell pushback ability difficulty will not be reinstated, but M’uru will release with its initial high health pool.

Another interesting change Birmingham specifics is to Paladins, which are present in Classic but were added to the Horde in Burning Crusade. When that happened, Horde Paladins were given an ability called Seal of Blood, while Alliance Paladins received Seal of Vengeance. The abilities, Birmingham said, were intended to be equal in power but distinct — but that didn’t quite pan out, as Seal of Blood was far more powerful. So with Burning Crusade Classic, both factions will learn the opposite faction’s version of the Seal at level 70.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic and details about the 9.1 patch for Shadowlands, Chains of Domination, were announced today at BlizzCon 2021. IGN also spoke with Hight and Birmingham about other Burning Crusade Classic features and changes, including potential plans for a Wrath of the Lich King Classic release in the future, and plans for character boosts and paid character cloning services to go with the Burning Crusade launch.

The Burning Crusade Classic launches later this year.

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Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

For those that have been enjoying a retro World of Warcraft experience through WoW Classic, Blizzard is expanding the experience by introducing a classic version of Burning Crusade. This means that players will be able to relive playing World of Warcraft’s first expansion just as it was when it launched in 2007.

World of Warcraft Classic is set to be updated with the game’s first expansion in the same retro style, Blizzard announced at BlizzConline. World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade Classic will launch later this year, letting you step back into Outland as it appeared in 2007.

The expansion will let you play as a Blood Elf or Draenei in WoW Classic. Content will be released in phases, letting players experience the Burning Crusade progressively over time. That means the community can prep itself for events like the opening of the Black Temple and the Sunwell. It will also reintroduce Arena PvP, jewelcrafting, and flying mounts to the WoW Classic experience.

WoW Classic players will have a choice as to whether they advance to Burning Crusade. You’ll be able to keep your characters in the vanilla Classic version of the game, or move to them the Burning Crusade era.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic is included with any WoW subscription, so if you’re playing the main game or Classic already, you’ll get access to this content for free.

Part of this announcement was leaked ahead of BlizzConline, along with word about Shadowlands’ next update. WoW Classic launched in 2019, offering players a chance to see the game as it originally appeared way back in 2004, with only slightly modernized quality-of-life improvements.

The first major update for World of Warcraft Shadowlands, Chains of Domination, was announced during BlizzConline, and it sounds very exciting for fans of Blizzard’s long-running MMO. As rumored, the update introduces a new raid and a mega-dungeon, while the content update also sheds light on certain story elements. Of course, it also introduces lots more gear to collect. You can also check out a story trailer below.

The Chains of Domination update introduces a new area, Korthia, which features new quests and outdoor activities to take part in. Players are charged with uniting the four covenants and then launching an assault on the Jailer on his home turf.

Chains of Domination also introduces a 10-boss raid called the Sanctum of Domination, and it sounds like a true challenge. It culminates in a battle against the iconic Warcraft villain Sylvanas. “Encounter the true Eye of the Jailer, turn the tide against Tarragrue, and come face-to-face with the Banshee Queen herself in a fateful confrontation,” reads a line from the description.

A new mega-dungeon called Tazavesh, the Veiled Market, is also included in the Chains of Domination update. This eight-boss Mythic dungeon takes place in the bazaar of Brokers. It ends with a “high-stakes heist” to pillage powerful artifacts.

Finally, the Chains of Domination update–which is free for subscribers–comes with new PvP Season 2 content, new Covenant cosmetic armor sets for any class, additional powers for Soulbinds and Conduits, and more mounts and pets to collect. What’s more, the update introduces flying to the Covenants’ four domains.

For more, check out out recap of BlizzCon announcements.

In World of Warcraft: Shadowlands, players get to choose to join one of four different Covenants, which dictates much of the storyline (and many of the characters) they interact with as they explore the world of the dead. But with patch 9.1, that’s all about to change.

Speaking to IGN ahead of BlizzCon 2021, senior game designer Jeremy Feasel and technical director Frank Kowalkowski said that Patch 9.1 sees players working to unite the four covenants, bringing them together as a collective army to launch a strike against the Jailer on his home turf: the Maw.

Shadowlands patch 9.1, Chains of Domination, was revealed today at BlizzCon, and centers the lost city of Korthia — which the Jailer grabs out of the Maw and smashes into the rest of the landmass players have explored so far. Much of Chains of Domination will take place in Korthia and the Maw at large, with new Covenant hubs in the Maw, ways to cleanse the Jailer’s oppressive influence, and yes — the ability to summon player mounts in the Maw, where previously they were unable to do so.

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Uniting the Covenants isn’t just a storyline choice. Feasel said that with 9.1, players will not only be doing most of the same content together, but they’ll also be able to follow the storylines of Covenants they haven’t joined, as well as receive story catch-ups to see what’s been going on in other zones.

“It was wanting to get across that feeling of the covenants really coming together, it doesn’t make sense for us to go off and deal with problems in our own home zone anymore,” Feasel said. “But then also, it allows us to show to every single one of the players, even players who may not play multiple characters, what’s been going on in some of the zones, and that helps us with our storytelling. Once everyone’s caught up with what’s going on, what’s happening in the world, it allows us take-off points from any of the four zone storylines.”

It will also be much easier to navigate the four Covenant zones, they said, because flying will be implemented in all four with the new patch. And, good news: there’s no reputation grind this time. If players have been keeping up with their Covenant story progression so far, they say it shouldn’t take long at all to unlock it — though still no flying allowed in the Maw, sorry.

Feasel added that there will still be things that make Covenants feel distinct to players, including extra storylines or “scene-lets” that only players of that Covenant will see.

The merging of Covenant storylines and ease of crossover begs the question: what if players want to change Covenants? The Covenant system was criticized heavily in the lead-up to launch due to players not wanting to feel restricted to one Covenant, especially if later changes to the game made a certain Covenant more or less ideal for more hardcore players. Feasel said that while there’s nothing specific to announce for now, the time between major patches is about the time Blizzard expects to see players experiment with other Covenants, and the teams will be listening to feedback from players who do swap to make sure they feel that changing Covenants isn’t too painful for them.

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Covenants, Korthia, and storylines aren’t the only new elements coming in 9.1. There’s a new 10-boss raid, the Sanctum of Domination, where players will take on Sylvanas Windrunner at last as the final boss — though Feasel said no return of Tier gear…for now.

“We really like the idea, we don’t have anything to announce today, but it’s definitely on our list when we find a time that feels right,” he said.

And Kowalkowski confirmed there’s more. There will be”at least one new wing” added to Torghast, possibly more. Feasel added that Blizzard is looking at adjustments to the rogue-like challenge’s rewards, suggesting the “everything or nothing” approach currently available probably needs adjusting.

“We want it to feel like you can achieve a bit more incremental progression,” he said, and continued that Blizzard wants players who like the content but don’t need the rewards to still feel they get something from it.

We’ll also see an eight-boss mega-dungeon themed around the Brokers called Tazavesh, the Veiled Market, and at some point encounter this real messed-up version of Anduin Wrynn, corrupted somehow by Sylvanas and despair.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic and details about the 9.1 patch for Shadowlands were leaked yesterday ahead of BlizzCon today, when they were formally announced. We also spoke with John Hight and Brian Birmingham ahead of the event about a number of Burning Crusade Classic details, including planned character boosts and paid cloning services, a potential future Wrath of the Lich King Classic release and changes to Burning Crusade from its original version.

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Blizzard has announced the Blizzard Arcade Collection, a set of three enhanced editions of some of Blizzard’s earliest, pre-Warcraft games. The collection is available today on PC and consoles.

The Blizzard Arcade Collection contains The Lost Vikings, Rock N Roll Racing, and Blackthorne. The collection provides these classic games in both their ‘Original Editions’ and newly enhanced ‘Definitive Editions’.

The Original Editions of all three provide the games as they were when first published, but do include a few modern tweaks such as custom key mapping and the ability to rewind up to ten seconds. The Lost Vikings and Blackthorne also have a ‘Watch Mode’ that allows you to watch the game being played and then take control at any point. You can also save progress anywhere in these original editions.

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The changes added for the Definitive Editions vary for each game. The Lost Vikings was originally released on various different consoles, each with differences, and so the Definitive Edition collates all these versions together to produce the best version of the game. This means extra stages, cutscenes, and support for three local co-op players.

For Blackthorne, an additional area has been added that was previously only available in the 32-bit version of the game, as well as a fog of war map that uncovers as players explore the levels.

Rock N Roll Racing’s definitive edition adds environmental effects such as snow and rain, and has support for up to four players instead of just two in local multiplayer. The racetrack count is increased to 384 variations, and the whole game can be played in 16:9 resolution. There’s also new songs on the soundtrack and voiceover clips for race commentator Loudmouth Larry.

Playing all three games in Definitive mode also unlocks new localisation translations in Italian, Korean, Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Russian, and simplified and traditional Chinese. These languages come in addition to the French, German, Japanese, and European Spanish that was part of the original release.

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The Blizzard Arcade collection is available for $19.99 on PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch online stores, or as part of the larger Blizzard 30-Year Celebration Collection bundle. On PC via Battle.net, it comes as part of the The Celebration Collection, and is not available separately. PC players who already own The Celebration Collection will find these games are automatically added.

If you’re unfamiliar with Blizzard’s pre-Warcraft history, both The Lost Vikings and Rock N Roll Racing were released back when Blizzard was known as Silicon & Synapse. The Lost Vikings is a puzzle platformer in which you control three Vikings with different abilities each, while Rock N Roll Racing is a combat demolition derby-like racing game. Blackthorne was the second game released by the newly renamed Blizzard Entertainment, and is a 2D platformer in which players control Kyle “Blackthorne” Vlaros and his increasingly powerful shotgun.

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Matt Purslow is IGN’s UK News and Entertainment Writer.