Players can return to Azeroth like it was in 2006 when World of Warcraft Classic servers go live Monday. To accommodate players, Blizzard Entertainment added more realms to choose from, but it’s still expecting a long wait time for people who want to jump back into the game they first played more than a decade ago.
WoW Classic went live in the Americas starting at 6 p.m. ET/3 p.m. PT Monday. Players who tried logging in right away likely found themselves waiting. Multiple players shared their queue time in the WoW Classic subreddit, waiting periods ranging from 30 minutes to a few hours. On Twitch, there were more than 1 million viewers watching a multitude of streams for the game.
The game, also known as Vanilla WoW, predates many of the expansions released over the past 15 years since the game was launched. The WoW Classic version of the game is 1.12, known as the “Drums of War” update released in August 2006, prior to the release of the first major expansion The Burning Crusade.
Blizzard expected extended queues Monday and added more realms for players to join when the servers go live, but it wasn’t enough as so many players attempted to log on. The developer also increased the number of character slots to 10 per realm.
Those interested in playing WoW Classic need to purchase a subscription from the Blizzard Shop, which costs $15 a month. This subscription also gives players access to the current version of WoW. All current WoW subscribers will have access to WoW Classic.
The idea for WoW Classic came from players who started their own private servers with older versions of the game. In April 2016, Blizzard began shutting down these unauthorized servers, causing a backlash from the fanbase, but it did spur the developer into looking for a proper solution. Blizzard made the first WoW Classic announcement in November 2017 and in May, gave it the Aug. 26 release date.
Originally published Aug. 26, 12:24 p.m. PT.
Source: cnet