Blizzard: New MMO In Development

In a recent interview with wired.com Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime hinted to a new MMO in development. No, it’s not another WoW, rather “It’s gonna be different”. He says:

We’re not trying to replace World of Warcraft with this new MMO. We’re trying to create a different massively multiplayer experience, and hopefully World of Warcraft will still be going strong when that one is released.

Perhaps a new franchise?

Call of Duty 7 Maybe WWII Based

In an interview with CVG, Treyarch hinted that CoD7 may go back to WWII. Here’s an excerpt;

I can’t say that there won’t ever be a WWII Call of Duty game again, but we’re glad we were able to end the war and we’re glad we’re going to support the title with lots of downloadable content

Diablo III - Not Till 2010

In an interview with Wired, Blizzard’s Executive Vice President of Game Design, Rob Pardo has unveiled that Blizzard is taking their sweet time with Diablo III. The highly anticipated RPG will get a release after StarCraft II - with StarCraft II shooting for 2009, it’s logical to assume that we’ll get to play Diablo III in 2010. A bit unnerving, but not unexpected.

Wired: Exactly. That’s key.

I have no idea if you guys are even remotely close to knowing this, but when — broad, ballpark estimate — can we expect to see Diablo III on retail shelves?

Pardo: When it’s ready.

Wired: Ok … alright …

Pardo: [Laughter]

Wired: Is that like 2 years from now? A decade from now?

Pardo: I don’t … I don’t know how far out it is, but it’s still fairly early in development. I think when people see it, it feels so polished and so finished, but the reality is we have a very small portion of the game done right now.

A lot of the way we develop is: We wanna make sure the game is really fun and the visual fidelity we want … we wanna make sure we have a small area that feels really done so we know what to build. So even though it looks really complete a lot of the content is just not there. We have a long ways to go to build each of the different acts in the game and put in all the quests and all the different monsters. We have a lot of development ahead of us before it will be something … It will definitely be out after StarCraft II.

Blizzard Gets Massively Greedy with StarCraft II

Well, looks like the capitalism bug has bitten Blizzard this time as the company plans to roll out StarCraft II as three different titles. StarCraft II, each containing different races. Bottomline, the game will be in 3 pieces (Trilogy), all priced at $50 to increase the revenues. Excellent! Furthermore, it appears that Battle.net will be getting a facelift with some premium features. Features that you’ll mostly likely pay for.

“[The second and third games] will be like expansion packs, but we really want them to feel like standalone products,” said Blizzard’s Rob Pardo.

Each campaign will be very different, with Pardo announcing the Zerg campaign will contain RPG elements. The Protoss campaigin will likewise be differentiated by elements of diplomacy. In addition, the Terran campaign will feature a Protoss mini-campaign.

Call of Duty 6, Coming 2009

Call of Duty 5 isn’t even out yet and the lizards at Activision have already unveiled plans for Call of Duty 6. The title will be developed by Infinity Ward (following the company’s flip-flop strategy) and will hit retail next year (?) Everything else is unknown at this point. It would be interesting to see if Infinity Ward sticks to Modern-theme or goes back to the World War era.

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Hitting Stores November 13th

The highly anticipated World of Warcraft expansion will be hitting store shelves on November 13th.

Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. announced today that World of Warcraft®: Wrath of the Lich KingTM, the second expansion for its award-winning subscription-based massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), will arrive in stores on November 13 in North America, Europe, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Russia, and November 14 in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. The expansion will be available in Korea and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau on November 18. Details regarding the launch of Wrath of the Lich King in mainland China will be announced at a later date.

Read more

Project Origin Gets Renamed and Delayed

After all the flaming hoopla Monolith went to rename it’s successor to 2005’s F.E.A.R., the company has acquired the rights to the F.E.A.R. name and now the horror-shooter will be called F.E.A.R. 2 with Project Origin being the subtitle. The game itself, however, has been pushed back to Febuary 2009.

StarCraft II - Not Till 2009

Blizzard’s hugely anticipated strategy title won’t be making an appearance this year. StarCraftWire has the word that SC2 has been pushed back to 2009 and will appear in Activist-Lizard’s 2009 line-up:

Next year’s offerings from Activision Blizzard should include highly anticipated PC strategy title StarCraft II, the sequel to one of the world’s most enduringly popular games.

Don’t take it as the final word as Blizzard is known to zig-zag release dates.

Diablo III - Factsheet & Screenshots

Blizzard has released a factsheet as well as 13 new screenshots for Diablo III. Check ‘em out below:

Factsheet:

What is Diablo III?
We’re developing Diablo III to be the definitive action role-playing game, and a true continuation of the Diablo series. Players will create a hero from one of five distinct classes, such as barbarian or witch doctor, each equipped with an array of spells and abilities. As these heroes adventure through rich and varied settings, unraveling an epic storyline and engaging in combat with hordes of monsters and challenging bosses, they’ll grow in experience and ability and acquire items of incredible power. Read more

Ghostbusters Game Canceled?

You might not get to call anyone as Activision may have completely canceled the upcoming Ghostbusters title.

Activision Blizzard has submitted its latest release schedule with no mention of forthcoming title from Terminal Reality, Ghostbusters, 50: Cent: Blood on the Sand from Swordfish or Double Fine’s Brutal Legend. 

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