Kern will “pick up the torch again” for vanilla World of Warcraft

It’s been a couple of weeks since the meeting between Blizzard and Nostalrius, and although the meeting went well, there was no decision by Blizzard regarding vanilla World of Warcraft servers.

Followers of the vanilla World of Warcraft petition and argument will have been pleased with the result of Blizzard agreeing to meet to discuss the possibility, but at the same time if Blizzard had ignored it and not engaged with the movement it would have been a PR disaster for them.

So was it just a PR exercise? That’s something we don’t know right now but it’s a concern for those who want to see real action, including ex-World of Warcraft developer Mark Kern who has helped champion the idea of vanilla servers. Mark has shared some more thoughts on the meeting today

“I think Blizzard did a great job turning around the PR disaster and making it a positive by embracing Nostalrius. But PR is not enough. We still need a real answer. After their work with Legion settles, I intend to pick up the torch again.

“I think we have some ideas on how to reconstruct the data that was lost. And we need to show the vanilla movement is not going away.

“I’m going to do what I can to push for the definite answer from Blizzard and see if we can keep Legacy alive as a movement.”

This is reassuring to hear because this could easily be forgotten about as weeks turn into months. It would be cynical to think that the meetings were simply a PR exercise in damage limitation, but Blizzard are extremely good at PR and they will attempt to quash unease in their communities by any means possible.

Directly related to this story

• Nostalrius report on vanilla World of Warcraft following Blizzard meeting
• Vanilla server meeting with Blizzard goes well
• Update Interview with Mark Kern
• Nostalrius no longer releasing the source code.
• The petition has surpassed the 200K goal.
• PC Invasion Interview – Ex-World of Warcraft dev Mark Kern explains why Blizzard should open vanilla servers
• Blizzard post official statement on World of Warcraft vanilla servers
• World of Warcraft vanilla server petition open letter released
• Kern responds to Blizzard on World of Warcraft vanilla servers: “Brack’s just … wrong”
• Blizzard to meet with Mark Kern and Nostalrius.