Blizzard Debuts Cinematic for World of WarCraft: Warlords of Draenor

This just makes me want a Warcraft 4.

Orcs!

Between this and Dans brave attempts at WoW makes me kinda want to install this again.

Man I can't be more pumped for this. Say what you want about the quality of the game but I still love WoW and I'm really like some of the changes they are implementing. I'm super depressed it so close to Dragon Age: Inquisition but I've definitely got a full winter ahead of me.

That was cool.

Haven't played WOW in a very, very long time but man you gotta love these Cinematic trailers. And I think I even killed that Giant demon with a two man army back in Burning Crusade.

This.

My copy of Warcraft 3 is disappearing just like Marty McFly's family in the photo.

Yup, that was pretty neat.

Yep. That was legitimately pretty awesome.

I'll probably end up checking this out.

Orcs are still the coolest race, jussayin'.

Anyways, I'm a little confused by this lore - assuming that is indeed Grom Hellscream, Gul'Dan, and Mannoroth - wasn't the whole basis of WC3 based on Grom accepting and drinking the Blood of Mannoroth? Is this looking at like a canonical revision if Grom turned it down instead or something for the expansion?

Also, is that other orc at the end that pushed Grom out of the way Garrosh? Or someone else?

I'm confused... but goddamn do I still love the lore.

Does this mean I get back 6 years of my life?!

It means you have to start those 6 years all over again!!!

From what I understand, it's time travel. At the end of the current Pandaria storyline Garrosh Hellscream is defeated by the players and imprisoned. A Bronze Dragon however frees him and using the dark portal transports him through time to the Draenor of 35(ish) years ago, before his father and the other orc leaders accept Mannoroths Blood (as depicted in the cinematic). Instead of the demonic blood, they use Garrosh's knowledge of tactics and advanced military technology to form the Iron Horde, imprison both Gul'Dan and Mannoroth under the Dark Portal to power it.

That's an Orc alright.

Wellp, Blizzard still crushes any competition with their cinematics. Great throwbacks in it as well.

Cool visual callback to the Warcraft 3 cinematic there!

goodbye next decade of my life

Alternate timelines and time travel stories are simultaneously the best and the worst.

@heatdrive88: It's time travel. Garrosh Hellscream has gone back in time and stopped the orcs from drinking the blood.

I would rather have a Warcraft movie like this instead of one with real actors.

you just saved my brain from meltdown. thanks!

Grom Hellscream is radical. Too bad his son ended up being a huge ass.

This pleases me.

If the games looked 0.0000000001% as good as the trailers, I might be interested in playing them. Seeing the game now however, it just looks so bad visually, it really sucks any and all will from me to even attempt it. That and there are a ton of other great MMO's out there now which are free. The Star Wars one was pretty fun, and Guild Wars 2 was pretty great as well.

you pleases me.

They've cannibalized the lore set up in WC I-III that they have legitimately no loose threads left to build upon, I think - no surprise they've gone back in time.

Cripes. That's practically all I can say.

Thanks for the update, by the way. I've been out of the game since Burning Crusade - I had no idea Garrosh turned into such a dickhead.

Grom looks like a fucking hobo. What the hell? He looks better in the Warcraft 3 Cinematic.

Were you ever a Warcraft 1-3 follower, or did you start with WoW? As someone who grew up with 2 and a bit of 3 before moving into WoW, this is way cooler than it has any right to be, and makes me sad this isn't A: the movie, and B: it's WoW, which after Blizzard fucked me over with account restoration after it got hijacked during ~2 years I wasn't playing, I've vowed never to play again. Or at least pay Blizzard for the privilege to.

But this must be way further back in time than Warcraft 3 (as referred to in the first post in this quote), at the time of Warcraft 2 lore?

In Warcraft 3, though, the orcs under Grom Hellscream's command, are offered to drink from the cursed demon blood again, if I remember correctly.

gimme dat warlords

Blizzard has a real cinematic talent. They are the best in the industry

@liquidprince: Thats really a shame - I've always felt it holds up amazingly well. They get so much mileage out of the art style and it may not be the shiniest, but none of it ever looks _bad_ to me. I've also tried many other MMOs both free and subscription and while most are always fun for a month or two, WoW is always miles ahead in terms of depth and content and sheer fun in my opinion and I never feel the cost is undeserved.

Ok, I liked the parallel there between the original cinematic where Grom dies and this time when Garrosh jumped in to save him.

I love these cinematics

@heatdrive88: It's an alternate time line, Garrosh goes back in time and warns his Father not to accept Gul'dans offer. The events of the original games and wow still happened, but there is now an alternate timeline.

November is way longer than I would have thought considering the current content drought.

Can't wait though.

@mythdark: Grom's forces are building a Horde settlement in Ashenvale when Cenarius comes to wreck them. In desperation they seek the corrupted spring without knowing that Mannoroth had spilt his blood into it to tempt them. In order to beat Cenarius Grom chooses to drink from it knowing it might be corrupted, and after they kill Cenarius Mannoroth comes to claim them.

Thrall then redeems his soul with the aid of Jaina in one of the most annoying RTS missions ever.

You and me both. I can't imagine how much money it would cost to make a 90 minute movie out of the art from these cinematics, but I'd watch it for sure.

I played them all and liked 3 a bunch. Haven't ever cared for the lore very much, but these cinematics are pretty great.

im pretty sure 90 percent of that movie is going to be cg anyway.

Loved that shot that was referencing Warcraft 3 where Grom Hellscream gets killed by Manaroth exploding. I haven't played WoW since Wrath (and that was a free trial) but the story in this seems like something I want to experience for myself. It seems to be a bit fan service-y but Warcraft 3 was my first PC game and because they're tying the two stories together it seems like it will be a great expansion.

It's also nice that they brought back the old composer to do the music because the newer music hasn't been so hot. The only down side to this is that Grom isn't voiced by the original voice actor, all orcs seem to sound pretty generic now - with the exception of Thrall.

I wish WoW looked this good.

So do I, but the new work they've been doing on the models at least means it will finally look better than the last..decade.

Time travel.. seriously ? I guess it's always been there in the background, but damn.. what a "great" way to completely muddle up the lore.

But hey, I guess they gotta find some kinda way for people to get to fight and interact with all the characters they know and love. It's becoming a recurring theme though, I don't know how many times they've gone back to the roots at this point...

I love me some warcraft cheese.

He's quite possibly the biggest dickhead in all of WoW. I'm glad that we got the chance to crush him in Pandaria.

I'll be interested in Thrall's role in Draenor. I know its stupid to preorder this but I'd like that free level 90 boost to get a shaman ready.

Nice callback.

And when they get back to Azeroth, it's completely different and Murlocs run the world, thanks to all of this timeline muddling.