No-one could acuse Blizzard of jumping ship to the console market, even after people claimed that the PC was dying. However, Blizzard has rejected claims that it is a 'PC developer', intead claiming that they just happen to publish games on the PC. In fact, Jay Wilson (game director of Diablo 3), in an exclusive interview with PCGamer asserted that 'Blizzard has done quite well off of that – the fact that people have the illusion that PC is not a place where you can make money. It’s made it even easier for us to do really well.'
And do well they have. World of Warcraft was just the first in a massive line of new generation Blizzard games, a line that includes StarCraft II and the upcoming Diablo 3.
Jay went on to claim that it was down to functionality, rather than platform loyalty, that had kept Blizzard in the PC market all these years. And that makes sense. It's hard to see how World of Warcraft or StarCraft II could be easily ported onto a controller. My first RTS experience was on the PSX with Command and Conquer: Red Alert. It's safe to say that I didn't know what I was missing until I used a mouse and keyboard.
Blizzard's assertion that they're a games developer rather than a PC developer is actually rather good, in my mind. True, they have no platform loyalty, but as long as they continue to make great games for the PC, we're laughing. And more focus on the game, rather than the platform, has got to be a good thing.
Good on you, Blizzard!
Credit: PCGamer and Tom's Hardware.
