Blizzard Entertainment, one of the most popular video game publishers in the world, is holding its annual BlizzCon event this weekend. The publisher is known for making big announcements at the events, and this year is no exception.
Blizzard has finally taken the wraps off its new MOBA game, previously codenamed Blizzard All-Stars. The title is now Heroes of the Storm.
Heroes of the Storm is Blizzard’s take on the DOTA-style MOBA genre, which began as a mod for Blizzard’s Warcraft III. Though Valve has taken up the DOTA brand and Riot Games’ League of Legends is the most popular in the genre, Blizzard’s Heroes is, perhaps, the only one of many recent MOBA games that stands a chance of developing a competitive audience.
The game will feature characters from Blizzard’s biggest franchises – Warcraft, Diablo, and Starcraft. Characters include World of Warcraft‘s Malfurion Stormrage, Starcraft‘s Sarah Kerrigan, and Diablo himself. The multiplayer maps will also be taken from various locations in those game franchises.
Blizzard is already taking beta sign-ups for Heroes of the Storm at the game’s new website.
Blizzard today also released three video previews of Heroes of the Storm. The first is a classic high-quality Blizzard cinematic trailer, featuring plenty of action and animation that rivals Pixar:
The second video is an actual gameplay trailer for Heroes of the Storm. Unsurprisingly, it looks an awful lot like DOTA:
The third is a behind-the-scenes look at Blizzard’s development of Heroes, detailing some of the decisions they’ve made about how the game will play:
