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The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

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Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#51

Post by twelvechairs »

mikeklaas wrote: post #43
twelvechairs wrote: post #17

> It’s surprising now to think what might have happened had Blizzard not controlled the intellectual property rights for the Warcraft universe — it’s highly unlikely Blizzard would be such a dominant player in the game industry today. This seems a very important observation. Its interesting how most of the major pre-computer fantasy universes with big fan-bases (Battletech, Dungeons and Dragons, Warhammer, Star Wars…

What? DnD was the dominant force in 90's computer rpgs (BG/BG2/IWD/IWD2/Planescape Torment), and continued into the aughts with NWN/KOTOR/KOTOR2. There are several candidates for greatest rpg of all time on that list. Star Wars has had its share of filler games, but also produced many truly great games. X-Wing/Tie Fighter were huge, and Dark Forces/Jedi Knight were pretty important in the early fps days. I've already…

I guess that statement was a bit of a stretch, probably I could have worded slightly differently, but I'm not sure its too far from reality. If you look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PC_video_g... the only games which are up there are BG/BG2, NWN, and Star Wars Galaxies. Which is pitifully few for such previously dominant companies which had huge fan bases.... Also probably reflects that WoTC did a better job after buying the D&D trademarks (1997 - just before for 3/4 of these games) after TSR completely failed to capitalise for 15 years or so...

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#52

Post by derpmeister »

Argorak wrote: post #48
Schwolop wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it didn't. Eventually it was rewritten (by fans I think) as Dune2000, and this version did have unlimited unit select.

Dune2000 is an official successor by Westwood Studios. It is based on the C&C-Engine and basically plays and behaves like Red Alert 2, right down to the awful C-Movie cutscenes.

Actually it was Red Alert 1 with altered graphics and just a single new feature: technology overview screens. The graphics for the G.I.'s were exactly the same as in RA1.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#53

Post by theycallmemorty »

twelvechairs wrote: post #17

> It’s surprising now to think what might have happened had Blizzard not controlled the intellectual property rights for the Warcraft universe — it’s highly unlikely Blizzard would be such a dominant player in the game industry today. This seems a very important observation. Its interesting how most of the major pre-computer fantasy universes with big fan-bases (Battletech, Dungeons and Dragons, Warhammer, Star Wars…

Dune (mentioned in the article) is one counter-example I can think of.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#54

Post by Retric »

twelvechairs wrote: post #51
mikeklaas wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? DnD was the dominant force in 90's computer rpgs (BG/BG2/IWD/IWD2/Planescape Torment), and continued into the aughts with NWN/KOTOR/KOTOR2. There are several candidates for greatest rpg of all time on that list. Star Wars has had its share of filler games, but also produced many truly great games. X-Wing/Tie Fighter were huge, and Dark Forces/Jedi Knight were pretty important in the early fps days. I've already…

I guess that statement was a bit of a stretch, probably I could have worded slightly differently, but I'm not sure its too far from reality. If you look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PC_video_g... the only games which are up there are BG/BG2, NWN, and Star Wars Galaxies. Which is pitifully few for such previously dominant companies which had huge fan bases.... Also probably reflects that WoTC d…

Lists like that are dominated by recent releases because of how rapidly the industry has expanded over the last 30 years.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#55

Post by namdnay »

phaus wrote: post #30
cpeterso wrote: post #18

I read that World of Warcraft was born when playtesting prototypes of Warcraft III, the first 3D version in the Warcraft series. People were having so much fun just running around with their 3D heroes that the concept grew. This is a great example of letting the product lead you .

Unfortunately, while the heroes may have inspired WoW, they also ruined the series. With the 3rd installment, Warcraft ceased to be a real-time strategy game and became an action-rpg. The heroes were so overpowered that you could win by focusing entirely on power-leveling your hero instead of building a city and managing units.

I think it's a clever move. It means they avoided conflicting with the Starcraft series' gameplay style. WC3 is halfway between SC2 and DOTA

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#56

Post by oconnor0 »

sukuriant wrote: post #12
cdmckay wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought that influence was common knowledge?

Ditto. Especially for Starcraft.

I feel like I've mostly heard about people talking about W40k being influenced by (or "ripping off") Starcraft and not the reverse.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#57

Post by silon3 »

MikeCapone wrote: post #24

I spent my youth playing Dune 2 (and then Warcraft, etc). This brings back so many memories. I had to find some Dune 2 gameplay on youtube... Hoping some people here will enjoy it too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiJLOjeyDxs Being a fan of Starcraft 2, I can't believe how painful it was to have to select each unit individually... Glad the mechanics of RTSes have evolved.

Dune 2 is favorite Tower Defense + Tank Rush game. Last month I played Dune 2000 Ordos to Level 8 (it's quite hard, or I suck more than I did in the youth).

There's also a "Super Dune 2" somewhere on the net for more difficulty.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#58

Post by Wilduck »

MikeCapone wrote: post #35

I can't wait for part 2. I wish there was a book written about the early days of Blizzard or Westwood Studios and those kind of great companies, kind of like the book Masters of Doom about id Software, or Revolution in the Valley about Apple.

Have you read the journals of Jordan Mechner from when he was developing Prince of Persia? They're a fascinating look at the development of early computer games.

http://jordanmechner.com/old-journals/

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#59

Post by skrebbel »

netcoyote wrote: post #6
knowtheory wrote: post #2

> Before I started in the game industry I had worked extensively with several low-end “Computer Assisted Design” (CAD) programs like MacDraw and MacDraft to design wine-cellars for my dad’s wine cellar business, so it seemed natural to use the “click & drag” rectangle-selection metaphor to round up a group of units to command. > I believe that Warcraft was the first game to use this user-interface metaphor. When I fi…

[note: I wrote the Warcraft article] /agree If the patent-standards for the 80's and 90's were as awful as today, I'm sure that some CAD company would have locked up the idea of drag-select, and the Macintosh WIMP interface (and hence MacDraw/MacDraft) would have been legally impossible to create. On a related note, after Blizzard Entertainment was acquired along with Sierra Entertainment in a corporate merger, I got…

Soooo, Warcraft 1 was mostly made by a junior programmer with 3 years of experience.

That's so awesome and so very bad for my ego at the same time.

Re: The Making of Warcraft 1: Origin of the series & creation of multi-unit select

#60

Post by coldarchon »

netcoyote wrote: post #6
knowtheory wrote: post #2

> Before I started in the game industry I had worked extensively with several low-end “Computer Assisted Design” (CAD) programs like MacDraw and MacDraft to design wine-cellars for my dad’s wine cellar business, so it seemed natural to use the “click & drag” rectangle-selection metaphor to round up a group of units to command. > I believe that Warcraft was the first game to use this user-interface metaphor. When I fi…

[note: I wrote the Warcraft article] /agree If the patent-standards for the 80's and 90's were as awful as today, I'm sure that some CAD company would have locked up the idea of drag-select, and the Macintosh WIMP interface (and hence MacDraw/MacDraft) would have been legally impossible to create. On a related note, after Blizzard Entertainment was acquired along with Sierra Entertainment in a corporate merger, I got…

Are there any patents which keep me away from buying this gem on Good Old Games gog.com?
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