Fans of real-time strategy can rejoice. Because the legendary Warcraft II is getting a remaster – at least all signs point to that.
Some may mourn the Warcraft franchise on its 30th birthday rather than celebrating. Because it’s been a long time since a new strategy game was released – but that could change soon. Early leaks reveal: Blizzard is bringing back a true classic and with it a Warcraft game that many of you may have never played.
In World of Warcraft, they are currently celebrating 20 years of the MMORPG:
What was found? As wowhead reports, a new entry was found in Blizzard’s Content Distribution Network (CDN) called “Warcraft II: Remastered Internal Alpha”. This is solid proof that Blizzard wants to give the old strategy hit a new coat of paint.
What kind of game is this? The original Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness dates back to 1995, so it is now 29 years old and was released only about a year after the original Warcraft I.
Since then, Blizzard has hardly touched the game. While it was once adapted to be playable on modern PCs, the original game hasn’t fundamentally changed – the graphics and gameplay remain identical. With a “remaster”, one can at least assume that the graphics will be significantly overhauled.
A good point of comparison is probably StarCraft: Remastered, which received similar treatment a few years ago. Here, the old 2D graphics were thoroughly revamped, the level of detail increased, yet the original gameplay was preserved exactly.
How extensive this remaster will be remains to be seen. Some worry that it will be as disappointing as the major flop of “Warcraft III: Reforged”, which promised too much and then delivered hardly any of it.
Is there more to come? Fans of Warcraft’s strategy games can hope that there will be more than just the remaster of Warcraft 2, as further hints suggest so. Blizzard has changed the material on its own page, which previously fell under Warcraft 3, to “Warcraft (RTS)” – the strategy games now have their own, named section.
A few weeks ago, there was also a leak where “Warcraft III: Reforged” received a new internal version – namely version 2.0. So it remains exciting whether there will be some fresh innovations for Warcraft fans after all.
When will there be concrete information? Even though the hints are already quite clear that Warcraft II: Remastered is indeed coming: Absolute certainty will only come in the coming week, as the “Warcraft Direct” will take place – a large livestream where the developers want to talk about all developments and innovations related to Warcraft.
