WoW’s revisiting old zones for Midnight and The Last Titan because not every story ‘has to be told within the context of a new continent’

World of Warcraft: Midnight‘s doing some interesting stuff—reimagining zones from The Burning Crusade which (sorry) came out in 2007 (so sorry) which was almost 20 whole years ago (I really am sorry). That’s only a couple years shy of being able to drink in the US.

But that’s not where Blizzard’s stopping. It’s tackling Northrend for the expansion afterwards, The Last Titan—and one of the questlines in Midnight will be called Arator’s Journey, taking you through a gauntlet of old world zones.

It’s a large change in tactic, given most every World of Warcraft expansion up until this point has featured a hefty emphasis on the new. The actual world of Azeroth has expanded with both new land masses and new dimensions. There are two Draenors—two! Okay, technically it’s the same one with some alternate universe shenanigans, but you get my point.

In an interview with associate game director Paul Kubit, game designer Jake Shillan and senior game designer Kim Flak, I was able to talk directly to the developers of World of Warcraft on why it’s starting to really use the whole tauren, not just leaving old zones to collect dust.

“It would be a shame for us to say that every story has to be told entirely within the context of a new continent or island or liminal space, wherever we’re going,” Kubit says.

“We’ve got this whole huge world with decades of world building inside of it, and to have places like Light’s Hope Chapel that we can’t go back to, or Wyrmrest Temple, or Orgrimmar or Stormwind—all these places that have such strong memories for us. We should be able to use them, and we want to.”

There’s a bit of an issue in going back to old world zones with their crunchy 2007 textures (hence why Silvermoon’s got a massive makeover) but it’s less of an issue than anticipated, Kubit tells me: “They were built with different art parameters and possibilities at that time. But when you’re telling the full story, none of that really matters for most players.”

Both Flak and Shillan have been working on the expansion’s zones—both in catching up with the blood elves and, as Shillan tells me, finally expanding on the Amani tribe:

“There are so many different types of troll out there in the greater mass that is World of Warcraft. But the Amani trolls have really only had, like two things, and that is Zul’Aman, a raid that we’ve had since Burning Crusade and Zul’jin … He gets a role in Burning Crusade. But it’s a villain, right? It’s the boss at the end of the raid that you beat. You get your purple pants from him and like, that’s it.”

Shillan is real excited to expand upon old lore: “We got to flesh out Zul’in and the Amani out of this little ball of dough—I don’t know why it’s the metaphor I’m choosing, but stick with me—this little ball of dough, and now it’s a whole pizza, okay? Toppings, sauce, cheese. There is no pizza in Zul’Aman. I’m gonna spoil that for you right now.” Damnit. There go my hopes and dreams.

“We sort of have to play mad libs, right? What happened in the interim between that moment [many] years ago and now, and how can we use that to launchpad into whatever comes next?”

As someone who is writing this very article right now because I was playing World of Warcraft when I was 12, and am now 30 (sorry again), I ask both designers if they were WoW fans when they were growing up, and what it’s like to revisit old parts of the world they were running around in back in 2006.

“We’re all old here,” Flak jokes, “I too grew up playing World of Warcraft, I spent way too many hours on blood elves in—what was it, 2006? We’re not doing math here.”

Flak reassures me that it’s not just a bunch of new blood coming in and mucking with old lore, though. “Obviously it’s been a collaborative effort, No one here is making single decisions. It’s so many great creative minds coming together, figuring out ‘what can we do with these lego pieces’.”

Pieces like Astalor Bloodsworn, who’ll be the face of the new Prey system in Midnight: “It’s like meeting a friend you haven’t seen in 20 years … But at the same time it’s like having to learn about a person from scratch, and an entire zone [like Silvermoon] is just that times 10. I think players are gonna really enjoy the stuff we’ve been cooking up.”