Heroes of the Storm Update - July 8, 2022

[Varodoc]

I'm gonna have to strongly disagree with this premise. HotS's biggest misstep was releasing at a time where the MOBA genre was already well-established. LoL released in 2009, and DotA 2 had released in 2013, whereas HotS didn't become a thing until 2015. As such, even if it was a blatant LoL reskin, I don't think it would have done terribly well for itself. Given how late to the party Blizzard was, I think they played things about as well as they reasonably could have.

We'll see how true this argument is when the Riot LoL MMO comes out.

[loras]

RIP.
Could've been great, but:
- Random anime-girls added instead of game characters
- WTF choices in terms of skins
- Only random maps
- Nothing consistent between various characters, sadly (no gear, nor anything like it)
- Failure to implement pretty obvious stuff (like i.e. skins
consistently added from the other franchises for each character)
- DotA did character customisation a lot better
- No mod/proper custom map support

It had strong points in having actually interesting maps and an insanely strong roster of potential characters, as well as a lot of mechanically interesting stuff. But seriously, the flavor part was the easiest part they could have gotten right, and instead we got anime girls, toys and other major bullshit.


Just realised that HotS may actually be the first time their art team failed pretty much game-killingly bad. Not often that that happens.

[Triceron]

With HotS and SC2 being put on ice, Blizzard no longer counts any actual good games among their roster.

D2R is the only real supported classic game that is still good. They're actively adding new Runewords to ladder and improving some much needed older abilities. I'm actually starting a Leap Barb now that they improved Leap Attack and allowed you to activate it at the end of Whirlwind.

[ExtremelyCrusty]

Disgusting how Blizzard treated HoTS

[Ghost of Cow]

Disgusting how Blizzard treated HoTS

It's time to slay the dragon.

[Romanthony]

Sad day indeed one of the only MOBAS i enjoyed playing with characters i loved and knew. I wish it would get the support it deseserved but due to them pushing it being a E sports HARD, before it had its moment to shy made sure it would die slowly,

[Jester Joe]

If this game had the same mechanics that League (most popular PC videogame) has, so last hitting, items, designated lanes, individual levels, it would have been more popular. It wouldn't feel so alien to many League players (who were the target audience, as the most popular MOBA ever). As it turns out, the iconic Blizzard characters were not enough to carry this casual game.

I don't know why Blizzard thought removing player agency that is pivotal to the MOBA genre was a good idea.

As if LoL players were the target audience

They were aiming people who didn't enjoy those mechanics.
Last hitting is one of the least enjoyable things about Dota/LoL.
Outside of individual carrying, most of what you're describing isn't the fun.

[ExtremelyCrusty]

It's time to slay the dragon.

Yeah, let's do this.

[Kel_Sceptic]

Blizzard is good at borrowing good/great ideeas and making them LEGENDARY.
Overwatch from TF2.
Loads of mechanics or features in WoW added from other MMOs.

But what Blizzard kind of sux, is creating from scratch. IF you had taken the well known working recipe of (1 map, 3 lanes, last hit, deny, items builds etc.) you could have created the greatest MobA esports ever. But NO, you wanted to make it baby friendly, with no last hits, no denies, with shared xp, random maps.
And, on top of that, choose the worst side for revealing heroes, by rotation.
The reason I play DOTA 2 and not LoL, besides graphics, you have ALL heroes unlocked all the time, so you can play without any disadvantage over other players.
You could have make tons of money out of skins and other stuff Valve uses, but you choose to do everything opposite or worst.

As if LoL players were the target audience

They were aiming people who didn't enjoy those mechanics.
Last hitting is one of the least enjoyable things about Dota/LoL.
Outside of individual carrying, most of what you're describing isn't the fun.

And yet, it seems those players hating those mechanics are to few to make the game worth it.

[GreenJesus]

I quit this game 1 month after Blizzcon 2018 when they made the announcement they were effectively killing the game. I didn't know they were still making new content.

[ThatsOurEric]

Blizzard really needed to make more modes of play for this game.

To really differentiate this from other MOBAs, they could've really pushed for a lot of PvE content, such as their Heroic Modes
against the Zerg that they did awhile back. It was actually fun. And most MOBAs only have the regular vs AI match, so Bliz
really missed out on an opportunity to capitalize on that potential.

The regular PvP was a clusterfuck of fail, as it was designed to pigeonhole players in ELO Hell rankings. Not unlike Overwatch 1.
The game would get insanely toxic very quickly, maybe not as infamously so as LoL or Dota2 to a lesser degree, but it could
definitely get there.

Not surprised they dropped the ball on this game. Looks like they're only going to focus on Live Service games hard for the
forseeable future.

[Kumorii]

I quit this game 1 month after Blizzcon 2018 when they made the announcement they were effectively killing the game. I didn't know they were still making new content.

In the same announcement they said they wouldn't stop making content.

[Alicianna]

I never understood how they cut back on that game in the first place. When they removed the competitive part of the game. It was clear something like this was bound to happen. I actually wonder what took them so long.
It was a fun game - I even spent a few bucks on it now and then. But I think I couldn‘t keep up with Koticks greedy plans…
At least they have the decency to keep the servers up and running.

[Nerraw]

I never understood how they cut back on that game in the first place.

Catastrophic response to Diablo Immortal at BlizzCon 2018. They cannibalized the Heroes team to prop up the other dev teams (Shadowlands, OW2, D4, WC3R). In the 3½ years since that only two of those have released, to, uhhh, questionable praise.

[KainneAbsolute]

I agree with some mistakes. I would like to add:

- The game lacked a good interface/engine. No spectator mode, not being able to minimize the game look into the shop, etc. Many friends who tried the game, asked for a spectator mode to learn the game. But there is no spectator mode.
- I don't know how Blizzard expected Hots to become an esports with a cool spectator interface.
- I am sure, the pitch talk was something: accessible game, low investment and capitalize the brand of our characters of five franchises. They didn't take the game seriously and once they noticed they needed more, they did Hots 2.0 and they promised more changes in BlizzCon 2018.
- Blizzard didn't understand that they were late and building a successful MOBA may take time. In the last HGC, they tried to do a sort of "Compendium event" like in Dota 2, where you bring crystals to your team and the community achieves goals. However, Blizzard was so greedy that only gifted 2 mounts, some banners, emoticons, and sprays. The FIRST Dota 2 compendium was way more generous.

They planned to do lots of stuff according to the interviews from Blizzcon 2018:
- Continue with the comics, and develop the stories of the Realm Lords.
- Continue with HGC.
- IMPROVE the UI. In an AMA of 2018, they explained the required work and, after that, they would work in spectator mode.

The promised other things like change catapult system, many reworks, xp system, core defense mechanics, etc. All those objectives were for 2019 but they delivered them between 2019 - 2021. Obviously, a reduced team wasn't able to work so quickly.

The game has poor planning from the start, but after Blizzcon 2018, Blizzard killed Hots and the new Starcraft game to deliver Diablo 4. Seems logical, Diablo is a big name.

Blizzard just needed to keep the game fun and let the community organize their own tournaments. Sell cool skins, let the community design some skins and win contests (like Dota 2 did). I remember when the game was popular, some people kept asking for a pve mode, maybe with a campaign mode with cool interactions between heroes. Those times are lost.

[Kralljin]

Given how late to the party Blizzard was, I think they played things about as well as they reasonably could have.

Nah, them pushing HotS that badly into an E-Sport simply set up the whole thing for failure.

(Activision) Blizzard desperately wanted to enter the E-Sport Moba market and pushed HotS hard to enter that thing, when after ~3 years it became obvious to anyone that it's not going to take off, they pulled the plug.
If they had settled on being #3 place and just rolled with it, it might've sticked around but that push basically incurred a debt HotS was not able to cover.

[Rexxgrim]

As someone who played LoL and Dota2 before HotS released: It saddens me so much to see this. I enjoyed HotS way more as a MOBA as it eliminated all the tedium, boring, annoying and outright un-necessary aspects that the 2 aforementioned MOBAs have and just focused on what I would call the fun aspects: Team work over solo work and maps that mad more variety and flavor. Replacing items with talents was the best decision I have ever seen been taken in a MOBA and while the writing has indeed been on the wall for years now, to see it made official as a final nail in the coffin is truly sad.

It's been over 2 and a half years since the last hero release, and the fact that they now won't even do something as miniscule as adding new skins or mounts is just depressing. I have no hope left when it comes to ActiBlizz for fixing this but I will still wait till sometime out in 2025 before I throw in the towel as I hope Microsoft does something. Will they? Likely not, but at this point in time I'd say there is a higher chance for Microsoft to do something after they take over as opposed to ActiBlizz doing anything.

Also, I keep seeing a lot of awry claims here as to why this game began dying, I suggest you all check out the "Death of a Game" video on HotS over at Youtube, it's exceedingly clear that HotS died because Blizzard drained their cash on pumping fake money into it's moba scene as opposed to just taking it slowly and letting it grow naturally. Would it ever beat LoL or Dota2? Nope, it would never do that for the same reason WoW never fell behind any other MMORPG before ActiBlizz began shooting itself AND The game in the foot: It was by most means too big to fail and it would take self destruction on 2 ends to make it fall, and LoL + Dota2 is not likely to do that anytime soon.

Hots never needed to become the biggest, but the fact that it now likely never will stand the chance at becoming relevant again is truly depressing.

[vizzle]

Aside from the fact that they let the MOBA genre slip through their fingers right at the very beginning, the biggest mistake here was the monetization team. The fact that they couldn't figure out how to keep a great game sustainably profitable is a joke. Don't fucking tell me that a Battle Pass system ala Apex Legends wouldn't have worked here, but they never even tried it. Pathetic, really.

Blizzard really has given so many examples of how not to run a business.

[Buffbringer]

Current Heroes Lounge season (EU Season 18) had 854 players sign up. And we're only a small part of the EU playerbase. Game has been very much alive up until today.

I know, i still play the game, since launch.

I was just mocking what i consider a silly remark (not to say another bad word): "hurr are people still playing this??!!!1one"

[Iain]

Aside from the fact that they let the MOBA genre slip through their fingers right at the very beginning, the biggest mistake here was the monetization team. The fact that they couldn't figure out how to keep a great game sustainably profitable is a joke. Don't fucking tell me that a Battle Pass system ala Apex Legends wouldn't have worked here, but they never even tried it. Pathetic, really.

Blizzard really has given so many examples of how not to run a business.

Their introduction of the lootboxes removed any reason for me to buy stuff in the game. Up to that point I was regularly buying skins that I liked, because that was the only way to obtain them. But with Lootboxes, the skins came flying at me, and with sufficient shards to purchase any skins I truly wanted.

Blizzard mistook the customer for a collector who wants to own every skin. But that's not true. Players have a few favourite characters and sure, they want some skins for those. Blizzar gave it to them for free.