quote:
Blizzard introduces a new concept in gaming: the RPS
(Role-Playing Strategy) game. A strategy game set heavily within
a role-playing environment, RPS takes the individual combat and
interactive environments found in role-playing games and
combines them within a competitive strategic environment.

This is pure marketing, not some new concept.

Trevor

Why didn't Blizzard create an entirely new product line to introduce this
supposedly new genre of RPS? Instead they used a highly successful product
line, the Warcraft series, all of which are RTS games. Why didn't they go
with Diablo III instead as the new genre of RPS? The Diablo series has more
role-playing in it than Warcraft, and this is what the name RPS emphasizes most.
But no, it's because Warcraft III will be a RTS game, true to its predecessors.

A new genre demands a new game with a new storyline, not a rehashed sequel.
Maybe they should have called this new genre GMS, Game Marketing Strategy.

Trevor

Is this really the first RPS? From what little I read about it, it sounds more like one of the console Tactic's games, like Shining Force, Final Fantasy Tactics, or Tactics Ogre. What special edge is it that Blizzard is giving Warcraft III to make it any different from these?

Jonathan

By contrast, strategy games like the RTS Warcraft series focus on a large
number of units. The player really doesn't care about developing who they
are, you just create them by the dozen and send them out to get slaughtered.
You can't take units with you to the next level, so everything basically
starts over again.

And whether the game is 2D or 3D, the look itself doesn't have anything
to do with what genre the game represents.

I think Blizzard didn't have the balls to start up a new game series or
a new storyline, in fear that their RPS marketing concept would fail
or not do as good as the rest.

Trevor