Has Blizzard Made A Remarkable Comeback, Or What?

About five years ago or so, Blizzard, once a company spoken of with the kind of reverence reserved only for the very best gaming companies (such as Valve or Nintendo) seemed to be suffering a loss of public standing or perception. They seemed to be losing their way, and their mantra of just making the best possible product for the customer:

• World of Warcraft was suffering- not only did the game itself plummet in quality, but subscriber count also began to drop dramatically.
• It took them ten years to follow up on Starcraft with a sequel. Starcraft II finally released, but Blizzard followed up with the baffling decision of splitting the game into three parts- the result of this is that the story seems to have suffered, and from what I understand, people generally are not big fans of the mechanics either.
  Starcraft is the one Blizzard property that I am ignorant of, so I will defer to being corrected here, but judging by the game's reception on Reddit and NeoGAF, it seems to have had no tail- it just petered out, died out, down to Blizzard's poor handling.
• Diablo III took over ten years to be released. When it was released, the launch was a disaster, full of bad policies (the always online DRM), bad design decisions (the RMAH, and how it negatively influenced the endgame), and bad PR (the infamous 'Deal With It')
• Blizzard completely missed the MOBA train, despite the fact that a mod of their game is what started it to begin with
• At this point, Blizzard was relying entirely on IP that were over twenty year old- and they only had three of them, with no new one in sight.

Fats forward to now, and they seem to be stronger than ever, moving from strength to strength:

• World of Warcraft has staged a remarkable comeback. The latest expansion, Warlords of Draenor, seems to be the best received since The Burning Crusade, and subscriber numbers have pulled back from the horrific slump they have been in for years.
• Diablo III is fucking amazing now- not only did Blizzard continue to patch and fix the old game, removing the controversial DRM, fixing the poor design decisions, removing the RMAH, but the expansion, Reaper of Souls, completely transformed the game, and made it amazing- it also helps that Diablo III got some exceptionally well done console ports. Right now, the game has sold 20 million copies worldwide, and that's before the Xbox One and PS4 versions are taken into account. If Diablo had ever suffered in any way possible, that period is long gone now- it is now in a position of more strength than ever before.
• Blizzard has managed to successfully diversify- last year, they released Hearthstone, which is absolutely great, probably the best example of a free to play game, one of the most popular, most played, and most watched games in the world, and probably one of the best products to have come out of Blizzard in years. The game is an absolute joy to play.
• After missing the MOBA train, Blizzard are getting ready to launch their own new MOBA, Heroes of the Storm, and by all accounts, it looks great.
• Between Hearthstone, Heroes of the Storm, and Overstrike, Blizzard have also launched a new stable of IP, each in a different genre (card battle, MOBA, shooter), that they can rely on, in addition to Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablo.

Really, the only issue that still stands might be Starcraft II, and like I said, I am willing to be corrected on that.

So... I mean, is this a hell of a comeback, or what?

I enjoy SC2...eh?

Never enjoyed a single game they made so dunno

No.

Has the last chapter of Starcraft 2 release?...if not no. :P

Outside of D3 pissing people off, I didn't realize they were really in trouble. Heck even with D3 problems they seemed to be doing fine

I thought Blizzard was fine? They make good games, and they all sale really well it seems.

I don't really like HoTS(played the Alpha a bit) that much, but Overwatch looks promising.

Lol no, outside of SC2 they've fallen from grace. It took them what two years to fix Diablo 3, which everything that they "fixed" should have been in D3 since day FRAKING 1. As for WoW, WoD was good for the nostalgia feeling which quickly burns through those nostalgia glasses and it shows WoD is just MoP 2.0 but even more dumbed down and even more gating.

The Blizzard that we grew up with died in 2009

Heroes of the Storm completely missed the point of the Moba genre.

Warlords of Draenor is the best expansion since TBC, but WotLK and Cataclysm were both blegh and MoP was merely decent. So the bar wasn't particulary high. Still a solid 8/10 though.

Hearthstone is supriringlsy good.

Overall, they are not as good as they used to be, but they are still better compared to their slump. They made a comeback of sorts. But they aren ot the blizzard of old.

They never went anywhere. Diablo 3 was decent but not good enough by Blizzard's standards but after Reaper of Souls, it's amazing and they apologized for Diablo 3's launch (No one is perfect). On other hand Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty was masterpiece (and yeah I've played the original + Brood Wars) and Heart of the Swarm was great.

The last year they released Warlords of Drenor that many consider as the best expansion for WoW in years and Hearthstone was also fun as hell. Diablo 3: UEE on consoles was nothing but impressive. They announced new IP(Overwatch) as well as revealed Legacy of the Void and Heroes of the Storm. Overwatch(Multiplayer FPS) and Heroes of the Storm(MOBA) aren't my thing but why should I blame them for trying something different? I am excited about LotV and can't wait to see what they do on Single Player side after it.

I am playing Warcraft 3 + The Frozen Throne right now and it is still fun as hell and Wings of Liberty was one of my most favorite games of last gen. People always hate when something becomes popular but fact remains, they make games that people can play for years to come instead of 6 hours long games with no replay value, advertised as "AAA". Yes, they are greedy but at the same time great "game developers".

Edit: I don't know why you mentioned Starcraft 2. It was the best Blizzard game in recent years. And did you really expect HoTS and LotV campaigns to be included in the base game and have length, variety and production values of Wings of Liberty?

Meh. Diablo III still sucks.

You can still feel the Activision taint that's followed them ever since the merger. They're not and will never be the same company that was loved back in the day.

That said they're still a very very talented developer and they'll still make great games but they'll never be as great as what the old blizzard could pull off, they've gotten way to greedy and anti-consumer lately.

Diablo III what?

I loved 1 & 2, III can go die in a ditch somewhere, art style is shit, game play looks shit, online only is shit.

They're probably the single most overhyped game developer to me. They take ages to put out one fucking game and when they do it's not that great. World of WarCraft and WarCraft 3 are incredible achievements in gaming (despite being Warhammer clones) but everything else is so uninteresting to me.

They were one of the best PC developers. Ever since they got taken over by Activision the quality aspect isn't up to the mark when they released games. Blizzard North was fantastic!

They were never out of it. Diablo III sold 10 mill before patches.

Lost Ark Online looks more fun than Diablo 3

they have def turned Diablo 3 around

@FireEmblem_Man:

Lost Ark is MMORPG not ARPG. Yeah it looks amazing, most Korean games do but their business model sucks.

Over dramatic much? All they've done is continue to release games and expansions to record sales and critical acclaim. I think you spend a tad too much time in here. It's warping your sense of reality...

My copy of Diablo 3: UEE is going to be arriving today from Amazon!!!!

I haven't played a Diablo game since the first one on the PS1.

Did they ? Didn't notice ?

@Boddicker:

Diablo 2 + lord of destruction is amazing. You should play it. Any PC can run it.

Diablo 3 wasn't a terrible game but for a company once put in the same league as Valve it was stunning how risk-averse its design was considering the time put into making it.

Amplifying just how low Blizzard aimed with Diablo 3 is how smaller companies have gone on to make very similar games to Diablo 3 but with fewer resources and development time.

Yeah, I heard Diablo 2 is the best of the bunch. I may get it for my laptop.

Comeback from what? They've never had a significant drop off in interest, quality games or revenue generation streams.

Diablo III was a minor hiccup.

Starcraft 2 is excellent.

This.

I'm a terrible Korean. Probably why I became Canadian instead.

As someone who was there from the Diablo III beta, I can't believe how good the current state of Diablo III is right now. They've made so many recent good decisions with that game.

@santoron: It is entirely possible to have a discussion or a response without resorting to insulting other users, particularly in cases like this where there is literally no provocation on my side. All I am doing is trying to have some actual discussion to this board. I am sorry you find that offensive, but I would like for you to not be a jerk about it. Particularly since I know you are better than that.

And had 9.9 million unhappy customers before patches :P

That's a Pokemon move. Blizzard :D

Haven't bought a single product of theirs since Diablo III.

I can give my money to a lot more deserving developers, those that do not treat their customers like crap. The AODRM and RMAH showed me how much respect they have for their buyers: none.

Meh, other than the console version of Diablo 3 I don't really care about blizzard games. They seem boring.

I don't get this thread. Besides Diablo 3 PC, everything Blizzard made recently has been quite excellent.

Blizzard hasn't dropped in quality unless you consider Diablo 3 PC. Yeah, they turned that around, but SC2 and WoW have always been at a high standard. Saying WoW was dropping in quality is as debatable as "my favorite Zelda game is ___". This thread should have been only about D3 PC; you are being overdramatic.

I've heard these excuses before. What have they released besides a mini game and expansions? Diablo 3 was their major release and they released it 5 times over. I get they are trying to re-market/reestablish themselves but overall blizzard is not the company they used to be. It's not even the same people.

@charizard1605:

Their new IP is overwatch not overstrike

I enjoyed SC2, though i havent play it in a long time nor have i tried the expansion.

D3 Vanilla was/is still a very shallow game with no end game, bad itemization and little to no fun builds. Im sure it has gotten better with the expansions, but D3 left a such a bad taste, i dont plan on giving them a cent anytime soon.
Specially when there are better options for dungeon crawlers.

only played 2 of their most recent releases: D3(RoS) and HS

D3(RoS) was alright, but PoE is definitely the spiritual successor to D2, and they managed to do microtransactions the right way.

HS is purely based on luck rather than skill, seriously one of the worst TCG ever, but i still enjoy it

so all in all i think blizzard has a long way to go if they want to be considered as a competitor

Nah.

I don't know, too busy enjoying Sony's tremendous comeback with the PS4. Might even make a thread about it.

Do you? Is it fun bro? I have never been an RTS player but I trust you, ya ole fart!!! Diablo 3 was a lot of fun, imo. But I figured it would be. I never got into WoW so I cant comment there.

Kaz hasn't com yet?

I did not notice this "comback."

They're better off now but they still haven't returned to form. What they need to do is fire their writing staff and get some people in who can make some better and more interesting story content. Also they need to stop charging super-premium prices for basic services and games. Just because they're over their missteps doesn't mean they've made a comeback. Their latest offerings are really good, don't get me wrong, but they're far from the classics the company is known for.

Blizzard is still the same for me.

They make good games that I grow tired of after a while.

D3 was the only game they made that I've played that I thought was pure crap.

I found Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3 to be worse than their predecessors and have no interest in their mobile and moba trash.

So to me they are nothing special anymore.