T w e n t y S i d e d

While trying to get World of Warcraft to install and run on my laptop once again (see previous entry), I started seeing a lot of commentary about something called Turtle WoW. Blizzard has created “Hardcore” mode for World of Warcraft Classic, Season of Discovery for World of Warcraft Classic, Twentieth Anniversary Edition for World of Warcraft Classic, and the upcoming Classic+ for World of Warcraft Classic, in addition to soon launching *the latest* expansion, Midnight; which finally adds “player housing,” a feature planned for the original release in 2004. Given all that, I assumed Turtle WoW was a new feature for World of Warcraft Classic. Turns out I was *sort of* right.

Turtle WoW is a private server, but not quite the same as the hundreds of others. I have actually been on two “public” private servers, one of which is still technically operating (I’ve heard it’s virtually abandoned); the other received the dreaded “Cease & Desist” letter from Blizzard and shut down. I also ran a family server off and on for about a decade. Blizzard doesn’t like private servers, especially if they are publicly available. Even moreso if they “get popular.” Although Blizzard’s delineation of “popular” seems random. The company started warring against private servers sometime after the Cataclysm expansion, but mainly after the Mists of Pandaria expansion. And to be entirely honest, Blizzard seems to respond more to “publicity” then actual, measurable “harm.” Considering even the most successful private servers host only a fraction of World of Warcraft‘s user base, this comes off as a specious argument. Another claim Blizzard has made is “any failure of or dissatisfaction with a private server reflects on Blizzard’s quality,” which is obviously silly (as are the claims that players will be confused about whether a private server is *actually* run by Blizzard). Yes, I know I started out above saying I thought Turtle WoW might be a new mode for World of Warcraft Classic, but keep in mind that was before I even looked it up. Just searching for “Turtle WoW” made it clear this was a private server, and every publicly available private server I’ve ever encountered made it clear THEY WEREN’T BLIZZARD.

The most comprehensive, and simplest; argument I’ve seen made about the private server lawsuits is the “brand protection” angle. That is, if Blizzard DOES NOT aggressively protect the World of Warcraft brand in EVERY FACET, then legally some judge or jury at some point may decide, essentially: “if Blizzard never cared about this, then they must not consider it a problem.” Which could result, in this specific example, of a private server running that was more popular than Blizzard’s own servers, and taking customers away from them. Note this is primarily but not *uniquely* a western civ argument, and is most-practiced in the United States. Even then, the lawsuits tend to coincide with bad press. The gaming media or public isn’t thrilled with Blizzard’s newest offering or announcement, some people talk about a private server that’s doing things better…that server gets a wall of lawyers thrown at it. And that seems to be the case with Blizzard’s recently announced collection of lawsuits against Turtle WoW, which includes for the the first time *racketeering* allegations. Blizzard is accusing the admins and designers of Turtle WoW of *running a criminal conspiracy.* Blizzard hasn’t brought this allegation against any other server since they started the lawsuits years ago. I suspect they might be influenced by recent attempts by the current political administration to claim almost any group that opposes them are guilty of “racketeering,” but that’s only a thought. And I’m sure appropriate lawyers would easily point out the dozen ways that can’t possibly be true (not that lawyers have a particularly impressive track record of predicting how the law is going to work lately.)

The topics I have mentioned coincide because a couple of days before I heard about the lawsuits against Turtle WoW, I had created a Turtle WoW account and started playing.

Turtle WoW is a Vanilla (original release, patched to just before the first expansion, The Burning Crusade; was released) without including any elements that point to that story is my understanding, but I could be wrong. That’s not unusual; arguably the most popular private servers have always been Vanilla, also known as “1.12.1” In fact, World of Warcraft Classic was started as an “official” Vanilla release. Although Blizzard claims otherwise, it is widely viewed that the Classic version of World of Warcraft was created mainly to combat the popularity of private servers. The main argument *for* private servers at the time was that they allowed the playing of a version of the game Blizzard didn’t publish any longer. Which was, with only certain caveats, almost entirely true. The 1.12.1 release of World of Warcraft literally did not exist anymore. In fact, Blizzard claimed until they started producing Classic that it “could not be recreated,” despite private servers being available that even Blizzard claimed were just copies of their own software.

The more interesting part is that Turtle WoW is a Season of Discovery-style server. That will take some explaining. World of Warcraft Classic was originally rolled out as a Vanilla server, but Blizzard actually progressed (recreated, really) through the various story updates; and even recreated the big events that capped off expansions, or opened new ones. For instance, they recreated the famous (and infamous) unlocking of Ahn’Qiraj at the end of Vanilla. I’ve never played Classic, to be honest; I just hear from other people what’s going on. I know they released a Burning Crusade update, then Wrath of the Lich King. HOWEVER, because I’ve never tried it I don’t know if Blizzard is just recreating the changes from one expansion to another on the Classic servers, or if each expansion is it’s own “game.” Would love to know, if anyone has tried it.

Season of Discovery is a recent version of WoW Classic. Everything I have read about it indicates this is a Vanilla game base. However, certain improvements and additions were made to skills, classes, and quest design. Most of these changes are improvements that were added to the live game over the years and proved to be popular. Additionally new content was added, like new dungeons and raids that didn’t exist in the original release. The 20th Anniversary Edition of World of Warcraft Classic seems to be a codified release of this version of WoW. The upcoming Classic+, if I’m interpreting things correctly, will make the Season of Discovery gameplay mode a permanent Classic version. In fact, it looks as if Blizzard are expecting Classic+ to essentially replace Classic when it releases.

Turtle WoW is basically doing that already. The various classes have been improved, including changes made later in the life of World of Warcraft regarding availability. Many of the changes in the game, such is new zones and additional quests, were planned for the original release but cut or frozen when Blizzard ran out of time. There are even two new races: the Goblins for the Horde and the High Elves for the Alliance. The High Elves were eventually added to the game as the “Blood Elves” with a backstory to bridge their last appearance in the Warcraft games with their new Horde alliance in the MMORPG. The Goblins, of course, are present on the Horde side of the Vanilla game, but only as NPC’s. Most of the “additional” quests are related to the new races and new zones, of course. I have run across at least one quest in the Forsaken starting area I don’t ever remember doing before. Doesn’t mean I never have, I just don’t remember it.

Blizzard’s irritation with Turtle WoW could be because of this, but is more likely due to the explosion in population reported over the past several months. In just the last year the daily population has increased from around 6,500 to reportedly 44,000 two months ago. There are claims of a registered user count now over 500,000. Considering Turtle WoW has been around for something like 8 years, and Blizzard only started caring the last month or two (assuming, because it takes time to prepare lawsuits properly), I would guess this is the thing scaring them a bit. The racketeering allegations may stem from Turtle WoW‘s opening of new servers in Southeast Asia. Three of their four domains are run from China, allegedly.

Honestly, the only reason I installed the game is because I can’t get the current version of World of Warcraft to install or run. I simply wondered if Turtle WoW worked on Linux, and quickly found you can download and install the game through Lutris. So I did. It won’t allow me to do all the things I wanted to do in World of Warcraft (most of which is contingent on the live version continuing to work like it has where I can out-level old dungeon and raid content easily), but at least Turtle WoW offers a lot of new stuff without screwing anything up. By which I mean, the two publicly available private servers I played offered different accelerated leveling experiences to get you into the end-game quickly. That, of course, wasn’t what I was interested in, and I found out those modifications tended to screw up the leveling experience if you, like me; are a completionist. Because you leveled so quickly, you stopped earning experience pretty fast in every given zone. That means most of a zone didn’t give you any appropriate rewards…you had to move on to something matching your level. If you want the end-game experience, that’s fine. But it’s not why I was playing. Turtle WoW is more focused on playing the game as it was published. You are encouraged to pay attention to quest text and immerse yourself in the game. This experience is actually quite enjoyable.

This isn’t just the default Vanilla experience at its core, though. I’ve done that on my own server. One big thing you notice if you haven’t played Vanilla, or if you haven’t played it in a while, is that the world feels larger and slower. I’ve always put this down to the player’s avatar size and running/walking speed being slower in the original game. Turtle WoW does seem to scale that up, much like later versions of World of Warcraft…but not so much everything seems to be only a short distance away. Tirisfal Glade feels bigger than it did even by Cataclysm, but not nearly as big it did playing Vanilla.

Turtle WoW makes it clear from the beginning they intend to present a different version of World of Warcraft, not just an adaptation. Of course, that won’t beat the lawsuits…the official name of the game you’re playing is World of Warcraft: Mysteries of Azeroth, after all. But some private servers have survived Blizzard’s attacks…they’re still online and still operating just as they were before the lawsuits. I know some of it is foreign involvement, and that may be what Turtle WoW is counting on. Blizzard mainly has had success with its legal battles in the U.S.; less in Europe and Britain. But more than in China, for example. I hate doing the “only time will tell” thing, but that’s kind of where we are. Blizzard only filed their lawsuits like, a week ago.

But for now, Turtle WoW is the best Vanilla experience I’ve ever had. They have created something that feels like the original game, with improvements that make it more fun without just ushering you to the end game as fast as possible. I’m currently leveling a new version of Cinderlynn, the Forsaken Destro Warlock on Ambermill. And I need a haircut (I was just trying things out at first, you understand. I didn’t pay attention to my hair choice.)

Paige Francis He/him