Next Blizzard MMO won't be WOW 2

By Oli Welsh Published 17 October, 2008

Morhaime drives final nail in that coffin.

Blizzard boss Mike Morhaime has finally laid to rest any speculation that the company's next MMO will be a follow-up to World of Warcraft.

"It's not going to be a World of Warcraft sequel," he said simply in an interview with Wired.

Despite Blizzard's repeated insistence that it's working on something "different" with the "next-gen MMO" it is known to be working on, speculation that the company was working on a new version of World of Warcraft has persisted in some quarters.

Morhaime said that Blizzard isn't aiming to replace WOW with a sequel - or anything else, for that matter. He hopes the two games will run side-by-side.

"We're not trying to replace World of Warcraft with this new MMO. We're trying to create a different massively multiplayer experience, and hopefully World of Warcraft will still be going strong when that one is released."

Ealier in the week, MTV revealed that WOW lead designer Jeff Kaplan - the man responsible for the design of the game's world, quests and dungeons - was "definitely involved" with the new game.

"I think the great part about a new MMO from Blizzard is that it doesn't have to be WOW," Kaplan told MTV. "There are a lot of lessons we learned in making World of Warcraft, and some of those you can take and do things better than you ever did before."

Kaplan also hinted that the new game may not share a high-fantasy theme with WOW and most of its competitors. "I'm shocked we haven't seen more sci-fi, near-future, post-apocalyptic, historical MMOs; there's all these completely different fantasy settings beyond the traditional high fantasy ones," Kaplan said.

Asked which of those settings the new MMO might have, he joked: "All of those combined!" Sounds a bit like Otherland, Jeff.

In fact, Blizzard's vagueness about the project may in part be because it hasn't decided what it is yet.

A high-level industry source has told Eurogamer that he believes Blizzard has two teams working on competing MMO concepts, and that it has yet to pick which one will go into full production.

Don't hold your breath to find out. It's "going to be a while" before we see Blizzard's next MMO, Kaplan says.

Picture of Oli.

About Oli Welsh

Oli is Eurogamer's acting deputy editor and reviews editor and likes to take things one word at a time. He is among the best dressed people in South London.

Read more articles from Oli by visiting the Oli Welsh archive page.

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Comments (25) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • iokthemonkey #1 3 years ago

    I hope it's some kind of sci-fi thing. I'd love to see what Blizzard could do there.

    Just make sure there's more to it than level grinding, pleasethankyouverymuch.

  • 7creature #2 3 years ago

    Oh, StarCraft MMO confirmed. Finally :) Maybe they will use stuff from Starcraft: Ghost... Considering amount of material already existing.

  • Xerx3s #3 3 years ago

    As much as I despise WoW and MMO's in general, wtf change a winning formula? It's just bad business practise...

  • iokthemonkey #4 3 years ago

    wtf change a winning formula? It's just bad business practise...

    -----

    WoW changed the formula by making MMOs more accessible. I don't think people realise the impact WoW had on the MMO market. For all its "inspired by" and "borrowed" elements, WoW was pretty revolutionary when it came out.

    Secondly, a lot of people won't play fantasy-based games as they dislike the genre. So moving into a new realm (such as sci-fi) offers an alternative to WoW. They've explicitly said, this isn't to replace WoW - it's to compliment it. In business speak, that means they're looking to hook in the WoW audience AND people who don't play fantasy games.

  • videogangs #5 3 years ago

    wtf change a winning formula? It's just bad business practise...

    -----

    New from Ford in 2009- The Model T!

    -_-

  • butler` #6 3 years ago

    like that wasn't obv!

  • rudedudejude #7 3 years ago

    Starcraft mmo it is then.

  • VicViper #8 3 years ago

    Please, Please, Please be a Sci-Fi based one, As much as I love warcraft I could do without Fantasy setting for once.
    This is why stargate worlds/Startrek Online looks so very intresting

  • Oldern #9 3 years ago

    Starcraft players are loving an RTS (do did WoW players, I know), and with the incoming of StarCraft II, i cant really see if that brand is strong enough to survive something like that.

    I really think that Blizzard will try something new. Starcraft should be kept to be THE competitive RTS, because obviously, Warcraft III failed doing the same.

  • ZuluHero #10 3 years ago

    World of Lost Vikings :)


    And their might not be many Sci Fi mmos "at the moment" - but there are plenty in the works ;)

  • Nithron #11 3 years ago

    The real problem is that while there are, or at least have been, a few sci-fi MMOs, they've all used the exact same mechanics(Possibly excepting Eve) as the fantasy MMOs, just heavy-handedly applied to bullets instead of swords.

    Which really doesn't work. And isn't very fun.

  • Machewman #12 3 years ago

    To all above asking for a Starcraft MMO, I have to tell you that the new MMO was confirmed at Blizzcon to be set in a totally new universe. So no World of Starablocraft, sorry :p

  • 7creature #13 3 years ago

    Well, StarCraft has really a lot of potential. I would say even more than WoW. The world was already described in detail after SC came out and with books, fiction, Starcraft: Ghost and of course following SC II, it will get even bigger. And SC has rather advantage compared to WoW - basically endless worlds/planets to explore. Not even talking about good old Earth :o)

    Xerx3s: Eh? I think you are missing certain pattern (you could say 'winning' pattern): Warcraft 2 (mainly conservative RTS) -> Warcraft 3 (not exactly conservative RTS with added (weird) RPG/hero elements) -> WoW (Many Men Online Role Playing Girls). And now we have SC (RTS) -> SC 2 (who knows...) -> ???

    I would say this riddle seems to be rather easy...

  • rudedudejude #14 3 years ago

    I think for them to launch an mmo on totally new ip is a bit of a risky business decision tbh.

  • iokthemonkey #15 3 years ago

    I think for them to launch an mmo on totally new ip is a bit of a risky business decision tbh.

    ---

    I dunno. All they have to do is say, "From Blizzard - Creators of World of Warcraft" and it'll be guaranteed a hit.

  • makeamazing #16 3 years ago

    If your successful you dont sit on your hands waiting for something better to come out, you get on with the next best thing. Why because alot of people will still probably play WOW, and they can continue to make money from it while pushing new ideas and new technology.

    I wouldnt be surprised if they do MMO whatever and then while pushing that get on with WOW2... common sense really.

  • hula hoops #17 3 years ago

    "All of those combined!"

    How on earth are you gonna combine history with near-future setting?

    Oh wait ... you did that in WoW with Cavern of Time.

  • Les #18 3 years ago

    It would be moronic to release WoW 2. There's no need (money is earned through subscriptions not selling the game itself), annual updates/upgrades of the game engine are more than adequate (and TBH most gaming proper sequels don't do much more).

  • UncleLou #19 3 years ago

    Of course it will be Starcraft. I have no idea how anyone can believe otherwise. Revitalising the franchise with the RTS, MMO to follow - with 3 different races/factions already in place.

  • Orange #20 3 years ago

    Well if all they're doing is changing the environment and keeping the core gameplay the same then f**ck that.

  • anomagnus #21 3 years ago

    why bother doing Starcraft

    all you're doing is taking the WoW frame work and re-skinning it

    i dont think they'll do starcraft, because it'll simply canablize their existing market

    what they will want to do is create an mmo that offers something completely different to WoW, forcing you too play both of them in order to fill two different needs/desires

  • UncleLou #22 3 years ago

    Nah. Don't believe that for a second. Blizzard aren't great innovators, and by the time it comes out, WoW will probably be past its prime. Fresh scenario, better graphics obviously, and of course a few new ideas, but probably a traditional game.

  • sneetch #23 3 years ago

    As a a Diablo MMO would be very like WoW, I'll predict a StarCraft "action" MMO like everyone else. :)

    Probably heavily inspired by WARs/DaoCs RVR model and Planetside.

    @Machewman
    "To all above asking for a Starcraft MMO, I have to tell you that the new MMO was confirmed at Blizzcon to be set in a totally new universe. So no World of Starablocraft, sorry :p "

    Ah, oh well. I still think they'll go with a Sci-fi action MMO. Where the only tanks are the ones with caterpillar tracks. ;)

  • sneetch #24 3 years ago

    @Adam_T
    "I think for them to launch an mmo on totally new ip is a bit of a risky business decision tbh."

    Making any MMO that isn't World of Warcraft is a risky business decision for Blizzard: they won't be guaranteed any custom from their current player base after all as they'll be playing WoW. Look at the relative failure of EQ II, the EQ players were supposed to leap at the chance of moving to EQ II but that's a tough thing to ask someone who has put so much time into a character.

    So they'll be bringing out a new MMO that has to compete with WoW amongst other games.

  • wowgoldpaladin #25 3 years ago

    I hope this new MMO from Blizzard will have a booming in-game economy that uses in-game currency like wow gold.

  • Nytol #26 3 years ago

    http://www.blizzards-next-generation-mmo...