WoW graphics engine to be overhauled someday

by Samuel Axon on May 16th 2008 5:30PM

World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Expansions, Interviews, News items

World of Warcraft producer J. Allen Brack and designers Jeff Kaplan and Tom Chilton were interviewed by Eurogamer today. Most of the interview dealt with Wrath of the Lich King content like the Death Knight, 10-person raids, and world PvP objectives. The most interesting bits of the interview were on the last page, though; the Blizzard reps talked about WoW's future.

According to Kaplan, a major graphics engine overhaul is "probably" part of that future. While he himself is not convinced it's necessary (he cited players' lukewarm reception of similar moves by the developers of Ultima Online and EverQuest), he said: "That's actually something we talk about every expansion ... and I'm positive we'll talk about it next expansion."

In the meantime, WotLK will allow "people with high-end machines some additional graphical effects." WoW Insider joked that future graphics engine updates might be dedicated entirely to producing even larger, more detailed shoulder pad armor. We wouldn't be surprised!

[Via WoW Insider]

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Tags: blizzard, effects, engine, eurogamer, expansion, future, graphics, interview, j-allen-brack, jeff-kaplan, overhaul, tom-chilton, update, upgrade, world-of-warcraft, wotlk, wow, wrath-of-the-lich-king

Reader Comments (1)

For those of us who can remember back that far, they were saying that an overhauled graphics engine (complete with optional more detailed human body textures) would be released with TBC. Didn't happen.

There are some glaring areas where the graphics engine could be improved, and I don't know why this hasn't already happened. Surely it can't be too difficult to allow access to improved textures for some cosmically ugly polygons? (human male faces.... *traumatized shudder*)