#shadowlands felt...empty (emotionally)

[norcumii]

Some days, like today, I desperately miss playing Warcraft.

Not WoW-as-it-is, with the mutable UI and all sorts of dragon-riding nonsense I won’t pretend I understand from my occasional skims of Wowhead. Not WoW-Classic-as-it-is, which pretends to be just like the original experience (except when it isn’t). Not even WoW-as-it-was from Shadowlands, with the absurd daily laundry list of required quests and nonsense that wasn’t even really satisfying to achieve, let alone in terms of story (oh, Legion, it didn’t get better than that).

I desperately miss WoW-as-I-remember-playing it, which – let’s be honest – doesn’t even exist outside of my mind. I miss the emotional impact of those so-late-at-night-it’s-definitely-morning runs farming thorium in Un’Goro, chatting with the Ozzie and Kiwi contingent – that ache of human connection mixing with the gentle numbing of mindless, repetitive, productive nonsense. (Likely ADD whomst?)

I miss leveling yet another alt because my main needs more esoteric things, and my primary crafting alt couldn’t produce enough of rare mat of the week, so it was time to get an alchemist up to [Pick Expansion Here]. I miss the utter joy of fucking with new players, the people in chat who seem genuinely clueless and then thrilled to have a helping hand – and then giving them a little trade of items (all those huge bags my tailors could make!) and slipping in a hundred gold or so because they haven’t learned how to read the trade windows yet.

I desperately miss my character logging on to be welcomed by a gleeful “Madame Mel!!” from my guildmaster, genuinely one of the kindest, most patient human beings I have never met. I miss the idle tells of nonsense through the hours, the invitations to dungeons and eventually raids – that at first I turned down cold because the possibility of responsibility was terrifying. Then – because seriously, one of the kindest, most patient human beings EVER – cautious accepts into a quick dungeon where everyone was kind and seemed to think my semi-competent flailing and WHUT DO attitude was endearing because I could follow directions and hit the appropriate things.

Gods, I miss Wrath, and finding Arthas’ fingerprints everywhere you turned; the delight of someone who never played anything else Warcraft uncovering all the lore and history and messy, messy interpersonal nonsense. Legion’s intertwined plots between classes and the gorgeously themed halls that was enough to make it easy to swap from my beloved DK main to my new main a Demon Hunter tank (a tank!!!??!) that fit my playstyle perfectly and then to literally everything else, because I had to see ALL the storylines.

I miss emotions, moments, people.

I’m not playing at 4 am anymore, a metaphorical sloppy drunk deep in sleep dep. I’ve forgotten more lore than I thought I could learn, and I’ve developed nonsense head canons that I’m sure contradict actual modern content. Both I and most of the people I know have moved on to other things, other games, even other activities that don’t aggravate wrist flareups nearly as much.

But sometimes, I close my eyes, and once again I see a nelf in plate galumphing along on the fastest nightsaber I could eventually buy, and I feel so thoroughly homesick.