Hey, remember when Blizzard callously killed the “Battle.net” name, a beloved moniker for its online service in games like StarCraft, Diablo, and Overwatch that dates all the way back to 1996? Well, the blue giant has now decided to un-kill it.
In a blog post, Blizzard explained that it’s forcing us to ride this rollercoaster of brands and emotions that’s a perfect summation of life in the digital age because of fan feedback to the first name change.
“We understood that Battle.net stood for something special,” the company wrote. “It represents years of shared history and enjoyment, community and friendship, for all of us and our players… The technology was never going away, but after giving the branding change further consideration and also hearing your feedback, we’re in agreement that the name should stay as well.”
Don’t think, however, that your precious Battle Dot Net is escaping entirely unscathed. Originally, Blizzard planned to do away with the name and simply call its service “Blizzard.” Now, though, the company has done some good old-fashioned corporate Voltron-ing to create Battle.net’s final form: “Blizzard Battle.net.”
After months of hard work, I imagine Blizzard’s Council Of Very Serious Name-Givers must be exhausted. Now, perhaps, they can finally rest.
Comments
9 responses to “Never Mind, Everybody, It’s Called ‘Battle.net’ Again”
It makes sense. I was never going to stop calling it Battle.NET anyway, regardless of the official title. I think a lot of others were probably the same.
Looks like they’ve decided to make the tansition a little less jarring and a little more gradual. Something like battle.net (2016) -> Blizzard Battle.net (2019) -> Blizzard (2021).
Except that the changes were more like this:
Battle.net (1996) -> Blizzard (2017) -> Blizzard Battle.net (2017)
Best news. Much happy.
And everytime Bungie mentions Battle.net, magically Morhaime suddenly pops into existence and corrects them by whispering “Blizzard’s”
Now to convince them to drop the Blizzard thing at the front as well, especially considering we now have Destiny.
I was honestly shocked they even considered getting rid of the name. some of the reasons were bull. they were worried about Brand confusion? its been known as Battle.net for 20 years. Dont go and change that shit now and says its better?
I was never going to stop calling it Battle.Net anyway. no matter how hard they forced the new Branding down my gullet.
Am I the only one that didn’t notice the first name change?
I heard they planned to changed and was wondering when it was going to happen. My Battle.net shortcut and installer never changed