The World of Warcraft: Legion launch trailer warns you'd better not screw this up

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The end might be coming (but probably won't be).

Ahead of tomorrow's launch of the World of Warcraft expansion Legion, Blizzard has released the launch trailer, entitled “The Fate of Azeroth,” which leaves little doubt as to the severity of the situation on the ground. Things are bleak—there aren't very many outcomes worse than "All worlds will burn"—but you don't have to worry about where the game goes from here: Blizzard told Polygon that there are still plenty of existential ultra-threats left to throw at players in the future.

Lead narrative designer Dave Kosak compared the return of the Burning Legion to the appearance of Arthas Menethil, the Warcraft 3 villain who headed up Team Evil in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. “He’s such an iconic bad guy," Kosak said. "We were like, ‘Are we really gonna do Lich King? Do we want to shoot that bullet? What are we going to do after Lich King?’ We’ve felt that way before."    

"It’s time to fight the Burning Legion," he said. "It’s time. It’s been dangling over our heads for a long time. Let’s just do it and do it right."

For WoW players there's not a lot of time left to get your inventory ducks in a row, but you can learn how best to prepare for the coming of Legion here, or you can just have a look at our breakdown of the five biggest changes it's bringing with it, right here.

Andy Chalk
Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.