Issue 48 - Secret Sauce: The Rise of Blizzard

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Chris

Starcraft, although argueably Blizzard's best and most popular RTS game, did not have the same affect on Blizzard's success as the Warcraft and Diablo series did. Blizzard was already ahead of everyone else on the way to the top before Starcraft was released.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Colilla

In the article talks about the evolution of the company and how they become the juggernaut they actually are, i dont know how they miss starcraft,maybe it was not a breakpoint but itwas a essential part of the evolution... and i totally agree with clemmens the cinematics and the story treatment was a fundamental part of his sucess ....
good article, great topic, but somehow feels unfinished

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Duncan

Everyone is asking "Where's Starcraft?" which is a valid question, but as a devout follower of blizzard games from WC2 to WoW I have to ask why there is no mention of Blizzard's completely liquid, indeterminable release dates? Blizzard has two notable characteristics:
1. Its focus on solid, innovative, fun gameplay and
2. Its utter refusal to release a game that was not completely perfect.
It is the second characteristic that made Blizzard extremely notorious for its constant release delays (I remember waiting for Starcraft was brutal), but in this way they were able to release the most comprehensively polished games ever. They're the only company out there who won't rush the release of a game for short term profit and it seems to be working. Let's hope it stays that way.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Randolph Lee

First Kudos for another fine issue. you have become a bastion of intelligent and insightful writing in a genera where far too much of the time all that is found is either sycophantic fan boy fawning or angry ranting.

I wonder if you have thought about writing a piece on the very early days of computer RPG? Back in about 1979 or so (give or take a year... hell I ws no kid then so you can imagine how much of an old fart I am now, the game which was in Applr Pascal, was in alpha and then beta for more than a year and I think it was released in 1981) I met some young programers at the boston Apple fest and became the only Beta tester of Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord that had no previous experance with table top RPG... the game later became the first of the popular Wizardy series and the programers were Trebor and Werdna, Andrew Greenberg and Robert Woodhead.

I bring this up because today they seem to be frequently forgoten and the Ultima series are cited as the seminal game series of this type... perhaps an article on the pair and their place in gaming history would be of interest?

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Raph
http://www.raphkoster.com
FWIW, Greg Costikyan was wrong in 1999 when he said that there were no other profitable online services at the time.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Iliya

Actually warcraft 1&2 were competing with the C&C series, blizzard was not ahead with them. The real success came with Stacraft and Diablo 2. Starcraft is the the most important part of their rise and success. The ultimate RTS game, which is played proffesionally with huge crowds at finals 8 years after it's release in a world where the greatest and most successifull hits of every other company are forgotten after a year at most. The only game that can compare to this is Counter Strike and it's 1.00 version was released around years after Starcraft.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Gabriel

Wow, Thanks Russ fantastic article loved reading it

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: Bjoern H


Hi people and greetings from Germany,

I fear the following:
Blizzard addons have always been much greater than their basic games. This is true for WarCraft2, very true for Diablo2, very very true for StarCraft (shame on the author not to mention it), WarCraft3, well, yes, The Frozen Throne is great.

So, us WoW-addicts?! What could we do to protect ourselves against "The Burning Crusade"?! Kill each other before the game will be in stores? Destroy our personal windows to Azeroth? Or simply (and most likely) fall into the game, run to level 70, jewel craft our swords and fly around with our mounts?!

We'll see.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: D Style

In the article Russ states that Blizzard has "become the single most successful video game company in the history of the world". Everyone is of course entitled to their own opinion and in my opinion that moniker should be applied to Nintendo. Its not that I don't think Blizzard makes great games, because they do.

Nintendo continues to do very well in the hand held space and have since the original GameBoy came out in 1989. In the past Nintendo has owned the home console space and looks to make a resurgence with the upcoming Wii. For a hardware/software company to survive the competitive game industry for over 20 years and continue to make great, top selling games is all I need to consider them the most successful video game company of all time.

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: WBS

Will there ever be a "World of Starcraft"?

 

[The Escapist Staff]

Original Comment by: umbrood

tThe secret sacue ingredients so to speak is no real secret, none of the actual contents is coveted to any degree.
IIt is the make up obviously that is the whole thing.

tTo use an alcohol analogy, wich I often do, anyone can go into a bar and make themself a Screwdriver, it contains the addictive component, [alcohol] as well as some flavor, [orange juice] to flush the whole thing down and perhaps even enjoy the process.

Now the difference is, not everyone can go into a bar and make a "pan-galactic gurgel burner", even though all the ingredients are there.