World of Warcraft: Battle for the Center of the Earth will add a variety of features to the game, but in the announcement of BlizzCon 2023, they overlooked a key question: what about those spooky spiders?
Players actually spend this expansion underground, battling out the old spider demon – it's a whole bunch of multi-legged models that are just writhing their disgusting limbs there!
Fear not, brave adventurers, the best feature in this expansion is yet to come – the arachnophobia mode. Although we don't have a lot of details yet, we do know that the model used for replacement is almost as pleasant as the accompaniment music in our game.
Let's talk about the new Arachnophobia mode, which will be coming in World of Warcraft: In Civil War: how it works and why it's important for the World of Warcraft community.
Arachnophobia mode is actually a toggle button in the game options (you don't even need to reload the screen). Yes, that's it, a separate, unobtrusive toggle button designed to replace the spider model with a crab, although there are still some problems in the system, as some more human-like models escape the fate of transforming into crabs.
According to a screenshot shared by content creator Ishiura on X (previously Twitter), the switch is very smooth, replacing the spider model with crab models of various sizes.
Not only is this a delightful visual comedy – imagine a big crab sitting behind a victim in a web – and while it may seem a bit comical, the arachnophobic mode represents a huge step forward in terms of accessibility for MMOs.
According to a 2022 study published in the BMC Journal of Psychiatry, arachnophobia is "one of the most common anxiety disorders, with a prevalence of 2.7-6.1%. "This is a large sample of the global population, even if the percentage affected varies depending on your source of information (for example, the Cleveland Clinic estimates that 3%-15% of the population is affected).
Now put that demographic sample in front of World of Warcraft, a game with a beautifully developed world and a whole bunch of spiders, you'll find that at least hundreds of thousands of players will be affected!
Arachnophobia mode isn't new to the game – The Happiness Factory has had Arachnophobia mode for years, replacing their chelate models with three different cat sprites and an animated holographic filter. These cats have even been replaced with an effect, and they will meow!
So, another small but delightful change has come to your favorite MMO - World of Warcraft!
To sum up: if you are also a arachnophobia, then try this new feature and swap them all out for lobsters and crabs with one click!