Blizzard Speaks out about Warcraft 3 Reforged

During Activision Blizzard's Q4 2019 Earnings Call, J. Allen Brack, President of Blizzard Entertainment answered a question regarding the negative press on Warcraft 3 Reforged.

Anthony Duplisea said: [...] And then relatedly also on Warcraft, there's been some negative press on Warcraft 3 Reforge lately. Can you tell us what you're doing to address that? Thanks.

J. Allen Brack said: [...] Concerning Warcraft III Reforged, honestly, it's been a bit of hurry. Our community has come to expect really amazing things from us, and we've heard from them that we did not achieve that bar. But we stand behind our games and have consistently shown that not only do we support them, but we continue to build on them even after launch. And we're committed to doing that here as well. And so we're going to continue to update the depth of the game and we'll continue to update the community with our plans going forward. Thanks for the question.

1.32.1 PATCH NOTES

Blizzard said: Version 1.32.1 – February 6, 2020 Changes and Bug Fixes Campaign Players should no longer be met with a “defeat” screen after loading into a mission. Audio levels for some dialogue have been adjusted. The animations, triggers, and cameras for some cutscenes have been tweaked. Disconnecting or logging out will no longer change the save file folder. Fixed a number of issues that would block progression or not give credit for completing missions. • Developer’s note: Updating a map for these types of fixes invalidates prior saves. This is similar to how replays from prior game client versions no longer work. Campaign progress will not be lost. ​ Custom Games Multiboards should no longer crash custom games. Joining lobbies for the same map no longer creates duplicate versions of the map. • Developer’s note: This also resolves disconnects from improper map names. ​ Gameplay The rendering of Classic mode has been updated. Resolved an issue with hitching when constructing buildings or training units for the first time. Fixed Ziggurat upgrade animation in Reforged mode. Adjusted animations and portraits for multiple units and buildings. Units completing training while off-screen again have voices. Starting locations are again obscured by the fog of war. ​ Interface Whispers now include the name of the sender. Locale settings for audio and subtitles can now be adjusted independently in Battle .net prior to launching the game. Non-Latin glyphs no longer overlap. A tooltip now displays when hovering over truncated text. Chat keeps up with the latest messages. Heroes on the match results screen are now contained by boundaries. All menus are now distinct between Classic and Reforged graphic settings. • Developer’s note: We’ve implemented a temporary solution to better inform whether you are playing in Reforged or Classic mode, by applying a sepia tone to the background images for Classic. ​

Warcraft III: Reforged Developer Update

Blizzard said: Hail War3 Players, We’ve been following the discussions the past couple days and want to thank you for your feedback as well as your support. First off, we want to say we’re sorry to those of you who didn’t have the experience you wanted, and we’d like to share our plans for what’s coming next. There were a few hours during launch day where we experienced server-load issues that impacted players’ ability to jump right in, but we were able to resolve those later in the day. Separate from that, we’ve seen community feedback about different aspects of Reforged that we wanted to take some time to address. Before we go on: the team is excited that Warcraft III: Reforged is finally upon us and we’re fully committed to supporting the game for a long time to come. The next few patches and updates we’ll discuss below are just part of our ongoing plans. This game is an integral part of the Blizzard DNA, with a team that loves Warcraft III, and we’re looking forward to pouring our hearts into Reforged and the Warcraft III community for the long term. One of the concerns with Reforged that we’ve seen are the visuals when selecting Classic Mode. We’ve identified the bug causing the colors and shading to look different from the original Warcraft III, and we’re testing a fix that will be incorporated in a larger patch addressing this issue and others. We expect to release that late this week. The patch will also address many other known issues, such as fixing some portrait animations and audio bugs, implementing some UI fixes, and more. Please keep an eye out for the patch notes for a detailed list of all the bug fixes. Another area of concern we’re seeing is regarding online features such as leaderboards and clans, which applies to all Warcraft III players, including those who haven’t purchased Reforged. At BlizzCon we talked a lot about how the team is actively working on standing up the back-end to ensure a smooth transition to this new MMR system, much like we did with StarCraft: Remastered. As with Remastered, these and other features will be included in a major patch for Reforged, which will also address the issue for players of the original game. We’ll share release plans as work progresses in the coming weeks—please be assured that the team is hard at work on standing these features up. There are some individual concerns we’ve seen that we’re not currently planning to address and we wanted to give the community a heads-up. As of Version 1.30 of the original game, we saw very low usage of tournaments and of the Reign of Chaos ruleset, so we removed both in mid-2019 (in Version 1.31). Eliminating the maintenance for underused elements has helped us streamline our overall support of the game and focus on areas impacting the most players. That said, we do anticipate that players who prefer Reign of Chaos will find custom games with similar rulesets, which we hope will help satisfy that concern. Related to that, as we talked about last year at BlizzCon, we did not want the in-game cutscenes to steer too far from the original game. We went a little deeper into the thought process behind that at the show, but the main takeaway is that the campaigns tell one of the classic stories in Warcraft history, and we want to preserve the true spirit of Warcraft III and allow players to relive these unforgettable moments as they were (albeit rebuilt with new animations and the higher fidelity art). We know this update doesn’t address all questions, but we’re committed to the development and support of this game. We hope you’ll keep an eye out for this week’s patch and future updates and let us know what you think as we continue fine-tuning things. Until then, thank you as always for your support and passion for Warcraft III. We appreciate all your feedback and will continue to keep the Warcraft III community updated on everything we’re working on. Sincerely, The Warcraft III: Reforged Team

WARCRAFT III: REFORGED PATCH NOTES

Blizzard said: Version 1.32 – January 28, 2020 Relive the events of Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and The Frozen Throne with Warcraft III: Reforged. Experience the epic origin stories of Warcraft, now more stunning and evocative than ever before, with vivid recreations of every hero, unit, building, and environment. Updates Battle .net Install, update, and launch Warcraft III from the Blizzard Battle .net app. Includes integrated Groups and Chat. Campaigns Restored three prologue missions from the original Warcraft III Demo: Riders on the Storm, The Fires Down Below, and Countdown to Extinction. Updated terrain, mission difficulty, and added auto-saves for all missions. Updated art and layout of major cities from three of Warcraft’s iconic cities: Dalaran, Silvermoon, and Stratholme. Updated all campaign characters and visual assets. Collections Equip hero skins, choose your favorite portrait, and browse unlockable campaign and matchmaking rewards. Languages Locale support added for Spanish (Latin America) and Portuguese (Brazil). Locale support updated for Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), French, German, Italian, Korean, Polish, Russian, Spanish (Spain). Menus and Options Added “Grid” or traditional hotkey layouts. New gameplay settings for unit health bars, team colors, hero status bars, and cooldown display. Classic Account linking to keep your historic wins. Legacy accounts will expire in 90 days, so link as soon as possible. Toggle between Classic and Reforged mode for graphics and campaign content. Versus - Competitive Matchmaking Queue for heads-up battle with the new matchmaking system for 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4, or 4-person “Free For All” melee. Create your group and join 2v2, 3v3, or 4v4 together. Known Issues We’ve posted our Known Issues List in the Warcraft III Bug Report forum 481. Please ensure your drivers are up to date before reporting issues.