Blizzard’s mighty CCG is out now; read our Hearthstone review to see what we thought of it.
Hearthstone’s mobile version is far enough along to be displayed for the public in three weeks’ time. An “all-new build” of the game will be playable on iPads at PAX East – exactly a year on from the game’s announcement.
Besides flicking minions about with their fingers and thumbs, Blizzard say attendees will have a “chance to find out what’s in the cards for Hearthstone” – so expect some news on that front.
Earlier this month, fans dug into the data strings of a Hearthstone beta patch and uncovered references to a series of ranked seasons. In this unconfirmed calendar, a “pre iPad release” test season was scheduled to land before the end of April – suggesting the mobile version of the game will come sometime next month.
Internal testing began on the handheld port for iPad, iPhone and Android in October. Blizzard told us last year that it wouldn’t “necessarily” feature cross-platform play for launch – but I can’t imagine that’ll remain the case for long.
Elsewhere at PAX, there’s a panel talk on the “ultimate Blizzard mashup” – Heroes of the Storm. Kaeo Milker, Dustin Browder and Phill Gonzales will chat about the MOBA’s challenges to “longstanding conventions of the genre” – namely multiple maps, unique objectives, and heroes who play “quite differently than you might expect”.
Blizzard will play a showmatch, and the whole talk will be streamed live on one of the official PAX Twitch channels for those not in attendance.
Our Nick and Tim say Heroes of the Storm is a triumph; I’m just hoping it can spark the same love for the MOBA in me that Hearthstone did for the CCG. How about you?
Thanks, Gamespot.