Topic inspired by the rage directed at Diablo 3.
Warcraft 3 was even more different from its predecessors than Diablo is. What was the general opinion before launch? Were people angry? Were they anticipating a failure?
Or perhaps the public was more peaceful in that Stone Age of the Internets?
I missed the Warcraft 3 hype train and when I eventually played it, I couldn't get into it.
Same here,i heard so many great things about the game,but then when i finally tried it i felt disappointed.
... I take the lives of a few to protect the lives of many. I commit acts of war to preserve the greater peace. I take no joy in killing, but make no mistake; I'll do what needs to be done. Because it's my job. It's my duty. My name is Sam Fisher, and I am a Splinter Cell.
I've dug up the PCG it got reviewed in (90%) and had a look at the uncensored in the issues after that - only one on WC3 and it's overwhelmingly positive. Bit of a limited set of data I admit but I'm not sure how you'd answer this question properly without pre-polling. I seem to recall WC3 multiplayer came in for a bit of hate at how bloody hard it could be to start with, but the actual single-player game was pretty heavily liked.
Personally, I did like the way the campaign was structured as I don't think I've another RTS that has used that particular sort of hero-driven whatnot, the RPG elements were deftly seasoned in, the videos were fucking fantastic at the time. I had played WC2 and loved it previously, and I think WC3 lost a bit in its random map skirmishes (actually did WC2 even have them, I'm not 100%...) , but the campaign was buckets better and heaps of fun.
I don't think Blizzard got their legions of hate until WoW became the biggest game ever
Last edited by Jiiiiim; 26-03-2012 at 05:56 PM.
Warcraft 3's reaction I remember as being largely positive. There was a fair amount of squeeing about adding "heroes" and RPG elements to the RTS mix.
But what Jim says is true: There wasn't much Blizzard hate until World of Warcraft.
Well, I remember from being active in a Warcraft 3 forum at the time that were vocal minorities that hated the game for various reasons. Some really hated the RPG elements, fairly slow combat and emphasis on smaller scale battles (those were mostly the guys coming from Starcraft), and others wanted more RPG elements instead, because when first announced Blizzard called it a RPG/RTS hybrid, instead it turned out to be a RTS with some relatively minor RPG elements.Originally Posted by Nalano
That's still an RPG/RTS hybrid. I mean, when I say cyborg, I can mean anything from a human with a chip in the back of his head to a brain floating a robot casing.
I liked WC3 almost as much as 1 and 2. I remember thinking the videos were atrocious, though.
It's true: WoW is what lost Blizzard my love.
Let me clarify: the first alpha versions, as far as I remember, had no base building at all and far more emphasis on the hero units, which also had a more complex leveling system than in the final game. It was more similar to the Frozen Throne Orc/Rexxar campaign in gameplay, so a few people were not happy that the RPG/RTS hybrid they were promised wasn't a 50/50 split.
Last edited by Subatomic; 26-03-2012 at 06:54 PM.
Indeed. Warcraft III was originally going to be very different from what it ended up being. It was going to be more like the bonus Rexxar(?) campaign with a lower/closer default camera angle and the ability to build/acquire other units from capturing towns and villages. There's a video or two of it on YouTube somewhere.
The Blizzard RTS games have got better every time, at least from an SP point of view.
Irrelevant on further examination of the rest of the thread.
Oh, right. I don't really play Blizzard MP. My WC comment was meant for SP.
Like I said, I slightly prefer WC1 and 2 over 3. And I much prefer SC1 over SC2. I also prefer Diablo1 over 2 (and I'll definitely prefer both over 3). I think the newer games have lost a lot of the airy, effortless charm that earlier titles had. That's what I used to love about Blizzard.
The only things I miss in SC2 is a proper Normal difficulty, and one or two traditional "build your base and destroy their base" missions. Other than that I can't think of any mechanics it does wrong.
Irrelevant on further examination of the rest of the thread.
I thought Warcraft III was kinda crap. They went to 3D graphics too early, and the result looked bland and controlled badly as a result. Tried it for a couple of skirmishes, went back to playing Starcraft. Much later I bought WC3 and Frozen Throne from a sale, intending to play through the SP campaign, but got bored 3/4 of the way through the main game and haven't touched the discs since.
I was but a wee bairn at the time but I remember it being pretty well recieved. For good reason.
A key thing to remember is that Warcraft one and two weren't that impressive, they were both pretty generic and limited. By the time 3 came out it had been superceded by several games. When Warcraft 3 came out it stood out in so many ways and even today it has few imitators and is still genuinely a benchmark in RTS. The only games to come close for me were the Relic games and they owe so much to Warcraft 3 it's obvious everyone in the team was a huge fan. This was why I was so disapointed in Starcraft 2, it was just such a rote retread of the original with it's additions (FMVs, day night cycles, Jamaicans) coming across as either pointless, underused or silly.
Warcraft 3 also didn't come with always on DRM or charge you extra to buy units. So there's that.
Last edited by Bhazor; 26-03-2012 at 11:10 PM.
I always thought Warcraft 3's campaign was it's strong point. Granted I've never been a dedicated RTSer (I suck), but MP seemed to always boil down to Hero level-racing whilst you either built up squillions of defense towers, or a bollock-off great big rush-ready army of as many big beasties as you could.
There was nothing wrong with it's graphics at the time though. Dated today sure, in hindsight all 3D from that era now looks pretty wank, rather than pretty pretty. But the cartoon look and smooth animations worked well for it, as did the splendid voicing. It had life, it had colour and the fully animated talking heads on the UI were very cool.
Last edited by Memph; 26-03-2012 at 11:24 PM.
I always wanted to like WIII but I just completely suck at it, my base building skills are nothing compared to the AI's rush and rape everything I have at that moment.
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Probably because it's a more traditional RTS AI. Play any of the older games (Dark Reign, Red Alert, whatever) and they generally do the same thing.
When I saw Warcraft 3, I went "Huh, looks like a cool game, I'll give it a shot." I approach D3 with the same mindset, though I wasn't a huge fan of D2. I completely missed the hype for W3 and only saw it in action when my friend got it (he didn't miss the hype, he went apeshit for it). I also can't recall people at the time being particularly polarised in their opinions about it; the reaction was positive by and large. At least from memory.
Not being in the beta for D3 I can't say how valid their complaints are, but in any case I think whatever Blizzard did (or didn't do) was always going to attract negative attention. It's the same as Valve doing anything regarding TF2; there's always a mass of raging fans on SPUF vocally resisting any change or addition. Or at least there was when people still cared, I guess most people have stopped giving a damn.
The whole hero thing was obviously nicked from the Warlords Battlecry series.
"Reason is the madness of the strongest"
~Eugène Ionesco
I remember thinking the videos were atrocious
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