Hearthstone, the card battler and World of Warcraft spin-off from Blizzard, is receiving some new content for its big Year of the Gryphon celebration. The updates include a new expansion, a new game mode, and more.
The name of the expansion is Forged in the Barrens, and it introduces 135 new cards themed around one of World of Warcraft’s most iconic locales. There are new keywords and game mechanics being added too, as well as ten Legendary Mercenary minions representing a different Hearthstone class.
There’s also a new game mode called Mercenaries coming to Hearthstone, which utilises both singleplayer and competitive forms. In it, you collect, upgrade, and battle powerful characters from all across Azeroth, and use that experience to level up, gain equipment, new abilities and evolve into stronger versions of your merc. This is all presented via randomly generated roguelike missions.
“The Year of the Gryphon will be yet another exciting and eventful year filled with new content and new experiences in Hearthstone,” said J. Allen Brack from Blizzard. “Forged in the Barrens will take us to a place straight out of World of Warcraft that’s dear to us and to many of our players, the new Core set will continue to shake up the game on an annual basis, and Hearthstone Mercenaries and the new Classic mode will introduce even more awesome ways to play.”
Forged in the Barrens has yet to be assigned a release date, but it shouldn’t be too far off according to Blizzard. You can pre-purchase it now as a bundle including 60 packs from the expansion, two random Legendary Cards, and the Hamuul Runetotem card back, which costs £44.99.
Then you can also grab the Forged in the Barrens Mega Bundle, a more expensive purchase which has 85 card packs from the expansion, five of which are Golden Card Packs, and two random Golden Legendary cards, which costs £69.99.
You can download Hearthstone now from the iOS App Store or the Google Play for Android store.