Warcraft 3 goes widescreen in a new update

The Warcraft 3 update that hit the PTR in February (and yes, there's a Warcraft 3 PTR) is now fully live. The patch brings widescreen support to the 16-year-old game, with "bookends" added to the interface and black pillars in menus, plus expanded game lobbies and more team colors, and an impressive selection of bug fixes and balace changes.

Ladder standings have also been reset, and Blizzard said that automated tournaments will be brought back next week. It also warned that this will be the last version of Warcraft 3 to support Windows XP and that replays are not compatible between "major game versions," which is partially good news because it suggests that more updates are on the way.

There are some known issues with the update, including some disabled features and a failure of the resolution to change properly when the game is switched between windowed and full-screen modes, and a few people on Reddit and the Blizzard forums are also struggling with it. But on the whole, the response seems quite positive. There's also some advice in there for people having issues with the installer, or just getting it to run.

There are a lot of small tweaks in the patch—Thunder Clap damage and area of effect have been increased, for instance, and the Carrion Swarm mana cost has been reduced—and so I won't get into here. Hit up Battle.net for the full rundown.

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.