WARCRAFT III - Games - http://maxpages.com/strategyforum/Warcraft

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Two years ago, we saw sketches for WarCraft III. And a year ago, we knew Blizzard was working on a powerful 3D engine for the game. We were sworn to secrecy then, but today, we can happily reveal the game that Blizzard has been dying to unveil. Yes, WarCraft III is under development - and has been for over six months.

At the ECTS trade show last month we sat down at a hands-on demo and really got to see the kind of game WarCraft III will be. What we saw proved that Blizzard isn't settling for a tried-and-true sequel. Instead, it's hoping to create something new that will infuse an increasingly staid genre with creativity and personality. WarCraft III is not a real-time strategy game in the traditional sense. It's not a mission-based game where you start each scenario gathering resources, erecting buildings, and cranking out hordes of units. WarCraft III is narrowing its focus, injecting many roleplaying elements, and is being touted by Blizzard as a "3D roleplaying strategy game".

Blizzard defines WarCraft III as "a strategy game set heavily within a roleplaying environment. WarCraft III will combine the focused combat and dynamics of a roleplaying game and apply them in a competitive, strategic environment." It's a definite departure from WarCraft II, with six races instead of two, a 3D engine, a more organic storyline, and numerous roleplaying elements.

The new 3D engine looks very good, with incredibly fluid and lifelike animation. Both the terrain and the units will be 3D, and the units will be rendered with a skeletal and skinning animation. Unit animation is so exaggerated and full of character that no one should worry that this game will lack the personality of its predecessor. In fact, Rob Pardo, producer on WarCraft III, says Blizzard will be able to do an even better job due to the move to 3D.

Despite concerns, WarCraft III won't be a Myth clone. Firstly, there will be unit recruitment, town management, and many roleplaying elements. Secondly, the camera won't be freeform - you won't have to deal with it at all. Blizzard says the camera will be fixed and lower to the ground, showing more of the horizon and giving you a wider view of what's ahead. Although you'll be able to move the camera slightly, it will only be within a very limited range. Basically, Blizzard doesn't think you should ever have to fiddle with it, since it would only distract you.

The campaign will play like a roleplaying game-style storyline. Instead of mission briefings, you'll begin the game at your keep with your one hero. From there, you'll probably never leave gameplay again. Non-player characters will give you missions, moving the campaign along seamlessly. For example, when you leave your town to explore the map, you might suddenly meet a troll hunter loitering by the gate. When you greet him, he tells you that a human camp is nearby and you should attack it. He'll join you and suddenly, you have your first mission.

While Blizzard hasn't stated how many campaigns there will be, you will get to play all six races in the open-ended campaign - which is still focused on the story of the orcs and humans.

Another big change is a more interactive general world with lots of neutral locations and wandering monsters and mercenaries. You'll find towns to explore and temples and ruins guarded by hostile monsters. Inside each will be treasures and information. You might find townspeople to talk to, heroes to recruit, or mercenaries to hire in the town, while the ruins and temples might yield gold or imprisoned heroes. In the demo, we stumbled upon a human camp, a destroyed bridge, a spider temple populated by skeletons and spiders, a sage's mountain retreat, and a valley protected by a great dragon statue.

Details will make the world even more alive. In the human camp, you'll see them sitting around a campfire and joking loudly when one might say, "Shh... do you hear something?" just before you attack. Additionally, music will be much more integrated into the game and will change to suit onscreen action: quiet and soft during conversations, loud and fast during combat.

Despite the heavy roleplaying influence, though, WarCraft III will indeed be a strategy game. Rob Pardo takes pains to emphasise that there will still be lots of tactical combat, a tech tree, troop recruiting and upgrading, and even the building of structures. However, he says that in real-time strategy games, "you spend about 70 per cent of your time doing town management and about 30 per cent actually out in the environment [in] tactical combat. We're looking to reverse that trend, so you'll spend 30 per cent of your time [on town management and] 70 per cent of the time dealing with tactical combat, questing, and interacting with the environment."

In WarCraft III, you'll start in a keep, where you'll have all your basic unit-producing buildings and your hero. Says Pardo, "The home keep for a player will operate in a very similar manner to a WarCraft II town. There will be unit-producing buildings, a tech tree [to research], and some base defences. The only real difference is that we want to make it easier to manage, by taking out the need to build a huge sprawling base. Instead of building 30 structures to enable the tech tree, the player will only need to upgrade his/her existing structures."

So, strategy fans of the Craft series will still have to decide which troops to upgrade and when, where and how to upgrade buildings to enable better troops. While you'll still research new troops, spells, and skills, these options will be open earlier and may also be dependent on more map exploration and questing. You'll still manage multiple squads, exploring the map and fighting the enemy.

As for resources, the one confirmed resource is gold that will buy troops, upgrades, and building upgrades. You'll have just enough to create a small party in the beginning of the game, gaining more as you adventure and kill neutral monsters. Later, you'll be able to build special structures - like farms, lumber mills, and towers - that will produce continuous, additional gold for you.

One key feature of Blizzard strategy games has been supply limit. In WarCraft II you had to build farms to support troops, in StarCraft it was pylons, overlords, and supply depots.

Since the game is hero-based, you'll have to attach units to heroes in so that you can command them, with a hero's leadership rating determining how many troops you can field in battle (a rating of two gets you two troops to command, etc). Since the maximum number of heroes you'll be able to command will probably be around six, battles will be more tactical and rely on fewer, more effective, units. Fewer units means you'll be able to spend more time on them during combat, and you'll want to because each will have a special ability. Orc grunts, for example, can go berserk, while wolf riders can throw nets.

Pardo has little comment on the multiplayer support, saying only that Blizzard will support more players per game than WarCraft II's eight. Team play and questing will be supported, but there won't be persistent characters in multiplayer games. Blizzard feels it's important that the winner of the game be the most skilled player, not the person with the highest-level hero.

At its core, WarCraft III is a deep strategy game, with upgrades, tech trees, and unit recruitment. But Blizzard is charting a new path for real-time strategy titles by injecting roleplaying elements, shifting focus more to tactical action rather than to strategic building, while centering gameplay around heroes and quests. Every indication is that this newest chapter in the WarCraft saga will sustain the immersive gameplay of the original, while giving us a fresh look at the world of WarCraft itself.

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Page Updated Fri Nov 26, 1999 6:53pm EST