Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans

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WarCraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans {{#if:{{{image\|}}}\|<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center;">{{{image\|}}}
Developer(s)	Blizzard Entertainment {{#if:{{{publisher\|}}}\|<tr><th style="background-color: #ccccff;">Publisher(s)<td>{{{publisher\|}}}
Release date(s)	NEVER RELEASED
Genre(s)	Adventure game
Mode(s)	Single player {{#if:{{{ratings\|}}}\|<tr><th style="background-color: #ccccff;">Rating(s)<td>{{{ratings\|}}}
Platform(s)	PC, Apple Macintosh {{#if:{{{media\|}}}\|<tr><th style="background-color: #ccccff;">Media<td>{{{media\|}}}

WarCraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans was a dark comical point-and-click adventure computer game under development by Blizzard Entertainment that was set in the Warcraft Universe. Russian company Animation Magic located in St. Petersburg was outsourced due to their experience in classical 2D animation to produce the 22 minutes of fully-animated sequences, the game's artwork, the coding of the engine and the implementation of the sound effects. Blizzard then provided all the designs, the world backgrounds, sound recording and ensured storyline continuity. Four or five months after Blizzard had released Battle.net and Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal had shipped, Blizzard began development on a title that would be cancelled just over 12 months later.

Tagline: "An Adventure Game in the World of WarCraft."

1 Story
2 Cancellation
3 Resources
4 Characters
5 Game features
6 References
7 See also
8 External links

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Story

Image:Warcraft-adventures-promotional-concept-art.jpg The game takes place immediately after the events of Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal. The player's role was that of a 22 year old orc named Thrall who was raised by a cunning human lieutenant named Aedelas Blackmoore, who found him as a youngster. Blackmoore raised Thrall in his prison-fortress of Durnholde, as a favoured slave and gladiator. Blackmoore trained the young Orc to be a peerless warrior, and an educated leader in the hope of using Thrall to take over the Horde, and thereby achieve dominion over his fellow men. The player guides Thrall on an adventure through Azeroth firstly by escaping from Blackmoore’s fortress, then by journeying to human internment camps where his brethren are being kept. From there, wishing to free his people, Thrall seeks out the last undefeated Orc chieftain, Grom Hellscream. Seeking the truth of his own origins, Thrall travelled to find the legendary Frostwolf Clan. Thrall discovers he was the son and heir of the Orc hero, Durotan—the true chieftain of the Frostwolves who had been murdered in the wilds twenty years before where Aedelas Blackmoore found him.

During his travels, Thrall found the aged warchief, Orgrim Doomhammer, who had been in hiding for many years in a castle, with his minions. Doomhammer, who was a blood brother of Thrall's father, is inspired by Thrall's passion and decides to follow the young, visionary Orc to free the captive clans and in the process gives his people a new spiritual identity. Thrall, with the remaining orcs, returns to Blackmoore's fortress to free the Horde. During the liberation of one camp, Doomhammer falls in battle, and Thrall proceeds to take up Doomhammer's legendary warhammer and don his black plate-armor, thus becoming the new Warchief of the Horde. Encouraged by his best friend and mentor, Grom Hellscream, Thrall storms Durnholde and defeats his surrogate father, Blackmoore, bringing the game's narrative to an end.

Some speculate that the impetus for Blizzard to "turn the orcs good" and rid them of demonic corruption in later games came from designing in-game events that would have exposed the player to the softer side of orcish personality.

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Cancellation

Image:Warcraft-adventures-baby-thrall.jpg The game was originally slated for a Q4 1997 release; however it was pushed back until the end of 1998. This was a result of unforseen technical problems coupled with communication limitations between Blizzard and their Russian third party animation company Animation Magic, due to distance and language barriers. Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans had been in development for over a year: nearly all features, puzzles, and areas were in place, the voice acting had been recorded, and much of the animation was complete, yet Blizzard was not confident with their title. Blizzard hired Steve Meretzky, creator of A Mind Forever Voyaging and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, as a design specialist to help refine the puzzles and make them further cohesive with the narrative. Meretzky spent two weeks with the developers looking over the game for up to 14 hours a day and it was decided that sequences of the game had to be re-written which would involve more animation and more dubbing. Image:Warcraft-adventures-grom-hellscream.jpg However as the 1998 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Atlanta was approaching, Blizzard became increasingly aware that implementing the proposed changes would result in them being unable to meet their already extended 1998 deadline. LucasArts was gearing up to release their (competing) title Monkey Island III, and had announced their next title Grim Fandango sporting a 3D engine. In comparison producer Bill Roper felt WarCraft Adventures looked dated; Template:Cquote

After over a year of hard work, press tours, magazine covers, and fan fervor Blizzard announced that WarCraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans was cancelled days before E3. Within hours of the announcement fans of the series formed an online petition, demanding the project be resurrected. On the 22nd of May 1998, Blizzard responded via their website;

Blizzard Announcement - 22 May 1998
Press Desk: Blizzard Cancels WarCraft Adventures

Blizzard wants to take a minute to respond to the Warcraft Adventures 
petition that is circulating on the Internet. First, we want to express 
our gratitude to the Warcraft fans that took the time to organize such 
an effort. We recognize that the cancellation of Warcraft Adventures has 
disappointed some of our customers, and we appreciate that they have 
shared their opinions with us.

Secondly, we want let you know that stopping development was not a 
decision that was taken lightly. It was a hard call to make, but each of 
us knows that it was the right choice. The cancellation was not a business 
or marketing decision or even a statement about the adventure genre. The 
decision centered around the level of value that we want to give our 
customers. In essence, it was a case of stepping up and really proving to 
ourselves and gamers that we will not sell out on the quality of our games.

And finally, we hope that Warcraft fans will consider our track record and 
trust our judgement on ending the project. The cancellation of Warcraft 
Adventures does not signal the demise of Azeroth. We have every intention 
of returning to the Warcraft world because there are still chapters to be 
told. We will keep you informed as we announce future Warcraft plans.

Image:Warcraft-adventures-screenshot2.jpg Despite their press release, rumours still persist the game was cancelled due to projected low sales from the deteriorating market of the Adventure game genre.

Even though the game was cancelled, Blizzard felt the story too important to ignore and hired an author to adapt the game's story into a novel. The author (who still remains unknown) contracted to scribe it was unable to complete the book on time. Star Trek novelist Christie Golden was then hired to write the novelisation based on scripts and outlines provided by WarCraft universe co-creator, Chris Metzen, and had to be completed within six weeks. The book was released under the title Warcraft: Lord of the Clans by Pocket Books and is considered canonical by Warcraft enthusiasts. Warcraft: Lord of the Clans is the second novel based in the Warcraft Universe.

Even though the game exploring Thrall's origins was cancelled, Thrall became a major character in Blizzard's subsequent games Warcraft III and World of Warcraft.

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Resources

Image:Warcraft-adventures-sceenshot1.jpg The project from conception to cancellation took over one year, over that time the following resources were used:

The cost of a small internal team for one year.
Outsourcing the Russian animation house, Animation Magic that had over 100 artists and animators working on the project.
Establishing a Boston sound team.
Establishing a secondary sound team.
Voice actors.
Hiring Steve Meretzky as a design specialist for two weeks.
Trademark costs and advertising budget leading up to its expected release.

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Characters

Image:Characters-designs-Art-of-Warcraft.jpg

Thrall played by Clancy Brown (of Highlander fame)
Doomhammer played by Peter Cullen (of Optimus Prime, Transformers fame)
Drek'thar (the shaman) played by Tony Jay (of Disneys The Hunchback of Notre Dame)
Zul 'Jin (Troll leader) played by Unknown
Nazgrel (the shaman) played by Unknown
Gazlowe played by Unknown
Durotan played by Unknown
Rend played by Unknown
Maim played by Unknown
Kargath Bladefist played by Unknown
Deathwing played by Unknown
Additional Voices: Bill Roper Template:Fn

Template:Fnb Bill Roper produced the voices for all the characters in WarCraft and many of the voices in Warcraft II, however as primarily a producer he is not a union actor so was not allowed to be used for WarCraft Adventures. However they could legally use his previously recorded work sparingly throughout the game.

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