For me, that isn’t the point. What’s exciting is the idea of eventually having new stories. Building upon something that’s already great. Warcraft III is sort of a “clean slate”, relative to WoW, that would allow this. On the other hand, connecting it to the MMORPG would lock WC3’s story in a box. A box that has many undesirable traits. New stories would be forced to retread a path left muddy.
As great as World of Warcraft was, and as much as I personally enjoyed it, it had to sacrifice a big part of what made Warcraft 3 great and memorable. I really appreciate this revival, and I love much of what’s being done, but I can’t help but feel like potential is being squandered.
I don’t want the original campaigns changed at all, I want them exactly the same, but this would be a good time to get some new assets for multiplayer.
Woah there. They want to retcon Warcraft 3 to fit with WoW? Just… why? I want my old Warcraft 3 campaign in HD, because this is what I grew up with and loved. Let WoW have its lore, and Warcraft 3 have his.
There actually already is a reference to Stormwind in the original campaign. In the last level of the Rexxar campaign Admiral Daelin Proudmoore says to Jaina something like: “You were too young to remember what the Orcs did to Stormwind.”
But I agree with you. They shouldn’t put any unnecessary references into the game.
One retcon that is probably goint to happen is that they will change the Sea Witch in the Tutorial campaign when you’re on the isles with the Dark Spear Trolls into an actual Naga. I actually don’t mind this but I hope they won’t change too much.
What I’m afraid of is that they will actually put the retconed Draenei into the Outland missions of the Blood elf campaign. If that happens I’m out.
I think they can’t do this with Draenei there. There was Akama after all, so they will not change also characters. They will be broken draenei I think. Also I will not like any map changes like in “The Culling” but it’s more known for WoW players - so we have it like this, without Zoo for example.
I hope in this matter they will not change a lot. You mentioned about Human campaign - what about Outland’s map differences from Warcraft 3 and WoW (Black Citadel/Temple)? Or for example Vandermar Village location in WoW? What they think about this in Reforged? This is something what interested me a lot. Some time ago I asked some retired Blizzard employee (David Fried who also done for example original “The Culling” mission for RoC) and he said:
“The differences between WoW and War 3 were byproducts of being different games with different level designers and very little oversight on cohesion. It was up to the individual area designers of WoW to use or not use as much of War III as they wanted. Similarly when we made the War III maps, we loosely looked at maps and areas from Warcraft lore, but most of us just made whatever served the gameplay best.”
-I hope doing Reforged Warcraft they will look more carefully on Warcraft 3 details.
I’m mostly worried for the Easter Eggs in the levels. While I liked that they swapped bandits for orcs as a little touch, I don’t think it was as good as the Zoo. This, and some of the secrets (like the Secret Level you unlock in the Blood Elf prison level) were (imo) vital parts of making the campaign interesting, and made you explore the levels, rather than just blitz through them. (I’m fine with minor cosmetic changes to make the level designs smoother/more defined, so long as the actual levels are faithful to their sources. I just don’t think you can make significant changes to the reasons people do things/what order they do things in, and not diminish the story).
Also, if I remember correctly, Akama mentions that he is some of the last of his kind, being hunted to extinction by the Orcs. So making him just a variant to the Draeneis pretty much undercuts his entire backstory.
I definetely see them creating a new Tile Set for the Black Temple mission in the Blood elf campaign. It’s just gonna be Shadowmoon Valley instead of Hellfire Peninsula.
They will also have to change Mulgore in the Rexxar campaign. In Warcraft 3 Mulgore looks exactly like the Barrens. In WC3R they will probably just make it more green.
Well for example I do not like it and it’s probably for a while till they will have bandit’s models done. Why not Orcs - well Orcs are ok, but Darkspear Trolls there - I don’t think so it’s good idea from lore perspective. I understand Grunt and some Forest Trolls (Amani - those who were allied with Horde in the Second War) but not Trolls from Island, where they for the first time met Thrall and Orcs and they travel with them to Kalimdor. Those are not suppose to be there, outside Stratholme and be reference to the Second War.
So again small details but make huge difference:
Grunt+Forest Trolls; Amani > Grunt+Darkspear Trolls
Agreed. It’s easy to lose sight of details like that when you are a game designer eager to “improve” the mission, but it would be something I instantly notice when I play.
Yeah, some units are interesting to see after remasterd. Did you remember units from “Brothers in Blood”? There were some that I remember and were mystery for me. They were called Mystics and were tainted in red and they looks like human priests. They were supposed to be Night Elves. Ok - they maybe were but they weren’t because they looks like humans. Funny thing was that according to David Fried every different unit was tainted red and bigger than other units (Cenarius, Tichondrius, Califax, Mystics - funny detail from the past how they dealt with those kind of specific units):
"Assets were locked at that point, so if we wanted something in a level that didn’t exist, we had to use what was available or do without it. The old joke around the level designers was “If you need a new unit, just pick one that exists, scale it up and tint it red.”
Yeah, again very excited about Reforged. Hope they will make it as good as I imagine they are able to now, after all those years.
I agree that the changes should be minimal. I’m all for upholding what we love about Warcraft III, and that includes the campaign missions and the story. Changing maps a bit isn’t the end of the world (though I hope the changes are small), but making changes to the story I would consider more questionable.
If they add more content after the original campaign missions, then obviously things are more up in the air.
Good point. While I’m sure they put in the units mostly to show off their new models, I hope they don’t make it to the final version (as bandits made a lot more sense being there anyways). I’d like to see new Easter Eggs like that, especially if they do minor map tweaks and can fit them in in a way that makes sense (new nooks and crannies and all that), but I’m skeptical that if they go through every map like this, that Wc3R will feel the same as the original.
Why? They don’t make any sense now. And really all they have to do is just make the models a bit draenei-ish. Akama, after all, says that they are darenei. Just imagine how confusing that is to a new player if they have seen draenei in WoW and suddenly they look like some mutant frogs in WC3…
For starters, Akama draenei still have their WC3 model in WoW, no one is going to be confused to see them like that. Also, the draeneredar retcon is the most infamous in the history of Warcraft: it was a clear departure from established lore, the spaceship theme felt out of place, let’s say they are not particularly popular among “old times fans”. Last but not least, I want the Warcraft 3 I grew up with, not something “improved” by WoW items I don’t necessarily care about.
Well, I don’t see any problems with that. Anyway, every other possible lore has pretty much accepted that now, it would be just stupid if WC3R suddenly took a different route, wether you like it or not. It’s not like it’s gonna make the game worse - at best the models are gonna be just a bit different. The draenei lore is not explained or handled in any way in WC3.
Warcraft 3 reforged should take the route they did when they made the original Warcraft 3. I’m interested in the 2002-2003 game, not the 2007 sort-of-sequel.
I think they meant if somehow they try to involve “uncorrupted” Draenei in the Outland chapters, at best they should keep to Broken and Lost Ones models, maybe make some models similar to the mix Akama’s model in WoW is, some easter eggs like ruined buildings or lore references would be accpetable, but not outright inclussion.
As far as I am concerned, I think they should remake the maps to be more in line with how they look in WoW (and the art that has come with it as well, like the Sunwell). I also want them to redo the models so they are more in line with what is in established lore now - basically, I expect Akama to look like a Broken more than a Lost One (though I anticipate both will be available).
I doubt they would add Draenei (uncorrupted ones), but if they do, they would most likely just be creeps or side things. I do want them to expand Outland’s creeps, I for one would love to see Arrakoa creep camps. The more models they want to put in, the better - because then we can re use them on the World Editor, and I will never complain about more assets for designing custom maps.
The only changes I would not like are if they actually change the story - and from what I’ve seen so far, there’s no risk of that. At most they would add little side things like bosses from WoW as a souped up creep to kill (like Salramm and Meathook as a buffed Necromancer and Abomination), which don’t affect the actual gameplay.
Not to mention as someone brought up before, many people have probably played the original campaign multiple times (I know I’ve gone through it at least four times), so if they spice things up for the reforged by adding new easter eggs or modifying the maps a bit, I would love it. After all, the original game is still there and will still be there if I ever want to play those maps again.
And finally… I am sure if people really like the old unchanged campaign maps, people will make a full custom map campaign version that is a perfect 1:1 translation of the original Warcraft 3 campaign, but with all the new assets instead. So bring on as much new stuff as they can - we can just repurpose it for our world editing.
