There are so many things about World of Warcraft: The War Within expansion that are worthy of praise, particularly for players like myself who enjoy playing the game mostly solo. Of course, any MMORPG is meant to be played multiplayer, but several negative situations over the years have left me preferring to do my own thing wherever possible. The War Within feels as though it is specifically catering to me in this respect, with numerous ways to explore the content of the expansion without social anxiety.

I am one of those people who have played World of Warcraft since its beginning 20 years ago. Over that time, I have been in different guilds, ed pick-up groups, convinced friends and family to play with me for a while, and generally just attempted to find ways to see all that the game had to offer in its multiplayer forms. Several years ago, after being harassed particularly cruelly, I gave up on group play and turned my WoW experience into a solo game. Despite feeling as though I am missing out on some key content, I have found a renewed enjoyment this way, and The War Within has made that infinitely better.

WoW: The War Within Is Perfect For Solo Players, Like Me

Delves, Follower Dungeons, And More

The new mechanics that developers put into The War Within give solo players a new opportunity to be able to enjoy the game more fully without having to either feel that they are missing out or find groups to up with to run dungeons and other content. Delves are my particular favorite, with being able to experience shorter dungeons alongside the sometimes-helpful Brann Bronzebeard, the current NPC companion in running delves.

Although these follower NPCs are not always the greatest at doing what I would like them to do, it allows solo players a chance to see the content that they otherwise may have missed out on.

Follower Dungeons, which were added a little while ago, have also been a huge boost to my gameplay, letting players who wish to be alone still experience normal-difficulty dungeons with four NPCs to take the places that other players would otherwise have filled. Although these follower NPCs are not always the greatest at doing what I would like them to do, it allows solo players a chance to see the content that they otherwise may have missed out on.

These are just a couple of examples of some of the new features that WoW offers to help make the game more enjoyable for all players, regardless of how they wish to play. These new mechanics, along with the fantastic Earthen race, are things that have truly made The War Within my favorite expansion to ever come out. There is just one problem with it, which is a major hinderance to my gameplay, which could have been absolutely avoided if the developers had made a different choice.

Flying In The War Within Is Giving Me Motion Sickness

Skyriding Should Not Be The Default From An Accessibility Standpoint

As great as I think that The War Within is about offering me so many things I love, to be honest, I am not playing it nearly as much as I would like to. The reason being, that it literally makes me sick any time I attempt to fly.

In the past, the ability to fly in a new WoW expansion has been locked behind the Pathfinder achievements, thereby limiting players to traversing the new zones on the ground and getting to see more of the beautiful areas that they could have missed out on by flying over them. In The War Within, players are able to access dynamic flight (previously known as dragonriding) from the beginning. Unfortunately, the dragonriding style of flying is exactly why I barely played any of Dragonflight beyond what I had to do to beat the campaign and reach max level, because that style of dynamic flight never fails to give me motion sickness almost immediately.

There are a few accessibility options that players can try messing with from the options menu, including adding a focus circle when flying and darkening the surrounding areas, as shown in my above screenshot. I spent several hours researching different settings changes to make and even placed a large, bright light behind my computer monitor. Although the changes helped, they didn't solve the problem. In Dragonflight, I ultimately resorted to taking Dramamine just to get through the campaign.

Dynamic flight (or skyriding, dragonriding, etc.) is available in all zones in WoW now, but players can toggle between skyriding and steady flight in most areas.

I have experienced motion sickness in some other video games as well, Borderlands titles being a big one, but never in the past 20 years had I felt any twinge of sickness in World of Warcraft before dynamic flight was introduced. The classic, steady flight from the flying mounts before Dragonflight has never given me any problems. I know that I am not alone in this problem, which makes me very curious why developers at Blizzard chose to lock steady flight behind a series of achievements, when dynamic flight was available immediately.

Unlocking Steady Flight Requires Completing The Pathfinder Achievement

Easier Than Other Expansions, But Still A Tedious Task When You Get Sick

To be fair, unlocking the Pathfinder achievement in The War Within is considerably easier than it has been in the past. Technically speaking, players can easily get this achievement before even reaching level 80, if players were to skip all side quests.

• Complete the level-up campaign zone quests in The Isle of Dorn, The Ringing Deeps, Hallowfall, and Azj-Kahet.
• Fully explore to reveal the maps of each of these four zones, earning the Explorer achievement for each.

Completing the level-up campaign zone quests for each of the four zones will be completing the story campaign of The War Within. For someone like myself, who gets easily distracted and wants to do every side quest everywhere they go, this means that it is all too easy for me to end up not unlocking steady flight for quite some time if I don't try to make myself focus on the campaign first.

I Love The War Within, I Just Wish Dynamic Flight/Skyriding Was Not Mandatory

Otherwise, This Expansion Has Everything I Love

As I said at the beginning, I absolutely adore The War Within and so many of its features feel specifically designed for me and my style of play. It is also a beautiful expansion, with an interesting story and truly enjoyable gameplay. Motion sickness is certainly limiting how much I am playing, but it won't stop me. I am simply spending a lot more time running along the ground whenever possible and avoiding using my flying mounts until either I unlock steady flight, or developers can somehow make it less sickening for me to fly in World of Warcraft.