World of Warcraft Forever, Blizzard's Classic+ game mode, launched this week to significant success. Senior game designer Josh Greenfield revealed in an interview with Bloomberg that the concept had been considered since before the original Classic release in 2019, but the studio opted for a direct port of Vanilla WoW first.
Development on Forever was sidelined as the Classic team experimented with WoW's older iterations. A key turning point came in 2023 with the release of Season of Discovery, a mode that introduced significant changes to Classic, such as ability gems and transforming dungeons into raids. The positive community reception to Season of Discovery, and subsequent remix events like Mists of Pandaria Remix in 2024 and Legion Remix in 2025, directly influenced Blizzard's decision to proceed with Forever. "That’s really when the conversation started around, ‘Hey, what does a permanent version of this game look like?’" Greenfield told Bloomberg.
The success of Season of Discovery also secured leadership approval for Forever's development. The implementation of new graphics engines and a technical demonstration at Northshire Abbey reportedly impressed internal stakeholders, paving the way for the game's creation.
Early reception to World of Warcraft Forever has been positive. IGN's reviewer, Len Hafer, noted in an early review that the game "made me believe I can go home again – and that home is somewhere I want to spend more time, with new surprises to discover." The game also experienced a remarkably smooth launch, with minimal server issues attributed to Blizzard's substantial hardware allocation, which included approximately 200 terabytes of RAM.