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Warcraft III World Editor Expands Your Digital Universe

By Brad Cook
Sure, your Mac is a digital hub that allows you to do all sorts of things. Rip your music to iTunes and load it on your iPod. Import digital video and edit home movies. Download still pictures from a digital camera and assemble virtual photo albums. Create robust web pages in minutes and let friends and family know what you’ve been up to lately.

But did you know that you can also build worlds with your Mac? All you need is a copy of Blizzard Entertainment’s new strategy/role-playing game Warcraft® III: Reign of Chaos. Not only does Warcraft III offer an intense single-player campaign and a wealth of multiplayer options, but it also comes with a rich 3D world editor that may be the most powerful application of its kind. And it only runs in Mac OS X. If you also own The Frozen Throne expansion pack, you’ll also have the ability to create custom campaigns that feature cutscenes and voice-overs.

The tools of creation are at your fingertips — just add imagination.

Endless Possibilities
laboratory

“We wanted to provide an easy-to-use 3D editor that anyone can use to make maps,” explains Bill Roper, a vice-president at Blizzard North. “Basically, with this editor almost any type of modification is possible — and most are easy to accomplish.” To prove it, we are providing an exclusive, non-playable map (452K) to Apple Games readers. It’s indicative of what you can create with the editor, and you don’t need to be a professional developer to tap into its power.

Human Palette

Only for Apple Games readers. Download this exclusive non-playable sample map for a taste of what you can produce using the Warcraft III World Editor. (452K)

Humans

Orcs

Night Elves

Undead

If you’ve dipped your toes in the world of Warcraft III already, you know how detailed it is. The story concerns four races — orcs, humans, undead, and night elves — and their struggle for supremacy in the kingdom of Azeroth, and the single-player campaign tells their interweaving tales with enough twists and turns to fill several Hollywood films.

The game also offers plenty of little details that keep you engaged during each mission. The waves of a lake gently lap the shore. Characters shift their weight and look around with apprehension as they wait for the next attack. Mystical creatures roam the woods and the plains. Mysterious treasures sparkle and shimmer in the sun, which eventually sets as night covers the land.

hero selection

That blue circle indicates the starting point
for one of the players.

All those terrain details, characters, creatures, and objects are available in the editor, and you can change the look, size, and translucency of any of them, according to Roper. You can even dig into the characters’ underlying ability scores and manipulate them to your liking, or create brand new characters who will establish their own legacies in the world of Warcraft.

(To learn more about using the editor, visit “Building a Better Warcraft World” on page two.)

Spiders on ice: make cold northern lands,
just like in the single-player game.

Tell Your Own Tales
crown

But that’s not all — you can also import your own sounds, either .wav files for sound effects or MP3 song files from iTunes. With the trigger editor, you can tell the Warcraft III editor to play a particular sound or song when certain conditions are met. For example, when a hero dies in battle, you could play a snippet from your favorite song or an ominous sound file to announce the event.

Warcraft III Media

	Play the Demo

	Download the performance patch

	Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne expansion pack

	iTunes: Warcraft III Soundtrack

	Reign of Chaos bonus maps

Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos is the pinnacle of game evolution for real-time strategy (RTS) games. Blizzard Entertainment’s Bill Roper explains why you’ll want to play it in Mac OS X, what’s new at Battle.Net, and much more. Read on, brave warriors.

The trigger editor also allows you to play cut scenes or display character dialogue at the appropriate times during the mission, which means that you can tell your own Warcraft stories and add to the game’s mythology.

gem

You can build your maps for either single-player or multiplayer action and send them to your friends or upload them to PlanetWarcraft.com, where you can also download other gamers’ maps. Or you can use them to create custom games at Battle.net.

map grid

Even build structures for city/temple-like environments.

Roper points out that your Warcraft III maps don’t necessarily have to mimic the ones you’ll find in the game. “We expect to see players go wild and create everything from role-playing games to Capture the Flag [scenarios],” he says. You can even build your own arcade-style games; load the map called “TheDeathSheep” (located in the Scenario folder inside the Maps folder that’s in the main game folder) for a great example of a tongue-in-cheek game.

Another Spoke Connected to the Hub
So if you’re wondering how games fit into your digital lifestyle, open the Warcraft III world editor and prepare to express yourself orc-style. Or human-, undead-, or night-elf-style. Look for Warcraft III at the online Apple Store, or at an Apple retail store or Apple authorized reseller near you.

Check out our systems for your best gaming experience.

Your step-by-step guide to the Warcraft III 3D world editor.