WoW Factor: World of Warcraft’s housing design is exactly what we need

I haven’t weighed in on this tiny little insignificant World of Warcraft housing news since it dropped last November, mostly because I’ve been waiting to hear more concrete details. Now that Blizzard’s started what promises to be an entire year of drip-fed hype for this long-awaited feature, I feel that it’s time to emerge from my radio silence and pronounce my take on this.

I am in favor of housing. There. I said it. My stark boldness and daring on this subject will no doubt inspire a hit Broadway musical.

OK but in all seriousness, that November announcement absolutely made my year. I’ve been adventuring in Azeroth and points beyond for two decades while wishing that I could live in it — and now, finally, I’m going to get that opportunity alongside the currently gigantic homeless population that’s sick and tired of being told that “garrisons are housing!”

Blizzard knows that all eyes are on WoW because of this, and it’s going to milk that attention for all its worth leading up to Midnight. Can you blame it? But I wasn’t expecting to get so much news on this so soon, even if we have yet to see a video or non-concept art screenshots of housing in action.

This initial post on housing primarily focused on the feature’s design document, starting with the identification of three pillars propping up this system. In short, the studio wants for housing to be very customizable, become a new social hub, and generate evergreen growth. I particularly liked this sentence: “Housing isn’t something players should expect to ‘finish,’ but instead continually look forward to the next housing release, be it new content or systems.”

This feels more thoughtful and involved than I had first assumed. Honestly, if we had gotten a single room apartment in the game that would allow us to slap furniture and decoration around, Animal Crossing-style, I would’ve been happy. Maybe not content, but happy. But this tells me that Blizzard is (a) really taking housing seriously and (b) planning for the feature’s long-term development, which is absolutely great to hear.

Astute readers can pull a wealth of info out of this article, including early looks at different housing design sets (“folk” and “rugged” decor concept art were shown), hints that decor will be drawn from in-game culture and expansions, a promise that everyone who wants one will get a house with no difficulty, and news that we won’t have to pay upkeep or worry about losing our houses if subscriptions lapse.

Of course, there were ominous notes that we’ll be seeing some decor items in the cash shop. I’m of a divided mind on this, as I wish a subscription-only game like WoW didn’t have a cash shop period and hate the thought of desirable items being tucked behind a price tag. But I also appreciate the studio being up front about this now instead of trying to slip it in later.

The more I think on it, the more I really love the fact that your whole warband can share a house if desired. That’s a great way to connect two systems and keep housing from spiraling out of control. Already in LOTRO I’ve consolidated to a single large house that all my characters on a server uses, and that’s far more manageable than, say, 16 different places.

A good chunk of the article dealt with how Blizzard is setting housing up in zones. We’re going to have two zones, one Alliance based on the Elwynn Forest/Westfall area and one Horde based on Durotar and Azshara. The concept art for the latter looks flat-out gorgeous, by the way.

The studio got really defensive about why it’s only doing two zones, and I buy only one of its explanations. Yes, zones are a lot of work to make, especially if you’re trying to do them in such a way that they can function as neighborhoods.

But the excuse that we should only have two housing zones because more would dilute social interactions is silly. Does the studio think we’re going to spend all our spare time wandering up and down the streets of these places? Maybe a little, but not that much, especially in the long run. We’re going to port to our houses, do stuff, and then port away to our questing region. It won’t really matter to most people if everyone’s condensed in the same zone or spread out between multiple areas.

All in all, I feel really good about the foundation of WoW housing and absolutely cannot wait to explore these spaces, see how the placement tools work, and have a billion other questions — functionality and integrated crafting in particular — answered. But this is a good start indeed.

War never changes, but World of Warcraft does, with almost two decades of history and a huge footprint in the MMORPG industry. Join Eliot Lefebvre and Justin Olivetti for new installments of WoW Factor as they examine the enormous MMO, how it interacts with the larger world of online gaming, and what’s new in the worlds of Azeroth and Draenor.