World of Warcraft is closing in slowly but surely on the release date of its eighth major expansion. The Shadowlands expansion release window was confirmed to come to PC sometime this fall.
While the wait for Shadowlands continues, Blizzard is still releasing material surrounding World of Warcraft. In fact, a recent novel set in the World of Warcraft universe, titled Shadows Rising, recently made a popular community meme canon.
With Blizzard maintaining the hype surrounding World of Warcraft’s eighth expansion, fans are eager to see what Shadowlands has to offer. A recent developer update for Shadowlands detailed tons of new content and changes coming to World of Warcraft with Shadowlands, including what the collector’s edition will look like for those interested. Players still experiencing Battle for Azeroth’s content are no doubt looking forward to all the fresh content coming with this next expansion.
Though Battle of Azeroth was well-received for World of Warcraft, the content is naturally starting to get a bit stale. However, one character who captured fans' hearts in one of the early cinematic trailers for Battle of Azeroth is certainly not getting stale in the minds of community members. Zekhan, a jungle troll shaman who was originally called ‘Zappy Boi’ by the World of Warcraft community, has had a monumental rise to fame. Now, his community-given nickname was canonically used to refer to him in a recent World of Warcraft novel.
Anyone who has been around the internet for a while knows the power that memes hold nowadays. A recent example of this is through a recent EA announcement, where memes essentially helped make Skate 4 a reality. Blizzard apparently wasn’t initially aware of the community’s infatuation with Zekhan but slowly understood that this ‘Zappy Boi’ had stolen the hearts and minds of many players. Since then, Blizzard has continued to build up Zekhan’s ‘Zappy Boi’ moniker canonically in subtle ways, like in-game voice lines.
The community surrounding Blizzard’s many games is passionate to say the least. However, Blizzard has recently had a spotty relationship with many members of its own community and many other members of the gaming industry. Many fans still haven’t forgotten about the company’s controversial handling of Blitzchung’s ban. This was made abundantly clear following Blizzard voicing support for the BLM movement, which many fans felt rang hollow.
World of Warcraft is available now on PC.
Source: PCGamesN.com