The announcement of World of Warcraft: Forever at Blizzcon 2026 really was a monumental moment for fans, who for years had been calling for some version of Classic+ that would last indefinitely. As someone who has been playing the various flavors of the game for almost twenty years at this point, it could be just what’s needed to really give the franchise its momentum back.
The game is designed to last as well, graduating beyond the more seasonal experiences we have seen to date into a full release that could even outstrip the main game in terms of popularity in the long haul. To do that, Blizzard is going to have to continue bringing out new content for players to jump into, and we now have a great idea of just how they’re planning to do that.
The advantage of the Classic formula, from the developer’s perspective, is that it takes a lot longer to reach the endgame than it does in the Retail version of the game. That gives them more wiggle room to get their plans in order for what comes next, after players reach 60 and exhaust everything that’s available at launch.
Now, principal game designer Kris Zierhut has sat down for an interview with IGN, and their plans for the game moving foward come with a lot of lessons from the past. Chiefly, the team behind the game has settled on releasing updates close to once every four months, or 17 weeks moving forward.
That’s a lot slower than Season of Discovery, but as Zierhut explains, that cadence simply wouldn’t have worked for a game that’s planning to be around for as long as Forever is.
“Season of Discovery, we cut it down to closer to that eight-week or 10-week schedule. It felt way, way, way too fast. So we’ve done a lot of experimentation to see what is the correct rate, and we’re fairly convinced the correct rate is something closer to once every four months or 17 weeks or three times a year, whatever you want to call it. That is a cadence we have in mind for releasing new content,” Zierhut said.
“And our plan for being able to do that is essentially, we say we have this much time, how much can we fit in the time? That’s one of the advantages of telling smaller stories and more localized stories, is we don’t have a giant huge story that needs six months to be told.”
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Though we don’t know exactly what the first major round of updates will relate to, the intended release rate sounds very reasonable. It should strike a good balance between the more casual player who needs time to explore everything without getting overwhelmed, and the serious players who work through everything quickly and need more regular content.
World of Warcraft: Forever is set to debut on November 4, marking a bold new era for the beloved MMO franchise that players have been demanding for years. The beta was exceptional, so let’s hope the full game manages to live up to everyone’s lofty expectations.
World of Warcraft: Forever
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