No WarCraft 1 & 2 Remasters Because They "Aren't That Fun Anymore"

[Steven Bogos]

No WarCraft 1 & 2 Remasters Because They "Aren't That Fun Anymore"

//cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1360/1360588.jpg
Blizzard co-founder Frank Pearce says that by today's standards, those old WarCraft games just aren't very fun.

One of the most nostalgia-laden announcements from this year's BlizzCon was the remake of Diablo 1 in the Diablo 3 engine [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/168768-Diablo-3-Necromancer-Class-Pack#&gid=gallery_6609&pid=1]. It raised a lot of questions about Blizzard "remastering" their old games. But, don't expect to see any remasters of the really old ones, like WarCraft 1 & 2, because Blizzard says that by today's standards, they just are not very fun.

During a panel at BlizzCon [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-11-06-blizzard-isnt-planning-to-remaster-warcraft-1-and-2], Blizzard co-founder Frank Pearce said explained that as well as the games not being particular fun any more, and while the team does have access to the game's original source codes, it is "really hard to access that stuff, unlock it, and figure out how it all works."

"We had some dedicated folks that were passionate about the idea, dig up the Warcraft 1 assets and code," Pearce explained. "They got it working and they got it running in a window. And I played it. Warcraft: Orcs & Humans was awesome for its time. I promise you, in today's world, by today's standards, it's just not that fun any more."

Pearce said that Blizzard only has so many resources, and rather than trying to relive the past [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/168778-Nostalrius-Team-is-Planning-to-Release-its-Legacy-WoW-Server-Source-Code], it would rather focus on creating new content for World of Warcraft.

Source: Eurogamer [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-11-06-blizzard-isnt-planning-to-remaster-warcraft-1-and-2]

Permalink

 

[Karadalis]

This... loopey looney logic....

Heres a guy that tells you that they basically had it working allready... and because HE didnt think it was fun anymore that means no one gets to play it...

Sure the game mechanics and graphics and everything about these 2 games are old as crap... but ever thought about that people want to relive those old times? That they want to play these old games on their new machines without having to fiddle with their OS and programs like dosbox?

Its the same thing with Vanilla servers... you have a customer base and demand... but you wont serve them because you claim to know better then these people who would want to throw money at you if you would just serve them.

And whats with this argument that "blizzard has only so many resources" when a couple of sentences before pearce said that they basically had it allready running on a new machine? Also blizzard is limited in resources? The guys that basically legally print money with every game they release? And you want to tell me that you cant manage to have 2 or 3 guys over there in the corner work on porting the old games to modern systems?


Also the success of GoG flys right in the face of pearce, with people paying good money to play age old games that "arent so fun anymore by modern standards"

TLR:

No remastered version because blizzard once again "knows better" then their own customers...

"You think you do, but you dont.. because you know.. i can read minds n shit"

 

[RJ 17]

Blizzard co-founder Frank Pearce said explained that as well as the gamsgames not being particular fun any more,

There you go. :3

WC1 was before my time, and I was barely old enough to remember playing WCII: Tides of Darkness and Beyond the Dark Portal...so I'd really like to have a chance to play those old games again.

But yeah, as Karadalis said: the quote from the guy seems to indicate that they already had it up and running...not sure how many "resources" it would take to finish the job. >.>

 

[Elijin]

On the one hand....he's right. Games that old just don't measure up anymore mechanically. They come from genres which have evolved significantly

On the other hand, people who would buy it are doing so based of nostalgia and should theoretically be totally fine with that.

 

[Wrex Brogan]

...which is weird, since Warcraft II runs on an older engine to what Starcraft 1 is on, and they released THAT shit early on. Ah well, they still run on DOS-box just fine, and I'm pretty sure there's places around where you can play Orcs and Humans (if you want to, I do agree with them that it isn't fun) in a browser or something. Bonus to being 20ish years old - that shit is real basic to get working these days.

 

[jimslade]

I am sorry, but WC1 was not a great game. Not for its time and not during its time. I was there when we all shrugged and said: "Nay, that's just a Dune2-clone with a fantasy setting and one faction less." Seriously, WC1 was not a big deal back then. I personally don't know anybody who ever played more of it than the first couple of missions back in the day. And me and my guys loved our RTSs!

WC2 was a great game, there's no doubt about it. It was at least as big as its biggest competitor Command & Conquer (which, by they way, was from the same guys who did Dune2 before). But as far as I remember WC2 ran in Win95, right? I'm pretty sure it worked easily on Win7, so where's the problem here? Why remaster it anyway? To have a 1080p resolution? Or 3D graphics? I don't know...

 

[Glongpre]

WC2 is still fun, but it wouldn't have any staying power.

A WC3 remake would be awesome though, it still holds up.

A WC4 though, now we're talking.

 

[lacktheknack]

And whats with this argument that "blizzard has only so many resources" when a couple of sentences before pearce said that they basically had it allready running on a new machine?

You DO realize that a remaster is infinitely, INFINITELY more than just jerry-rigging the old thing in a window, right?

...Who am I kidding, this is the Escapist, we don't allow "definitions" and "word meanings" get in the way of our incessant bitchfests.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

WC2 is still fun, but it wouldn't have any staying power.

A WC3 remake would be awesome though, it still holds up.

A WC4 though, now we're talking.

I'm choosing to read his exclusion of WC3 in his statement as a suggestion that a remaster is coming. One can dream.

 

[Hawki]

I've mixed feelings about this.

Now, speaking personally, Warcraft I has aged terribly. My order of playing Warcraft games went 3>1>2, but even that aside, it just isn't...well, fun. I haven't played Warcraft II in ages, but it's a much better game IMO, though stifled by the Alliance and Horde practically being identical bar their spellcasters. There's a few people who prefer Warcraft II to 3, but IMO, 3 overshadows both its predecessors.

On the other, I wouldn't mind the option to at least have them playable on modern systems and/or integrated into the battle.net launcher. I technically can't fault Blizz for not doing that, but they did make Blackthorne free for instance. Or, bundle them. EA bundled every Command and Conquer game into a download after all. Now, speaking personally, Tiberian Dawn overshadows both of the first Warcraft games, but I wouldn't mind Blizz doing the same for Warcraft.

Or, if you want the short version:

WC2 is still fun, but it wouldn't have any staying power.

A WC3 remake would be awesome though, it still holds up.

A WC4 though, now we're talking.

This.

(Though I'd be happy with Warcraft III being made available in the battle.net client, I don't think it needs a remaster per se. I've also been unable to re-install it via my disc, but I could try the download option at some point, since I've registered the product key.

 

[Worgen]

Weirdly enough Command and Conquer aged better than warcraft 1 or 2.

 

[The Enquirer]

I mean, as much as I want to say "what the hell Blizzard" he's got a good point. The games just haven't aged well and at the end of the day they needed to decide whether it's worth the resources or not.

 

[ghalleon0915]

I kind of agree with this, but then again I've never been one for nostalgia. Never played WC 1 but loved WC II but I think that hasn't aged well. Actually tried to play WC III after dl'ing it and stopped playing after Arthas' campaign because I was bored. That may be just me knowing what is going to happen already and having finished the game multiple times though....which goes back to the whole nostalgia thing, I guess.

WarCraft 4 though? Now that I could get excited about, and if they make more new content for WoW then that can only be good for the WoW community.

 

[Saelune]

Thats why you re-make them. Ya know, make them again, but better. I dont give a fuck about Warcraft, but Im sure the people who do, who were late to the party, might like to see the old games plots firsthand. Why not remake them, and use the chance to fill in the holes made by later additions?

 

[TheSYLOH]

Weirdly enough Command and Conquer aged better than warcraft 1 or 2.

Unfortunately the Command and Conquer franchises were both murdered and had their desecrated corpses paraded around town.

 

[Hawki]

Weirdly enough Command and Conquer aged better than warcraft 1 or 2.

Unfortunately the Command and Conquer franchises were both murdered and had their desecrated corpses paraded around town.

Um, how? Tiberian Twilight was dog-shite, I agree, but Red Alert 3 was pretty good (actually my favorite Red Alert game), and Generals 2 was never 'born' to be 'murdered,' so to speak.

If anything, I feel Blizz could take a leaf from EA (never thought I'd say that), and at least make the old Warcraft games (heck, Diablo I also) available to purchase, similar to how all the Command and Conquer games can be bought in a pack now.

 

[Wrex Brogan]

Thats why you re-make them. Ya know, make them again, but better. I dont give a fuck about Warcraft, but Im sure the people who do, who were late to the party, might like to see the old games plots firsthand. Why not remake them, and use the chance to fill in the holes made by later additions?

...honestly, the plot of the first game makes no sense anyway, and has seen so many retcons over the decades that the only relation they have to the current storyline is in name alone. Hell, Warcraft 1's plot was literally 'You are humans/orcs, you go and kill Orcs/Humans, final level is blow up Blackrock Mountain/Stormwind'. They wouldn't so much be filling holes as just copy-pasting from a Wikipedia page on 'History of the First War' at this point.

As for remakes... ehhhh. It'd be much better to just do a GoG with 'em than spend THAT many resources rebuilding the things. Especially with Warcraft 1 - They'd be better off making a friggin' Warcraft 4 rather than try and bring that piece of garbage (note, I played it when it was new and it's what got me into Blizzard games) into a modern era. Really hard to remake a game that had no Voice acting, minimal animations, barebone gameplay, non-existant AI and an idiotic plot faithfully. Warcraft 2 maybe could fair better, but that's mainly because someone could probably slap all the War2 assets onto the Starcraft 1 engine and call it a day.

 

[Transdude1996]

On the one hand....he's right. Games that old just don't measure up anymore mechanically. They come from genres which have evolved significantly

On the other hand, people who would buy it are doing so based of nostalgia and should theoretically be totally fine with that.

Bullshit

If this were any other media, people would be in uproar. Books and works release prior to the 50's haven't aged well in the writing, so let's never never make those easily available for future generations (Or, even attempt to abridge them). Films are being constantly remade today, so let's not have them rerelease and restore the original Ben-Hur, Ghostbusters, Ocean's 11, Magnificent Seven, Psycho, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Walter Mitty, King Kong, etc.

Also, why not just declare the games abandonware, or even just release the source code? It's pretty obvious that Blizzard doean't want to do anything with the games, so why not let the community take the games and run with them?

And, to top it off, who can really declare what people will define as "fun"?

 

[Soulrender95]

Blizzard again deciding what customers say they want is not what they want because according them it isn't fun.
They did that with World of Warcraft and the people who want legacy servers "you think you want that but you don't"

Blizzard, you are not the arbiters of fun, you do not get to decide what I enjoy, I want classic Warcraft 1 and 2 playable on modern systems without any gameplay updates, I want the option to experience the games as close as possible to how they were intended when released and I don't want to deal with the problems that can arise from second hand copies.

 

[Elijin]

On the one hand....he's right. Games that old just don't measure up anymore mechanically. They come from genres which have evolved significantly

On the other hand, people who would buy it are doing so based of nostalgia and should theoretically be totally fine with that.

Bullshit

If this were any other media, people would be in uproar. Books and works release prior to the 50's haven't aged well in the writing, so let's never never make those easily available for future generations (Or, even attempt to abridge them). Films are being constantly remade today, so let's not have them rerelease and restore the original Ben-Hur, Ghostbusters, Ocean's 11, Magnificent Seven, Psycho, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Walter Mitty, King Kong, etc.

Also, why not just declare the games abandonware, or even just release the source code? It's pretty obvious that Blizzard doean't want to do anything with the games, so why not let the community take the games and run with them?

And, to top it off, who can really declare what people will define as "fun"?

Don't really get how what I said is bullshit. I admitted they've aged terribly and don't hold anymore.....but the primary audience who would buy them are totally aware of that fact.

But since you wanna go down this path, I will say what no one else is saying.

A huge swath of Blizzard's audience wasn't alive for WC1&2. Many of those same people will instabuy anything with a Blizzard logo on them. Young people are terribly critical of the tech curve, and will not appreciate the humble origins and nostalgia of the originals. They will just see a shitty product. Not putting the originals out is pure brand protection, because if you're old enough to remember them you're also no longer the primary demographic being chased by these companies . Especially one like Blizzard who keeps a small handful of IP's and goes for the 'loyal for years' customer set.