They didn’t actually say so, ‘cause they’re tricksie, but that seems to be the clear indication if you read between the lines of Blizzard’s recent announcement that the Starcraft II beta would start soon, and that Blizzard was planning to release one “frontline” title each year. Blizzard has confirmed several times that Starcraft II will be released before Diablo III, and now that they’ve confirmed that a new game will be released this year, that game will obviously be Starcraft II. The question then, is what’s their game in 2010?
Development on their still-secret Next Gen MMO is accelerating, as the transfer of WoW Lead Designer Jeffrey Kaplan indicates, but that game hasn’t even been revealed yet; there’s no way it’s less than 2 years from release. So 2010’s “frontline” title must be Diablo III. Right?
Would an expansion count as a “frontline” title? How about 2 of them? The 3rd World of Warcraft expansion is set for a 2010 release too—the 1st WoW expansion was released in January 2007 the 2nd in November 2008 (20 months later), and Blizzard has said they’re trying to accelerate the pace of WoW expansion. How about a Starcraft expansion? With SC2 set for release later this year, and the game split into 3 parts, it’s certain that SC2 part 2 (and 3?) will also be released in 2010. Is there room for Diablo III in there as well? Could Blizzard release 3 games in one year? That would be epic, even if 2 of them are expansions. And if expansions don’t count as “frontline” titles, then it’s got to be D3 in 2010.
If you’ve not made your projection yet, join the release date thread and seize your place in prognostication lore!
