World of Warcraft legend Chris Metzen is making his prodigal return to Blizzard. The former senior vice president of story and franchise development for Blizzard is returning to the World of Warcraft team in an advisory role.
Metzen worked for Blizzard for over 20 years, and was responsible for shaping the universes of Diablo, Starcraft, and especially Warcraft. After World of Warcraft: Legion launched in 2016, Metzen stepped away from Blizzard to spend more time with his family and to care for his own mental health.
Now, it seems Metzen is coming back to the world he helped shape. John Hight, the current senior vice president and general manager of the Warcraft franchise, announced Metzen’s return to Warcraft as a creative advisor on his Twitter. According to the announcement, Metzen will be focusing on World of Warcraft initially, but will eventually work on other Warcraft projects as well.
Despite leaving Blizzard, Metzen has not been a stranger to World of Warcraft. Though he had stepped away from game development, he continued to voice Thrall in his appearances in World of Warcraft and most of them in Hearthstone. Metzen is also still an active World of Warcraft player, and has been tweeting his own reactions to Dragonflight. Beyond that, Metzen has been working on Aurobouros: Coils of the Serpent–the first major project for Warchief Gaming, the tableop roleplaying game company he founded in 2020.
Players are ecstatic to have the legendary developer back at the World of Warcraft table. Metzen played a large role in shaping Warcraft into what it is today, and most think the franchise can only be better with him back. Fans, friends, and former co-workers poured out their excitement for the return, with hundreds of comments and thousands of likes and retweets in minutes. Players couldn’t help but draw parallels between his own return and that of Thrall’s during Battle for Azeroth.
Many World of Warcraft fans are curious as to what brought Blizzard to recruit Metzen again, however. While his hand in World of Warcraft itself will obviously help bring the MMO to new heights, some can’t help but wonder if Metzen might eventually start working on a new story-driven, single player Warcraft game in the future. Metzen had a great deal of influence in the story of the Warcraft RTS games, especially Warcraft 2 and Warcraft 3, so his return could herald the long-awaited Warcraft 4, or possibly a re-remake of Warcraft 3 Reforged. Speculation aside, most players and developers alike are simply happy to have Metzen back to work on World of Warcraft.
World of Warcraft: Dragonflight is available now for PC.