NetEase Announces The War Within Begins in China on August 1st
In a streamed press conference, NetEase announced that retail WoW service in China will be restored on August 1st, starting with The War Within pre-patch and launching the full expansion on August 26th alongside the rest of the world.
A webpage recap is also now available.
Joined by Blizzard President Johanna Faries and Senior Vice President of Story and Franchise Development Chris Metzen in welcoming players back to the World of Warcraft after servers went offline in January of 2023, an animated Li Li Stormstout detailed the restored service and upcoming expansion features, while offering a wide variety of bonuses to returning players.
Wrath of the Lich King Classic
As of today, Classic WoW service has been restored, starting with a special «expedited» version of Wrath of the Lich King Classic, which features special gear vendors and will progress through its phases faster than in other regions previously, before moving onto Cataclysm Classic. Access to the game will be free from June 27th to July 10th, with the in-game shop disabled until July 11th.
The enhanced bundle is said to have the same price as previous, which should be around $40 USD.
At that time, a special Wrath Classic bundle will go on sale for 298 RMB (around $40 USD), unlock all ranks of flying, all flying paths, maxing all Northrend reputations, a full set of item level 213 gear, 22 slot bags, gold, and more. By all indication, this is intended to be an extremely fast version of Wrath Classic, with Ulduar within just a couple weeks.
Retail Bonuses and Compensation
Having missed the majority of Dragonflight, NetEase is offering several bonuses to returning players, including 14 days of free game time, a «greatly increased» leveling experience from 60-70 through Dragonflight, two free mounts, the Aura pet, 500 extra Trader's Tender each month for 12 months, and a new Trading Post NPC featuring 20 missed cosmetics from previous months! The new Trading Post NPC is exclusive to Chinese servers
