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| J. Allen Brack, president of Blizzard (right) and Senior Vice President and Co-Founder Alan Adham (left) | ||
Blizzard’s annual game festival, BlizzConline, opened on the 20th. At this event, held online, announcements and highlights related to various games in service or under development by Blizzard are followed.
In this year’s event, instead of unpublished new titles, additional news of existing games were announced. ‘Diablo 2: Resurrection’, a remaster of’Diablo 2′, new job information for’Diablo 4′, new regularity and game mode of’Hearthstone’,’The Chain of Domination’, a large-scale update of’World of Warcraft’, etc. Showed off.
Blizzard arranged for video interviews with executives for the Blizz Conline. Blizzard President J. Allen Brack and Senior Vice President and Co-Founder Alan Adham attended the event.
President J. Allen Brack replied, “The content of the announcement changes according to the development cycle every year” to the opinion that there is a lack of news for the new work at this BlizzConline. At BlizzCon in 2019, bold new titles such as “Overwatch 2” and “Diablo 4” were announced, but it is an unusual case for new works to be released at once. He said, “This year’s BlizzConline was prepared in order to inform the news of existing games,” he said. “Although we have been preparing offline events every year, we also have online events so that people who cannot get tickets or cannot visit California can enjoy the event. In particular, this year, it will be held as a 100% online event. We have finished preparing for quarantine, putting the health of not only our employees but also our partners’ employees first.”
Vice President Alan Adham also emphasized Blizzard’s philosophy of revealing the game when it’s completely ready. He said, “A lot of projects are being prepared, but it is difficult to tell them in detail,” he said. “I will provide information after more preparations.”
“In the early days of Blizzard, it took a few months to create a game,” he said. “But now the situation is different. To develop new games while continuing to support existing games, a lot of development resources are required. I have many ideas, but In order to realize everything, there is a lack of manpower.
Regarding the recent opinion that Blizzard is focusing on recreating existing games rather than discovering new IPs, he replied that it was because of the demands of users, not the company’s policy. President J. Allen Brack said, “In the case of WoW Classic, there have been requests to release the game for many years. The same is true for the Diablo 2 remastered version. Also, the Blizzard Arcade Collection, which updated its early hits such as’The Lost Vikings’, celebrates its 30th anniversary. It was released for the purpose.” “The number of people in charge of WoW Classic’s new expansion pack, Burning Crusade, is very small,” he said. “The majority of people are busy preparing new games and new content.”
President J. Allen Brack explained that’Diablo 2: Resurrection’ is the last case of remastering an existing game. In the meantime, Blizzard has released a remastered version of’StarCraft’ and’Warcraft 3’with improved graphics and convenience. President J. Allen Brack said, “There seems to be no more games for us to remaster.”
Blizzard, which celebrates its 30th anniversary, plans to deliver new joy to users in the next 30 years. “We’ve changed a lot in making games over the past 30 years,” said Alan Adham. “Text-based adventure games have changed to graphics, and traditional RTS games have changed to tower defense and other genres. Over the next 30 years,” I think there will be a game we couldn’t have imagined. The resolution will be greatly improved, and the immersion and realism through VR headsets will increase. Blizzard loves creating new games. We will continue to work with passionate and creative developers. Said.
The executives did not forget to say thank you to Korean users. President J. Allen Brack said, “I feel a deep bond with Korean users and I respect them. It is not easy for the game to succeed globally, but among the successes of Blizzard, Korea has made a lot of contributions.” Looking at the Overwatch League alone, there are not many Korean players among the professional players. We will continue to consider the opinions of Korean users very important when making decisions.”
Dongmin Seo, reporter of Hankyung.com Gametalk