After hinting at new Diablos and Starcrafts, Itzik Ben Bassat says his company's next MMO game will be more "innovative" than its current cash cow; WOW movie still in development.

By Tor Thorsen, GameSpot
Posted Jan 22, 2007 2:26 pm PT

Last week, Blizzard Entertainment vice president of development Itzik Ben Bassat dropped something of a verbal bombshell. At the London launch event for the World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, the executive appeared to say the next installments in two of his company's storied series might not be far off.

"We'd like to say to our fans of Diablo and Starcraft that we haven't forgotten we have these franchises," he said. "We cannot wait to be here in a few years, or however long it will be. It won't be a decade, and we'll be celebrating the launch of [the next] Starcraft together." Some took Bassat's comments as meaning that the first Starcraft game since 1998 would be out in 2008. Others thought he meant new games in the franchises would be out by 2017.

Given the success of World of Warcraft--which has 8 million subscribers and counting--and the shelving of Starcraft: Ghost, many have speculated that Blizzard is prepping a Starcraft massively multiplayer online role-playing game. However, Bassat has now hinted that Blizzard's next MMO game won't just be a clone of its current cash cow.

"When we announce our next MMORPG it's not going to be another WOW--we're not a company that tends to tread the same ground," he told British film magazine Empire. "It'll be something innovative and new that really brings entertainment to another level." American Blizzard reps delcined to expand on Bassat's comments, although the fact that the company began hiring real-time strategy developers last summer might offer a clue.

Though such comments will likely fuel the fires of speculation, Bassat had precious little grist for the rumor mill surrounding the forthcoming World of Warcraft film. "Hollywood has its own pace but we're working as hard as we can to push it forwards," he told the mag. "Bringing Warcraft to the movies is the next step for us, we want to let people bring World of Warcraft into other aspects of their lives. After all, we're competing for people's entertainment time, whether it's listening to music, watching TV, or going to the cinema."

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6164522.html?tag=latestnews;title;2

Gay, who cares about Diablo or Starcraft. I hope they don't slow down on WoW development.

Actually, I find the characters, plot, and history behind both SC and Diablo interesting, moreso than the Warcraft universe. Diablo especially is quite fascinating if you take the time to learn the history and the plotlines behind the games instead of just, "Woah, its the devil, KEEL IT!".

Im excited to see somehting besides WoW being looked at.

The fact there hasn't been a Starcraft since Brood Wars is a god damn crime.

Ghost didn't count, and i'm glad it got shitcanned.

I'd really like to see another Starcraft. It was the only RTS I think I played for a really long time without getting bored. I think I played it for over 2 years with friends a few times a week.

When Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle signed a contract to publish an updated rewrite of Dante's Inferno, they rushed through and completed it in four months. Their publicly stated reason was that they hated the material; they wanted out! I can't see how you'd make an engaging Diablo game that wasn't constantly so dark and menacing that I wouldn't want to play it for long.

Starcraft, now... I could play an MMO based on Starcraft for years if it's done right. The original was awesome, the expansion just made it better, and I was one of the few who was sorry to see Ghost get shelved.

Funny, because I always found Starcraft to be every bit as dark and menacing as anything from Diablo.

When high=level company execs start saying stuff like that it makes me think they have something retarded in the works. Like a game for ultra-casual players to try to break into the mainstream even more.

Just give me Starcraft mmo.

Starcraft wasnt as dark in terms of story, but was as dark in terms of look/feel and the actually darkness ingame...

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Brood War was certainly a dark story.

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