It was recently revealed that March 2, 2026 will be the release date of the next World of Warcraft expansion, Midnight. This is the second expansion of three that are in the World Soul Saga, a storyline that has helped revive World of Warcraft. However, unlike any expansion in previous years, Midnight will fundamentally change how the game is played. By the end of the World Soul Saga, World of Warcraft developers are going to remove the use of third-party addons from the game completely. Midnight marks the first part of that transition, with many of the most useful addons that bring great quality of life features to the game will be replaced by in-game features that function similarly.
Before getting into why the game will be getting worse, let’s discuss the positives.
- Midnight will introduce player housing, a feature that has been requested for many years. Players will be able to collect decorations, upgrade their houses, and reside in neighborhoods with the guildmates and friends.
- Old zones relevant to the new expansion will be graphically updated. Iconic places like Silvermoon City will be brought up to modern WOW graphics standards.
- New open world activities called Hunts will be introduced. This allows players to further immerse themselves in the new zones of Midnight and get relevant rewards.
- The raid cadence is different, which could mix up gameplay and reduce player burnout. Instead of one raid being released every six months, three raids will be released in the span of a month. The number of bosses remains the same as the old cadence, but the atmosphere and difficulty of each raid are completely different.
- Classes and specializations are changing in a big way. Most classes are losing defensive abilities so there will be less buttons for players to worry about pressing.
Everything else will remain largely the same, other than the addons, which will be a net-negative to the game at the beginning. For players who have played WOW for a while, addons are massive part of the game. They allow the customization of the UI, make doing tough content easier, allows players to compare performance, and so much more. While some of that is step too far, addons in general are a massive positive for the game. As the years have gone by, WOW has become an increasingly more complex game and addons reduce that complexity in a big way.
This decision to move away from addons comes on the heels of Microsoft’s acquisition of Blizzard, the developers of WOW. Rumor has it that Microsoft’s ultimate goal is to being WOW onto their Xbox platform. Before that can happen, WOW needs to become less complex and third-party addons must be removed because Xbox wouldn’t be able to facilitate those two aspects of the game. The purge of addons and simultaneously making the game less complex is the first step, but also biggest leap that needs to be done well. Most players are not hopeful that this transition will be done well.
For example, many players are currently playing the Beta for Midnight. In the Beta, big addons like Details (Damage Meter), Plater (Nameplate Customization), and Deadly Boss Mods/Big Wigs (Boss Ability Alerts and Tips) are banned. The in-game features that are replacing these addons are notably worse. Damage meters look clunky and not as much information can be taken from it. Nameplate customization is super janky and complete breaks beyond a certain number of nameplates. Boss alerts are unclear. No one is confident that these features will be made better by the time of the expansion release.
To summarize, there are several exciting new features and content coming in Midnight. However, the addons situation could completely overshadow all of it. Even if everything is fixed by the time the expansion is released, telling millions of players that they must change the tools they use to play the game is not a winning plan. In the long run, removing addons could make the game better. It’s tough to know exactly how these changes will land with players, but most believe that WOW will become a worse game going into Midnight.
