Blizzard’s MOBA enters maintenance mode
Heroes Of The Storm, Blizzard’s take on the MOBA, is entering its dotage. In a shortnews post, Blizzard say they’re going to keep the game running, but “there are no plans for new for-purchase content” and future patches will focus on bug fixes.
“Moving forward we will support Heroes in a manner similar to our other longstanding games,StarCraftand StarCraft II,” says the post. “In the future, we’ll continue seasonal rolls and hero rotations, and while the in-game shop will remain operational there are no plans for new for-purchase content to be added. Future patches will primarily focus on client sustainability and bug fixing, with balance updates coming as needed.”
All players are being gifted a previously rare Epic Arcane Lizard mount in next week’s patch, as a thank you for supporting the game.
Although the MOBA genre grew out of WarCraft 3, and Blizzard’s influence is still visible in character archetypes across the genre, Blizzard were late to the party with their own entry. Heroes Of The Storm - which they preferred to call a “hero brawler” rather than a MOBA - starred characters from across Blizzard’s other games and was friendlier and more accessible than most of its competitors. For that reason it was loved by people who didn’t normally play the genre, as per Marsh Davies in hisHeroes Of The Storm reviewfor us. It’s probably for the same reason that it’s nobodies job to play Heroes Of The Storm.
Blizzard typically do an admirable job of keeping their games running over the long-term, and the original StarCraft still receives patches and balance tweaks even now. Heroes Of The Storm will hopefully therefore remain playable for a long time to come.
Blizzard Entertainment parent company Activision Blizzard are also in the process of being bought by Microsoft for $69 billion.
