Every year, BlizzCon arrives. And every year, Bree and I sit down and liveblog about the most pertinent event for our readers to follow along at home because we love you. We just don’t love you enough to put on pants and head to California. That’s expensive.
The part where we go to California, that is. Pants are not expensive. We both own at least one pair of pants. I own several, but I don’t want to presume to speak for Bree. [Do PJ pants count? -Bree]
Of course, all of this raises a rather important question: What can we expect from this year’s BlizzCon? Unlike last year, this year we don’t have a new World of Warcraft expansion coming down the pipe, and the game just received its first big post-launch patch. What new and exciting things will be revealed at BlizzCon? What should we keep our eyes on? What will have exciting new developments added into the comments as it happens? Why did we have to suffer through Metallica and Linkin Park in previous years when we could have had Weird Al all along? Read on for the answers to some of that as we look at what to expect from this year’s BlizzCon!
Sombra (probably)
Blizzard has been teasing this hero for some time, and BlizzCon is the perfect time to actually show her off to the world. There’s even an entire panel about what’s coming next for Overwatch in the near future, so there’s plenty of reason to expect that players will hear all about how she plays. Heck, we may well even hear about new modes and the like; that’s a distinct possibility.
It’s worth noting that there are two opportunities for new Overwatch announcements before the Q&A on November 5th, with both the opening ceremony and the specific “what’s new” panel. Also worth noting is that the panel is about what’s new rather than what’s next, which might indicate that anything new is going to be revealed before the panel… or that you can just expect a rundown on what’s already in the game rather than what’s around the corner.
Lots of unhappy Diablo fans
There’s been a rumor that we’re going to hear about a new expansion for Diablo III at this year’s BlizzCon; we’ve got franchise anniversary stuff going on and that game has been languishing for a long while. However, the schedule certainly doesn’t support that; the developer talk is even scheduled exactly opposite the World of Warcraft talk, and the only listed event is a look back on 20Â years of the franchise. That seems to indicate that the fans of the game are not going to be walking away with a spring in their step and joy in their hearts.
As with other things, expect to hear about this during the opening ceremony. The game could definitely use an expansion, but there’s not much time for the developers to talk about it if it happens.
Even unhappier StarCraft fans
Unlike the Diablo III fans, StarCraft 2 faithfuls have no reason to expect big new news… and there’s nothing on the schedule that talks about much more than making the game a foundation for future multiplayer developments. I would advise against getting your hopes up.
So much e-sports stuff
Oh, boy, it will be endless. Here’s a drinking game: every time e-sports are discussed at the convention during the non-e-sports event (the competitive stuff takes up a full 60% of the streaming content), take a shot. Try not to get alcohol poisoning during the opening ceremony.
Discussion of World of Warcraft’s next patch
Patch 7.1 is still fresh in everyone’s mind, but the watchword of the recent developments with World of Warcraft have been all about convincing players that we’re not going to have another year-long gap between content updates. (Of course, that was also what happened with Mists of Pandaria and releasing four patches in half an hour, followed by a year-long content gap, but let’s not go into that again.) So you can safely expect that the big talking point for WoW this year will be about what’s happening next and what’s happening beyond even that.
The next patch may also already involve addressing some complaints that have been heard repeatedly and at high volume during the past few weeks of Legion‘s operation, so expect at least as much of that as content. It’s far too early to expect anything in terms of trailers for the next patch, but we will no doubt hear quite a lot about what it’ll contain and get lots of concept art.
Another Hearthstone expansion
Really, this is just one of those things that always syncs up nicely with BlizzCon. I can’t say with any certainty whether this will be another adventure or a full-on expansion (I’ve lost track of where we are in the game’s cycle), but we always hear about some new set/gameplay coming to the game at each convention. The turnaround for the game is fast enough that it lines up perfectly.
More Heroes of the Storm gewgaws
Heroes of the Storm is in a nice place for development insofar as all it needs to do is keep turning out a steady stream of maps, heroes, and skins. And those are not terribly difficult to produce, so that’s exactly what we get. We’ll hear about some of those at BlizzCon, without a doubt, and while it doesn’t exactly tax the grey matter. it’s a reliable draw. Your speculation about new heroes is as good as mine, although we might see another Diablo reference or two in there.
No legacy servers
We know we’re not hearing about this one, and really, the only baffling part is why people thought we would be hearing about it. Yeah, that’s not happening.
Nothing world-shattering
If you’re waiting for this particular BlizzCon to feature either an enormous reveal (“WoW goes free-to-play!”) or some big new announcement (“World of StarCraft is happening years after everyone had given up on that and kind of lost faith in our management skills!”) you should probably go ahead and temper that expectation. The reality is that this is a time of the year and a convention without that sort of big highlight; there are no impending expansions we’re just now learning about and now new titles coming out of left field like with the initial Overwatch reveal. If you’re a big fan of a Blizz game going into the convention, you’ll be happy, but don’t expect a game-changing that alters everything in an eyeblink.
Do, however, expect the show to end with “Weird” Al Yankovic. Really, that should be more than worth it. I’ve seen him live; he’s great. So I’m ending the article with my favorite song of his.
Also, liveblogs. We’ll have those. Expect them.
