Blizzard announced a Warcraft III: Reforged at BlizzCon Friday, and when it hits shelves next year, it’s going to include some surprising features – notably, it’ll be compatible in multiplayer with the original game and it includes the Frozen Throne expansion.
Blizzard is all re-recording all of Warcraft III’s voice lines, reports PC Gamer. We’ve already seen Reforged’s completely redone unit models, and its cutscenes are also being rebuilt from scratch.
The original Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos game has been getting a recent raft of balance and unit tweaks in preparation for Reforged launching in 2019 – and owners of both editions will be able to play against each other when it comes out.
“The idea is that these two groups of players should be able to be friends, and play with each other,” designer Michael Scipione told PC Gamer.
The Frozen Throne expansion added a brand-new single-player campaign to Warcraft III, and introduced new units to each in-game faction. It also brought back the naval combat from Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness. The Frozen Throne campaign stars Night Elf warden Maiev Shadowsong and Blood Elf prince Kael’Thas, and it showcased some remarkably creative level design for its era.
As we noted yesterday, BlizzCon attendees are getting a chance to play one of the base game’s most iconic missions on the show floor in Anaheim this weekend. The rest of us will have to wait for when it launches in 2019.