WoW’s Iconic Gate of Wrath Movie Looks Like It Was Made With Tape And Glue – Creo Gaming

World of Warcraft players will soon be able to relive the first movie of the MMORPG with the release of Wrath of the Lich King Classic, but knowing what went into creating the iconic Wrathgate scene can make it even more epic. Looking back.

Wrathgate was a great moment in WoW history as the combined forces of the Horde and Alliance go head to head with the Lich King’s forces to confront Artha, but all three factions will be destroyed by a deadly chemical weapon released by the Renegades is unleashed. This was the players’ first personal encounter with the Lich King, and the events of Wrathgate led to the death of Varok Saurfang’s son and the deformed Bolvar Fordragon, who replaced Arthas at the end of the expansion.

The MMO’s first in-game movie may also have been shot and taped, as WoW’s chief cinematic story designer, Terran Gregory, provided a new behind-the-scenes video regardless of the importance of the scene. Blizzard is known for its stunning pre-rendered cutscenes, but when it came to using the actual WoW game engine to create a cinematic moment, in 2011 there were few real tools to achieve that.

This meant that Blizzard had to get creative. They turned a camera module designed for sports commentary into an in-game cinematic camera tool. Employees, including Gregor himself, were hired to provide voices for various characters, Blizzard employees were forced to act as NPCs because some of the characters created for the films lacked the necessary mobility. Charging the iconic crowd in the Wrathgate scenes was actually handled by a team of 40 Blizzard employees who actually made the charge by syncing the in-game load. According to Grigor, about 90% of the animations featured in the scene were already in the game.

The scene in the Gate of Wrath ends with the Crimson Dragon Flight as their dragons sweep across the battlefield with their flames. Bringing this moment to life required creative use of the game’s (then) new vehicle technology. By creating several pillars of flame-throwing piloted vehicles and then attaching them to dragon character models, Blizzard was able to move them around the scene as they saw fit, making it seem like dragons were actually flying around the Gate of Wrath and spewing flames. They were large vehicles in the shape of fire, with only one dragon as a passenger.

The rest, as they say, is history, a story that players will soon be able to relive when the Wrath of the Lich King Classic arrives on September 26. While Wrath of the Lich King is a very faithful reproduction of the classic game as it was in 2008, Blizzard is making changes to the classic MMO even as it tries to deal with the influx of new players causing server queues. The most populous kingdoms in the game.