World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Q&A

While they might be a bit late to the party, Goozer Nation is offering up a short Q&A with Blizzard Entertainment's Frank Pearce about their third expansion pack for World of Warcraft. A little something to get you started:
Arti Gupta: Let's talk about the Cataclysm expansion for World of Warcraft. I know one of your focuses for this expansion pack was to get new players attracted quickly, include social media aspects in the game, and also try to balance that with the needs of hardcore gamers. How did you do that?

Frank Pearce: It's a difficult balance. In terms of making it accessible for new players, one of the most important things we did is to go back and revamp all the starting zones for all the existing races, all the old-school races. That's really where people that are new to the game go, and that's where it's going to make or break you in terms of whether or not you grasp it and love it. But then we always focus on end-game content for our most hardcore players. So we added content that takes players from level 80 to 85, and we've got some really great five-man dungeons, five-man heroics and some other great content as well.