The story of the first Warcraft multiplayer game... ever

"Something changed when I played the first multiplayer game of Warcraft."

- Patrick Wyatt, programmer, Warcraft: Orcs vs. Humans "The knowledge that I was competing against an able human player -- not just in terms of skill and strategy, but also in terms of speed of command -- but was prevented from seeing his actions by the fog of war was both electrifying and terrifying," writes Wyatt, who participated in the first-ever test of the original Warcraft's network mode during the game's development. "In my entire career I have never felt as excited about a single game as I was during that first experience playing Warcraft, where it was impossible to know whether I was winning or losing." This comes as part of today's Gamasutra feature, in which Wyatt reflects on the development of the PC game that forever changed the fortunes of Blizzard Entertainment. "As we started the game I felt a greater sense of excitement than I'd ever known playing any other game. Part of the thrill was in knowing that I had helped to write the code, but even more so were two factors that created a sense of terror: playing against a human opponent instead of a mere computer AI, and more especially, not knowing what he was up to because of the fog of war." To find out the results of the first multiplayer game of Warcraft -- ever -- read the full feature, live now on Gamasutra.