Blizzard Celebrates Its 20th Anniversary With Special Webpage
Blizzard is pulling out all the stops to celebrate its 20th anniversary in the gaming industry. To share their joy with all the loyal Blizzard gamers, on August 9, 2012, they added a special feature to the Blizzard website to commemorate the event. There is even a page with a year by year timeline of highlights from the last two decades of Blizzard gaming. You will probably laugh a bit you look at the pictures from 20 years ago, but we are sure Blizzard President, Mike Morhaime, will forgive you.
Its been quite a journey for the company started in 1991 by three guys fresh out of college. In its first incarnation, Blizzard was known as Silicon Synapse, founded by Allen Adham, Frank Pearce, and Mike Morhaime. The company’s very first game was RPM Racing. We can only wonder if the three friends had any idea of the incredible success that would come in the years ahead. Today, Blizzard is part of a four billion dollar a year gaming empire.
Since changing their name to Blizzard in 1994, the company has brought some of the most successful games ever created to life. Included are such titles as Warcraft, Warcraft 2, Warcraft 3, Diablo, Diablo 2, Blackthorne, Orcs and Humans, and of course, Starcraft.
In November of 2004, Blizzard jumped head first into the online gaming universe, with the ground breaking release of the world’s most popular subscription based MMORPG, World of Warcraft. WOW peaked at 12 million subscribers in 2010 and still manages to attract over nine million paying customers, after almost 8 years online. Blizzard expects subscriber numbers to skyrocket again, with the release of the Mists of Pandaria expansion on September 25, 2012.
Building on the success of WOW, gamers were treated to the release of Starcraft 2 in 2010. Then Diablo 3 made its awesome debut in 2012; breaking all records by selling 3.5 million copies in the first 24 hours. Blizzard continues to develop new content and expansions for each and every one of its current library of games.
In addition to great games, Blizzard brings fans the famous and fabulous Blizzcon; now in its 7th year. Gamers from around the world get together to see all the latest Blizzard offerings and frolic for three days of awe inspiring fun. If you are a gamer, you haven’t lived until you have experienced the insanity and mayhem of a Blizzcon.
Take a moment to visit the timeline page that illustrates the 20 years of Blizzard gaming history and smile as you remember your favorite games from the past. Then log on to Battle.net and play your favorite current Blizzard game. Lets all take a moment to thank Blizzard for 20 wonderful years of world class gaming.
