World of Warcraft has become a game for casuals. But is that really true? Cortyn from MeinMMO thinks: No, that’s just a term that wannabe pros like to shout.
In the past 10-15 years, there have been several points that many players of World of Warcraft have pointed out. The most persistent of these is that WoW has increasingly become “casualized” over the years.
Before we delve deeper into this statement, we might want to clarify what exactly a “casual” is. Apparently, there is no clear definition of this, which is why it should probably be up for discussion.
What is a Casual? My personal definition of a “casual” would be: A player who only occasionally has time for gaming (“Casual Gamer” = occasional player). This could be once a month or a few times a week for a few hours. A “casual” clearly differs from a “core gamer,” who typically plays a game more intensively and often even daily for several hours.
Short Dungeons as an Example of Casualization
A frequently cited example of supposed casualization is the length of dungeons. “Back in the day,” they always say, “Blizzard used to make long dungeons for us core gamers.”
And while it is true that many of the classic dungeons were relatively long (just think of the Blackrock Depths), it wasn’t Blizzard’s intention to design it that way for hardcore players. The long dungeons were created under the assumption that players would only enter a dungeon once. The idea of dungeons being revisited over and over again was simply not part of the original planning.
Even during the vanilla period, they moved away from this and incorporated shorter dungeons, such as the individual wings of Scholomance or the Scarlet Monastery.
Another misconception here is that a short dungeon is more aimed at casuals than core gamers.
Sure: A casual who only has an hour in the evening can only complete one dungeon. But a core gamer who has several hours can complete multiple dungeons (or the same dungeon multiple times) and thus farm specifically for their optimal gear. Shorter and repeatable dungeons benefit not only a casual but also a core gamer.
The necessary time for a single piece of content cannot be the decisive factor in whether a game content is “casual” or not. Otherwise, one would have to explain that a 5-minute arena match with a rating of 2400+ is definitely something for casuals, because it ends so quickly.
Another good example against casualization was mentioned by OnkelBarlow on YouTube some time ago in one of his videos. Nowadays, almost every single group of enemies in a dungeon has multiple abilities, of which almost always one or two need to be interrupted, as long as the dungeon still has relevant difficulty. Barlow paraphrased it this way: “Probably every mob group in current dungeons has more mechanics than all the bosses from Molten Core combined.”
It is clear that World of Warcraft has broadened in recent years in terms of game modes and content. In addition to dungeons, raids, and battlegrounds, new content has been added, such as arena battles, further professions like archaeology, pet battles for pet collectors, island expeditions, war fronts, scenarios, and so on.
Easy Entry – Is that Casual?
The entry barriers for most content in WoW are quite low. Anyone can start a pet battle, and anyone can manage to sign up for an LFR raid with 2-3 clicks. And if that were all that WoW has to offer, one might speak of a casualization. But that is not the case.
Raids go up to mythic difficulty. The fights there are more complex than ever before. Multiple mechanics stack up, can overlap in certain intervals, and often require the attention of the entire group. A single mistake can lead to the death of the whole group.
Even dungeons have a (even endless) scaling difficulty. “Mythic+” dungeons at level 15 and above, which offer the best rewards, are surely far beyond what a “casual” can achieve with a group of other “casuals”.
This is not comparable to raids, as it was back in the
