Warcraft

Warcraft is a franchise of video games, novels, and other media created by Blizzard Entertainment. The series is made up of five core games: Warcraft: Orcs & Humans, Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, World of Warcraft, and Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft. The first three of these core games are in the real-time strategy genre, where opposing players command virtual armies in battle against each other or a computer-controlled enemy. The fourth and best-selling title of the franchise is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), where players control their character and interact with each other in a virtual world. The most recent title is Hearthstone, a digital collectible card game.

Of these games, no expansion sets were released for Warcraft: Orcs & Humans, but Warcraft II was accompanied by the release of Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal and Warcraft III was accompanied by the release of Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. Multiple expansion packages also accompanied World of Warcraft, which include: The Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, Mists of Pandaria, Warlords of Draenor and Legion.

All games in the series have been set in and around the world of Azeroth, a high fantasy setting. Initially, the start of the series focused on the human nations that make up the Eastern Kingdoms, and the Orcish Horde, which arrived in Azeroth via a dark portal, beginning the great wars. The Orcs came from another world, referred to as Draenor, which then turns into Outland, the world that will be shattered into pieces by demonic magics during the events of Warcraft II. Later on in the series the world of Azeroth was expanded, revealing the new continents of Kalimdor, Northrend and Pandaria, allowing the introduction of the Night Elves, Tauren and other major races into the universe. The world of Azeroth also contains the traditional fantasy setting races of elves, dwarves, gnomes, orcs, and trolls.

The series also resulted in the publishing of several books relevant to the Warcraft universe setting, covering a broad range of the timelines of the universe. A collectable card game was also published, which offered those who bought booster packs a chance to gain access codes to limited in-game content in World of Warcraft. An upcoming film adaptation is planned. Many comics have also been released alongside the books, further covering parts of the universe's storyline. A short-lived, online subscription only magazine was also available but later ceased publication after just five issues.

The first three games in the Warcraft series, including their expansion packs, were all released on both the PC and Macintosh. All of these games were of the real-time strategy genre. Each game proceeded to carry on the storyline of the previous games, and each introduced new features and content to improve gameplay. Warcraft III was the first game in the series to feature a Collector's Edition, which all subsequent games have released as well. Warcraft II was the first game in the series to feature play over the internet using Battle.net, although this was not included until a later release of the game. Warcraft II was also the first in the series to be re-released as a "Battle Chest", a bundled copy of the game containing both the original and expansion. Warcraft III and World of Warcraft also have both had "Battle Chests" released for them subsequent to their initial release. The "Battle.net" edition of Warcraft II was also the first to introduce the use of CD keys to the series, requiring each user online to have their own copy of the game in order to be able to connect. However, a CD key is not yet required to play via a Local Area Network, although speculation is that future games in the series will do so, as another product in Blizzard Entertainment's portfolio, StarCraft II, is doing so by removing the option for using LANs altogether, requiring the use of Battle.net.

In 1998, an adventure game in the series, Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans, was announced as being cancelled, having been previously delayed from a 1997 release.

In 2004, Blizzard Entertainment moved the series away from the real-time strategy genre and released World of Warcraft, an MMORPG. Requiring a subscription fee to be paid to play, it also introduced regular additional content to the series in the form of patches. World of Warcraft quickly gained much popularity worldwide, becoming the world's largest subscription-based MMORPG. They reached a peak 12 million subscribers worldwide. World of Warcraft has had five expansions as of 2014. During the production of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, Blizzard co-founder Frank Pearce stated that "If there’s a team that’s passionate about doing another WarCraft RTS, then that’s definitely something we would consider. It’s nothing that we’re working on right now, we have development teams working on Cataclysm, StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, Diablo III, and when those teams are all off the projects they’re working on, they’ll be intimately involved in the discussions about what’s next."

In 2013, Blizzard announced a new online free-to-play trading card game titled Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, with the beta being available in summer of 2013. In March 2014, Hearthstone was officially released. In addition to the free-to-play basic gameplay Hearthstone also contains fee-based features like extra card packs, a special tournament mode or additional restricted matches against computer opponents.