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Blizzard's secret project: Hydra

News | Sept. 11, 2007 (12 months ago) | by Kody | Filed in Blizzard Entertainment

Austin GDC is a great convention for the game industry. It affords game developers a meet and greet opportunity with other members of the industry, the chance to see the latest and greatest technology that will drive MMO's and games in general into the next generation and of course the panels that everyone enjoys sitting in on, as veterans in the industry are able to offer sage advice to up-and-comers.

But that's not all Austin GDC is good for. It's also good to spark some discussion on things coming in the future, like say... Blizzard's un-announced project. The Inquirer is reporting that the previously un-announced project at least has a codename within Blizzard: Hydra. Now I'm not one to jump on speculation, but does anyone else see a stark resemblance to the codename used for StarCraft II? It was Medusa, for those not familiar - and that was because of Kerrigan, whom closely resembles the mythological creature.

So then, what exactly is project Hydra? If Medusa is a good indication, it's definitely something related to StarCraft. Hydra... Hydralisk... well, you get the idea. It's also not a secret that Blizzard is hiring for their secret project - just check out their job opportunity page and you'll see a slew of Next-Gen MMO positions open.

Hydra plus hiring for a Next-Gen MMO... StarCraft Universe, anyone?

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4 weeks ago

hydra is multipel heads the diabilo 3 beast hade burning heads on his sholders. it is the 3 prime evils in one body that is why it is called hydra

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4 weeks ago

hydra is multipel heads the diabilo 3 beast hade burning heads on his sholders. it is the 3 prime evils in one body that is why it is called hydra

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2 months, 1 week ago

Well, we now know that hydra is NOT Diablo, since D3 has been confirmed and there is still a top secret MMO out there, I suspect it is either a Starcraft MMO or WoW 2...

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2 months, 2 weeks ago

Why would hydra more likely refer to starcraft than diablo? ..

Yes.. Diablo is 'some kind of' fantasy game which they already have (WoW)

But.. To me, diablo seems to be in some kind of Horror/Religion categories.. Good versus Evil.. Heaven Vs hell.. Which isnt exactly the same as WoW..

Anyway.. They only just announced Starcraft 2 not long ago.. You really think they'll announce an expansion to Starcraft 2 already? oO or a non-platform Starcraft game? .. a World of Starcraft? .. I seriously doubt that.

They havent been working on the Diablo trilogy in ages now.. They've lost some of the people who made the Diablo games, but that definetly doesnt mean that they cannot make a Diablo 3..
Just look at the game Titan Quest.. Its like a graphically renewed Diablo with another story.. But i havent heard about that any of the Diablo makers have been a part of creating that. and besides, some of those who made diablo is working on another game called 'Mythos' which is only in beta testing now so...

And blizzard is recruiting people for next generation mmorpg(s) (check their homepage)
Seeing as they probably lack people for the creation of a diablo 3, (since some of the creators of diablo 1 / 2 / LOD has left blizzard) then it could very well be what are recruiting people for

Anyway.. i doubt the codename 'Hydra' has anything to do with the game really.. ive done some research and i came across someone mentioning that a 3 headed beast definetly WASNT a Hydra.. it was a Cerberus (not sure its spelled right) .. a Hydra has 9 heads... if thats true then i have an idea..

Diablo 1 -- 1
Diablo 2 -- 2
Starcraft 1 -- 3
Starcraft 2 -- 4
Warcraft 1 -- 5
Warcraft 2 -- 6
Warcraft 3 -- 7
World of warcraft -- 8
Unannounced Hydra game -- 9!! ... Woot! 9 heads.. remember?

That might just be the only thing that the codename means..

This is of course only if you do not include the expansions

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9 months, 1 week ago

Getting technical with it, Medusa isn't correct. Medusa was a Gorgon not a Hydra. Hydra refers to a serpent type monster with multiple heads and when you cut off one head it would grow more (number varies on the tale). Think it usually dwelt in the sea if memory serves me right.

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11 months, 4 weeks ago

They could just be hiring people to work on wrath of the lich king....

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11 months, 4 weeks ago

Wrath of the Lich King isn't a Next-Gen MMO. :)

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9 months, 1 week ago

They aren't advertising "Next-Gen MMO" they are advertising jobs for "Next-Gen MMO Technologies".

The important word is the last one. Technologies.

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12 months ago

If I were Blizard, I would be working on a Future/scffi type MMO to shore up that market segment. Diablo 3 would be nice but it's "fantasy" and they already have thier hands full with WOW to be working another fantasy MMO. My money is on SC.

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11 months, 4 weeks ago

im am totally with you with that zexy i would be awesome 2 have sci-fi mmo like wow but then in the future

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12 months ago

Starcraft would work. I was very bored at work and came up with a way that Zerg could actually be a playable class even though they don't fall into the standard find armor and weapons mold. in fact the idea embraced the fact taht starcraft each race played distintly different. why not use that for an mmo use 3 different RPG styles for each Race. Terrans getting a tiered class tree similar to how tabula rasa sounds like they are using where the higher up you get the more specialized you can become. Protoss get a standard Class tree with some tweaks and give Zerg a highly mutable class structure based on their use of manipulating genetics. In essense you would have several 'slots' where you could put say hydralisk dna or zergling dna. these slots would be limited and your choices as a player would be as to what you put in the slots. do you use all your slots on one form(and get advanced and more powerful versions of it) and specialize or do you select a couple forms and take a more hybrid roll. basically would would be able to become say a hydralisk but then enter the iconic zerg cocoon and remerge as say several zerglings(we know two usually come out, the ones your not currently directly controlling could act as pets and if your main focus was destroyed your would shift to another until all was dead).

I will put the full idea up in the Blizz forums. have it typed up but never posted it on blizz yet.

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12 months ago

there is a Diablo2 skill named Hydra, it could be a codename for that

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12 months ago

yes its diablo for sure

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12 months ago

The thing with NCSoft is that they have several different types of MMOs. They might steal some players from eachother, but at the moment Blizzard has pretty much capped their pure RPG capacity. Putting out one more game would pretty much ONLY steal players from WoW. It will most likely not make any of the people who quit play again, another expansion (WotLK) will do that nicely however, another expansion also allows them to compete with the new fantasy RPGs: AoC, WaR and whatever else is on the horizon. A PvP-FPS MMOG however would tap into that relatively empty market. It would also fit the franchise more imo. 3 factions with only two that actually use melee weapons, extremely varying types of attacks skills/base health, no proper classes for one faction (zerg sort of). It does however lend itself quite nicely to AVP type MMO. All this is obviously theoryBlizzarding, but its also common sense. Where did you hear about the servers btw?

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12 months ago

maybe its a new Warcraft RTS game? or it could be an entirely new game all together.

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12 months ago

They will not launch World of Starcraft as a Wow-style MMO. Not a chance. Nor will they launch it as a Diablo style "MMO". They might however launch a game much like Planetside with some glances at Battlefield and Quake Wars. Why? Because a WoW style Starcraft game would be bad. There is a lot of things lacking for a game like that to succeed (IMO). And/or people would try the game, and lots would quit WoW, especially in their Asian markets. This is not a good thing for Blizzard. I would expect a Starcraft MMO once WoW players start declining worldwide.

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12 months ago

I disagree that a StarCraft MMO wouldn't work. The game has tons of lore and more opportunity for expansion than even the Warcraft universe, IMO.

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12 months ago

I don't agree. You see, the thing you have to take into account is that, as long as you are still playing a Blizzard MMO, they still earn money and whilst their costs would increase, they have 1000+ opeteron servers that are just hanging around somewhere that they aren't using for World of Warcraft at this moment in time so they are obivously preparing for some major MMO. Also, Blizzard have a habit of, "tried and tested," which means they don't like to take a game and make it revolutionary. It makes them more money to elaborate on things that are already tried and tested.

They may face an exodus from one game to another in the event they release another MMO but you seem to miss the key point here. They are going from one MMO made and owned by Blizzard ot another MMO made and owned by Blizzard... NCSoft own multiple MMo titles including City of Heroes and Villains, Tabula Rasa, Guild Wars etc. Where is the problem with having multiple MMO titles?

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12 months ago

World of Starcraft :P Naah too obvious...

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12 months ago

I'm not convinced the the codenmae Hydra has anything to do with the Starcraft franchise. Medusa has links to both the Diablo and Starcraft franchise and these linsk were analysed during the lead up to the announcement of Starcraft II so it is safe to say that we can't speculate about Blizzards names. Hydra could also have links with the Warcraft and Diablo franchise if you look closely enough so to say, "Hydra = Starcraft," is a little premature.

It is true however, that releasing a Science Fiction MMO based on the Starcraft franchise would be a logical step for Blizzard. At the moment, they are dominating the fantasy genre but with Star Trek Online, Stargate Worlds and rumours of a new Star Wars MMO springing up all over the net, Blizzard might be planning to try and take the market from these three major titles. On the other hand, Star Trek, Star Wars and Stargate are far bigger franchises than StarCraft simply due to the Pop Culture status of each entity so it is a risky move if it is what Blizzard is doing.

And if you look at the below posts, the speculation has already been destroyed by even more speculation. My advise would be to place no expectations on Blizzard.

Also, if the codename is out now, I expect an announcement of the game after WotLK/Starcraft 2 are released but we also have to remember that Blizzard have said Warcraft 4 could be a possibility after StarCraft 2 ships.

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