World Of Warcraft, you don’t have to be a gamer to understand the impact that those three words have had on not just gaming but also pop culture. If I could hazard a guess I would say the vast majority of gamers old and new have stepped into the world of Azeroth at least once in their life, some have probably left after a short stay whereas the majority who enter tend to stick around for quite a while, that is if World Of Warcrafts subscription figures throughout the years have anything to say about it.

World Of Warcraft took the world by storm when it was released back in 2004 and pretty much stomped its main competitor Everquest into the ground in the process, so much so that when you mention MMORPGs to almost anybody I can almost guarantee the first game that comes into their mind would be WOW. The world of Azeroth as well as the mechanics of WOW have undergone many, many changes since the games first release, all eight previous expansions to the base game have brought the series to new highs and in some cases new lows. So much has the gamer changed that if you have only ever played vanilla WOW and logged into the game as it is today you would be hard pressed to recognise it, the pace of the game was once plodding, methodical and very grindy whereas todays version of the game almost runs at hyper speed by comparison. The last expansion Shadowlands was not received very well by most WOW players, myself included, as it felt like too much of a departure from what we have come to expect. Blizzard listened to community feedback and promised that their next expansion Dragonflight would bring the series back to its roots, we take a look at the latest WOW expansion to ascertain whether it glides gracefully through the skies like a dragon or crashes into the ground in a crumpled mess.

Each WOW expansion introduces a new storyline to the world of Azeroth and Dragonflight is no different in this regard, the Dragon Isles are the main setting for the ninth expansion and bring five new zones into the game, the Waking Shores, Ohn’ahran Plains, Azure Span and Thaldraszus, the city Valdrakken serves as a neutral player hub in the game. The story centres around the new playable race of dragon warriors called the Dracthyr awakening from a 20,000 year slumber, they discover that their master Neltharion induced this slumber due to his fear of the power they could possess if they did not remain under his control, after awakening the Dracthyr discover that a group of enemy proto-dragons wish to end the reign of the Aspects and in the ensuing battles release their leader Raszageth the Storm-Eater which leads to the Dracthy aligning with both the Alliance and Horde in order to fight back against this ancient enemy. The Alliance and Horde must work together to empower 5 Oathstones through the various zones in the Dragon Isles to try and put the threat of Raszageth to rest.

“Borrowed power” is a term that is thrown about a lot when it comes to WOW and has been a major problem especially with the last few expansions, in simple terms borrowed power is abilities that you spend a whole expansion obtaining that then become useless once the next WOW expansion is released, which can make you feel quite deflated when you realise how many hours you have spent obtaining powers that are now useless. One of the biggest examples of this is how WOW forces you to learn how to ride flying mounts again for nearly most of the expansions they have released, not this time though as one of the major features of Dragonflight is that you will be able to obtain your own dragon mount and the ability to fly from the start of the new expansion. As you make your way through the story and the Dragon Isles different zones you will be able to collect Dragon Glyphs (there are 48 in total) in order to upgrade your dragons skills to your liking as the new dragon riding skill comes with its own talent tree, not only that but you can also customise the look of your dragon by collecting various different customisations options through quest rewards.

Dragon riding is hard to get used to at first but as you collect more glyphs and upgrade your dragon you will be gliding and zipping around the skies like a pro, and it feels absolutely fantastic when you get the hang of it, there are even several dragon races in the game where you can earn rewards for your performance. All of the dragon glyphs you earn apply to your whole account, so once you have collected them on one character there is no need to go back and do this on any of your alt characters which makes the game way less grind heavy compared to previous expansions.

Talent trees have been given a major overhaul in Dragonflight and now resemble the more traditional talent trees that were featured in The Burning Crusade and Wrath Of The Lich King eras of WOW, this is a fantastic change in my opinion as the simplified talent trees that featured in the later expansions of WOW killed build diversity as most times there were only one or two meta builds for each class which had the drawback that nearly everyone was running the same builds as each other as their weren’t many reasons or options to explore other builds. Professions are another area of the game that has been given a massive overhaul, there has been much needed depth given to all of the professions and you can branch out and specialise in different areas of each profession to become proficient in different areas. To explain it more simply professions now have a talent tree of their own so you can customise your skills as you see fit, this is fantastic as it adds a great amount of diversity to what has always been one of the most time consuming, boring and grindy parts of the game.

Another big quality of life change for crafters is that they will no longer need to spend hours typing in chat trying to sell their wares or wait anxiously to see if their items on the auction house sell, there is a new work order system that allows you to sort through listings made by players that allow them to specify items they want made and the price they are prepared to pay for them, pick one of these orders up, make the item, send it off and you receive your money, this is an amazing quality of life feature for those players that spend all of their time honing their professions and crafting gear.

Questing is pretty much standard MMORPG fare, fetch quests and kill quests but it’s a formula that has worked since the dawn of this game genre and I honestly don’t see how WOW could improve upon its questing system without a massive overhaul to the game. It has been a long time since I have been compelled to actually read quest text in World Of Warcraft though and I am happy to say that the story of Dragonflight did have me enthralled enough to take an interest in why I was actually killing the monsters I was killing or collecting the items I was tasked to collect. All of the zones in Dragonflight are masterfully created and have an amazing sense of verticality that ties right into your new dragon riding abilities as some areas can only be reached once you have enough points to earn the skills in dragon riding that are required to reach them.

It’s been a long time since I have felt the urge to explore in WOW and the Dragon Isles are absolutely stacked with areas to explore and the rewards for doing so are well worth it. Graphically the new zones are wonderful from the massive city hub of Thaldraszus through to the massive Azure Span and the sweeping plains of Ohn’ahran these are some of the best zones that have been added to the game in years and I had an absolute blast swooping around on my dragon exploring them and discovering new factions, quests and collectibles.

For an expansion Dragonflight offers an incredible amount for the price, 5 new massive zones, 8 dungeons, a new class and race, new factions to grind for rewards that actually mean something thanks to the improved faction system, it truly felt that once I hit the level cap of 70 that this was when the game truly opened up and it was then that I realised what a truly overwhelming amount of things there was to do in the game, it really feels like Blizzard have catered to both hard-core raiding guilds and solo players alike in this expansion as both can find meaningful ways to progress and earn better gears through doing activities they want to do rather than being forced to raid if they don’t want or have the time to.

Dragonflight is the best expansion that Blizzard have put out in years and if this is the quality of upgrades and expansions that we can expect going forward then I can honestly say that WOW is nowhere near close to a dying game as Dragonflight has breathed life back into it. Don’t get it twisted though if you are a player that prefers the slow methodic, grindy and plodding pace of classic WOW then the hyper pace of Dragonflight might not sway you back to retail WOW, I would highly suggest giving it a try though even if it is just for the 8-12 hours you can expect to get out of the main questline as it may just be enough to get you hooked. After the less than stellar Shadowlands, Blizzard really have taken a step in the right direction here and I think I can safely say that most World Of Warcraft fans will be happy with their travels through the Dragon Isles.