gameplay footage shown at
ECTS 1999. The screenshot shows the original, minimal
game interface and
over-the-shoulder camera perspective. A similar camera angle would be adopted for future games in the franchise, such as
World of Warcraft. After the success of
Warcraft II (1995) and
Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal (1996), Blizzard originally planned to continue the story with a point-and-click adventure game called
Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans. This game was supposed to tell the story of Thrall from being raised in captivity to becoming the leader of his clan. The game was announced as a role-playing strategy game (RPS) on September 5, 1999, at a press conference by the game's lead designer
Rob Pardo inside the Henley-Suite at the
European Computer Trade Show 1999. According to Pardo,
Mike O'Brien, the game's lead programmer, originally planned a strategy game—tentatively titled
Warcraft Legends—with few units to command, over-the-shoulder camera and no base building. However, after a year of work this concept did not work out and the existing framework was used to create
Warcraft III instead. In first previews, the game's design and gameplay was therefore compared to games such as
Myth and
Heroes of Might and Magic. Various articles showed that abilities and items were used via right-click on a unit and an appearing icon collar. This version already had an interface concept, however most of the interface were placeholders. Then from E3 2000 around May 12, 2000 to ECTS 2000 the game was not changed very much. Gameplay footage from 2001 reveals a polished version of the interface seen in the E3 2000 trailer. Back in November 2000, the game was set to feature five playable races (with the addition of demons) and only a single resource to be mined. In January 2001, Blizzard announced the Night Elves as the last race as well as the conversion of demons into an
NPC race. The next major changes came between ECTS 2000 and E3 2001, when a different interface and the Night Elf race was revealed. The versions demonstrated at E3 2001 and ECTS 2001 already contained all the final interfaces and units. In April 2001, Blizzard still experimented with different resources and had versions of the game with gold, lumber, mana stones and upkeep or a race depending resource that represented the population like the required food in newer versions. In the middle of January 2002, Blizzard shipped out 5000 beta versions of
Warcraft III to randomly selected testers in order to help improve it before being released in stores. The beta release had all the game's units and races, however, it was only playable over Battle.net; single player games and LAN play were not playable on the beta version of the game.
Warcraft III was first released in the United States and Australia on July 3, 2002 and in Europe on July 5, 2002. Blizzard continued to maintain
WarCraft III, regarding technical issues and compatibility for newer operating systems. In April 2018, Blizzard integrated
widescreen support for the first time, more than 15 years after the game's first release.
Visual design Warcraft III was the first Blizzard game to be rendered using 3D graphics. Blizzard allowed classical fantasy properties like
Dungeons & Dragons and
The Lord of the Rings to influence
Warcraft II, adding more fantasy races such as elves, ogres and dwarves, while still keeping a more realistic design. The shift towards a more cartoonish looking world that started with
Warcraft III was continued in
World of Warcraft which deliberately used less realistic depictions to allow the game to be played on less powerful PCs, thus increasing the potential player-base. The artwork of
Warcraft III was hugely influential on a number of other high fantasy real-time strategy games that followed it.
Audio Most of the music of
Warcraft III was composed by Tracy W. Bush, Derek Duke, Jason Hayes, and Glenn Stafford. The Limited Edition of
Reign of Chaos came with much of the orchestral music on a separate CD. Each of the four playable races has different music:
monastic music for the humans;
ambient and
Native American-sounding music for the Night Elves; warlike music for the Orcs; and fast, haunting music for the Undead. Metzen had previously contributed artwork to
the first game and became involved in writing stories and missions in
Warcraft II. Warcraft III was the first game Metzen served as creative director for, a role he would continue in for all Blizzard games until his retirement in 2016.
Modding As did
Warcraft II and
StarCraft before it,
Warcraft III contains a
World Editor program that allows players to create their own custom scenarios and maps. Despite its wealth of features, the
World Editor was easy enough for players without any coding experience to design new games. Though the editor has received updates through game patches, it is not officially supported as a product.
The Lord of the Rings was a particularly popular subject for modded maps, as
a trilogy of movies was released around the same time as
Warcraft III. Some custom maps have enjoyed great success, particularly maps based on
Aeon of Strife such as
Defense of the Ancients (DotA), which became a tournament item at
BlizzCon 2005 and other tournaments around the world.
DotA is largely attributed with to being the most significant inspiration for the
multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) genre. In 2012,
Valve acquired commercial rights to the
DOTA name trademark.
Expansion Immediately after the release, Blizzard began brainstorming content for an expansion and development began in October 2002. In January 2003, Blizzard announced that the expansion pack was titled
The Frozen Throne and continues the story for the Night Elves, Humans and Undead after the events of the main game while providing a completely separate, role-playing focused campaign for the Orcs. it was released worldwide on July 1, 2003.
Special editions Upon release, Blizzard made
Warcraft III available with four different box arts, one for each faction, in a limited edition. In addition to the regular game, a limited
Collector's Edition Warcraft III bundle containing a
Warcraft III cinematic
DVD, including behind-the-scenes features and the cinematics of all prior
Warcraft games; a Collector's Edition
Soundtrack; a Collector's Edition
instruction manual;
The Art of Warcraft book; and
lithographic prints was released. Another version, the Exclusive Gift Set, came bundled with the cinematic DVD, official BradyGames
strategy guide, and Warcraft II: Battle.net Edition.
Warcraft III: Reforged At
BlizzCon 2018 on November 2, 2018, Blizzard announced a
remaster of both
Warcraft III and its expansion
The Frozen Throne entitled
Warcraft III: Reforged featuring remodeled characters and graphics with a prospective release in 2020. It was released on January 28, 2020. Many promised features and updates were not initially included, and several controversial changes were also made to the game even for players who did not purchase
Reforged. This led to mixed reception from critics and
negative reception from fans, resulting in Blizzard offering refunds. The release of
Warcraft III: Reforged resulted in the termination of the original titles
Warcraft III and its expansion
The Frozen Throne being supported any further. ==Reception==