“We Firmly Believe Our Best Years Are Ahead of Us”: Blizzard Has a “Bigger Vision” for Warcraft Than Just WoW

Last week, as part of a flurry of showcases Blizzard Entertainment announced to start 2026, the studio hosted a World of Warcraft: State of Azeroth showcase, which dug into the roadmap the company has for the long-running MMORPG in 2026. Following that showcase, in an interview with The Game Business, game director Ion Hazzikostas and executive producer and vice president Holly Longdale went further into what they envision for the future of World of Warcraft, and the "bigger vision" they have for the franchise.

It's clear that Blizzard has a lot coming for World of Warcraft. The game's next major expansion, World of Warcraft: Midnight, is due to arrive on March 2, 2026, with several major additions coming to the game in the expansion. It'll be the game's eleventh expansion since it launched in 2004 and completely changed the landscape of the video game industry forever. Even after all those years of massive success, over 20 years later, Blizzard is looking to the future for Warcraft's best days.

"We firmly believe that our best years are ahead of us," said game director Ion Hazzikostas. "It's game design, but it's also social design, and it's thinking about how we meet a new generation where they are. That's going to mean thinking outside the box in some places compared to what our game has traditionally been. But we're excited to keep taking big swings."

That could also potentially include new games within the Warcraft universe that aren't an MMORPG. With BlizzCon 2026 arriving in September, and Blizzard promising it'll be "one for the ages," we could really start to see the Warcraft IP branch out. A new RTS is one possible avenue, but the reality is, with how expansive the Warcraft universe is, Blizzard could really take the franchise in any direction it feels fits within the world, and offers something new to its audience.

The drive for Blizzard to expand and do more with Warcraft comes in part from the fact that the game is now, in 2026, 22 years old. It's old enough to drink in the US, and that means there are people who started playing it in their early to middle age who lived a whole life and are now retired, still choosing to spend their time in Azeroth. At the same time, there are young people getting into the game for the first time today, and Blizzard has to find a way to satisfy the game's whole audience.

"We've got a lot of players that say to us, 'Give me something I can play with my kids, or play with my partner,'" added Holly Longdale. "We have so many players and the ability to really dig into how they play, it's given us a lot of interesting opportunities to be able to broaden out. We are aiming to be a game that's approachable for anyone."

"Breadth is really the key," continued Hazzikostas. "It's less about change in the sense of moving away from something and becoming something different, and more about being broader and more approachable in our offerings and meeting people where they are. We already do have retired folks playing World of Warcraft, and a generation of young students who may have all the time in the world. 20 years ago, there was a sense that, for a lot of people, the game might be something that appealed to them, but they don't have the time for it, because it might be all-consuming. That is not what we are anymore. It's not what we've been for a long time. But we still have that depth for those who want it. If you only have 20 minutes to play, you can accomplish something. But if you have an entire weekend or a vacation, and you want to go deep, that's there as well."

How that breadth of experiences materializes is something we'll see as Blizzard continues to update and work on the game going forward. Though we know that, at least for now, that won't include a console version of Warcraft, bringing the game to other platforms and making it playable in new ways is definitely one avenue Blizzard might explore.

It's World of Warcraft: Classic offering is one avenue it's already deep into, as Hazzikostas explains that there's an entirely different audience of players who go for Classic, over the modern World of Warcraft. "Classic players are completely different, for the most part, than modern players. They behave differently. They want different things. We don't have a whole lot of crossover between both games."

Wherever Blizzard takes World of Warcraft, it's clear that Blizzard sees more for the game, with Longdale going so far as to say that it's currently an "underutilized" IP.

"It’s a fantastic IP. In my humble opinion, it’s been underutilized, and I just want to bring it to as many people as possible. And that means evolving what Warcraft means, what it is, and where it’s going. We want it to be approachable," Longdale said.

"And at the same time, we want to take advantage of 20 years of stories that have been told and not told, and start bringing it out to the world in a broader way. That’s my goal and vision. We’re never going to stop doing the things people love. But at the same time, we have a bigger vision than simply being an MMORPG."

For more on World of Warcraft and its upcoming Midnight expansion, check out our deep dive preview of Midnight, and our interview with associate game director Paul Kubit and lead combat systems designer Jade Martin on how the Warcraft team plans to grow the new housing feature for the long term.

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