In honor of the fifth anniversary of World of Warcraft and the 15th anniversary of the Warcraft series, we talked with Blizzard Art Director Sam "Samwise" Didier, WoW Lead Content Designer Cory Stockton, and WoW Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street about the series' past, present, and future.

Turns out a Calvin & Hobbes cartoon of a dinosaur flying a jet plane may have changed the story and setting of Warcraft 2, a Devil's Crush-inspired Warcraft pinball game almost happened, Stockton's car proudly sports a Warcraft license plate holder, Didier hates* the alliance, and Street only started playing WoW because his friends wouldn't shut up about it. Read on for that and much more.

This is the companion interview to Mobcast #30 -- you can hear clips from this chat in the show, but the full Q&A is right here, after the break....

*Not actual hate.

Sam, I know that you've been with Blizzard for pretty much ever, but for Greg and Cory, what was your intro to the Warcraft series, and what did it mean to you when you were hired to actually work on the series?

CS: I came into the series when the online patch was added to original Warcraft, I was actually in college. I of course played Warcraft 2, played Warcraft 3 pretty obsessively, and I got caught up in the storyline of it. So that's why when WoW was announced, that was what initially had my interest in the game, are they going to be able to continue those kinds of storylines?

When the opportunity came up to come here -- and I came here about three months after WoW shipped, so pretty early on -- it meant a ton, because it was a game that I was really interested in that I had been playing for a long period of time, so I was able to come in and pick up on the story line pretty quick, without having to learn a lot of new stuff.

GS: For me, I've always been a big RTS fan, so I played all of the earlier versions, and then the MMO came out, and my friends, we'd go to lunch, they'd be talking about WoW, and I'd be like, "Guys, can we talk about something else? I'm so tired of hearing about this game...." And they'd say, "No, no, you've just got to try it, you've got to try it." That went on for months; I finally tried it, and got hooked.

So Sam, you were there as Blizzard formed?

SD: Yeah, I started when we used to ride mammoths to work. The first ice age, I think.

Can you talk about the genesis of the first Warcraft?

SD: It basically started out much like we did with World of Warcraft, where we had a lot of guys here playing EverQuest, and thought, man, this would a really fun type of game to make. Same with Warcraft -- we were playing Dune 2 I believe it was. That game was just so fun; we wanted to make our version of it. And we decided to go with the fantasy realm. Everybody at work loved Dungeons & Dragons, and Tolkien, and everything, so just right from there the game kind of just designed itself.

Back then, though, we stuck with just orcs and humans, we hadn't introduced a lot of the other races in. There were demons and stuff on the orc side, water elementals on the human's, but that was basically it. It all just grew from the love of a game that we had been playing, and we decided to make our own. Again, just like we did with WoW.

And what was your role, personally, on the first Warcraft?

SD: I think I was the art director? We didn't really have the big titles back then, we were all artists, I'm not sure if I was labeled as art director on it. But basically, as with all the artists, my job was to concept up a lot of the characters, and then we would start making them.

We were working in a program, I think it was Deluxe Animator, and it was all animated by hand. We did start experimenting with 3D, and then we'd take the 3D characters and draw over them. A lot of our style came from that, because we would render the 3D models and their colors were all messed up, so we would kind of just recolor them. And we would recolor them with what colors we had available. Deluxe Animator only allowed you to use 256 colors I think it was, so we were very limited in our palette. And that was for the whole game. We had about four greens to work with in that color selection.

As you guys were working on the first Warcraft, was there a long-term vision for the series or did you more just want to get the first one out and see what happened after that?

SD: Back in those days we were working on different games every year. Before we did Warcraft, in the four years previous we had done a puzzle game, Lost Vikings, a car game, Rock N' Roll Racing, we'd done Blackthorne, which was like an RPG...I don't know if we were really thinking so far ahead, we just though that Warcraft would be another cool game for us to work on and then we would be doing some other kind of game after that.

As far as I know there has only been one Warcraft game that was cancelled, the Warcraft Adventures game. Can you talk about any of the earlier ideas that were kicked around at Blizzard for expanding the franchise, before WoW came along?

SD: We did have earlier -- when were deciding on Warcraft 2, what we could do with it -- there was actually a notion being passed around of doing it where the orcs invade modern society. You would have real battleships versus orcish battleships. Actually, some people were into it until someone sent out the Calvin & Hobbes cartoon, I think it was, of a T. rex in an airplane. And everyone just went, "Yeah, that's probably not going to be a very good idea. Let's just keep it fantasy, guys." That was one of the ones that didn't make it.

And I believe maybe at one time we had thought about doing a Warcraft-ish sort of...it was an idea to do a pinball game...I can't remember the name of the game, a TurboGrafix 16 game, a fantasy pinball game -- oh, Devil's Crush. We were talking about doing something like that too, again never really seriously, but it was just one of those ideas like the T. rexes and the F16s, that thankfully, never made it.

This one's for everyone -- What's your favorite WarCraft series moment?

<Silence>

SD: Yeah I guess there's none, sorry. [Laughs]

CS: I'm thinking. There's a bunch to go over here.

GS: I'll just throw out one I remember. At the end of Warcraft 2, defending the Dark Portal with all the NPCs, I remember that that was a really epic moment; it felt like the fate of the world was right here. And then I had no idea at the time how much of that was going to influence the whole story of WoW as well, so it turned out to be even cooler than I thought.

CS: Yeah I think one that plays back now, in the same way -- I didn't really think about it when it happened -- was the plagued grain in Warcraft 3. You look at World of Warcraft now and how we've ran with that in Old Stratholm and that storyline continued through; I think that's something that resonated with me always, doing that initial mission in Warcraft 3, playing through it and seeing the cinematic, seeing Arthas and all that -- you're able to do that now in WoW. I never really thought you would see that out of that game again later.

SD: In Warcraft 2 I believe it was, we have the death of Lothar. He was one of these real noble Alliance characters, and he died, and that was kind of sad for some people, right, because he was a really cool character. Well, one of the guys on our team, in the mission, played it and actually saved him. And you weren't supposed to do that. So we're like, "Oh, awesome! But we can't have that, that screws up the story! I saved him -- and then the mission plays, 'Oh, he's dead.'" So we actually had to tweak that so you couldn't realistically save him. But we still have that under our belts, we were the people who saved Lothar. Had times been different, the whole story could've been changed because of that.

What contribution that you made personally to the Warcraft universe are you most proud of?

CS: For me the biggest thing is being involved in the creation of the world. Coming here a couple months after WoW had launched and then working on a number of patches all throughout Ahn'Qiraj, then Burning Crusade was getting kicked off, and just being able to be in all those initial meetings about what we were going to do, working with [Chris] Metzen on that stuff. We knew we wanted to involve the Burning Legion somehow, but how we were going to do it....

And then being able to go through that same experience again on Northrend, and help create the universe, to me that's been the biggest thing, to come up with creative ideas and see them actually come to fruition in the game.

GS: Some of the things we do, I couldn't take personal credit for because so many people are working on it together, so it's hard to say, "This is the thing that I did." But one of the things I'm really happy with, with Lich King, is how we got a lot of other players to see the really awesome raid content. People were killing Kel'Thuzad, and hearing his great voiceover work and seeing an epic encounter, that never would have in the original WoW, when raiding was for the uber 2% or so. I really like that now it feels like something that's approachable for just about anyone that's interested in it.

SD: I think for me it would be helping develop what's now referred to as the "Blizzard artstyle." Back when we first started doing PC games, everything was a little bit more realistic, even the mighty warriors that you were playing were kind of thin dudes with thin swords and doink armor. We just threw that out and started making our characters a little bit more over the top. We took the comic book superhero approach and we did that to fantasy.

Nowadays, you see that around all the time, but back when we first started, there wasn't a lot of that going on. It's cool now for me to look at other games that are out now and I see people doing that. We kind of helped start a style of fantasy art work that wasn't the norm, and now it's kind of becoming the norm. It's really cool to see people sending in art submissions that look like our style; it shows that we've really helped set a style of art in the industry.

On that subject, have you guys played Borderlands? That game definitely takes some cues from WoW and other genres; I'd be curious to hear what you think of it.

SD: I haven't been able to play that yet, it's on my list, but Left 4 Dead 2 came out, so I've been playing that.

CS: Yeah I've definitely been playing a bunch of Borderlands, and you're definitely right, it's basically a first-person shooter with quests and experience and loot. I think there's a bunch of things about it that are really cool. The biggest thing that I think it's missing is just that sense of world and story, that's the one thing I miss.

But as far as gameplay-wise, they're doing a bunch of really cool things; you can play with multiple people really easily, and the way that quests share between people of different levels, it doesn't matter, you can be really far apart and still do quests together and get rewarded for it. That's one thing I really like. The random loot system reminds me a lot of Diablo, the way better loot drops if you have more players. They're doing a bunch of little small things that feel really cool; like I said the biggest thing is being able to be drawn into that world as something that will keep pulling you back.

On that same subject too, but speaking about WoW in particular, was there a moment that made you realize, "OK, I might be addicted to this game"?

CS: Hmm. I mean for me, what it is about WoW, it wasn't so much that I ever felt like that, it's that I felt like I wanted to do something with my friends, and it was a way to experience something that I could do on a weekly basis with my friends. I always looked at it as a way of communication. I play WoW with people who don't live anywhere near me, but we've been best friends for years and years and years.

I look at it as a way for us to stay in contact while we're still trying to complete a goal within the game, and I think that's one big thing that kept me coming back to the game.

GS: Yeah, I'd really agree with that, the sense of friendship, I would feel like, gosh, I wonder what my friends are doing right now, am I going to hear some awesome story that I missed out on, because I wasn't hanging out with them tonight? It was kind of the first social game for me, there were party games and things like that, you pick up, play for a few hours, and put down, but WoW was the first time where I really felt like, OK, this is going to go on and my friends are going to be with me the whole time.

SD: Our games have always been really popular...but not to this extent. We have all kinds of people in different age groups playing this game. I was actually at the El Pollo Loco drive through, and there was this older guy sitting down, eating lunch, and I was eating lunch, and he was like, "Do you work at Blizzard?" and I go, "Well yeah, I do." I thought maybe his kid or whatever was playing it. And he says, "You know I've really been enjoying Wrath of the Lich King." I'm like, "Wow, uh yeah, cool!" It really shows how kind of broad spectrum our games are now, we have tons of people playing it. It's just really cool.

CS: I actually had a similar thing happen, we were driving back from Palm Springs last weekend, and I stopped at a gas station and we've got the World of Warcraft license plate bracket on the car. People pulled up behind us, it was an older couple, the guy in his 60s, and he gets out of the car and he looks at me and looks at the back and just gives me this huge thumbs up. He's like, "World of Warcraft? Awesome! Do you play also?"

He had no idea that I worked on the game, he just thinks I'm fan, and he proceeded to tell me he's got a level 65 character, he's just bought the Burning Crusade, and I'm sitting there pumping gas and talking to him...it's just one of those games that feels like it's permeated the culture a little bit more than just something that is here and gone, it's definitely sticking around.

Do you feel like you're cheating on WoW when you play other games?

CS: No, not at all, I don't. Definitely. I've been a gamer pretty much my whole life. WoW is something that I feel like I'm going to come back to because there's new content, there's always something new to do. Whereas other titles -- just being a gamer in general, I think you want to play stuff. You hear about other games that are good or you've been following them online and you know the release dates, I think you know a gamer when you see one and you know if you are, because you're just drawn to that kind of content.

SD: WoW is something that I return to a lot. I'll definitely check out the latest things, but most of the other games don't have the continuous playability. This game you can keep playing on so many different ends, and when you're all done with that you can start a new character, or heaven forbid play an Alliance character -- no, I'm just kidding. But yeah, the game has so many different things that you can return to and keep working on.

GS: I was just thinking about your question about Borderlands, it's a really brutal time to be a gamer right now. You've got Dragon Age and Modern Warfare 2 --

SD: Brutal Legend.

GS: Yeah, a ton of great console games coming out around Christmas, it's tough, I wish there were more hours in the day to play all the things I want to play.

SD: The problems we have in this society.

GS: I think a lot of the community thinks that we must get tired of WoW because we spend so much time dealing with it, but it's really not true. Everyone I hang out with at work still loves the game and still can't wait to play it, even after working on it all day.

SD: The best thing is, if you get tired of WoW, we can sit there and go, "OK, well let's make some new stuff!"

CS: It's funny because we work in these patches, right, and we don't get to play the patch any more than you guys do. We're waiting, and when patch day hits, it's a super huge event around here. We're almost tortured because you see all this content and you know what's coming, but you can't actually do any of it, it's almost worse to know it because you can't wait for your character to get in and do it.

Where do you guys see Warcraft in another 15 years?

SD: Hopefully we'll have another expansion out. [Laughs]

CS: If you're lucky.

I mean, the way we work in the game is we don't see an end to it. We look at it as like, as long as the players want content, we're pretty much going to make it. As long as there're people there to play the game, we're not going to run out of creative ideas on our side. It's just a matter of getting it up.

SD: The fun thing with Warcraft, too, designing it, at least artistically, there's no limits. You've got guns, you've got the worgen -- werewolves, you've got guys from other planets, you've got your traditional knights and good guys, evil -- we could design almost anything and fit it into the Warcraft world, and it would probably be pretty cool. You can almost get away with anything.

GS: Dinosaurs in jet planes?

CS: Except dinosaurs in jet planes.

SD: Yeah, and that one...almost made it! Someone said well, "Can the T. rex go in a tank?" Well no, if they're in jet planes why would they ever go in a tank? We tried to fit an Allosaur in a tank -- it just didn't work. So we just dropped the whole idea.

Do you guys ever feel conflicted about creating a game that, along with enriching many peoples' lives, has also caused significant hardship for people who have trouble controlling their own playing time?

SD: We just make a cool game. I don't think it goes really beyond that.

CS: From our perspective, we're making an enjoyable entertainment experience for people. That's what we look at it as, and nothing more. Our goal is to give content to players that they want to play, and to make sure that they're having a fun experience in the game, and they can do it with friends, and that we have a game that's playable solo. Those are where our goals lie and that's what we're trying to do.

GS: One of the awesome things about WoW is, you look at the number of more casual players we have, [it] really speaks to the fact that you don't have to commit an enormous amount of time to really have fun in the game.

Do you have any good stories about playing with other people who didn't know that you were on the development team?

GS: I see people pretty regularly on the servers I play on cursing my name in trade chat.

CS: When I first started here, my guild had no idea that I worked here...I was actually getting advice from people here, because we couldn't do an encounter, and I was trying to figure out if there was anything that I could help the guild with. It was really funny, because we still couldn't beat the encounter, even after...it was our quality level of how good we were at that point in time.

SD: I've met myself online. Somebody was [named] Sam-something, and they said, "Yeah, do you know the art director at Blizzard?" I go, "Who?" And he says, "Sam." And I'm like, "No, who's that?" He's like, "That's me."

GS: That's awesome.

SD: So I proceeded to ask him about how I do things. I actually told him he needs to make the shoulder pads bigger, so hopefully that'll happen some time.

GS: More spikes.

SD: I was really nice, though, I wasn't too cocky.

Did you ever break the news to him that he'd been living a lie, or did you just go with it the whole way?

SD: No.

GS: Hopefully he'll hear this and find out.

SD: Yeah, so, uh, don't listen to this, Samwise, if you're listening. Keep up the good work.