It is through a very sober press release that Blizzard Entertainment revealed the meeting time for the announcement of the ninth expansion of World of Warcraft. The Shadowlands sequel will be revealed on Tuesday, April 19 at 6:00 p.m. EST on YouTube and Twitch . Just a week before the big day, Blizzard is officially giving us an appointment!
Patch 10.0: A late ninth expansion?
Usually, it is BlizzCon during the month of November that tends to be the meeting place for fans of the Warcraft license. It is indeed at Blizzard's annual conference that players are used to discovering the news concerning the most famous MMORPG to date. However, for two years already the Covid-19 has prevented the holding of this ceremony and even pushed Blizzard to completely reorganize it by completely canceling it until further notice.
With the end of the arc dedicated to the Shadowlands and the deployment of Patch 9.2: Eternity's End, many players are still eagerly awaiting the continuation of their epic in Azeroth (and beyond). While some more or less credible theories seem to point to an extension with an extremely vague theme of "dragons", a supposed "leak" recently revealed new elements going in this direction and raising the tension a notch higher. However, to date, nothing really makes it possible to affirm or invalidate this one, nor even to have a semblance of idea on the theme of the next extension.
But one thing is certain: we will not have access to it right away. At the same time, Blizzard unveiled a final minor patch for the Shadowlands expansion: Patch 9.2.5. New season, "new" raids, new affixes... So much content that seems to indicate without official confirmation that the PrePatch of the next expansion is still quite a long way off. We reasonably estimate its deployment at the end of 2022 in the best case (or the worst depending on the point of view), if not at the beginning of 2023. And you?
A double announcement planned for WoW?
But while the next modern expansion is a hot topic that most World of Warcraft players have been waiting for, another party is also about to complete the expansion they've been browsing for several months already: Burning Crusade Classic players. With the recent deployment of Zul'Aman and Phase 4, we estimate without too much fear a deployment of Phase 5 at the end of June or even during July 2022.
Lost Ark continues to evolve and expand in the West, despite a slightly bumpy start. The players are there and expect regular developments. The next change to come, however, may not please everyone...
