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The kids who grew up playing StarCraft on Nintendo 64 must have thumbs of steel. With the exception of a handful of games designed specifically for consoles like Herzog Zwei and Halo Wars, the RTS has not been a genre that's played well with controllers. It remains the heartland of the mouse and keyboard.

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And yet, Total War developer Creative Assembly is committed to releasing Total War: Warhammer 40,000 on consoles. The studio's battle product owner Dave Petry told TechRadar at Gamescom he thinks it's a "myth" that controller support doesn't work for the RTS genre and that they've "landed something that really does work."

"Because yes, obviously, controllers are your primary method for using consoles, but it's just an input method. It's an accessibility tool, right? It's how you want to play or how you would like to play, and so we've always wanted to be able to bring that experience to people who want to use a gamepad."

Creative Assembly co-developed Halo Wars 2, which Petry cited as a specific example of a "really strong implementation of controller and RTS," though it benefits from its simplicity. When the more fiddly Age of Empires 2 came out on Xbox it had to have automated villagers who would gather resources and construct farms based on your preset preference, because that kind of micromanagement is a bit of a faff with twin sticks.

Of course, the Total War games leave building and tech trees for the turn-based side of the campaign, and it's only battles that happen in real-time. While the finer points of cycle-charging or drawing missile fire by marching your lord back and forth might not feel as nice with a controller, I'm sure it would be possible.

"I think we are learning that we can do this right, and yeah, it's definitely something that we're all keen to keep evolving as we ship and work on it," Petry said. "I think we've landed in a really solid spot. I think we're quite proud of where we are when it comes to the technical side of things as well."

For months, World of Warcraft fans have been speculating that something is about to happen to WoW Classic. Blizzard Entertainment has now put those theories to bed and announced World of Warcraft: Forever - an all-new version of the MMORPG that lives alongside Classic and Vanilla. The best part? It comes out in seven weeks, on November 4.

Executive producer Holly Longdale revealed the game at tonight's BlizzCon 2026 Opening Ceremony presentation, describing it as "a new beginning that never ends" and is set around the same time as WoW's Year One. Longdale even called it Classic Plus casually, if that makes it easier to understand.

A World of Warcraft: Forever beta begins this Thursday, September 17. The game is apparently "friendly [and] familiar" for both newcomers and oldheads alike, and it's aiming to return to what made WoW so iconic two decades ago. "There's no rush here," according to Longdale. "It's the journey that counts."

The upcoming MMO sounds seriously huge, so let's quickly list off everything it's promising. Four new zones including Mount Hyjal and Zephras Isle, which is intended to be a starting area of sorts. Zones from the original game that have now been expanded. New dungeons and new raids that accommodate 10-players or 20-players. New skills and talents, a new playable race called the Skyborne, over 1,000 quests, toggles for SD and HD character models, updated visuals, and so much more. Phew!

World of Warcraft fans were eating good even before the company got around to announcing Forever. BlizzCon's Opening Ceremony also revealed that WoW: The Last Titan is coming out next year, with Midnight: Eclipse giving us enough to chew on until then.

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Reactions to the StarCraft trailer shown at BlizzCon this year seem pretty universal. Initial excitement, immediately deflated when the words "STARCRAFT RETURNS 2030" appeared at the end. (The fact it's going to be an "open world shooter" didn't help.) The surprise announcement of Diablo 5 coming in 2029 seems odd too. There were 11 years between Diablo 3 and Diablo 4, but the gap between that and Diablo 5 will only be six.

Announcing videogames more than a couple of years ahead of release feels like a relic of the past. Everyone assumes games will get delayed anyway, and viewers are adding "at the earliest" as a footnote. Saying something is just around the corner earns goodwill, while saying it's three or four years away tells us to gear up for a hype cycle we'll be tired of before the actual game materializes—if it ever does.

Blizzard president Johanna Faries spoke to Bloomberg ahead of BlizzCon. "We want to convey confidence in some of our biggest bets coming forward," she said on this topic. "We're a Blizzard that's going to ship, and ship big, and ship on time, and all hands on deck to set those projects up for success."

Blizzard has so far managed to avoid being hit by Microsoft's recent layoffs, but more are coming next year. It's a good time to make sure everyone knows you've got loads of exciting projects in the works and you need as many staff as possible to make them a reality.

While Faries didn't discuss the possibility of job losses, she did say she wanted BlizzCon to be "a sort of oasis, a moment for real joy" for both Blizzard's staff and its fans, and that she was "completely focused on creating as healthy a Blizzard as possible".

"Preserving that has been my ultimate focus," Faries said. "The unique special sauce that is Blizzard both culturally and creatively. And to the extent that we can perform well for Microsoft, I think that should be seen as a mutual win."