A new report claims that Microsoft and Activision have formed a smaller team at Blizzard to work on new games, featuring some of the studio’s beloved IPs like StarCraft, Overwatch, and Warcraft.
Fans of Overwatch, Warcraft, and StarCraft hoping for new games in each series may have finally gotten their wish.
According to a new report from Windows Central, many employees from Microsoft’s King subsidiary have joined a new team designed to develop ‘AA’ titles based on existing Blizzard IPs.
King is known for its work on mobile titles such as Candy Crush, suggesting that these smaller games will be designed for phones. Though, it’s unclear if they will be limited to mobile devices. For instance, Diablo Immortal was made for mobile, but it ended up becoming a cross-platform title.
In its history, Blizzard has created some extremely popular franchises. However, they’ve released very few actual games in these franchises when compared to other companies.
For instance, space-themed RTS StarCraft has been limited to just one sequel since its 1998 debut. A third-person FPS titled ‘StarCraft Ghost’ was canceled during development, leaving the series dormant beyond StarCraft 2 expansions.
Warcraft, another RTS, saw three games released before the series transformed into the MMORPG ‘World of Warcraft.’
Overwatch, meanwhile, has had its campaign mode completely canceled to prioritize the multiplayer experience, leaving the future of its story content in limbo.
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As Microsoft was buying Activision-Blizzard, Microsoft Head of Gaming Phil Spencer expressed a desire to bring Starcraft to Xbox.
“Not only StarCraft, but WarCraft, when you think about the heritage of RTS games that we’re talking about here, specifically from Blizzard. And I don’t have any concrete plans today because I can’t really get in and work with the teams.” Phil said during a 2022 interview with Wired.
“StarCraft was a seminal moment in gaming, right? From an esports perspective, from RTS on console perspective, and from just an RTS storytelling perspective in the genre.”
In 2023, Spencer replied to a tweet by Twitch streamer Lirik, who claimed the series is “dripping with ways to break out of RTS form.”
Spencer agreed, saying the series has “insane potential” and is still “one of the best IPs out there.”
There’s no word yet on exactly what this new team is working on first, but given the Microsoft boss’s past comments, we could very well see something new in the StarCraft universe down the line.
