In Ulduar: Defiance, I hinted at a further story to be told through a series of shorts. While machinima is a ton of fun, I wanted to create something without the limitations of the game engine. I installed some 3D character animation software and got to work.

I made a decent amount of progress learning to model and animate, but the software suffered from being a very closed ecosystem. It was not compatible with any other programs, and could be incredibly glitchy and challenging to work with.

The story initially focused on searching for a missing sister and would lead to the Scarlet Onslaught in Northrend. However, I also found myself wanting to tread carefully and not contradict Blizzard lore, and eventually decided that it was a story better told outside of their IP.

I’ve had to focus on other things over the years, but the project itself is still alive and has evolved in a new direction using Unity and Blender. I was never satisfied with the stylization of the old character models that I had created, but here are some test renders and animations from what was then called The Scions of Mal’Ganis.