The studio that brought us "Starcraft," "Diablo" and "World of Warcraft" is at it again with their latest, a decidedly not-so-hardcore online collectible card strategy game called "Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft." Blizzard's PAX East panel provides the first real announcement for the Boston convention, following the "Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm" release.
Under the direction of a "scrappy and versatile" 15-man team, Ploygon writes, "Hearthstone" is a simplified kind of virtual card game built with accessibility and the free-to-play business model in mind. Players should be able to earn the cards, according to Blizzard, but they'll also be selling them in packs as well. Though pricing has not been announced, Blizzard officials say they'll probably charge "about a dollar" for a pack of five cards.
Showing off some gameplay at their panel, the game has quite a simple look, set very much in the "Warcraft" universe with a wide color-pallet and cute attack-animations as the cards bash eachother. While hardcore fans may be a bit disappointed by the small scale of Blizzard's "Hearthstone," the virtual card collection game genre has taken a small upswing over the past couple years with "Magic: The Gathering" releasing on the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
Blizzard looking to cash in on free-to-play with a strong niche game may just prove a new direction for the behemoth pc game maker.
Initially available on PC and Mac sometime in 2013, the game is also coming to iPad at a later date.
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