Blizzard Launching Mobile Version of Warcraft This Year

[Tsing]

Image: Blizzard Entertainment



Blizzard Entertainment has already been booed by fans for trying to turn Diablo into a mobile experience with Diablo Immortal, but the negative feedback hasn’t been enough to persuade the developer from trying the same for one of its other iconic franchises, Warcraft. As part of its fourth-quarter and 2021 financial results, parent company Activision Blizzard revealed that it would be expanding the Warcraft brand with a new mobile game set for release this year. Story or gameplay details are unknown, but executives revealed in 2021 that there are actually multiple Warcraft mobile titles in development, all of which will be free to play.



Activision Blizzard Announces Fourth-Quarter and 2021 Financial Results...

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[Brian_B]

Do you guys not have phones?

This isn't a mobile version of WoW. This won't be "World of Warcraft" on a phone. This will be some crappy mobile titles with Warcraft IP. Probably a bunch of auto-players and strategy card games. There might be some tie-in, where you can bid on the WoW auction house or something... but i'd be very surprised if you could actually play WoW on a phone.

 

[Grimlakin]

Wow... I am so very surprised this is a thing. I mean totally shocked. This is tencent trying desperately to get more out of their investment in WOW before the sale to Microsoft becomes final so they can isolate this piece of software and keep it for their own profits.

 

[Brian_B]

This is tencent trying desperately to get more out of their investment in WOW

Hmm. Possible, but I doubt it.

I thought 10c only had the Chinese publishing rights for WoW, not an actual license to use the IP for other purposes? That, and the article does say this is coming from Blizzard. It's true 10c does have an investment in ActiBliz, but it's a relatively small stake: 5%, so they wouldn't be bullying anyone into this if it wasn't already someone's bright idea.

 

[Nanobot]

This is what happens when instead of innovating and leading the pack, you treat your workplace like a frat house and are trying to catch a ship that has already sailed. The time to get into mobile gaming was how many years ago? And free to play? That’s so old. We know that the whole industry will move to earn to play. Really surprised there was no mention of nfts and the metaverse.