World of Warcraft Classic gets release date, beta test

Blizzard Entertainment made it official on Tuesday when it revealed World of Warcraft Classic will launch in August.

WoW Classic is a ‘vanilla’ version of the once super popular MMORPG launching on August 27. Players will be able to play the 1.12 version of the game known as the ‘Drums of War’ update. Before the game goes live there will be both beta and stress tests.

As the popular MMORPG saw millions of players leave over the years, WoW fans began creating their own private servers offering the ‘classic’ WoW experience that didn’t include any of the multiple expansions or updates over the course of the game’s lifetime.

In April 2016, Blizzard began closing down classic WoW unauthorized servers to the dismay of fans. The company cited the shutdown was to ‘protect against intellectual property infringement.’

It was November 2017 when Blizzard announced it would release its own version of the ‘vanilla’ experience called WoW Classic.

Along with revealing the WoW Classic release date, Blizzard also listed plans for both a beta and stress test of the game. Players who opt-in for the testing on their account manager page and have an active subscription will be randomly selected for the beta starting on May 15. Then the developer will have three stress tests where players can log in to play the game for a short period of time on the following dates:

• Stress Test 1: Wed May 22–Thurs May 23

• Stress Test 2: Wed Jun 19– Thurs Jun 20

• Stress Test 3: Thurs Jul 18– Fri July 19

Players who want to secure their name for WoW Classic can create their character starting on August 13. Following the release of the game, Blizzard will add in original WoW content in the order of their initial release date.