Blizzard is officially reviving the Battle.net brand, about a year after the company said that it was moving away from the classic name after two decades.
Battle.net, the company's online platform for its games, was renamed as simply the Blizzard App. However, the service is still being referred to as Battle.net by players and other companies, which is probably why Blizzard is bringing back the popular name.
Blizzard Brings Back Battle.Net Brand
In September 2016, Blizzard revealed its primary concern that players could be confused on why the name of Blizzard's online gaming service is called Battle.net. There is no apparent connection between the two, so Blizzard moved to change the platform's name.
Players reacted negatively to the decision. Battle.net has been the platform's name since 1996 when it launched as a service to connect players in the classic dungeon crawler Diablo, and gamers have made many memories on it since then.
In a new official Blizzard News post, the company agreed with players that the Battle.net name should stay.
"We understood that Battle.net stood for something special — it represents years of shared history and enjoyment, community and friendship, for all of us and our players," the company said in a statement.
Blizzard will now again rename the service by combining its current and past name, and will now be called Blizzard Battle.net. The new name will simultaneously respect the history of the Battle.net brand while also providing a direct and rather obvious link between the service and Blizzard.
Battle.net Never Went Away
With Battle.net carrying its iconic name for two decades, it was very hard for players to start calling the platform by another name. In fact, even other companies still recently referred to the service as Battle.net.
The companies in question are publisher Activision and developer Bungie, which announced in May that it will enable futuristic shooter Destiny 2 on PC through Battle.net, instead of referring to the platform as the Blizzard App.
This caused confusion among gamers on whether Blizzard was officially bringing back the Battle.net name. With other companies, and many other players, still referring to the platform as Battle.net, it apparently made sense for Blizzard to finally listen and bring back the classic brand.
Blizzard games that are currently playable on Battle.net are World of WarCraft, Diablo III, StarCraft II, StarCraft Remastered, Heroes of the Storm, Hearthstone, and Overwatch. Players will need only one Battle.net account to access the online play experience for all these titles.
