Goodbye, Battle.net! Hello... Blizzard

Officially releasing with the original Diablo, Battle.net has been the staple service of Blizzard's catalog of classic games since the late 90's - but its days are now numbered with Blizzard set to move on from the name in the new future. While it's already happened with the likes of Blizzard Streaming - a tie-in with Facebook - and Blizzard Voice, but the company has been open in the past about how it made sense to call the service Battle.net all those years ago when online multiplayer was still fresh out of the gate.

The Battle.net name was given to let players know the service was there to allow them to play together, in some form, over a network that wasn't simply a LAN match. Now, however, with multiplayer inclusion in practically every game in some form, it seems counterproductive to run a service with a name that quite simply explains the obvious. So, going forward, each of Blizzard's services will henchforth just be known as Blizzard... something.