World of Warcraft’s factions of the Horde and Alliance are a key part of Blizzard’s MMORPG, but it was far from set in stone during development, with the decision to divide the playerbase into two camps coming together “nine months to a year” before WoW shipped in 2004.
That nugget of information comes from former Blizzard veteran Jeff Kaplan in a recent interview with Lex Fridman (via PC Gamer). Kaplan, a devout Everquest player, joined Blizzard during WoW’s development as a quest designer. He said the team would argue about whether to force players into joining the Horde or the Alliance, and that the feature’s biggest proponent was Blizzard co-founder Allen Adham.
“The Horde/Alliance decision was really controversial,” Kaplan said. “Because in Everquest it was mixed…[Rob Pardo] and I came from Everquest, where we felt like this was a horrible decision [Allen Adham] was making. And we argued.”
It’s interesting to see how the foundational elements of WoW, like the Horde and Alliance divide, were developed so close to the game’s release. It really shows how much thought went into creating the game’s lore and dynamics. Excited to see how this continues to evolve!