by JR Cook - 10 years ago     show comments

Exactly 23 years ago today on February 8, 1991  three recent UCLA graduates joined together to form what would become Blizzard Entertainment. Michael Morhaime, Allen Adham, and Frank Pearce started a studio they called Silicon & Synapse, which then became known as Chaos Studios, before they finally settled on Blizzard Entertainment in 1994.

During their time as Silicon & Synapse they worked on ports for several games such as Battle Chess and Castles. They also developed their own games such as The Lost Vikings and Rock n’ Roll Racing. In 1994, not only did they change their name to Blizzard Entertainment, but that was also the year they released their first mega hit Warcraft: Orcs & Humans.

Going to kick it old school blizzard style tonight #LostVikings http://t.co/GxGm3ZjS8N

— BlizzPro (@BlizzPro) February 8, 2014

Since then Blizzard has released 2 more original IPs with Diablo (when they acquired Condor Studios) and StarCraft which have dominated the PC gaming scene for almost the last 20 years and has helped define gaming as we know it. They have dominated the real time strategy and action RPG genres for well over a decade now and the MMO market for nearly 10 years. Now with Hearthstone and Heroes of the Storm coming up we could see them start dominating digital CCGs and being a driving force in the MOBA market.

I don’t believe any other game studio with the exception of Valve can really put this kind of success on their resume in a relatively short period of time.

With that said, Blizzard is approaching their 25 year anniversary and we know they’re working on even more games that have yet to be announced. I think if Blizzard wants to continue being successful they need to draw their energy back from when they created the Warcraft and Starcraft universes and I think with the development of Hearthstone being a scrappy team they are doing just that. I know I’m excited to see what Blizzard has in store in the next few years ahead.

With that said, we want to wish Blizzard Entertainment a happy 23rd birthday and here’s to many more!