Blizzard have a lot of very successful projects going on right now. Like Apple with personal computing and Google with web search and innovation, they’ve found something they’re good at and stuck to it. (Microsoft is good with things too, before all the Gates fanboys comment me to death. Just not things I’d actually want to use to get work done.) Blizzard’s strength is in creating immersive and engaging gaming experiences. And right now, they’re coming full into bloom.
Starcraft II releases July 27th. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm (the third expansion for WoW) releases Soon™ after—probably before October, based on statements made at BlizzCon 2009. Diablo III is widely expected to release in 2011, though no definitive statements on that have been forthcoming from Blizzard. And it’s no secret that Blizzard has been working on a “Next Gen MMO” as well.
Enter Battle.net’s REAL ID. This is a clear signal from Blizzard that it will not fall behind in social gaming. While cross-game friend lists have been around for a while (current consoles have them, as do companies like Steam), deep integration with Facebook is new.
New, but not surprising.
You see, gaming is powerfully social. One need only to look at Farmville or Scrabb… I mean wordplay games… on Facebook to see that. Since the dawn of history, humankind have played games to pass the time, and played them with their friends and family.
It follows that since Facebook is the current social template for organizing and communicating along those relationships, social gaming will stand a better chance for success if it closely follows that model. Game providers used to have to build their own networks (GameSpy anyone?) but now they can tap into pre-existing ones. It makes social networks less fragmentary and more… well… social when you don’t have to check five different places to see if your friend wants to get together to play a game of chess or PvP in Southshore.
By 2015, there will be very few—if any—games left that fail to connect the player to a robust social network.
Part II of this series will deal with the privacy implications of Blizzard’s new changes.
