World of Warcraft
"World of Warcraft" was first announced by Blizzard at the ECTS trade show in September 2001. Released in 2004, development of the game took roughly 4–5 years, including extensive testing. The 3D graphics in "World of Warcraft" use elements of the proprietary graphics engine originally used in "Warcraft III". The game was designed to be an open environment where players are allowed to do what they please. Quests are optional and were designed to help guide players, allow character development, and to spread characters across different zones to try to avoid what developers called "player collision". The game interface allows players to customize appearance and controls, and to install add-ons and other modifications.
StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty
Mike Morhaime, president of Blizzard, announced during the opening ceremony of Blizzcon 2009 that "StarCraft II" and the new Battle.net platform would both be released in 2010, with an approximately one-month gap between releases. As of March 2010, Blizzard had stated that the new platform was being tested outside the beta and was planned for release in early July 2010, for both "StarCraft II" and "", with a later upgrade for "Diablo III". On May 5, 2010, it was revealed that "StarCraft II" and Battle.net 2.0 would be integrated with social networking site Facebook, "linking the world's premier online gaming platform with the world's most popular social platform"—a move that allowed gamers to search among their Facebook friends for "StarCraft II" opponents. "Wired" magazine, in its annual Vaporware Award, ranked "StarCraft II" first among the delayed technology products of 2009. "StarCraft II" was finally released on July 27, 2010, with launch parties in selected cities of countries around the world. Customers and reviewers who received the installation DVD before the July 27 release were greeted with an error screen, telling them to wait until the release date. There was no known workaround and some reviewers had praised the action for limiting journalists to playing and reviewing the game with actual players.