As some of you may know, multiple articles came out in the past couple of days, one of them shedding light on the internal struggles that led to the disgrace that was the launch of Warcraft 3 Reforged. Today, let's take things one at a time, cut through the BS, and see what really happened, and what we can learn from it...

Years years yearrrs ago, when Blizz mentioned the merger with Activision. There was a massive outcry from players who worried Blizzard would be pressured to adopt Activision's game strategy. Blizz attempted to reassure us, that they were only using Activisions money, and that Blizz was free to use it as they see fit. Seems Player predictions ended up being correct.

They could have done more for WC3 by doing nothing.

So let me get this straight, the story of Warcraft 3 Reforged is essentially the story of Warcraft 3? I mean, nobody listened to Medivh about the impending disaster.

Blizzard is but a name that by now refers to different people than it did in the '00s, and no matter what else, Warcraft III is a timeless, incredible game that has changed my life and that of so many others forever, a game there's no shame in continuing to appreciate and treasure. I only hope the corporates pressuring the people who'd been genuinely passionately trying to revitalize it get what they have coming to them.

Saw this stream live. Such an intense notion and I am glad that we are not alone. The passion and the demand to stabilize the WarCraft 3 client must survive!!!!

Arthas: This entire Activision must be purged.

When you compare this circus with AoE2 Definitive Edition, it just makes you wanna puke. How WC3 could have been, it's just sad.

I agree with your sentiment about giving bad parts of Activision blizzard power of you... but how can we except better if we just keep giving them money? Doesnt that tell Bobby this is ok?

A simple remastered would've been the best.

They shoulf make Diablo 2 res free for wc3 reforged owners.

“No king rules forever, my son”

Oh wow, I didn't realise that 'game' STILL doesn't have ranked system in it. What a scam.

For me it is worse that they actually pretend Reforged didn't happen, instead of trying to work on the game and redeem themselves for the offense they committed against us fans. Warcraft III Reforged was completely unmentioned in BlizzConline earlier this year. I find this to be absolutely pathetic and it hurts me greatly to swallow that this is the reality we are dealing with.

We all knew deep down this was Blizzard's future when Activision got involved. It's still sad to see this gem of a company slowly become an empty shell. They are slowly but surely going down the Rare road.

I actually cried when they announced the remaster, and since it's release I have completely given up playing video games. This betrayal hurt more than when my ex cheated on me during our relationship. I will never forgive this.

Such a shame they never made a proper WARCRAFT 4. And it’s never going to happen either.

it's not about making games anymore. it's not even about just making money. it's about making ALL the money

Warcraft 3 is the game that made me a gamer. This is the game that made Dota possible. Watching this and hearing grubby's personal experience makes me both angry and sad. Blizzard is a shadow of its former self and I want them to burn for the thing they did to this game. I am ready to stand with my time and money if someone has an idea, how can we fix the mess the greedy Activision made.

Unless people stop pumping money towards Blizzard, literally nothing fundamental will change with their current game development stance. With all due respect, rooting out evil is wishful thinking and not realistic with a company that has become a puppet of a larger body.

Grubby. Best to you. Your heart and life is tied to this IP. That said mine is not. After over a year of realizing playing blizzard games were no longer enjoyable and I just left games upset day after day.... it has been better for my own health to step away from anything blizzard does.

38:30 you aren't sentimental or exaggerating...Blizzard used to mean something to all of us.... for me, they felt like a family business who loved their work, passionate, cared about the smallest of details in EVERY game to perfection and I felt they enjoyed the process of doing so...you could really feel it in the art, music, gameplay, story, everything and it was a pleasure to experience their games to enjoy and appreciate their work at the same time. I believe it was those employees who were laid off were the essence of Blizzard. Anyway, all I'm saying is I completely understand what you are saying and you are not exaggerating!

I sure hope that game companies are now learning their lessons. We gamers want one thing. Good, finished, polished games. Hitherto, Blizzard did stand for this. Since 2016 games and devs have become pure products for the companies. This goes directly against the core of gaming as I see it. Before games were made essentially by gamers. The devs themselves were often pasionate gamers and engaged with the community. The past 5-10 years the industry has gone from pasion projects to money making giants. Now these decission will come back to haunt the creatives who are now either 50+ and deep into management or gone from the scene. Left are the sharks and shills (sorry for the direct wording)

A sad day for the loyal and pure hearts who still love the game to this day. Grubbys‘ words are cutting as deep as Grom’s Gorehowl. „Thrall... The blood haze has lifted. The demon's fire has burnt out in my veins. I have... freed myself“

the only thing that I can do (and I did) was to close my wallet regarding Blizzard

The Team was disorganised & their decisions reflected that. Their push for Reforged graphics on a game proud of a very distinctive cartoony art style, their push for new voice actors over the already incredible audio in the game? Remember the "extra" death noises for Workers & Archers for example, who asked for that? My hopes are that eventually they return to at the very least bring back features that they removed. Good Video

What is the point of releasing a finished game when people buy it before it is finished - Blizzard mindset

Blizzard lost my trust many years ago when D3 was launched and their expansion was launched, i never hooked up by WoW because the massive drain o money and low effort that i think they do every expansion after the two first expansions. I think that Blizzard as nice company died many years ago and WC3 for me was the last good game from blizzard. Reforge never looks fine to me, I as many people really want that Reforge will be a awesome thing but the reality of the market and blizzard itself makes that impossible.

they've admitted that the executives at Activision-Blizzard didn't want decent Budget for Warcraft 3 Reforged because it wasn't a big and new title that is going to generate a lot of money so they spent as little as possible this is how new Blizzard is, they do as little as possible but they'll do everything to suck the money out of their Franchises. quality is not close to being a priority.

You have played a big part in my life, and so has Warcraft 3. I will continue to support you through membership and views. The best to you, cass, and Logan.

Blizzard lost my trust the moment they cancelled HGC and announced they're moving devs off of HotS. Up until that moment, I believed that Blizzard is a company that would strive to succeed and make the game as best it can be, no matter the cost or how long it takes, but what happened with HGC and HotS just felt like a case of "well boys, we feel like we aren't making enough money here, so we're just gonna move on."

You can't really improve wc3 classic's perfect graphics, they've should have made a new campaign instead as an expansion.

Grubby will always be fondly remembered for his funny Reforged playthrough moment: "Somewhere in the Arathi Highlands, Thrall, the young warchief of the orcish Horde, wakes from his troubling dream." (Cue the defeat screen) "I've just LOST."

Grubby the word stable is correct, used as noun as such: 'A group, as of athletes or entertainers, under common management: a stable of prizefighters.'

39:22 Some wishful thinking in hoping that they will remake the game again. This is not how the corporate world works. :) The most likely thing that will happen with Reforged in one year from now is exactly what happened in the past year.

I agree. The soulless shell Kotick should never get his grubby hands on anything ever again

Thank you for covering this! You are awesome!

The Electronic Arts' command and conquer situation repeats with Warcraft(with Activision fills EA's place here while Blizzard here fills Westwood studios) Reforged make old Warcraft 3 only available pirated

Hard to watch. Stay strong my favourite WC3 Streamer

The company has been gutting and cost-cutted themselves into obscurity for a decade. Corporate greed ruined all of the Blizzard IPs.

While I usually agree with Grubby's calm, logical views and arguments, I strongly disagree with his overly forgiving take of continuing to support Blizzard, while just "weeding out the bad actors." This isn't like a few police departments with bad officers; this is a company run by a cash cow, who cares about nothing besides money, and will cannibalize its people if it means more profits. The only way to take down a power like that is to no longer feed it money. I agree that no one should be demonized for continuing to play Blizzard games, especially when your livelihood depends on it, but this isn't just "a few bad actors" ruining a company.

Was excited for reforged then saw the reviews. Never going to spend a dime on any atvi game again

There are so few things left from my childhood that a company didn't take a massive dump on.

well, i lost a lot of trust in blizzard, im playing warcraft 3 since release in 2002/2003, and i played a human warlock from tbc to legion, and i stopped playing because warlock got worse and worse. I still play warcraft 3, but i was totally pissed when reforged was releaed. Besides a visual update, which i dont like, the game lost all the good features you mentioned, you cannot even play wc3 classic, which i loved to play!!

After WC3R fiasco, when D2R was announced, I had very low expectations. However, after trying myself and checking out others playing D2R beta, I have hope. D2R is excellent so far, and why WC3R wouldn't be in the future? Better later than never. Hopefully...

I'm not even angry that game is unfinished, I'm upset that they don't do anything about it, don't work on it at all. I wish they could just give me my old WC3 client back so I could continue to play the game the way I did before this "reforged" disaster.

I never played much WC3. I suck at RTS in general. But I love to watch Grubby play it. It's just fun to see you play the game! :) Not gonna lie, this video was hard to watch. I felt your sadness so much and I can relate so strong, even though I never played much at all. I'm sorry for you, the whole community and the developers of the original WC3. I hope you are doing fine. Heads up, you are a great person. I wish you a nice day and a wonderful life! :)

Blizzard Entertainment: What are you doing, Arthas?! Blizzard-Activision: Succeeding you, Father. *Frostmourne stab*

I think heroes of the storm is one of the most underappreciated mobas

The big issue with these major publishers (Ubi, EA, Acti etc) is that they don't want to just make money, but that they want to make all the money. WC3 Reforged would earn them quite a bit because droves of people would buy it, but it wouldn't earn them nearly as much as the latest Battlefield and therefor the top doesn't think it's worth spending extra resources on.

This isn't the blizzard news that I was expecting...

4k textures. better anti hacks. better servers. integrated custom hotkey tool. the ability to have a control group with more than 12 units in it. maybe some fresh icons and rewards to achieve, to make grinding the ladder more fun for average players. thats basically all they had to do.

No, it's stable, like what you keep horses in.

it's "stable" not "staple". Stable means team/group/collection.

Fried here (freed). ;) Yeah, the meta that people on the floor of the War III Reforged may not have realized, is that it's the financial pressures from Activision that trickled down onto the War III Reforged team. Literally 1 person was doing all of the level design and in-game cinematics adjustments. Those levels were created over 2+ years by 7+ people, all with somewhat different styles of trigger use and idiosyncrasies of design. It was absolutely set up to fail, and that has to have come down from Activision mandates on spending. There's no other explanation. Happy to talk with you further on the topic (within certain NDA constraints). Nothing will ever be improved from this point forward under Activision. It's a closed book to them. The team is dead and Kotick reaped all those future salaries into his pocket. That's how Activision operates.

The problem is for the future: Blizzard keeps riding their old horses, but they're not treating them well. The only relative new universe is Overwatch. WoW is currently in a difficult state, where people start to look for other games. I do not think it is the usual supersaturation after playing a new expansion intensely for the first few month. I have the impression it connects much more with the philosophically changes of the company that also brought down WC3 Reforged. Blizzard lost already huge amount of its legendary reputation for polished gamecontent and i really do not care if they do Diablo 2 Ressurected right or wrong - although this will be an interessting observation, because this is also a classic release. They should repair WC3 Reforged and not throw it away like a worn-out cloth. What follows? If WoW loses players, will they not try to fix it? The articles say, they'll prioritize those games. But everyone knows, that they keep doing the same stuff with WoW and its larger fanbase. It is a homemade desease spreading on their entire products and i wonder what they are going to do about it. Sooner or later they will run out of attractive IPs with that behaviour. Blizzard in 5-6 years? They will exist, but for sure not in the comfortable position, Activision wants them to be.

I'm still sad and bitter about this. I still haven't bought the game even though WC3 is one of my favourite games of all time. I promised myself that I wouldn't get it until they added the updated cutscenes, and I stand by that. I don't think they will ever add it at this stage, which is very unfortunate.

I wished like to add the naga tribe to the 4 race and became 5 races orc,elf,undead and human❤️

That beard still gives me strong Benedict Cumberbatch vibes in your look.

You can’t root out evil when it goes all the way to the top Grubby. I understand where you’re coming from but it is too late for Blizzard. All the wonderful people that made amazing games have long left the company. It’s just a rotting husk that spits on its legacy with everything they do these days. It’s hard for content creators as your livelihood is connected to them but any other person should stop giving Blizzard money in order for anything to change at all.

the thing I don't understand about the remastered graphics is that they have a repository of high resolution warcraft assets from World of Warcraft that would really look great in the RTS game.

I mean, this doesn't really say anything we didn't already know. Development was rushed to meet the deadline, stuff got cut (although, I still say they didn't plan to have "SD" graphics option and new UI and possibly cinematics wouldn't work with that) and there was "Warcraft 3 team". As far as I figure it was classic games team (who also had SC1 and D3 to run at that time) doing the remaster. Now the classic games team is disbanded and supposedly Vicarious Visions handles all classic games (SC1 and 2, D3, War3, D2 and possibly HotS). So yeah, financially Reforrged was a disaster they hope to forget (didn't even get a discount during summer sales). I still would like to believe that once VV is done with D2 Resurrected, they are allowed to take a swing at Reforged and get those shiny new cinematics and other stuff (remember the online profiles said to have been in the works almost a year ago?).

Love you, Grubby. You are one of the best things to ever happen to Blizzard.

as a casual gamer i play reforged vs classic since the unit graphics are so much better. that said it's too bad classic is the only version that is played in competitive tournaments.

Ok, after 1 and a half year we found out something that absolutely no one is surprised of: the Activisions thirst for money (with no work or unpaid if possible) wrecked the development of W3:Reforged. But I have a question: are they going to still update and optimize the game? Do they intend to bring all the changes they've promised at some point?

I was the biggest Blizzard fan back in the days. But things went dark, greed for money killed the love of gaming... 😓

21:00 even doge is angry at blizz

I actually got emotional watching this. I might be younger then the game itself but i still played it a couple of times 10 years ago and got back to it once 3 years go and now again 1 year ago. Blizzard was once such a great company but as so many other companies they are blinded by income rather then Quality and passion. Love you Grubby and all Warcraft III enthusiasts

You're incredibly naive. The "good people" have already left Blizzard, Activision Blizzard is not the company you loved, it is the company that murdered the company that you loved. If you still support them then you're part of the problem, not the solution. You're not "giving them more power" by abandoning the sinking ship, you're giving them more power by giving them free advertising by making them more content and more money by buying their games. You're a supporter of the evil, not the "good people".

We all WANT to support Blizzard because of all the great memories and experiences...We all want to believe that Blizz is still that classic, old gaming company that had a record for putting out superior games... That old Blizzard is long gone...The new Activision Blizzard is just a corporate shell...

A long time ago I was walking with Blizzard games down a road, hand-in-hand and joyfull for years. We continued our trip over numerous games and countless hours, it was fun... Then we came to a crossing point and while I turned left towards "fun", expecting my friend to follow me, he pulled his hand away and turned to the right, towards "maximize profits". Since then I have never seen my friend again... Farewell Blizzard games and good luck on your path, may it bring you to the destination you desire

@04:39 -- no, I think they really do mean stable. As in, full of what horses fill it with, if you don't clean it regularly.

i will just say i expect the blizzard news like this these days. its just so tragic how the mighty now have stoop so low that its actually very sad, i just hope the best for grubby and for other people that enjoy WC3

I remember the golden age of blizzard. The release of this game unfortunately made me stop supporting this company. I won’t be buying D2 Remaster or D4 rather just remember my earlier experiences with the company.

The WarCraft 3 campaign, especially the expansion, pulled me in in a way few games ever have. It was so good that I was actually disappointed with WoW. WoW is fine and all but it didn't pull me in like Warcraft 3 did. When they announced Warcraft 3 Reforged and when I saw the sheer amount of promises and resources that were going to be poured in, especially the changing of voice lines, I kind of got excited that they would start making the WoW expansions in RTS modes, so you could play the story that way. They could add expansions with the Draenei and the Worgen as new playable factions, the sky was the limit. My hopes and my imagination got me so excited. Especially since Warcraft 3 kind of ends on a cliffhanger. (This all made extra sense since Starcraft 2 was clearly winding down. Why not have a new RTS king?) Then they just gave me a full price cheap remodel with none of the features I was looking forward to most (new story building cut scenes). I don't think I'll ever stop being angry at the betrayal.

It breaks my heart seeing grubby so affected by these revelations. Blizzard should hire the w3c team and others who are passionate about resurrecting this project.

I feel you mate. We're about the same age, and although I'll never admit how much Blizzard games have shaped my life, our stories sound the same. Keep your head up though, we have a great community.

If people are just bailing on Blizzard as a whole, one thing is going to happen: A lot of talented people are going to lose their jobs and all the executives with the huge salaries are going to move on to another equally high salary position in a nother game company. So call out those people and their business practices. Put a spotlight on them so they can't go unnoticed anymore.

I respect everyone's right to make decisions for themselves on how they spend their time and money. However, the problem I see with the "we're punishing the whole company because of the 10% of bad guys" is that the bad guys are and have been being protected by the company. The #1 bad guy, Bobby Kotick continues to be one of the most overpaid CEOs (and most CEOs are overpaid so that's saying something) in America. So when you spend money on a Blizzard game or subscription... that's not going to the victims or the "passionate developers" you're talking about. Most of it goes to Bobby Kotick and the other executives that knew about this stuff and either took part or did nothing. Because that's just it, the only language these creeps understand is money and power. The only people with the power to "root out" or "purge" that evil are the Shareholders and Board. And the only way either of those groups will be pressured into making that kind of change is if enough people stop giving money to Activision/Blizzard. If you continue to give Activison/Blizzard money... you're letting these scoundrels, these evil people use their victims and these "passionate developers" as human shields for their bad behavior. They won't ever change. And we'll be back here in 6 months, 12 months, 18 months, however long when the next article like this is written about the next time they botch a game or have a multi year investigation come to light revealing more of their misdeeds. If boycotting isn't the answer... what is? What do we DO? Because it's not enough to shake our heads, wag our fingers, and say "Someone oughta do something." We are all someone. We all can do some thing. It may not have much impact on its own... and it may cause us some personal or professional pain... but if we just shrug and move on... what will change? How will the victims be helped? How will the bad actors be punished?

I can hear the dog groaning and getting stressed out over Grubby's distress. Unforgivable.

I've been hooked on Blizz since WC2. It is a complete disgrace what has happened to this, once amazing, company.

It's so sad seeing this same story play out over and over with everything I grew up with. I understand the need for growth in business and all of that, but when these massive corporate entities get as big as they do and the upper management is so far removed from what's happening on the ground, there needs to be more power given to the people doing the work. Just a simple majority rule veto on what was happening here would have prevented this. It sounds like everyone actually doing the work on the game knew there was a problem, and the fact that awareness amounted to absolutely nothing in the end is just unacceptable.

Blizzard died the moment it merged with Activision. That is when WoW began to become a worthless grind of dailies and other bullshit. Activision ruined everything and the Blizzard we all loved hasn't existed for more than a decade.

classic Triple A gaming development absurdity. Now that blockbuster games are so expensive, the barriers to entry are so high, and games are so profitable even when they mess up its almost not even a surprise.

Activision: What do the fans want? Blizzard: Warcraft 4 Activision: Okay let's destroy the legacy of Warcraft 3.

As things stand now, reforged is an accurate depiction of our trust in blizzard. If they do implement fixes and improvements, it would mean signs of improvements. No mans sky's one example of hope(though they're indie, blizzards a company, i know) but as long as reforged stays broken, the trust we have in blizzard will sadly be the same. And eventually everybody will move on...

How can they misjudge the potential for wc3 reforged? Warcraft 3 and tft sold immensely well. Even if popularity for the RTS genre declined over the years, warcraft 3 was an entity all of its own.

The Game is still broken and still unfinished I tried playing Elemental TD for old nostalgia sake and it just randomly crashed on me

Lets be real here. Sure I bet there is completely innocent people working at blizzard, but anyone who turned their head to this behavior is as bad as the person who is doing these things. There is literally no excuse why this came up now if it had continued for years and anyone who knew about this and didn't bother doing anything is basically same as those who did harass someone.

I really get the sense that cigar smoking Activision bosses who knew nothing about WCIII, other than from some executive summary memos and slideshows, swooped in and told devs to change things that didn't need changing and scrap the good stuff that took too long.

On a side note, you know what my second all-time favourite period of Blizzard was (second only to playing Diablo 2)? It was watching the HGC. I spent SOOOOO many hours listening to Grubby and Gillyweed and Dreadnaught and Khaldor and the team. Activision struck again ... /sadface.

The main thing I take from this is shame on the people who invalidated people who were complaining about the release state if the game and people who were greatly disappointed. It was clear MANY things were missing... being optimistic is one thing but telling people they are wrong or calling them names for expressing their disappointment in the game happened quite a lot from you Grubby.

This is definitely sad to see... For me personally, I actually liked the graphical update on the game. I liked the slightly more realistic / darker tone they took in their new designs. Like you I also believed they could do all the things they claimed they were going to do. In fact, I know they could've have done those things. With the info I've heard, and with the info found in these articles, it's clear that this team was just never given the reinforcement needed in order to hit those targets. I do disagree in the delay timeframe you mentioned though. I think with a full team, they could've finished this game with a 6 month delay. And, I don't believe they would have seen more than 1% returns had they pushed it out another 6-8 months.

Large videogame publishers like Activision and EA have done a lot that we gamers hate. EA regularly takes studios like Visceral and Westwood and guts them, they take beloved franchises like Dead Space and Command and Conquer and Mass Effect and wreck them. Activision is depleting fan goodwill in Blizzard rapidly, pushing for players to spend ever-more money in microtransactions for games like Hearthstone and World of Warcraft. We fans hate that. But if I was an investor for Activision, I'd be happy to give Bobby Kotick, Activision's CEO, large bonuses for his performance. Activision's share price has risen eightfold over the past 10 years, which is phenomenal. Large publishers' bad behavior makes for good business because we, as consumers, are rewarding this bad behavior. We are part of the problem. If you want game companies to behave better, you need to punish this type of bad behavior, and reward good behavior from other companies. Some simple steps you can take are: 1. STOP PREORDERING GAMES. If you give game companies your money before you even have a chance to tell if their game is good or not, you're incentivizing the decision-making that led to the W3: Reforged debacle. 2. If you hate microtransactions and loot boxes, then stop spending money on them. 3. If you find a game you love, make sure you support the developers who made it. Personally, I've played the hell out of Vermintide 2 lately, and bought all of the game's DLC to show my gratitude, and support those who made it.

All that I can say on this topic is Blizzard was unable to create really new game from Overwatch which is kinda remake of Team Fortress ideas. All the games before it was either original or containing new and original ideas. Blizzard was failing from Overwatch and for now all that Activision tries to do is to make the Blizzard do the thing gamers love them for. And the thing is a new and original game. All people who left Blizzard had not do this thing yet. I doubt Activision can reform Blizzard to resurrect them

Taking in the consideration how much emotional damage in total was dealt to WC3 players, probably it would be fair enough to swap Bobby Kotick with Illidan in his prison. For 10,000 years. Btw which persons are also responsible for that, except Bobby Kotick?

When it launched it hurt me really bad. I get what you are feeling, could give u a hug if I could. Don't lose hope and cheer up :D

I totally can relate to your sentiment about the games. I also see a different company, being led by someone else, without all the people I respected. Its just a matter of time to when I'm gone.

Actually, when I noticed a Grubby video with the words "reforged" and "news" in the title, I've become super excited again. That's a shame the main news we get about the game are about lawsuits because of the terrible company's work conditions. I just hope we can still get that game fixed, even if it must take a great deal of time before it happens.

Since you played the original playtest at Blizzcon 2018 and tested the beta up 'til it's release. Can you tell us at which point did you realize that Reforged wasn't in a good spot? Also how did the test version of the game feel at Blizzcon 2018? Cause that was the version with all the new ui & portraits. I really wish we got that. I think it could've been a good modern look to wc3. :(