Revisiting the Warcraft Strategy Trilogy

[Music] [Music] hi I'm no debate this past year world of warcraft turned ten and work up the franchise turn 20 this video takes a look at the first 10 years of the Warcraft franchise which takes the form of three really incredible realtime strategy games one released in 94 one released in 95 and third one released in 2002 these games really grew up alongside gaming as a medium and it's really fascinating to look back at the trilogy as a whole especially how it came to shape World of Warcraft let's get started this past year Warcraft celebrated its 20th anniversary lizard the company behind Warcraft has come up from very humble beginnings to occupy an incredibly unusual position in the business world a financial juggernaut that the fans really love and that really loves its fans back the Warcraft franchise has been the keys the kingdom for Blizzard not just because world Warcraft is such a solid game but because even in the decade before wow the franchise was an industry groundbreaker Warcraft is at the root of so many of today's most popular games Starcraft Defense of the Ancients and more trace the lineage back to Blizzard genuinely classic realtime strategy trilogy if you go back to 1994 his original flavor Warcraft there is absolutely no way that you or me or anyone would say oh this this is definitely going to make hundreds of millions of dollars over the course of two decades but it did and that uncertainty is there if you go back to gaming in 1994 from whatever angle you look at it the original Warcraft came out at a time when the genres of today were still being invented and defined Warcraft alongside westwoods command & Conquer series established the basic mechanics and rhythms that realtime strategy game is still used today more or less the original Warcraft is a pretty distant ancestor in a lot of ways complexity polish pacing but the fun thing about it is that a player only familiar with Starcraft 2 would still be able to figure it out and excel at it within pretty short order now many gamers these days remember the first Warcraft but they don't need to whether its gameplay mechanics or characters who still pop up from time to time in the world Warcraft the legacy that grew from the first game is arguably much more impressive than the game itself that doesn't make it any less interesting to go back and take a look though 20 years after the fact older games are noted for the complexity relative to today's games but in terms of real-time strategy that's not always the case with war games like these complexity has generally gone up as technology improves the better the hardware the more numerous the unit's the fancier the animations the baguette battlefields and the larger the number of play options although realtime strategy was a viable genre since the early 80s Warcraft 1 is at the very beginning of computers being fast enough to render large battles in actual real time with enough pixels to give the player a pretty good idea of what was going on West Was dune 2 released in 1992 beat Warcraft of the punch in terms of general formatting but Warcraft is very much its own RTS from setting to mechanics to attitude it's also very difficult the develop that difficulty in the first Warcraft is unfortunately as much from clunky interface in poor unit AI is from the campaign's intended strategic challenge I've talked a lot about how important Warcraft 1 was in establishing an enduring gameplay template but it is very much a rough draft of the template the basics are all their user peasants or peons to harvest gold from mines and lumber from trees build farms to increase unique app builder army from one or more barracks greater Town Hall to access the next tier of units and buildings defend attack win all the things that are enjoyable about all the blizzard strategy games Warcraft or Starcraft but doing those things here in the first game is an incredible pain in the ass all of your production structures produce one unit of time with no Q and a feature that would be dropped for later titles all your structures must be connected along the road network while the units are a good tactical mix you may only select four at a time only for that more than any other shortcoming makes this game really difficult to play only being able to control a tiny handful of units is made more problematic by a more aggressive fog of war than nearly any RTS I've seen besides total annihilation you start out most Maps not even knowing where a gold mine is not being able to see with a forest to start and this way Warcraft requires a lot of patience to explore the map and make a tactical assessment of what you're even supposed to do later blizzard games starting with Starcraft put a lot of effort into giving the player clear direction Warcraft 1 does not to win Warcraft you have to fight the enemy sure but you also have to fight the fact that your units are dumber than a bag of hammers they're very bad at anything that you do not tell them to do and even then it's possible they might walk halfway across the map in the wrong direction to die even if you tell them exactly what it is you want from them if you leave them to their own devices units almost never engage for the enemy unless they're attacked directly if you don't notice your base being attacked your defenders will actually sit there giving the raiding party Stern looks until you explicitly tell them to do something about it the game even knows this control of the map is all about control of bridges and other choke points where enemy units literally cannot get by without directly attacking your forces in provoking a response units are also a lot more fragile than later titles which coupled with only being able to select four units at a time can lead to assaults that fall apart so quickly while you struggle to micromanage strangely the easiest way to overcome this is to slow down the game speed take the real time out of the real time strategy as the unit's agonizingly inch their way across the screen you can issue attack orders more leisurely make sure that you don't have just a few year units hit the enemy's frontlines just die as the rest of your raiding party gets hung up on a stand of trees from a technical perspective it's all kind of janky but Warcraft had more going for it than just bare-bones gameplay it has huge personality for a simple little game art direction and sound design even here in 1994 are quite distinctively Warcraft fun memorable blend of bright cartoonish art with a lot of blood a lot of charmingly distinctive character and building designs backed by an upbeat and likable soundtrack expressive sound effects and a winking Lee silly ambient dialogue Warcraft is kind of a chore to play but it's a chore that's clearly trying to be as entertaining as possible along the way and it's offhanded charisma makes up for many of its technical shortcomings as far as the campaign's go they're both straightforward simple and relatively identical both orc and human armies are mirrors of each other the difference is principally cosmetic besides spellcasters who do differ a little but balance in the first game is achieved by equivalents rather than encouraging different play styles like command conquers GDI and nod we're craft three would shake that up but for the first couple of games or can human campaigns are more or less just about which aesthetic you prefer all the campaign missions are mostly the same just moving in opposite directions the missions are also much less complex and in later titles but controlling battles at scales any larger than what Warcraft 1 tries to accomplish with the interface frustrations that the game causes a player would be recipes for disaster and some really unfair losses on the players part the template is all here but it needed a lot of refinement same thing for the plot according to an IGN article Warcraft developer bill Roper found out that there was no actual script when he sat down to record the narration so he literally made up the founding lore of a multi-million dollar franchise on the spot ad libbing lines in the venting characters that would be featured and expanded on in games novels and comic books for 20 years over the course of an afternoon in a way Warcraft is representative of early gaming as a whole this way untried unstable likable experiments in genre and construction whose influence was a complete unknown whose long-term success was an enthusiastic yes Roper's original ad-libs have been refined and corrected over time and blizzards official version of Warcraft 1 is now codified in the novel's rise of the Horde and the Last Guardian the orc campaign where storm wind is destroyed is considered the canonical victory with the addition of human campaign mission where you kill the wizard medivh world of warcraft players these are important names in major places here in 1994 is Warcraft 1 storm wind is about 2 square inches of highly pixelated screen space but as your wolf riders hack into the ground and fire blooms from its tiny little spires a player knows damn well they're still witnessing a legendary moment technical refinements wouldn't be too far off either Warcraft 1 came out in November 1994 and Warcraft 2 was released in December 1995 Warcraft 2 is better in every wave in the original and its ambition is practically bursting from behind every pixels it's a great game and stayed a great game for years Blizzard even re-released it in 1999 with battlenet connectivity people still even play it competitively though not too many people anymore Liz it still sells it it deserves this longevity Warcraft 2 is an amazing RTS and it more than any other Blizzard title of the mid-90s set in stone the company's reputation quality and personality it prompted an RTS rivalry between blizzard and Westwood Studios that would last for another solid decade driving development of some of the most amazing RTS games both companies would ever produce it all starts here Warcraft 2 carries over and doubles down on both the charm and the challenge of the first game while making huge improvements to the interface and controls critically warcraft 2 is considerably more mouse-driven than the previous game allowing you to issue orders quickly and without having to rely on hotkeys so much it's the same mouse-driven hotkeys supported play that Starcraft 2 still uses if you've played that game you literally already know how to play all of Warcraft 2 it also establishes the pattern for Blizzard campaigns for the next 20 years three or four missions and an act divided by short cinematic cutscenes the cutscenes in Warcraft 2 are really rough though especially compared to the insane level of detail in later titles starting with Warcraft 3 but they got a fun off-the-cuff attitude that's really enjoyable really the whole game does you can select up to nine units at a time this time which makes the game so much more playable as well pathfinding and unit automation is better but still out great it's still pretty common to see units forgetting to attack but at least the attack area command is actually pretty functional here in the second title defensive structures were added all of these improvements in the controls army compositions and interface are incredibly importantly because Warcraft 2 also expands the scope of battles and battlefields far beyond the ambitions of the first settle for craft to not only forces you to battle on land but also introduces air and naval combat to the mix while at the same time making maps two or three times larger than those in the first game and pitting you against two or three times as many enemy forces wolf campaigns are like the first game mostly identical to each other they start out incredibly easy - they're about solid 7 levels per campaign where the main goal of the mission is only to introduce you to unit and mechanics it's important to put this into perspective this was pretty much the fourth modern real-time strategy game there was dune 2 there was the first Warcraft there was command conquer and then there was this Warcraft 2 was many gamers very first realtime strategy titled so the game takes its time to make sure that you're up to speed with it before ramping up the difficulty then what it does get hard holy does it get hard unlike the first game where you're battling the interface as much as the enemy here pretty much all the challenge is technical it's got that bit 90s severity to it when it comes to making mistakes Warcraft 2 is shockingly unforgiving if you use to a modern wizard campaign like the first Warcraft your units are very fragile you also need to know how to use mixes of those units to counter enemy strategies and pay close attention to how your own units are attacking and handling their business again adjusting game speed is pretty much he to larger battles the computer is a much easier time micromanaging when the player does and unless your force is genuinely overwhelming you'll need a little time slowdown to get all of your orders issue friendly fire is also a major concern catapults dragons and Gryphon riders will all damage your own units if you don't position and fire them carefully if you have several Gryphon riders in a circle attacking the building they will all kill each other in the process they will destroy your own raiding parties if you aren't extremely careful and this way Warcraft 2 is a game of extreme patience it's not enough just to have the unit you have to micromanage the unit to the point of making sure it's facing the right direction during an attack fog of war is still pretty aggressive too but feels more manageable and less artificial all in all the way you build units and explore the map isn't really too far off from contemporary realtime strategy titles just with less polish and more challenge the only thing missing from the first game is dungeon mission something Blizzard would enthusiastically return to in Starcraft and Warcraft 3 but here in Warcraft 2 is just battles battles battles till you just can't battle no more in fact patience is as valuable in warcraft ii as gold or timber or oil especially oil this third resource used exclusively for naval and high-end building construction is a real drag on the game naval battles in general are fun and novel but they feel a little unnecessary a good idea that in practice adds about 20 to 30 minutes to every level where naval battles occur this is actually most levels for whatever reason Warcraft 2 designed its Maps to incorporate Nevelson a vacant sin to damn near every engagement levels especially later on take place across a relentless sequence of islands Delta's archipelagos whatever map design forces the player to make amphibious landings once twice three times or more to complete your objectives in theory and occasionally in practice this adds an exciting new tactical dimension to the game but having to do it so frequently it makes it feel like an artificial barrier to advancement it's not really that surprising that they dropped naval stuff for later titles nearly everything else about Warcraft 2 would carry over though while human and orc units are still rough parallels of each other there are a lot more units from the first game and their animations are a lot more colorful and fun while some units like the ogre mega and with bloodlust are a little overpowered the balance of the game is still pretty solid both orc and human forces feel unique vivid and well matched and both campaigns do something that would become incredibly important later on they pretty much went about inventing the world of world of warcraft order on Hills Brad well fellas almost every area of the eastern kingdoms is touched on however briefly by the campaign pretty epic but it only really feels epic toward the end of the campaign honestly the game feels a little short in comparison with other Blizzard realtime started titles by the time the easy first-aid levels are over your 2/3 done of course the last third takes longer to play than the first two-thirds but still the real need of the game is a little underwhelming it's expansionpak beyond the dark portal would change that beyond the dark portal changes a lot actually and it's strange that it isn't more talked about it is with the exception of top-level competitive Starcraft multiplayer and hardcore diablo 3 the most difficult Blizzard game that there is the difficulty of beyond the Dark Portal and its length are both completely out of control but in a good way expansion packs were all about delivering more of what people loved about the first game but with more challenge and more features for true fans beyond the dark portal was an outrageous value for what it was by that metric first off the campaigns are very distinct from one another the imman campaign begins in Azeroth and then crosses through the dark portal to take the fight to Draenor at the homeworld of the orcs in the orc campaign it's vice-versa brief org versus org act and Draenor where you and Grom Hellscream help prepare for a second version of Azeroth and then the rest the campaign is executing that plan they are incredibly different campaigns for the first time in franchise history the expansion also starts off being hard and then dials up the challenge right Ward's impossible contemporary design values the players being able to complete the game much more than presenting a challenge that only the most capable players can manage beyond the dark portal does not seem to really even expect you to be able to beat it its value is to challenge you past the limits of your abilities so you either improve or lose it's very blunt about it it also makes reviewing the expansion difficult because I am NOT nor ever will be good enough to truly beat it the game rewards players who invested months if not years of play time into truly mastering the game by giving them a challenge that's worthy of their skill I admire that and I admire anyone who's beaten beyond the Dark Portal with nothing but their own skill my opinion they ought to give you a goddamn application of West Point out of the credit screen to cruise through and try and pry into the deeper parts of the expansion I had to cheat my ass off I never would have finished this video if I hadn't I'd still be trying to work my way through the last couple of missions by their campaign perhaps that's why it's so seldom discussed the only ones who can really comment on its construction that's and its depth or the mighty few bested it it's got to be pretty tight company in 2015 but beating the game is also as tedious as it is difficult in some ways most notably the mini missions that require you to kill all enemy units across these huge maps with a fog of war of as severe as Warcraft 2's this can take agents hunting down the lone stragglers hidden among the trees and blending into your mini-map that's a problem for the main game but the huge maps of the expansion really double down takes great patience in addition to great skill to be beyond the dark portal and I do not always cut it in those departments bleep for the more average sort like me there's still a lot to like about beyond the dark portal even if it is impenetrably different funnest thing is the consistently strong use stronger and tougher than the average unit these are persistent story characters who could actually leave in game assaults you just couldn't let them die the campaign has a much more you depth story than Warcraft one or two does with a lot more exposition and a few fun twists so having characters persist in the game role makes it all feel more in the medium when wizard released Starcraft a couple years later they drink hero units back in a big way even more so when Warcraft 3 rolled around but you'll find the bad genesis of hero units is a classic Blizzard gameplay device way back here and beyond the dark portal the emphasis on naval combat is reduced considerably from the main campaign to making the in-game pacing a little smoother and naval engagements more enjoyable when they do come up ultimately these complex missions effectively explore most of the tactical situations you could possibly come up with for this game and also serve to explain the lore of Warcraft Mists of pretty interesting ways mostly Warcraft is really derivative high fantasy Lord of the Rings pretty much set the template for high fantasy and initially in the first game it really wasn't clear what was distinct about Warcraft by the end of beyond the Dark Portal that's easier to see by making the orcs extra dimensional invaders burned on by a shadowy demon masters Blizzard was doing at least something different and they've continued to do something different characters they introduced in this expansion were picked up on again just last year warlords of Draenor the most recent World of Warcraft expansion ties in directly with the chaotic climactic events of beyond the Dark Portal this expansion also introduces the dragon death wing start of the show in the World of Warcraft expansion in Cataclysm and beyond the dark portal ends with the shattering of Draenor in the creation of outland the world which would be revisited in the Warcraft free expansion prose and throne and the Burning Crusade which was World of Warcraft's very first expansion the plot events of Warcraft 2 and its expansion have also been turned into novels simply titled tides of darkness and beyond the Dark Portal not entirely sure those are still in print but they're easily found you in any case if you fancy yourself a top-notch Starcraft 2 player or a massive World of Warcraft fan this frequently passed over expansion is a goldmine of early Warcraft lore and razor-sharp realtime strategy level design many of the concepts that introduced would be refined and incorporated into Starcraft 6 years would pass without another Warcraft then Warcraft 3 hit and it hit like a Mack truck Warcraft 3 was a rare moment in consumer and gaming where years of hype culminated in a game that actually delivered on all of its promises gamers who were there I'm sure remember trying to choose which of the four races they wanted on the box covering orc and human of course but now two more races the undead and the Night Elves what's with that Starcraft made two major changes to the Blizzard RTS format that would carry over in a big way to Warcraft 3 the first was to abandon the idea of two opposite campaigns for each race for StarCraft each race had its campaign take place in chronological order to follow a plot that lasts the whole game Terran Zerg and Protoss the second thing was to abandon the parallel construction of the units and structures each race and Starcraft encouraged its own distinct play style and their units were extremely distinct from one another Warcraft 3 takes both these changes and runs with them this time with four races four campaigns and a plot told almost entirely in game using a brand new 3d engine Warcraft 3 is the first game that's immediately identifiable as a modern Blizzard title its art style would be what persists almost unchanged into World of Warcraft and the difficulty is completely retooled to be accessible to more casual RTS fans with a harder difficulty mode for Warcraft veterans Warcraft 3 plays today as smoothly easily and charismatic Lee as the day was released it's a genuinely fantastic RTS and like how Warcraft 2 was meant to introduce players to the general idea of realtime strategy games workout 3 is excellent in gently ramping up difficulty as new concepts are introduced that progression is handled in an incredibly cinematic way to cinematic for 2002 maybe but the scenery-chewing capital letter high fantasy thrill of it comes loud and clear it's pretty incredible just how contemporary this thirteen-year-old game still feels from its gameplay to its presentation to its instantly recognisable aesthetic Warcraft 3 is a triumphant moment in PC gaming that triumph is all in the details way more so than Starcraft Warcraft 3 is a hero driven game not only the campaign but the multiplayer as well is oriented around classic Warcraft army building with powerful hero units at the forefront using exotic abilities in a six item inventory to break the enemy on the frontlines or support the masses for regular troops unlike in Starcraft and Warcraft 2 your heroes can die and it isn't a problem you just have to spend gold to revive the NOT an altar this way there's no reason to hold them in reserve already lose the level throw them right into the thick of it let me get their hooves and claws and hands dirty it's the way it's supposed to be and as levels progress in-game cutscenes trigger and advance the plot while the level is already underway even Starcraft hold its story primarily in between the missions this in-game approach was pretty revolutionary especially when you considered just how much plot and dialogue their views of the game motivations in Warcraft 3 are never unclear the narrative drives the game forward as much as the unfolding tackles tactical situations and while the dialogue is extremely cheeseball it's still really likable the voice actors put in an earnest performance and while the characters are all kinda cliche it's easy to become invested in the good guys are great guys the villains are delightfully mustache twirling Lee evil and characters do come to occupy the spaces in between as the narrative develops first there's the game's tutorial which introduces you to thrall and orc you could really have a beer with as he and good old Grom Hellscream abandon Azeroth and flee across the ocean there's great danger coming you see and no one can stop it and then the human campaign the human campaign might be one of the best introductions to a realtime strategy game I've ever seen the narrative of Warcraft 3 is closely oriented around events that the players can directly participate in in this case the story of the rise and fall of the peloton Arthas Arthas is right in the middle of an outbreak of a strange plague being spread through the granaries of Lourdes or on a plague that causes the dead to rise and go to this isn't orcs versus humans anymore it this is something new and much cooler Arthas is a good guy sure but he's prideful they established that early and they established early that the undead threat is voting Arthas into pursuit long before he does anything truly demonstrably evil the player knows pretty well that Arthas is kind of a son of a and bound for trouble the way the conflict escalates from level to level was the stakes of the undead plague grow higher feels not only natural but incredibly compelling it's not terrifically original but it's presented with an undeniable energy and charisma and laid out at an extremely fast pace but the time Arthas takes up the cursed sword Frostmourne and sells his soul for petty revenge the game is only a quarter of the way done and the kingdom of Azeroth is already completely doomed then you swing around to the undead campaign and your hero is still Arthas a death knight now on a mission to claim his own Kingdom for the armies of the undead it's fantastic and a little reminiscent of how Kerrigan bridges the gap between Terran and Zerg campaigns and Starcraft it does mess with the momentum of the plot a bit though you end up wondering where thrall went for a long time before you find out but the undead campaign has some fantastic missions and moments like the destruction of the elephant kingdoms that gave rise the blood elves and the moment where Arthas turns Sylvanas Windrunner Windrunner into a banshee these little moments end up catalyzing into events that shape and reshape World of Warcraft when the MMO rolls around but here in Warcraft 3 world shaking events happen basically every 45 minutes and snowball the entire length of the game until a demonic invasion of staggering proportions is cut off at the root pretty fun general writing extremely fun plot development for a real-time strategy game enough can be said either about the enduring attractiveness and charm of the game world and landscapes of Warcraft 3 attention to detail especially for 3d game in 2002 is huge my come across is someone basic by today's standards but Warcraft 3 set itself apart from other RTS titles of the time and its commitment to rich vibrant color palette high detail and incorporation of hand-drawn art it's got a bit of a cartoony vibe not too cartoony but enough to make the silliness and heavy-handedness of the plot seemed perfectly reasonable against the excitingly expressive backgrounds of the game world there's just nothing quite like it the Warcraft aesthetic is unique to Blizzard and the game establishes the exact tone and character presentation that would go into World of Warcraft the scope of events are so much larger than previous Warcraft titles as well when the orc campaign rolls around it feels like a whole different game all of a sudden that's a testament to how different all four factions are to control the humans are more or less the same from previous titles but with a lot of new mechanical units the undead are a peculiar mix of zerg creep and Protoss based construction from starcraft and the orcs are retooled to rely on aggressive expansion all of the strategies and play styles contribute to the strong sense of personality that the different factions and races have it gives real flavor and variety to the combat plus the combat is the smoothest that Blizzard had ever made upon release with expressive and bloody animations playing out across huge maps with multiple plot driven objectives the orc campaign is completely different in tone from previous Warcraft or campaigns and this plays out as a struggle between thrall as shaman who wants to turn the orcs away from pillage and slaughter and Grom Hellscream who represents the more traditional kill all humans horde over the course the campaign you look for a new homeland for the orcs and the mysterious continent of Kalimdor and then seek to break the ancient bond between orcs and their demon masters so the thrall in the new horde can go their own way it's great storyline and to throw a little honour and a little compassion into the otherwise blood and thunder orcs makes them a lot more personable plus thralls just a great character straightforward sure but memorable and likable plus the orc campaign showcases the greatest variety of level objectives in Warcraft 3 level objectives are much more interesting than in previous games but their campaign really takes the cake in widely varied goals and rhythms during your campaign the fourth playable race is also unveiled the night elves the night elves are new to the setting but according to all the new lower Warcraft 3 brought to the table they've been around for tens of thousands of years their backstory in the backstory of the main characters in the novel campaign are collected in Richard a nax War of the Ancients trilogy the night elf campaign is actually kind of hindered by all the backstory in the novels an ancient love triangle is given a lot more narrative attention than it's worth because it's so key to the lower of three books but the night elves might be the most distinctive race to play out of all four and the plotline incorporates and wraps up many of the dangling plot threads from the other three campaigns some plot items are left deliberately on addressed but the build-up to the climax and climax and the climax itself is completely worthy of a game this epic and scope trying to slow the inevitable crushing advance of a demon army of Mount Hyjal as a trap is laid it's a phenomenal setup executed perfectly worker 3 was not only the right game at the right time truly cutting-edge RTS in terms of presentation and use of 3d but it was also a triumph of the multimedia art of game design worker 3 is not especially original in any single aspect of itself not the story not the gameplay not the technology but the way it makes each one of those three pillars of design support the others is flat-out billions the narrative serves the gameplay and the technology gives vibrant definition to both and all with a winning charm that's pretty much it about it's no wonder Warcraft 3 is such a classic even better its expansion does for the third game what beyond the dark portal did for the second like Warcraft 2 expansion the Frozen Throne assumes that you've beaten the main game so you won't mind if it starts out hard and just gets harder nobody minds unlike beyond the dark portal the upswing in difficulty is still manageable for less skilled players although it presents considerably more challenging in varied situations than the original campaign it has a different feel to it than Warcraft threes main campaign to boot a little more carefree and deliberately weird alongside the typical high fantasy melodrama it isn't immediately apparent just how different it is from the main game though the first campaign the night elf 1 is the least impressive and it's kind of a drag to get through my have the central character is obtuse and unlikable and the plot is muddled six hours of chasing after Illidan directly after the main night elf campaign where you're doing sort of the same thing is not that great pacing I just don't find Illidan a compelling character either his voice actor is a massive ham and the brooding anti-heroes in 99-cent cliche still the introduction of the Nagas and revisiting the tomb of Sargeras last seen in Warcraft 2 are pretty fun moments the Nagas function is a kind of fifth race alongside the primary four and a particularly lethal that fighting them is fun having to spend hours more applying Night Elf missions after the main campaign is over is a slow ponderous introduction to another wise amazing expansion but things really pick up in the blood elf campaign which follows Prince Kalfas as he rallies the survivors of the elven genocide Arthas commits over the course of the main games on dead campaign the elves are mistreated and spat on by the rest of the Alliance and when the Nagas show up to offer their help Kalfas leaps at the chance it's really interesting seeing him struggle with his people's destiny and duty and the pacing picks up a lot of speed the elephant variants on human units and structures are fantastic in nude units like the spell breakers add some fun new tactical strategy to the mix in all the expansion campaigns new units are given special prominence frozen throne features a ton of dungeon missions many more than even Warcraft 3 effectively using all the units and abilities at your disposal especially these new units is the only way to really get through them there's certainly the most robust dungeon missions of the Warcraft trilogy besides huge fun and chock-full of Secrets there's even a secret level you can get to when the blood elves flee the alliance they cross with the Naga into what's left of the shattered realm of Draenor now called out land that Crossing is featured in a fantastic bonus level a fast pace wild pleasantly bizarre tower defense map tower defense would become one of the most popular sorts of custom maps for Frozen Throne of which there were many the modding scene for Frozen Throne was tremendous back in the day the biggest breakout hit of the modding community was of course defense of the ancients or dota which began as a custom map for Frozen Throne and later was released as a standalone sequel much like how natural selection was originally a half-life mod before getting its own retail release the fan made maps are typically much more complicated than the multiplayer maps that shipped with the game - but nobody's really able to imitate blizzards weird and wild sense of humor like the timeless gag lines when he clicked the same unit over and over again or the way the Pandaren are randomly introduced in the secret level not to be seen again until the world of warcraft or finally in a later level where you find the majestic penguin frozen throne has hilarious secrets and throwaway gags and practically every corner of its maps and this combined with the exceptionally clever challenges of the levels and the wide variation and mission objectives give the impression that the Frozen Throne is all about giving players what they like and what they want most out of a warcraft RTS experience the undead campaign is particularly satisfying way to cap things off - starts out following Arthas and Sylvanas Windrunner coming back to these characters after so much else going on the plot is a lot of fun and they do have fun with it Arthas as the campaign goes on loses levels up until the final mission it's the hardest campaign and the last one of the franchise after all before it becomes an MMO if they're not putting you in a position of constant disadvantage they're not making the level challenging enough Arthas eventually becomes the Lich King and so bonus splinters a faction of free will Don ded off from arthas's main army and occupies the ruins of Lordran you know the final plot events leading up to World War Craft while the initial original quests and plot lines of vanilla World of Warcraft are gone possibly for good following the Cataclysm expansion and players are still able to follow most of the plot threads from Frozen Throne Warcraft 3 and Beyond the Dark Portal rat the Lich King is pretty much a direct sequel to the undead campaign here in Frozen Throne but what happened to the orc campaign well something really peculiar happened to it it became a 100% hero focused role of Warcraft prequel bonus campaign called the founding of Durotar it was released in three parts as free DLC long before a DLC was even common terminology and it is a very strange frequently overlooked link between the legacy of the realtime strategy trilogy and the MMO that would come to overshadow them all of the base-building portions of Warcraft 3 in the Frozen Throne are removed and buildings are resized to be more proportioned scale to your hero your hero in this case is the half ogre Rex R who also made a recent reappearance in warlords of Draenor rex Ark comes down from his isolation in the wilderness to find thrall deep in the process of constructing Obama or the orc capital players lead Rex R as he completes quests to help thrall marked by little X yellow exclamation points he slays monsters for experience money and loot and then he completes optional dungeon it is literally all of the bare-bones gameplay formating world of warcraft in archaic miniature it's a weird game to play for these reasons it's a little on the boring side to be honest because it has none of World of Warcraft's polish and all of its grind the first chapter takes place in Durotar with a few diversions to help the trolls on their islands it's mostly centered around one gigantic map the second chapter takes place across many tiny maps but also ties up a ton of loose ends like why the ogres left the Horde at the end of Warcraft 2 what Karen bloodhoof and Jaina Proudmoore have been doing since the end of Warcraft 3 that sort of thing at the end of the chapter Janus dad admiral Proudmoore shows up is a veteran character from Warcraft 2 so he knows better than to believe that a peace with a horde is possible then the third chapter is a fantastic assault on Proudmoore his island fortress I always wondered why the coast of Durotar was littered with shipwrecks now I know interestingly the second and third chapters incorporate naval combat back into the game in a way not seen since Warcraft 2 doesn't use oil but naval combat is big it's done it's done through mercenaries in a lot of ways it's a fitting farewell touching on many of the key features characters and themes the strategy trilogy while orienting towards heroes being more important than armies for the MMO Blizzard doesn't seem to have any plans to swing the emphasis back in the other direction either 10 years in and World of Warcraft is still a dominant force in MMOs Blizzard did however release HD models of all of the Warcraft 3 and Frozen Throne resources for use in Starcraft 2's map editor wizard might not be making warcraft 4 but they gave players all the tools they need to do the job themselves this is an amazing gesture by the company one that rewards the fans who haven't been able to get this franchise out of their head for 20 years world of warcraft success is built not only on the virtues of that game alone but the fact that the world of World of Warcraft literally grew up alongside the medium as it developed all the lower all the geography all the art it all accumulated and matured across these early titles as the games changed from unsure unsteady concept tests to these gorgeous 3d battlefields with dozens of complex systems of advancement and abilities popping off and guiding the action with an incredible smoothness Gaming changed so much from 2004 to 2014 sure but it did not change half as much as from 1999 to 2004 it's a remarkable progression and that progression is illustrated in microcosm across this charming trilogy thanks for taking a look back at them with me this is the end of the main portion of the video what follows is an appendix on how to install and run the first two games from CD on Windows using a program called DOS box and then a special thanks to patreon subscribers so you've still got your craft one and two disks but he haven't used him in years or you've never played him before but it curious about the early games luckily both warcraft 1 & 2 are classified as banned and we're now and are available to download for free using links here in the video description to play using those versions please also see an attached link the link about installing from disk image this tutorial uses the CDs just installed dos box and insert the warcraft 1 CD to continue first you want to mount your CD drive by typing mount space a space e colon backslash space hyphen T space cd-rom or whatever the letter of your cd-rom drive is usually D if you only have one hard drive then you'll mount your C Drive for installation it'll warn you against it but we're just going to do with this month's real quick just type mount space C space C colon backslash then type e colon backslash to access your CD Drive type install and follow the prompts do the default audio setup and it will run just fine then when setup is complete type borer or to play when you open up dosbox again you just want to type mount space C space C colon backslash Warcraft and then bring up the C command prompt and type war to play you installing Warcraft 2 is essentially the same mount your C Drive as the Warcraft folder using mount space C space C : black slash Warcraft as well as mounting your disk drive with the mount space a space equal and black slash space hyphen T space cd-rom then bring up the e drive prompt and type install again with the defaults this one installed within your Warcraft folder if it says it's installing to see war to when it completes type war 2 to play to run later and mount your C Drive as mount space C space C colon backslash Warcraft backslash war 2 and then type war ii @c prompt you your sound card works perfectly you you [Music] you the beyond the dark portal expansion is also quite easy just mount the disk drive then mount the C Drive as C colon backslash Warcraft backslash war 2 and then install if it was a success you'll be given the options for all 4 campaigns the new game menu of Warcraft 2 note that the videos of the campaigns are stored on the disks so you'll need the correct disc inserted for either the tides of darkness or beyond the Dark Portal campaigns let's play enthusiasts should also note that DOSBox has a built-in video recorder which you can toggle with ctrl alt f5 good luck and good gaming you thanks again for watching and by name some people who are pledged at $10 a month or more on patreon that includes Cassie Bayer Pat hey Connor blue Joshua artnet red Wallace Ryan goons Creston Allen Espen Stein says so chic Sigmund Kaoru Stephen Clark Jonas Amir Aguilar Christine Zechariah Kenya will encroach pecans eligio richard stephenson stephen person Sigma Jensen Kim OH - Jay Schmitz Joe wolf Oliver hy0 Ouray Petrus sill Dalton Simon provost pariah and a Jonathan Latian here also big thanks to everyone else who's pledged to me on patreon currently it's helped me cut down my hours at pizzeria I really appreciate it a lot thanks for watching

Channel: Noah Caldwell-Gervais

Views: 184,516

Rating: 4.906527 out of 5

Keywords: Trilogy, Warcraft: Orcs & Humans (Video Game), Warcraft (Fictional Universe), Real-time Strategy (Media Genre), Strategy Video Game (Video Game Genre), Warcraft III: Reign Of Chaos (Video Game), Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne (Video Game), Warcraft II: Tides Of Darkness (Video Game), Warcraft 2: Beyond the Dark Portal, The Founding of Durotar, Blizzard, Warcraft Lore, Retrospective, Review, Critique, Wow, World Of Warcraft (Video Game), Video Game (Industry), Reviews

Id: mUcrAtn0uVc

Length: 42min 56sec (2576 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 27 2015