Wired Interview with Ion Hazzikostas, Fan Art - Cosmology Chart, Rumor - Diablo 2

[Stoy]

Wired Interview with Ion Hazzikostas - How WoW Has Evolved with the Internet
Wired recently interviewed Ion Hazzikostas on the evolution of World of Warcraft with the internet over the years. Here are some highlights. Click the banner below to read the whole article.

• In the early days of WoW, opacity was a double-edged sword. Strategies and class hierarchies were mostly dependent on fragmented information that didn't work for everyone.
• The reality is that back in the day almost everybody was playing the game wrong.
• These days, the internet as a whole has refined the process of accelerating and socializing information.
• Because of this, stretching and sustaining an increasingly elusive sense of awe in the game has many more challenges.
• In the early days, WoW's magic came from a sense of mystery due to the vastness of its world and the long, rocky path to top level.
• This feeling of being teleported into an antagonistic, unknowable world forced players to use each other as buoys.
• You were much more tolerant of each other's mistakes and faults because of the effort needed to create a group.
• Finding good players usually ended in friending each other for faster leveling next time.
• There's an inverse relationship between friction and the strength of bonds that are formed as a result of that friction or to overcome that friction.
• Over time both Blizzard and the players began to streamline ease of access with quality-of-life changes and information sources such as wikis and guides.
• Today players are almost trained to min-max their characters. The community pushes people in this direction.
• Although there have been things added to the game to make finding a party easier, things like group finder and server hoping has also made online strangers plugged into a party disposable.
• WoW Classic isn't made to be blasted through at top speed, and as a result questing feels less like a means to an end than an end in itself.
• Back in the day, much of the novelty of the game was the ability to talk to strangers online. Today, almost every multiplayer game has voice chat and social networking systems.
• Although there isn't the same desperation to connect, the core of WoW still holds up. It is still a place where people gather, a fantasy-washed social media network.
• Ion mentions having a co-worker who was one of the original developers on WoW, whose guild in WoW classic split up over loot drama. Some of the old tropes never go away.
• Ion says that they have an incredibly passionate community that they couldn't be more grateful for, but they are still always chasing that mystery, the fantasy of the unexplored and undiscovered.

Fan Art - Warcraft Cosmology Chart in Color
Redditor AJT2K19 recently posted to reddit fan art he created of the World of Warcraft Cosmology chart in beautiful color. There is also a version without the text to enjoy!

Rumor - Diablo 2: Resurrected Remaster Coming this Year
A recent rumor has surfaced from the French site Actugaming that seems to claim that Diablo 2 will be remastered as Diablo 2: Resurrected and released for the fourth quarter of this year. (They also state it might be slightly delayed do to the current situation.) Take this rumor with a grain of salt, but this website was also responsible for the Overwatch 2 and Diablo IV announcement rumors that surfaced before BlizzCon last year.

[rlloyd3]

This recurring idea of WoW being a place people sought out as a tool to talk to strangers is getting now less insane. Not to mention the idea of "no, gamers, you're playing it wrong!" being perhaps the most egotistical thing uttered time after time over the years.

[Tomana]

Oh hell, Diablo 2 remaster AND Shadowlands? RIP my free time.

[Palapop]

The only thing I'm REALLY thankful to Ion is that he successfully stopped my obstipation.

[korijenkins]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

[HitRefresh]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

I wish they would just redo WC3 in a new engine akin to the Resident Evil remakes.

I bet most of their time was spent trying to get things working in an old shit engine.

[Tomana]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

The article says that the remaster is subcontracted to Vicarious Visions, so looks like it's a different team. So we have a chance

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Maybe, but if you move away from the original engine, it won't look D2 anymore because of the way the sprites are working.
Also, if you no longer have the whole breakpoint thing due to the speed of internal calculations, you'll have to rework half of the mechanics in the game.

[Saltysquidoon]

Well, basically everything he said about WoW is correct. I kind of wish more people knew/understand this.

[beanman12345]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

If the rumor is even true, it's being done by a completely different dev team than the wc3 one, and they have experience in remasters so in theory it shouldn't be a disaster that wc3 was. *Fingers crossed* though for sure.

Also if they are clear that it is only a remaster, then it should also be a nightmare the wc3 was. And if they are also open if they do remake it in d4 engine or whatever, should also make it less a nightmare. Clear messaging will go a long way.

[Stormykitten]

I think war3 reforged mostly shows that outsourcing a classic game is a bad idea for them. If they do D2, they need to do all of it inhouse, or at least with a trusted longterm partner, and do it properly.

[Orisai]

Blizzard developers already said that a Diablo II remaster would be impossible, as they lost the original assets, and (if ever done) they would have to make them again from scratch.

https://wccftech.com/diablo-ii-remastered-unlikely/

[Lurker1]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

All i see from you is non stop crying it's sad man really.

[kranur]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

This ... remastering it is pointles ... everything about it is obsolete not just the graphics.

[Kralljin]

I think war3 reforged mostly shows that outsourcing a classic game is a bad idea for them. If they do D2, they need to do all of it inhouse, or at least with a trusted longterm partner, and do it properly.

Only the 3D art was outsourced.
And that mostly came from the poor directions on Blizzards part, some of employees working there spoke out and pretty much said "we had to follow Blizzards direction on the artstyle".

In other words: Blizzard fucked up, the contractors aren't at fault if you give them shitty directions.
Small trivia here, the lead Artist for Warcraft 3 Reforged left the company in November 2019 (=shortly before release).

[Dracullus]

D2 remaster, watch it be totally broken like Warcraft 3.

D2 should just be rebuild in the D3 or D4 engine as a remaster.

Even better, D1, 2, and 3 should all be in D4 as an adventure setting.

Or it will be fine like Starcraft remaster.

Besides, Reforged was something between remaster and remake, and we have no idea what potential DII remaster would be. We need more details, if it's even true of course.

[Orby]

After Warcraft Reforged I am very nervous about any new game coming out of Blizzard that isnt a WoW expansion

[Gravity2015]

dont frigging touch d2 classic client for the love of god - next thing we know we will play a shit graphics diablo 2, no clans, no ladders, and unfinished polished graphics with no cut scenes

[Queen of Hamsters]

Hopefully they learned a thing or two from the WCIII "remaster".

[Beazy]

Is that Ions excuse for putting the wow dev team on auto pilot and turning wow into a mid tier level MMO?

[Biomega]

Is that Ions excuse for putting the wow dev team on auto pilot and turning wow into a mid tier level MMO?

I think they simply realized BFA was unsalvagable because it would have required too much work on too many core aspects to fix. So they put it on simmer while they cook up the future.

As far as the social aspect goes... that's just a consequence of the internet becoming such a central part of people's lives, and how that affected the way we use it. We don't need things like WoW as social media platforms, because we have actual social media platforms for that now. Instead, WoW other role - as a game - is emphasized, and social aspects becomes less important. People just want to play, not deal with social networking.