I was looking forward to getting Warcraft III Reforged and I still am. I’ll probably wait for it to go on sale as I have a lot of great games in my library to play. (Currently working on Assasin’s Creed: Origins and I have Odyssey too etc.) .
However it’s the current “this game is a disaster oh no” on various news articles and youtubers channels.
So I guess it’s because people thought it would be XYZ but it’s just a reskin? I’m wondering why Blizzard wasn’t more honest about that. It is a valid criticism.
However, StarCraft 1 Remastered was just a graphical upgrade and I’ve been having loads on fun playing the Campaigns in that game, which was what I wanted to do with Warcraft III Reforged.
So I’m wondering why StarCraft 1 was liked, but Warcraft III is getting sort of review bombed right now. When they both seem like just graphical upgrades of a classic RTS.
It’s a bunch of things. Starcraft Remastered was sold as “Starcraft, but with higher res”, and it was. Reforged was initially hyped as a bit more, with reworked/extended cutscenes for example, but what came out is more or less a standard graphical update.
It also has, atm, less features than the old game. And you can’t just say “eh, i still can play the original”, because they patched it to use the same client, so they effectively cut features from a eighteen, seventeen years old game (we’re talking about multiplayer here, single player is largely fine).
Also, the “political climate” around Blizzard was much better at Starcraft Remastered release, since it was before “don’t you guy have phones”, the euthanasia of Heroes of the Storm and the Hong Kong debacle.
One of the problems is that Reforged is not standalone. It has a direct impact on the original. From Polygon:
Warcraft 3: Reforged came out yesterday, and fans are not happy. This is a bit more complicated than your run-of-the-mill “people are angry on the internet” situation, however. That’s because this new game and the old one — the product that was first released in 2002 — are intermingled. The end result is that the inadequacies of Warcraft3: Reforged are being foisted upon people still playing the original Warcraft 3 .
Customers are complaining about connectivity issues. They can’t reliably connect to custom matches. They can’t access custom campaigns that worked just fine previously. There’s no support for a competitive ladder. Making matters worse is the fact that there’s simply no going back; even if you install the original Warcraft 3 , you’re still going to end up with the same issues once you connect to Blizzard’s online services because the infrastructure is now the same for both the old and the new versions of the game.
This seems more than the usual uproar from a tiny set of gamers that are vocal about a change that upsets them, this seems like a legitimate issue has broken the original version of Warcraft III and is affecting quite a number of people.
The changes to the EULA are quite concerning too. They don’t want to miss out on a possible Dota in the future haha.
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Thank you for the replies everyone. I read all your comments, I was busy with work but I read them all. I think you have helped make the issue much more clear to me. Blizzard just should have branded it “Warcraft 3 Remastered” not “Reforged” and they should have been open to the public about the change in expectations.
I mean I remember when the game was delayed! (Which shows I really was looking forward to this.) And I thought, “Oh great they are taking the extra time to really make this a great remake.” So I think that added to this too, because then it was released and it’s just like, “Wait it was delayed for what?”
I don’t blame them, here. The DOTA thing is a little grey in my book. If I build a house but used trees from your back yard, should you not be entitled to something? I’m open to both sides of the argument, but DOTA was a good lesson for every developer to put some kind of safeguard like this forward. It would be foolish for any legal team to let that slip.
Somewhat, the tools may be there but the idea is what proves successful. I think Valves approach or even Bohemia Interactive (DayZ) where they work with the mod creator to make something rather than the idea that they now own it.
In most instances the tools are simply a means to create the idea, this could be replicated across other tools as we have seen from non WC3 games - LoL and Dota. Even with the Battle-Royale games.