If you have a suggestion or a piece of content with an amazing story, please let me know, I would love to see it! =================================================================================================================================== Want to be a filmmaker/storyteller/writer? These books will help you! Links in the description. Support the channel: Become a channel member! - th-cam.com/users/kaizammitjoin Merch - www.kaizammit.com/ Tell everyone around you where you get your filmmaking knowledge from plus, you're gonna look cool as hell! Don't forget to let me know so I can share your snaps! =================================================================================================================================== Filmmaker Reacts to Gaming Cinematics playlist: th-cam.com/play/PLWF6myhJ6iSvJVz1Iw1nmX0JIkn6OACka.html
I would suggest Eve Online that is also one of the really old games out there still kicking around! played it myself long time ago, still looking on returning now and again since its just become more beautiful each time they upgrade the game. th-cam.com/video/3l0k2xkcT3g/w-d-xo.html
FYI, the guy with the horns and wings you saw a few times throughout the cinematics is Illidan Stormrage and as close to a main character as Warcraft is going to get. He goes through a whole redemption arc which culminates in the "Legion" expansion, which is widely regarded as the last truly great bit of content Blizzard put out. I urge you to search up Illidan Stormrage cinematics as you have done with Arthas, as he's as interesting, if not more interesting of a character.
Here is a brief explanation of these cutscenes to make them easier to understand: 0:46 - End of the plague campaign, at the end of the expansion we return to Arthas who must come to the frost throne where the Lich King rests, because he is threatened by Illidan. 3:20 - Basic intro of the game that appeared at the time of game launch. 5:11 - Introduction to the tutorial campaign, the visible orc is called Thrall and he is the leader of the horde, at the end of that mini campain, he learns that he should take his people to the west, to the land of Kalimdor (other continent of this world). 8:05 - Beginning of the Alliance campaign, where we leading Prince Arthas, we fight the plague that one of the ambassadors talks about and which ends with his transformation into the Death Knight, the most important commander of the Lich King. 11:43 - End of the Alliance campaign, return of the victorious Prince, therefore everyone cheers without knowing about his transformation. 14:18 - The next cutscene is the end of the undead campaign, the plague as it was called in the game. Here we have the further fate of Arthas after the transformation, we learn here that the plague was sent by the burning legion (demons) who want to conquer the world of Azeroth, the visible figure is one of the legion leader (Archimonde) summoned at the end of the campaign, he destroying the wizard city Dallaran. 16:21 - End of the Horde campaign, during it we accompany Thrall while exploring the land of Kalimdor, at some point the action splits into 2 threads, the orc shown here next to Thrall, Grom Hellscream initially succumbs to the corruption that long ago on the orcs were sent by demons from the burning legion (which is why Grom has red eyes). The rest of the story is about saving Grom and healing him, the cutscene is a confrontation with the minor legion commander who was responsible for Grom's "disease". 20:18 - End of the Night Elf campaign, the legion's invasion of Kalimdor is in full swing, the elves for whom the Alliance and the Horde were intruders at the beginning, finally join forces to defeat the legion together. Here we see the leader of the legion, the same as in the excerpt from 14:18, trying to destroy the world tree, if he succeeded, Azerot would face doom, the character that appears in the foreground is the druid Malfurion Stormrage, the most important elven druid who uses the artifact we had to get in during the campaign to summon the ancestral spirits that defeat Archimonde. 23:04 - Intro to the expansion, visible guy is Illidan Stormrage, Malfurion's brother, we get to know a piece of his story in the night elf campaign. His mission, however, is recognized by his brother and Tyrnade, the leader of the elves as crimes against nature and he is banished, here we have the continuation of his story, how he tried to gain more power. 26:10 - Epilogue of the expansion and the whole game, reconciliation of the Death Knight and the Lich King (after fight from the begining of the reaction). Arthas will be sitting on this throne until the World of Warcraft expansion pack, whose intro you've already seen.
Like I told you in a previous video, just watching the fully rendered cinematics would not show a lot of the story. Here you see the story jumped from Medivh trying to rally the king to prepare for the Burning Legion, to his son coming home, corrupted, and killing his father. A LOT happened in between.
Bro, he gives and inch and you demand a mile. Nobody has the time or wants to watch all of the old-ass trash looking in-game cinematics from 20 years ago. He threw you a real bone by watching these as it is.
@@ficklefox2171 "Old-ass trash looking in-game cinematics" Bud calm down. This is a whole universe with 20 years of history written into it. People grew up with these games and want them to be appreciated and understood to the extent of their content. Mst is just explaining that the information is super vague, and Kai is definitely appreciating it for what is being shown even if they still don't quite grasp the lore. SO there's no need to play white-knight for him, he can do it himself if he needs to.
@@ficklefox2171haha you are so angry boy. these cinematics and the overall game is to this day known as one of the best games ever made. so sit down and be quiet kid, cause you beign salty aint gonna change a thing
Its worth noting that in a lot of Blizzard's games, a huge chunk of storytelling is done during the gameplay. Cinematics are usually reserved for the BIG lore moments
Yeah, back then to produce and render CGI was hugely expensive and these were at the absolute peak for the time. So they were reserved for the critical moments in a story, I still remember patiently playing through each mission knowing that eventually there would be a great big lore cinematic at the end. Story-driven RTS' have really fallen out of fashion since the AoE/WarCraft/StarCraft era. Hopefully they'll make a return one day.
@@AMorphicTooli doubt they will, as much as id love it. but the fact is, RTS games are among the most difficult and complex games ever made. the standart casual modern gamer doesnt want that, they want something easy to access and easy to play. fast food games, so to speak.
Great video, thanks for this! If you want the lore filled in, I'll leave it below (it'll be a little long lol): Firstly, the first cinematic was out of place. It should have been second to last, so ignore that for now. Back in the day, the orcs showed up to invade this planet after being corrupted by a bunch of demons. These demons also corrupted a powerful mage called the Guardian who actually opened the portal to let them into this world. This Guardian is Medivh, the crow man who tries to warn everyone that the demons are coming back now that he's no longer corrupted. This is what he is referring to when he mentions failing humanity once before. The next part of the game centers around Arthas, a paladin and the son of the human king. He's trying to stop the plague mentioned in that cinematic, which is turning people into undead. Along the journey, Arthas slowly does worse and worse things mostly out of necessity, and finally takes what appears to be a cursed sword in order to be powerful enough to defeat the demon that seems to be leading the undead forces. In doing so, the sword steals his soul. The next cinematic is when he returns home, ostensibly a war hero, having defeated the undead army and their demon leader. But he is now corrupted and kills his father, and slaughters most of the kingdom, turning many into undead. Arthas, now a death knight, obeys his demon masters to a point, helping to get them into the world, but is also trying to secretly work against them because he is just a tool to them. He works with the Lich King (a spirit trapped in a magical block of ice called the Frozen Throne) who is the leader of the undead forces, under the command of the demons. They successfully summon Archimonde, a powerful demon leader. He is the one in the next cinematic who destroys the mage city of Dalaran with the spell in the sand. Next, the orcs actually did listen to Medivh's warning, and they sailed to another continent. Lots happens there, but most importantly, a faction of the orcs decides it would be a good idea to drink the blood of a demon, Mannoroth, which is how they got corrupted years ago in the first place. Eventually you as the player manage to rescue some, including Grommash, the leader of this faction. In the next cinematic, he and the leader of the orcs, Thrall, track Mannoroth down, and Grommash sacrifices himself to kill the demon, freeing himself and the rest of his people from the corruption. Finally (for the first part of the game), almost everyone bands together to stop Archimonde. Archimonde wants to get to and consume the World Tree, but the Night Elves and everyone else lay a trap for him, and detonate the whole tree, destroying Archimonde in the process. This is the end of Warcraft 3, Reign of Chaos. The next cinematics are newer as you noticed, as they are from the expansion, The Frozen Throne. The guy with the horns is Illidan, and he was a night elf. He was locked away about 10,000 years ago (they're immortal) for dabbling in demonic magic, although his excuse was that he used the weapons of the enemy to fight the enemy. He was released as a sort of desperate last measure to help fight the demons while they set the trap at the tree. In the process he snacked on yet more demonic magic, so they banished him afterwards, so now he's mad, and in the cinematic he summons the naga (fish people) to serve as his army. A lot of relatively minor stuff happens in the rest of the game, but the relevant stuff is that another demon lord shows up and strongarms Illidan into working for him again, and tasks him with destroying the Frozen Throne, because the undead are now just rogue and not serving the demons anymore. This is where that first out of place cinematic fits in. The Lich King sees the attack coming, and calls Arthas to defend him. Arthas and Illidan race to get there first, and meet in the north. They fight, Arthas wins, and he climbs the spire to the Throne. Cue last cinematic, where Arthas breaks the Throne and puts on the helm, merging with the Lich King. He sits down and has a rest for a few years, and people forget about the undead menace for a bit. The events of World of Warcraft and The Burning Crusade take place, and finally Arthas awakes as the Lich King in the cinematic that introduced the Wrath of the Lich Kingg.
Just wanted to add some important details that didn't get mentioned about Arthas. Arthas was initially a "good" guy, prince of a human kingdom and a paladin of the Knights of the Silver Hand and the apprentice of Uther. Arthas was dispatched to investigate the undead at a nearby city. That was when he found out that people were dying to contaminated grains that turned people undead. So it was then that he chose to kill everyone in the city to prevent them from turning undead, not knowing who ate the contaminated grains and who didn't but stopping the undead was more important to him, going against the better judgement of his mentor, Uther and his love interest, Jaina (who never made an appearance in any of these cinematics). So he told everyone there with him at that moment that either do what he says or go away before slaughtering every person he saw and burned down the city. At the end, he found out there was a demon that was behind it and the demon told Arthas to find him in Northrend (the snow-covered cinematics was mostly held in Northrend) if he wanted his revenge. Arthas, not knowing that the demon was trying to lure him, did exactly that and in that journey to find the demon, found the cursed sword, Frostmourne. It was mostly that that made him a tragic villain who wanted to do the right thing but forced to do something "evil" and then, lost his soul to power, trying to defeat the evil he wanted the power for, and, inevitably became that very same evil at the end.
@@kaizammit oh believe me, I do! However, I mainly feel dissapointed for you. You should have been introduced to Illidan (winged guy) with that cinematic with the Naga (fish-reptiles). It's also a shame they only remastered the first cinematic (the orc and human fighting 1v1) and none of the others 😢
You are indeed missing loads of information, i'd say about 95%. Each cinematic is the intro to or culmination of one of the large chapters of the game. All of them very powerful moments which fitted the tone of the chapter perfectly. Seeing Hellscream avenging his people or Arthas 'succeeding' his father still gives me shivers.
3:25 no thats way out of order, should be second last, 7:57 it is Michael Bell, 13:30 that was the voice of Ner'zhul (the current Lich King) whispering to him through the sword, 15:00 Transcrpit for this scene: "Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world. From this seal shall arise the doom of men, who, in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own. Blindly they built their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit. Now they shall be consumed by very flame they thought to control" 16:00 Archimonde is an Eredar, a demon corrupted Dranaei, who is one of the generals of the the Demonic Burning Legion, which is one of the main antagonists in Warcraft. 24:56 this is the start of the expansion pack.
13:30 that was not Ner'zhul but Arthas, beside the obvious Arthas voice it would make no sense for Ner'zhul to tell all that to Arthas like "you no longer need to bear the weight of your crown" Arthas never had a crown, Arthas took care of his own people not Ner'zhul
@@Ciffer-1998 Why would he be talking to himself in the 3rd person dude that makes 0 sense. It's also in the lore that Ner'zhul spoke to arthas through Frostmourne. The "weight of his crown ' was the metaphorical weight of being the prince, not a literal one.
@@Ciffer-1998 I went back and watched the older version, they changed the voiceover to indeed sound more like Arthas, it sounds a bit more like Lich King in the original. If they had cut the last line "I've taken care of everything" it would make more sense as an internal dialogue. As it is it sounds more like coming from Ner'zhul that he's arranged the invasion in the aftermath of the Kings death. Either way its still one of the best cinematics in the game, only narrowly beaten out by Thrall and Grommash in the canyon.
The very first cinematic feels weird, because reforged version was trying to recreate in game engine scene from 2001(i think), at the time, it was really good because taken by surprise(especially for RTS genre), but in that case, i dont really know what they wanted to achieve tbh. Its not full cinematic, and not full in game engine.. its neither version. And reforged came out in 2021 if im not mistaken. Also, the next cinematic in this video, is the only one was properly reforged in... reforged version. And clearly for pretty trailer purposes. That's why this part looks most modern. Rest of cinematics are just re rendered in 4K, or could be just upscaled compared to original.
I remember finding these in my War3 folder when I was a kid, I was too bad at the game to actually finish it at the time and get to see most of these cinematics, but when I got to watch them without any real context in the game files, I remember being so excited and happy and these cinematics were really what made me eventually a Warcraft fan, they were awesome and seeing people watch them without context always reminds me of my own childhood and it's a fun experience, you just get to appreciate them as what they are.
@@kaizammit Well, the first two Warcraft games are ancient and not really worth playing, Warcraft III is an amazing experience if you enjoy RTS games and even if you don't, I would still really recommend it, Arthas' journey alone through War3 and Frozen Throne is something very unique and special, you really fall down a massive rabbit hole of madness with him and since he's often the protagonist while being a clear villain, It really makes you question whether you should like him or not, but the game still has much more to offer than just Arthas' story, but I would say they are heavily overshadowed by his... I guess charisma.
The guy who destroyed the city is known as Archimonde, one of the 2 great demon lords under Sargeras - They generally lead the burning legion most of the time, as Sargeras is pretty much always absent. What he spoke about was the arrogance of humans, how they've mostly just copied others, attempted to control demons, and things like: "Let this signal the first blow against the mortal world."
The first scene is Arthas just before he becomes the Lich King (Hence no helmet). The "enemy" he faced was Illidan. That was from a Warcraft 3 Expansion called The Frozen Throne. This is one of the last of the cinematics of the series.
ahhhh! That makes sense, that confused the hell out of me. It didn't look like a first cinematic, no world building etc. I blame the person who made the original video :). Thank you for letting me know fella! KZ
@@kaizammit That cinematic was one of the remastered ones that looks like it was rendered in the newer World of Warcraft cinematic engine, the original one from the old game looks better IMO
I love how the king was all bored and no looking them at all, until that dude in the background said "quarranteed" and the king pop up "HELL NO YOU WONT" showing that even when the king isnt paying attetions to what this people said, he actually still sharp as hell.
Thank you for this; I always like seeing cinematics and stories I've enjoyed through the fresh eyes of others. Mind, as others have pointed out - trying to gleam the story arc of the game through the final reward cinematic of each separate campaign is like watching the last five minutes of every Lord of the Rings movie, and then writing a book review about it. You don't pick up much of the character development that way. :-p I'd point towards the cinematics from the first Starcraft game, if you crave more 90s retro feel - but the same problem exists there; they're the "grand finale" moments of long story arcs, meant as rewards for the player - not really for separate viewing.
I feel like these cinematics were all over the place time-line wise. And a lot of the context is out of order. Arthas is a paladin and the son of the king you saw in the cinematic with the mage transformed into a raven. He goes to investigate the claims of the plague ravaging the outer regions of the human’s kingdom to find that not only is there a plague ravaging the populace, not only had the plague infested all of the grain shipments moving through the country, but that this plague causes the victims to rise again as a legion of undead monsters. Faced with an impossible choice, he opts to purge the city of the still living but infected people so the undead might not be able to spread farther. This caused his mentor Uther and friend and love interest Jaina to abandon him and to see him as a monster. In his purge of the city he comes across a dread lord, a demon commander responsible for the plague, who tells him to seek the demon in Northrend, the forgotten frozen waste of a northern continent to that Arthas might fight him to get revenge. While Arthas does find the demon he also finds Frostmourne, the great sword you seem him using in the cinematics. The sword is very powerful, but it whispers to him and slowly corrupts him into what we come to know as the Lich King. The demon hoped he would become corrupted and take him on as a commander, but Arthas used the power to strike him down. It was merely a setback, for the demon. When he took the sword, it caused an explosion that killed his good friend (or so he thought) giving him even less of a reason to resist the whispers of power from the sword. After returning victorious from Northrend, he kills his father like you saw in the cinematic with all the rose petals and throws the kingdom of man into chaos. This would prevent one of the stronger world powers from stopping his next move, going to Northrend and claiming the frozen throne as his seat of power over the quickly spreading undead legion - remember the infected grain. Without the Lich Kings helm, the Crown of Donination, his possession is incomplete. The first cinematic shows Illidan, a demon hunter, trying to stop his ascension to the Frozen Throne where the crown awaits him. Once defeated, Arthas takes the throne and the crown where he becomes the Lich King in full and loses his last shreds of humanity. Or so we think, until we completed the events of Wrath of the Lich King. He started as a force for good, a paladin of the light, and a beloved prince poised to take control of a vast kingdom of people who adore him. In a single moment, he is given an impossible situation and makes the best decision he felt he could, losing all of his friends and loved ones respect in the process. In his desire for revenge, he was driven to take up a dark power which ended up destroying everything he had loved and cared for.
Clicked as soon as I saw this! Awesome to see you go through these already since our chat on your last video with the lich king trailer, wasn't expecting it so soon! Much love man.
It was between this and Starcraft but that was 2 hours long! As I've not done a video like this before, thought I'd start with a small one. Hopefully I'll do a video like this between each cinematic breakdown. Got to give you guys content! 🙏🏻 Thank you so much for watching! KZ
@@kaizammit I know I will be 100% onboard for the in-game cinematics too, even if they end up filmwise not being the most interesting, I believe it'll be super cool seeing you piece the story together like many of us did back in the day. I suppose the in-game cinematics could be the glue to the overall narrative. As the expansions go on, it definitely becomes more fluid with in-game cutscenes in relation to the cgi cinematics. Cheers!
I will most likely put them in the Cinematic breakdown videos as they are meant to be epic. This style of video is for in-game cutscenes or other content all together. Thank you for watching and taking the time to comment. Means a lot fella! KZ
The Death of Hellscream cinematic is one of my favorite pieces of video game "cinema", period. It's just done SO well. That sequence, and how it played out, single handedly compelled me to start playing World of Warcraft back in the day when it was still in Beta. EVERY time I watch it, I get choked up. It's just so damn awesome.
2:50 haha in the story actually the guy with green is the witcher lol. he's trying to prevent the swordsman from becoming evil which is when he puts on the helmet. and as you said the sword is the evil influence.
You will now gather the entire warcraft audience on your channel! It is very interesting to listen to your reasoning! The phrase "Succeeding you, father" gives me goosebumps all these years. The legendary phrase
I hope so, I just hope you enjoy my reactions and thoughts. My breakdowns are the ones that I really go to town on. Thank you for hanging out with me. KZ
30:06 Great video. As far as the missing story bits, Blizzard does A LOT of its exposition in game, especially Warcraft 3. Starcraft has some of my favorite story beats ever.
After this one you must see the last one that remains from classic Blizzard, and that would be Starcraft. The first game cinematics can be a little too old and basic but theyre filled with emotion and is pretty enjoyable, but the cinematics in Starcraft 2 are really something to see and comment, its purely amazing although like this one, its usually the beginning or the ending to a whole story. I hope you do it soon. Great work there man!
Always enjoy seeing your breakdown on some of the scenes. I think various elements of this have been laid down by some other comments, but I can add a very brief bit of context to each of the cutscenes. 0:43 - This scene is the second to last cutscene. It was re-made in Warcraft 3 Reforged. Arthas and Illidan spent the final mission of the expansion competing to reach the Frozen Throne first, and Arthas wins. This scene is played out in-engine which is why the graphics look so different. While the models are in-engine, they are much more detailed than the standard unit models. 3:22 - This was the teaser trailer for Warcraft 3, but this version was re-made much later based on the original. The human and orc each represent the most basic unit that each race uses, the Footman (human) and the Grunt (orc). In Warcraft 1 & 2 they were the only races, and fought each other. The fire from the sky, and the demons invading were new to Warcraft 3. 5:12 - This was the intro for Warcraft 3, it doesn't really have much plot persay (beyond the broadest strokes), it mostly exists to get you hyped, and the end where he points at the camera leads into some Prologue missions, where that character gives the Orc leader some further plot, while also teaching the player the basic controls. 8:07 - This was the intro cutscene before the Human campaign began. The plague briefly spoken of is a large factor in the plot. The raven/man shows up to some additional characters during the first few missions (including the still-good Arthas) 11:49 - This was the final cutscene after completing the Human campaign. Over the campaign, Arthas has been your main POV, and while he started heroic, he was slowly corrupted. The final mission is where he claims the cursed sword you see him using. The voice it speaks with is the voice of the Lich King (who isn't Arthas at this time). 14:18 - This was the final cutscene after the Undead campaign. The final mission was to summon an Arch-Demon, while defending against waves of enemies. The creature you see is that Demon, who uses his formidable powers to devastate an entire city to show off how big of a deal it is that he's here. He's the big-bad of the game. 16:22 - (This one was my favorite growing up) This was the final cutscene after the Orc campaign. The two orcs were your main POV characters during the campaign. During the earlier Warcraft games, the demon you see here used his blood to both empower and enslave the orcs. The orc with the Axe willingly drank the blood again for power, and the final mission is fighting against his demon-empowered orcs who are slaves once more, as the hammer-orc tries to save axe-orc with magic. 20:18 - This was the final cutscene after the final campaign of the base game (the Night elf campaign). The demon you see is the same demon you saw in the earlier cutscene where he destroyed the city. The final mission involves holding out against his invasion long enough to prepare the big spirit-bomb that defeats him in the cutscene. 23:04 - This was the intro cuscene for the Expansion "The Frozen Throne". It was produced later, and the technology has indeed improved. You see Illidan (a popular character from the Night Elf campaign who was also corrupted) summoning the primary antagonists for the expansion. 26:12 - This was the final cutscene after the Expansion (the expansion only had two pre-rendered cutscenes). Arthas spent the expansion racing back to the Frozen Throne, both he and the Lich King losing power as the game goes on (instead of gaining power like other heroes have been). In the end, he is victorious, but the audio clips you hear are all the dark moments from along his journey, echoes of what he lost. But none of that gives him any pause anymore. Anywho, these are all core memories for me growing up. Lots of personality and epic moments, and they were great rewards after struggling through a really tough last mission.
If you decide to watch every Warcraft cinematic in chronological order, you have a good 1-2 hrs of content. It's always fun to watch people with no experience trying to piece the story together. And if you ever decide to watch the cinematics in order and with the added in game cutscenes, well you are gonna have a blast! Especially when you reach the later expansions. Some good 10-15hrs I believe. Take care! 💪🏻
These clips sure brings me back! What a treat. 😁 Yes, that part does have subtitles. Yes, a lot of story elements are missing from just the cinematics. The story flows well as you play through the game(s). Warcraft 3 and Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne.
So you're absolutely right that there's a ton of context missing from these as they are designed to play at the end of each subsequent race's story campaign in the game culminating in their specific plot points while driving the overarching story forward. Here's a bit of context that can be fit into a youtube comment. 1:03 - Out of order. Fight actually takes place just before the cinematic at 26:10. Arthas fights the horned elf, Illidan, for access to that cavern with the spire and what is known as the Frozen Throne. This is also the only cinematic that was actually a remaster in any significant way; the rest are mostly slight lighting differences. 3:20 - Real first cinematic - NM actual plot relevance besides displaying the arrival of the Big Bads "The Burning Legion" an endless interstellar demon army. 5:45 - Medivh (Raven Mage Guy) showing a dream vision of the Legion's arrival to Thrall (that orc with the hammer) to convince him to lead the orcs west to their "salvation." That's why you see the orc wake up part way through and then a raven flies off after. Thrall goes on to become the warchief of all the orcs and, along with some other alliances, forms "The Horde" that is known today. 8:15 - Medivh attempts to warn the human kingdoms to also go west to salvation; the plot shows later that he expects the humans and orcs to join forces with the elves who live in "the west" to repel the Burning Legion. The plague that one council guy mentions is a huge plot point of WC3 as it leads to the downfall of the human kingdom. 11:55 - Takes place after human campaign. Arthas, then the crown prince of the kingdom and a righteous paladin (and player character), attempted to stop the plague that was turning the infected into zombies. Fails completely and goes on a downward spiral of rage fueled vengeance against the perpetrators behind the plague of undeath. Ends up finding the evil magic sword and picks it up after making this vow "I will give anything or pay any price, if only you will help me save my people." Sword says "Bet" and consumes his soul. Now soulless, he becomes an ally of the undead and shows up where the cinematic starts and proceeds to assassinate his father and, now as a "death knight" leads the undead invasion upon his own kingdom. 14:15 - Mage dude is one of the top 3 space demons in the Burning Legion and named Archimonde. He just got summoned to our world and proceeded to do that magic trick to destroy the mage city that tried to stop his arrival. He will the go on to lead the Legion's invasion as a whole of the planet. This cinematic was mostly just a flex of his power. 16:22 - Thrall (hammer orc) and Hellscream (axe orc) are chiefs of their people and consider each other brothers. Orcs aren't originally from the human planet. They got ported there by the Burning Legion as a kind of advance invasion force after the orc leaders (led by Hellscream) were corrupted in a bargain for power where they drank the big burny faced demon's blood (Mannoroth); their green skin is proof of this corruption and is hereditary as Thrall was born afterwards and never actually drank. The effects of the corruption caused the orcs to become magnitudes more brutal, violent and savage turning them into berserkers that were enslaved to the will of the demons. All this corruption etc actually takes place during Warcraft 1. Leading up to the events of WC3, the orcs have fought to free themselves of the demons, but the curse from their bargain remains. This cinematic is Thrall and Hellscream confronting Mannoroth as he showed up to corrupt the orcs even further and force them to rejoin the Burning Legion's army. Instead, Hellscream overcomes his own bloodrage and manages kills Mannoroth; though the resulting explosion mortally wounds him. This breaks the orcs' curse of rage and servitude as Hellscream implies when he says "The demon fire has burned out in my veins. I have freed myself." Thanks to his actions here, no more orcs will be forced to bow to the demons and they are a free people once again. Poetic since Hellscream was the first to damn them by drinking the blood on the day of the bargain. Thrall proceeds to join forces with the humans and elves to stop the demons once and for all. 20:22 - Archimonde has grown into a giant and is attack that big tree (The World Tree) to consume its powers and win the day for the bad guys. All the spirits that show up are called "wisps" and they are actually the souls of elves' ancestors that remain on the mortal plane. Any single wisp is largely incapable of causing harm as they are actually the worker unit for the Elves' player race. They have one offensive feature which is a self-destruct that burns mana of anything in the affected area. The amount of wisps in that cinematic proves fatal for Archimonde since he is, himself, a giant magic space demon pretty much filled with nothing BUT mana. The fiery explosion afterwards was the blowback of Archionde's death in response to the wisps kamikazeing him. As Mannoroth showed, demons go out with a bang and Archimonde was one of the biggest. 23:10 - Illidan (the elf with horns and wings) is called "The Betrayer" by his people due to his actions during a previous war vs the space demons causing the death of many elves and he specifically made sure a font of magic called "The Well of Eternity" survived the conflict despite it being the catalyst for the demons' original invasion. He stated his reasons were that we would need it to fend off the demons again, but the elves had had about enough of arcane magic as they outlawed it after the war and he was the first offender. Illidan is the typical edgy and misunderstood anti-hero. Here he summons the naga (the snake people) to serve him as he goes to try and stop Arthas from reaching the Frozen Throne. The reason for the jump in quality that you saw is because these next cinematics were from an expansion to WC3 called The Frozen Throne. It was released almost exactly 1 year after the original game in July 2003. Insert the 1:03 cinematic here. Climatic fight between Illidan and Arthas as Illidan is all that stands between Arthas and the Frozen throne. 26:10 - Having bested Illidan and with no more opposition to stand in his way, Arthas ascends the spire to the Frozen Throne where he finds that armor and helmet in the block of ice. Said armor is possessed by a ghost named Ner'Zhul. He was placed in the ice as a prison by the Burning Legion (the undead plague turned out to be Plan B for advance force invasions for the demons). This way, Ner'Zhul was their prisoner and master of the undead via telepathic control. He was also the voice in the evil sword (Frostmourne) that corrupted Arthas. The voices you hear as Arthas climbs the spire in the cinematic are all his former allies and loved ones that tried to stop him from falling to darkness; several of which he ended up killing with his own hands. He breaks the ice and Ner'Zhul is freed from his prison and from the control of the demons. When Arthas puts on the helmet (known as The Helm of Domination) their souls merge into a new and even more powerful being known as The Lich King. He then takes his place on the Frozen Throne of his undead kingdom and sits there until the start of the World of Warcraft expansion Wrath of the Lich King where he serves as the big bad for that expansion. Heck of a comment wall I know, but these are the basic cliff notes of context for these cinematics without getting into a ton of the minute details; such as the specifics of Arthas's many unspeakable crimes or the allies that Thrall meets to form his new Horde etc. All that stuff is learned and experienced by playing through the game. I hope this helps though!
I love, that you took your time to watch the WC3 replays and I enjoyed the reaction, but trust me, no matter how much you read and learn about it it is just not the same as being there, seeing it for the first time as a fan all those years back.
Thanks fella, it's a very popular look in colourgrading. Teal and orange it's called. Instead of grading my footage that way, I thought I'll do it with my lighting. Teal light and a lamp/s at 2700 kelvin. KZ
I don't use a Teal and Orange LUT, instead I use a film grade which enhances the blue. However I've set my office to give that look (T&L) without the LUT. If you ever wanted to have a go at using my blue enhancer grade, I'd be happy to share. KZ
20 years later and I still remember all the lines in all the War3 cinematics. Pointless to say I still play War3 when I have some spare time during weekends.
I'm glad for the reaction and the honest opinion. I've always loved this game so much especially the lore. I'm glad I was born in this generation. This game is a masterpiece and the lore even more.
I think I was born in this prime time too but sadly was only a console gamer. How naive I was. Thank you for watching and hanging out with the channel. KZ
The voice you are curious about (you are right, same voice actor as Raziel)...the character is named Medivh (pronounced med - eve). He is responsible for the orcs being on Azeroth (Warcraft's version of Earth). He opened a portal from a far away world known as Draenor and the orcs flooded through it. He's seen as a prophet, and remains a key lore figure throughout.
At 15:49, the being destroying Dalaran is a Man'ari Erdear. They are the evil cousins of the playable Draenei who are the exiled Eredar group that refused to accept the gift from Sargeras.
For me my favorite scenes were the illidan one and the one where arthas killed his father, I loved the voice acting... I watched it when I was kid back in 2004
In World of Warcraft, if you travel to the Undercity entrance that is in the Throne room of Capital City and turn your volume way up, you can hear the dialogue between Arthas and his father in that cutscene where he kills him, and the bloodstain from the crown rolling across the floor is still there.
Haven't played for centuries but I get the feeling the order isn't right here. Some information, of course spoilers if you haven't played: The guy playing with the sand castle is an Eredar, Archimonde, one of the three leaders of the Burning Legion, an other one is Mannoroth, the guy fighting the two orcs, Thrall and Grommash Hellscream. The first fight should be at the end of the game, I think? The winged guy is Illidan, a night elf demon hunter, who wants to destroy the Burning Legion. The guy on the tree isn't a giant, it's the same demon playing with sand earlier. The other guy is Malfurion, an other night elf and the brother of Illidan. The ferries are dead night elves sacrificing there after life to kill Archimonde. It is so damned much lore in the game.
@@angussharington2374 These are the cinematics that are at the start/end of campaigns, and are CGI. These are not in the per-level in engine cut scenes, which is where a lot more of the story is told.
Arthas begins the game as one of the protagonists - Paladin and heir to the throne, surrounded by good people (Uther his Paladin mentor and Jaina his childhood friend and love interest). As he tries to save his people from the plague, he begins to make wrong choices which eventually lead him to his end. Arthas eventually goes for the promise of power that Shadowmourne (the evil sword) offers and it costs him his soul. From that point on he will eventually kill his mentor, father and defeat Illidan (Antihero - winged demon character you saw) and eventually wear the helmet that turns him into the Lich King.
Gonna try to add a bit of context to the Cinematic with the two Orcs and the Demon. The one with the Hammer is Thrall, who would basicaly become the leader of the Horde which consits of various races like Orcs, Trolls and Tauern (many more later on). Next to him is Grommash Hellscream or Grom, you could call them good friends or even kin but Grom is not only far older but also far more ferocious and impatient. He doomed many of the Orcs to do the bidding of the Demons by drinking their Blood and subsequently succumbing to unpredictable rage. Long story short, Thrall smacked some sense back into his friend and they went for Mannoroth, the demon in the cinematic who is the one who offered his blood to Grom and his people. Thralls Hammer is a powerful weapon indeed but Mannoroth is close to the top as far as demons are concerned, it took the sacrifice of a very angry orc on demonic steroids to cast him out. Grom freed himself, and all the other orcs who drank Mannoroths blood, from the demonic influence and died as a hero, though you can make the argument that he doomed them in the first place. Twice even depending on which lore you consider as cannon (Blizzard retconned a lot). You'd get to see a few interactions between Thrall and Grom prior and during the corruption, learning more about everything surrounding this event but that is happening during ingame cutscenes / conversations.
If you feel confused by these cinematics, that's alright. In the game the movies are shown in between of whole campaignes, so story makes huge jumps. In short, old enemies must put aside their differences to defeat even greater threat ("aliens" falling from the sky, and the "troll" that destroys the city with sand magic; they are the Burning Legion btw). In the process heroic prince Arthas, by trying to save his poeple by whatever means necessary, grows in power, looses his humanity and turns into villainous Lich King, ruler of the undead. His story continous in Wrath of the Lich King, where he is the main antagonist. It woudn't be too far off to say, that the Lich King is Warcraft's Darth Vader.
@@kaizammit You actually made me realize something regarding the storytelling of "The Fall" and how Ornn was basically the narrator through the weaponry. I had never thought of that. It's what convinced me that you're doing very well here, I'd say.
Around the 24 minute mark, thats the start of the expansion of Warcraft 3 the Frozen Throne which is basicly the beginning of Wrath of the Kich King trailer. The "kraken people" are Naga. They used to be High Elves that got drowned in a very important event known as "The Shattering" which was caused by their Queen Azshara. They got cursed to become Naga by a deal with one of Warcrafts worst antagonists called Old Gods, N'zoth in particular, who are basicly planet sized immortal space gods with the power to do anything. The Naga are featured in the 2nd WoW trailer and expansion along side the big horned winged guy (Illidan Stormrage) thats summoning them in the trailer you watched , who also used to be a High Elf, now a demon and even if he looks like the bad guy and is treated as the bad guy, he is actualy the only true hero in the universe. Along side Arthas of course. Arthas did nothing wrong.
I think the problem is the cinematics that get shown are major lore moments,as in Obi Wan Kenobi holding his lightsaber and "dying" in Star Wars or Luke getting his hand cut off and finding out Darth Vader is his father levels of magnitude. The rest of the story gets told through the gameplay,but i am sure someone brought you up to speed with what's going on. I do hope you realise now how impactful Arthas showing up has been. He is literally the reason WoW and that expansion peaked the entire game series in terms of subscribers and people playing the game (12.5 Million!) ,because we all played Warcraft 3 :Reign of Chaos and Frozen Throne,we all went through the campaign and saw the story for ourselves....and to then see such an important lore character make a return to the story blew everyone's mind! I went to the midnight sale of the game and couldn't wait to get my hands on it to play it and see and experience the story and how it goes on and concludes,and i sure am glad that i did.
The first cinematic was released after the Wrath of the Lich King one, the original Arthas vs. Illidan Fight was not a CGI cinematic but a real time enginge cinematic from the Warcraft 3 expansion The Frozen Throne. This Warcraft 3 Reforge game is a remaster of the original game and is infamous for being a bad remaster on every aspect. The remaster was not made by Blizzard but rather comissioned to a third company that made all the in game assets while literally 4 or 5 guys from Blizzard worked on the code. The story of WC 3 is about Arthas and his journey to become the Lich King, he gains acces to the Helmet after defeating Illidan, thats why he does not have it yet. Not only that, he was being controlled by the magical being that possessed the helmet and planned to just take Arthas body, but ultimately Arthas will and resolve overwhelmed the Lich King and he took control of the combined form and embraced his name: The Lich King.
That's the type of information I was hoping to get by watching these cinematics. Thank you so much for telling me. I bet playing the game as a hero to then see him turn must have been mind blowing back then. KZ
@@kaizammit Indeed, the story arch of Arthas is the best Blizzard has to offer, they have never been able to replicate what they did with Arthas and Illidan, Arthas journey is quite complex, you have to experience it yourself playing the game, even when he bacame a villain, you still feel his actions were justified, everything he did was the logical step no one had the spine to do. Whatever you felt with the Wrath of the Lich King cinematic, the one when he revives the giant dragon, multiply it by a hundred and that is what a fan of the Warcraft 3 game felt, no amount of technology or better graphics have been able to duplicate that feeling, it was the combination of the best cinematic and story work from Blizzard, no one knew then it was their pick but we really milked all the joy it could have given to us.
While at the same time you can also tell (especially with his later actions) that he knows what he's doing either is wrong or would be seen as such with the lengths he goes to to cover everything up but he's already being influenced by the sword to carry out those actions anyway.. With the cinematic of Arthas killing his father, as you can tell from the celebration and shower of rose petals, his people even at that point see him as a hero because nobody (living) knows what he's done. It pretty much blindsides his people as much as it did his father.
@@kaizammit Even this long after it came out and with the somewhat of a downgrade reforged was, I'd still recommend playing it (or watching the non-cinematic cutscenes if you can find them, preferably the original ones).
Keep up the good work. Felt like you were a bit short on the film maker bit in this one but was nice to see your reactions. Used to play the warcraft series so much that it was kinda an obsession. But the wast lore and great characters really sucks you in and really makes you want to see how it ends
Thank you for watching! This is a new type of video series where I react and give my initial thoughts only. It's a way where I can look at other content like in-game cutscenes, music videos, short films, etc, etc. My filmmaker breakdowns are still coming but they take me longer to actually put together so this content is to give entertainment and just an excuse to hang out. Editing a cinematic breakdown right this very second so yeah, keep an eye out. I'm glad to hear it left its mark on you, sadly I missed this golden age of gaming being a console guy. KZ
It's funny you make the comparison to 90's Mainframe Studios animation(Beast Wars) given many of these were actually from 2002.(I believe the opening cut scene, with the Knight and Orc, was the only one that was completely remade for the 2020 remaster.) It's interesting how we often remember things from a nostalgic stand point as, semi-recently, I went back and looked at the older 90's CG cartoons and it is much, much, rougher around the edges then we often tend to think in our minds eye.
5:00 i remember, that those hands where seperated from the bodies in the original version. Did Blizzard cut this in the reforged version, or did the uploader of the compilation cut it out?
Next up? World of Warcraft Cinematics! I like that you reacted to many in one video and didn't pause. If you keep to reacting with commentary on TH-cam, you can safe the Break Downs for Patreon content. Which I'll be sure to join.
Thank you so much! I don't like to pause it as it will pull me from the experience or I won't be able to get into it. If I start doing movies and TV shows, if... then I may do a Patreon. I decided to go for the TH-cam channel memberships (THE JOIN BUTTON) that way you get a little icon next to your name when you comment and you decide what I put out next. I let you guys control the channel basically. I'm also going to start posting more behind the scenes type thing for the members, BTS on the TH-cam channel and sometimes, my on set life. It also supports me. I'd love to have you as my first ever member but don't feel pressured! Just enjoy whatever is right for you. Just by watching, liking and commenting is support so thank you! KZ
The thing with watching "just" the cinematics is that they tell the lore only very fracmented. There is like 1 to 2 per campain, which limits what they will tell
Quick about the Warcraft orcs: Yes, they are quite "savage" by nature, but it was the undead demon Mannoroth (the four-legged, winged dude with a very bad breath), and others, that corrupted them with the "demon fire" Grommash Hellscream (the orc that fell) mentioned. You might have missed Thrall (the orc that had the dream in the beginning, and Hellscream's buddy) replying "No, my friend, you have freed us all", after Hellscream sacrificed himself in taking Mannoroth down. Always brings a lump to my throat. I love how Blizzard with Warcraft (at least from WC3 onwards) have painted a way more neuanced picture than the black-and-white "these are the good guys, these are the bad guys". Here in WC3, we play as Thrall as he tries to make a "new Horde" from the remnants of the (more definitely "evil") Horde from the first two games, and them trying to find a home in this new world they find themselves in rather than conquering it for conquest's sake (thanks to manipulation and the mentioned "demon fire"). The glowing orbs that surrounds Archimonde (the "giant?") are whisps, elven spirits. This cinematic followed the last mission you do with the elves, culminating in Malfurion (the elf with the horn) ordering all of the whisps to sacrifice themselves and the elves' wold tree in order to defeat the demon lord. 23:11 onwards is from the expansion to the game, The Frozen Throne. In the first clip, we se Illidan, the elf that absorbed demon powers in order to fight fire with fire, becoming the OG demon hunter. This, with the nagas (sea creatures) is continuation of literal tens of thousands of years of in-game lore. Nice touch, imo, is the spikes surrounding the spiraling stairs Arthas is ascending in the last clip, resembling the King's crown from earlier, as Arthas (literally and figuratively) ascends to the throne as the Lich King, and the very heavy chains "supporting" the throne, since the Lich King himself is not really in controll of his own mind and actions.
One of the most painful things of these scenes is the fact that Medivh could have leveled the entire city on his own, but allowed them to cast him out. He was the cause of it ALL, but was trying to right his wrongs. Had he uttered who he was -- literally everyone there would have at least listened. He was the last Guardian of Tirisfal, and thus the most powerful mage within the entire world. If he saw a threat -- people should have listened.
unfortunetly all of the cinematics save for the intro cinematics, are all story capstones so without the gameplay that has told the story through dialog they don't really tell you anything. Though even if you arent a gamer Warcraft 3 reforged is actually a pretty good game, even if only to play off stream when you have time.
Counter Strike: Global Offensive trailer is one i think would fit really well for this series. intense short story, thrilling music, from a filmmaking standpoint it's really cool since the cinematic is run in the engine of the game, pretty much only adjusting the light on a playable map for cinematic effect. And as always i love watching these video game cinematic/trailer reactions from you, keep it up lad.
I will always know that voice. As I said, that's a core memory for me that game. I used to write fictional stories about Nosgoth when I was a kid. Thanks for watching fella! KZ
Thank you so much, if you want to learn, watch my breakdowns as that's where I get my teacher hat on. This type of content is more of me sharing my thoughts. KZ
This is the transcript of the subtitles that should be in the cinematic (beginning at 14:15) where the demon lord Archimonde destroys the city of Dalaran. "Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world." "From this seal shall arise the doom of men, who, in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own." "Blindly they built their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit. Now they shall be consumed by very flame they thought to control." "Let the echoes of doom resound across this wretched world, that all who live may hear them and despair."
I've actually got that on my list. It's on my Cinematic Breakdown list so it will be a little while as I've already got 3 on the go but soon, thank you for the suggestion though, means a lot! KZ
Man I loved seeing your reaction to the cinematics but as a lot of people already told you this is kinda like watching 5 mins of a large series and then making it into a single video. so much amazing lore is done in the game proper and so many details on who Arthus is what he goes through how it is he becomes the lich king is what makes these cinematics shine just so much brighter and makes the wrath of the lich king cinematic feel so ungodly different. whilst I am not even sure if you will read this message if you have the time and are interesting in how it all comes to be I highly HIGHLY recommend playing warcraft 3 and it's dlc The frozen throne (which was that up in quality you saw) to fully understand the jump to characters and the change the people go through. yes it is pretty decently long and sadly reforced is really bad (it got a 0.4 on metacritic for a reason) the main story is still to this day one of the greatest stories ever told imo and I again HIGHLY recommend you play the game yourself and maybe you could have record the reaction to the story? idk maybe that is taken it a bit 2 far but seeing these cinematics are making me wanna play warcraft 3 again and feel the love for that story just rushing back!
Great reactions, I would love to see your reaction to Arthas' Betrayal, it was the first legit cinematic I think they made in the warcraft universe. It still burns in my mind, and why the lich king was so big in WoW. Keep doing what you do.
There's many ingame cutscenes/cinematic from WoTLK expansion leading all the way up to the heroes final encounter with Arthas, what happens to him & what comes next for the Scourge (the Undead's that he controls). And then fast forward maybe 10+ years and Blizzard finally decided to come back to the Lich King's story. For example your reaction to the Expansion Shadowlands cinematic will be "Wtf? Where's my boi Arthas? Who's this guy? Wow who's this badass chick?". But Arthas is a good starting point because his story is all tangled up with the Banshee Queen Sylvanas' story, someone who you'll be seeing fairly soon if you carry on watching the WoW Expansion cinematics... Just like Arthas she's a huge figure in the Warcraft community. Everyone will suggest the WoW Cinematics... I'd recommend the short stories called Harbringers, Warbringers and Afterlives. These are 4-6minute long cinematics which tell the stories of the main figures from some of the later expansions and can easily be bulked together in 1 video per expansion. These characters all have incredible stories in there own right. So I'd suggest just reacting to them after watching the main Expansion Trailer Cinematics. The short stories belong to the follow expansions: Harbringers (Guldan, Khadgar, Illidan) from Legion expansion Warbringers (Jaina, Sylvanas, Azshara) from Battle of Azeroth expansion Afterlives (Bastion, Ardenweald, Maldraxxus, Revendreth) from Shadowlands expansion Arthas is involved in both Afterlives: Bastion & Sylvanas' cinematics. What makes Bastion very powerful to watch is it's the story of what happened to Uther (someone Arthas looked upto as an uncle of sorts) & his regret over the decision he made at the plague of Stratholme (the first event that set Arthas on his path to turning into what you see in the cinematics). Ps. Great job on the reacts buddy!
This is Illidan, elf demon hunter obsessed with power. He was imprisoned by the elf's for 10 thousant years. This is the intro to expansion to warcraft 3. Warcraft 3 is mainly about Arthas, human paladin and son of a king. He take the cursed blade Frostmourn to save his kingdom and He fell in the trap of lich king, he became unded knight. Lich king sits on the frozen throne, he dont have body and is imprisoned in the ornament crown. In the main game Ilidan is released to help fight demon's invasion. Combine force of all the races drive back demon's. Arthas remains in the ruin of his kingdom as the king of the unded and Illidan is banished from the land of the elves. In the expansion Illidan is recruited by the demon's to destroy unded lich king who betrayed them, he find new allies, Naga underwater species. Lich king sensing the threat summons to the frozen throne his champion Arthas. At the end Illidan lose and Arthas unite with the lich king by placing the crown on his head. Thats the plot for the two first RTS games, later is WOW and entire diffrent story...
Yeah, you won't pick all that much of the lore from those cinematics (and especially not on Arthas that you desired). Most of the story told through engine-based cutscenes, that's where it's all at. It might not be inline with sort of content you do for the channel, all things considered, but I'd highly recommend to get to know it at least in your spare time. Also, someone messed up with chronology, putting the second to last (I believe) cinematic of the "The Frozen Throne" as the first here. Also Also, when the guy destroys the city there are, in fact, should be subtitles. He's not orc or troll, but rather Eredar - a race of powerful magicians in the Warcraft universe. 'Is this the same game?" It's expansion pack that came a year later. So... Kinda? P. S. voice actor's name is Michael Bell.
To expand on the Eredar, there's essentially 2 sub races Man'ari (meaning twisted or corrupted in the Eredar language) who started as mortals but were turn into powerful demons, the second subrace is called the Draenei (exiled ones in the Eredar language) but they play only a minor role in the story (sort of) and aren't that important. When the Man'ari became demons they gained a power boost to their already powerful magical abilities as Eredar were possibly the first mortals to learn to use magic in Warcraft and Archimonde (the demon guy who destroyed the city is powerful even among his people. as for what subtitles would have said. "Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world. From this seal shall arise the doom men, who in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own. Blindly they build their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit. Now they shall be consumed by the very flame they sought to control. Let the echoes of doom resound across this wretched world, that all who live may hear them and despair".
the thing that destroyed the city with sand was a demon (later world of warcraft made him a different race that became a demon but here he was just always a demon) and yes there are subtitles, he's basically saying that the mages in the city play at magic like children but soon they see true power as it destroys their world
Up next has to be some of the world of warcraft cinematics. Absolutely incredible videos for that game, just like the wrath of the lich king cinematic showed
Thank you for watching fella! Now I've done this I will start my move on the cinematics, breakdowns take me some time so they are much slower to get out. I will try and get them to you as soon as I can. Thanks again, KZ.
Awesome! Really been enjoying this series, it's always cool to get another perspective on things and some info about why the makers do what they do and what effect the shots / cameramovement etc. has. Looking forward to the next one :) @@kaizammit
There's so much context being left out by cinematics. Well, you see it all by playing the game :) If I may, another great Warcraft cinematic is Illidan Rejection of the Gift
The original has 3 major parts and a ton of half major parts, and also alot of minor parts. They play out mostly simultaneously witch can be confusing. The famous ones you see alot and hear alot about is Illidan (a night elf) and also Arthas (human). Then you also have the Burning Legion, witch is a bunch of different races, most visible is the eredar witch is corrupted Drarneis that turned and joined the Legion and the doom lords serving the corrupt titan Sargeras, that have a part in both stories. There is a red thread running through. Illidan did most things to help the world but got shunned. Arthas armor is actually a shaman that got torn apart and is not the greatest guy so to speak. It's a lot of lore 😅 And yeah, then there is the Naga witch are nightelves almost drowning after the well of eternity (they were in process of summoning the legion as queen azshara was mindcontrolled cind of) blew up the world. So they joined the old God N'Zoth to be turned in to fish people 🙂
I wasn't prepared for the deep feeling of grief I felt watching these. As someone who remembers saving up money they earned cutting firewood to go and buy Warcraft 1, 2, 3, and the Diablo games, it's really sad to see what's become of Blizzard and their worlds. I'd be willing to watch a Warcraft movie with Henry Cavill as Arthas. I reckon he'd do it justice since he played World of Warcraft.
Loved reading about your history there man. I'm hoping they (Blizzard) will return to their roots now they belong to Microsoft. I know a lot of people aren't happy, a certain console audience but I believe it will allow them to return to the old ways. When budgets strings don't matter it can become more about the art again. Who knows though. Thank you for watching fella. KZ
You should watch all of the Warbringers cinematics and the warlords cinematics from world of warcraft. They have alot of story telling that is very easy to understand.
The reason you feel like you're still missing a lot of information is because you're basically missing all the information lol. These cinematics cap off entire campaigns that tell the story over the course of around 40 missions and several in-game cutscenes. I would recommend checking out the entire story of Warcraft 3 if you want to understand this amazing world at it's peak. Glad to see you enjoyed the cinematics even out of context though!
I very much enjoyed them but tbh, it's because I'm a nerd and I love it. Anything like this I can enjoy. I also bizarrely enjoyed trying to piece together the story. Thanks for hanging out with me man. KZ ✌️
There's a LOT of context missing from the 2nd and 3rd cinematic but it tells a compelling yet albeit unoriginal story. Still very good. A classic to be sure.
If you have a suggestion or a piece of content with an amazing story, please let me know, I would love to see it!
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Filmmaker Reacts to Gaming Cinematics playlist: th-cam.com/play/PLWF6myhJ6iSvJVz1Iw1nmX0JIkn6OACka.html
I would suggest Eve Online that is also one of the really old games out there still kicking around! played it myself long time ago, still looking on returning now and again since its just become more beautiful each time they upgrade the game. th-cam.com/video/3l0k2xkcT3g/w-d-xo.html
till this day one of my favorite intros to a game is Warhammer Mark of Chaos
I would love too see your reaction to all honkai 3rd cinematics. The animation is great and i think it deserves at least looking at.
FYI, the guy with the horns and wings you saw a few times throughout the cinematics is Illidan Stormrage and as close to a main character as Warcraft is going to get. He goes through a whole redemption arc which culminates in the "Legion" expansion, which is widely regarded as the last truly great bit of content Blizzard put out.
I urge you to search up Illidan Stormrage cinematics as you have done with Arthas, as he's as interesting, if not more interesting of a character.
Wow Shadowlands intro cinematic is probably the best they have done, just ignore the actual expansion was garbage.
Here is a brief explanation of these cutscenes to make them easier to understand:
0:46 - End of the plague campaign, at the end of the expansion we return to Arthas who must come to the frost throne where the Lich King rests, because he is threatened by Illidan.
3:20 - Basic intro of the game that appeared at the time of game launch.
5:11 - Introduction to the tutorial campaign, the visible orc is called Thrall and he is the leader of the horde, at the end of that mini campain, he learns that he should take his people to the west, to the land of Kalimdor (other continent of this world).
8:05 - Beginning of the Alliance campaign, where we leading Prince Arthas, we fight the plague that one of the ambassadors talks about and which ends with his transformation into the Death Knight, the most important commander of the Lich King.
11:43 - End of the Alliance campaign, return of the victorious Prince, therefore everyone cheers without knowing about his transformation.
14:18 - The next cutscene is the end of the undead campaign, the plague as it was called in the game. Here we have the further fate of Arthas after the transformation, we learn here that the plague was sent by the burning legion (demons) who want to conquer the world of Azeroth, the visible figure is one of the legion leader (Archimonde) summoned at the end of the campaign, he destroying the wizard city Dallaran.
16:21 - End of the Horde campaign, during it we accompany Thrall while exploring the land of Kalimdor, at some point the action splits into 2 threads, the orc shown here next to Thrall, Grom Hellscream initially succumbs to the corruption that long ago on the orcs were sent by demons from the burning legion (which is why Grom has red eyes). The rest of the story is about saving Grom and healing him, the cutscene is a confrontation with the minor legion commander who was responsible for Grom's "disease".
20:18 - End of the Night Elf campaign, the legion's invasion of Kalimdor is in full swing, the elves for whom the Alliance and the Horde were intruders at the beginning, finally join forces to defeat the legion together. Here we see the leader of the legion, the same as in the excerpt from 14:18, trying to destroy the world tree, if he succeeded, Azerot would face doom, the character that appears in the foreground is the druid Malfurion Stormrage, the most important elven druid who uses the artifact we had to get in during the campaign to summon the ancestral spirits that defeat Archimonde.
23:04 - Intro to the expansion, visible guy is Illidan Stormrage, Malfurion's brother, we get to know a piece of his story in the night elf campaign. His mission, however, is recognized by his brother and Tyrnade, the leader of the elves as crimes against nature and he is banished, here we have the continuation of his story, how he tried to gain more power.
26:10 - Epilogue of the expansion and the whole game, reconciliation of the Death Knight and the Lich King (after fight from the begining of the reaction). Arthas will be sitting on this throne until the World of Warcraft expansion pack, whose intro you've already seen.
Underrated coment, take your good like, good man.
sadly to fully understand it all one has to play the game...
Like I told you in a previous video, just watching the fully rendered cinematics would not show a lot of the story. Here you see the story jumped from Medivh trying to rally the king to prepare for the Burning Legion, to his son coming home, corrupted, and killing his father. A LOT happened in between.
Bro, he gives and inch and you demand a mile. Nobody has the time or wants to watch all of the old-ass trash looking in-game cinematics from 20 years ago. He threw you a real bone by watching these as it is.
@@ficklefox2171 "Old-ass trash looking in-game cinematics" Bud calm down. This is a whole universe with 20 years of history written into it. People grew up with these games and want them to be appreciated and understood to the extent of their content. Mst is just explaining that the information is super vague, and Kai is definitely appreciating it for what is being shown even if they still don't quite grasp the lore. SO there's no need to play white-knight for him, he can do it himself if he needs to.
@ficklefox2171 don't watch it then shithead 😂
@@ficklefox2171haha you are so angry boy. these cinematics and the overall game is to this day known as one of the best games ever made. so sit down and be quiet kid, cause you beign salty aint gonna change a thing
@@ficklefox2171Why are you so mad?
Its worth noting that in a lot of Blizzard's games, a huge chunk of storytelling is done during the gameplay. Cinematics are usually reserved for the BIG lore moments
Yeah, back then to produce and render CGI was hugely expensive and these were at the absolute peak for the time. So they were reserved for the critical moments in a story, I still remember patiently playing through each mission knowing that eventually there would be a great big lore cinematic at the end.
Story-driven RTS' have really fallen out of fashion since the AoE/WarCraft/StarCraft era. Hopefully they'll make a return one day.
@@AMorphicTooli doubt they will, as much as id love it. but the fact is, RTS games are among the most difficult and complex games ever made. the standart casual modern gamer doesnt want that, they want something easy to access and easy to play. fast food games, so to speak.
Great video, thanks for this! If you want the lore filled in, I'll leave it below (it'll be a little long lol):
Firstly, the first cinematic was out of place. It should have been second to last, so ignore that for now.
Back in the day, the orcs showed up to invade this planet after being corrupted by a bunch of demons. These demons also corrupted a powerful mage called the Guardian who actually opened the portal to let them into this world. This Guardian is Medivh, the crow man who tries to warn everyone that the demons are coming back now that he's no longer corrupted. This is what he is referring to when he mentions failing humanity once before.
The next part of the game centers around Arthas, a paladin and the son of the human king. He's trying to stop the plague mentioned in that cinematic, which is turning people into undead. Along the journey, Arthas slowly does worse and worse things mostly out of necessity, and finally takes what appears to be a cursed sword in order to be powerful enough to defeat the demon that seems to be leading the undead forces. In doing so, the sword steals his soul. The next cinematic is when he returns home, ostensibly a war hero, having defeated the undead army and their demon leader. But he is now corrupted and kills his father, and slaughters most of the kingdom, turning many into undead.
Arthas, now a death knight, obeys his demon masters to a point, helping to get them into the world, but is also trying to secretly work against them because he is just a tool to them. He works with the Lich King (a spirit trapped in a magical block of ice called the Frozen Throne) who is the leader of the undead forces, under the command of the demons. They successfully summon Archimonde, a powerful demon leader. He is the one in the next cinematic who destroys the mage city of Dalaran with the spell in the sand.
Next, the orcs actually did listen to Medivh's warning, and they sailed to another continent. Lots happens there, but most importantly, a faction of the orcs decides it would be a good idea to drink the blood of a demon, Mannoroth, which is how they got corrupted years ago in the first place. Eventually you as the player manage to rescue some, including Grommash, the leader of this faction. In the next cinematic, he and the leader of the orcs, Thrall, track Mannoroth down, and Grommash sacrifices himself to kill the demon, freeing himself and the rest of his people from the corruption.
Finally (for the first part of the game), almost everyone bands together to stop Archimonde. Archimonde wants to get to and consume the World Tree, but the Night Elves and everyone else lay a trap for him, and detonate the whole tree, destroying Archimonde in the process.
This is the end of Warcraft 3, Reign of Chaos. The next cinematics are newer as you noticed, as they are from the expansion, The Frozen Throne.
The guy with the horns is Illidan, and he was a night elf. He was locked away about 10,000 years ago (they're immortal) for dabbling in demonic magic, although his excuse was that he used the weapons of the enemy to fight the enemy. He was released as a sort of desperate last measure to help fight the demons while they set the trap at the tree. In the process he snacked on yet more demonic magic, so they banished him afterwards, so now he's mad, and in the cinematic he summons the naga (fish people) to serve as his army.
A lot of relatively minor stuff happens in the rest of the game, but the relevant stuff is that another demon lord shows up and strongarms Illidan into working for him again, and tasks him with destroying the Frozen Throne, because the undead are now just rogue and not serving the demons anymore. This is where that first out of place cinematic fits in. The Lich King sees the attack coming, and calls Arthas to defend him. Arthas and Illidan race to get there first, and meet in the north. They fight, Arthas wins, and he climbs the spire to the Throne.
Cue last cinematic, where Arthas breaks the Throne and puts on the helm, merging with the Lich King. He sits down and has a rest for a few years, and people forget about the undead menace for a bit. The events of World of Warcraft and The Burning Crusade take place, and finally Arthas awakes as the Lich King in the cinematic that introduced the Wrath of the Lich Kingg.
Nice and clean explanation
Just wanted to add some important details that didn't get mentioned about Arthas. Arthas was initially a "good" guy, prince of a human kingdom and a paladin of the Knights of the Silver Hand and the apprentice of Uther. Arthas was dispatched to investigate the undead at a nearby city. That was when he found out that people were dying to contaminated grains that turned people undead. So it was then that he chose to kill everyone in the city to prevent them from turning undead, not knowing who ate the contaminated grains and who didn't but stopping the undead was more important to him, going against the better judgement of his mentor, Uther and his love interest, Jaina (who never made an appearance in any of these cinematics). So he told everyone there with him at that moment that either do what he says or go away before slaughtering every person he saw and burned down the city. At the end, he found out there was a demon that was behind it and the demon told Arthas to find him in Northrend (the snow-covered cinematics was mostly held in Northrend) if he wanted his revenge. Arthas, not knowing that the demon was trying to lure him, did exactly that and in that journey to find the demon, found the cursed sword, Frostmourne.
It was mostly that that made him a tragic villain who wanted to do the right thing but forced to do something "evil" and then, lost his soul to power, trying to defeat the evil he wanted the power for, and, inevitably became that very same evil at the end.
Great explanation in so few words. Brilliant
Thanks dude! KZ
Ah crap! Why did they put the Illidan/Arthas duel in the front?!
Still awesome visuals. The Orcs vs Mannoroth is still my favorite.
IKR
Right?? I was yelling at the screen "No! Why is this first?? Who messed this up?!"
yea it is strange putting the last one as first
Blame the original video... link in the description! Get em! Haha KZ
@@kaizammit oh believe me, I do! However, I mainly feel dissapointed for you. You should have been introduced to Illidan (winged guy) with that cinematic with the Naga (fish-reptiles). It's also a shame they only remastered the first cinematic (the orc and human fighting 1v1) and none of the others 😢
YES! Another Legacy of Kain fan! Michael Bell as Raziel and Simon Templeman as Kain will forever be etched in my memory.
I feel that!
You are indeed missing loads of information, i'd say about 95%. Each cinematic is the intro to or culmination of one of the large chapters of the game. All of them very powerful moments which fitted the tone of the chapter perfectly. Seeing Hellscream avenging his people or Arthas 'succeeding' his father still gives me shivers.
I've heard I need to play the game or at least watch someone... Choices! KZ
3:25 no thats way out of order, should be second last, 7:57 it is Michael Bell, 13:30 that was the voice of Ner'zhul (the current Lich King) whispering to him through the sword, 15:00 Transcrpit for this scene: "Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world. From this seal shall arise the doom of men, who, in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own. Blindly they built their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit. Now they shall be consumed by very flame they thought to control" 16:00 Archimonde is an Eredar, a demon corrupted Dranaei, who is one of the generals of the the Demonic Burning Legion, which is one of the main antagonists in Warcraft. 24:56 this is the start of the expansion pack.
13:30 that was not Ner'zhul but Arthas, beside the obvious Arthas voice it would make no sense for Ner'zhul to tell all that to Arthas like "you no longer need to bear the weight of your crown" Arthas never had a crown, Arthas took care of his own people not Ner'zhul
@@Ciffer-1998 Why would he be talking to himself in the 3rd person dude that makes 0 sense. It's also in the lore that Ner'zhul spoke to arthas through Frostmourne. The "weight of his crown ' was the metaphorical weight of being the prince, not a literal one.
@@Ciffer-1998 I went back and watched the older version, they changed the voiceover to indeed sound more like Arthas, it sounds a bit more like Lich King in the original. If they had cut the last line "I've taken care of everything" it would make more sense as an internal dialogue. As it is it sounds more like coming from Ner'zhul that he's arranged the invasion in the aftermath of the Kings death. Either way its still one of the best cinematics in the game, only narrowly beaten out by Thrall and Grommash in the canyon.
@@vahdoom he is not he is whispering to his father
@@Ciffer-1998 That is a possibility as well I suppose.
The very first cinematic feels weird, because reforged version was trying to recreate in game engine scene from 2001(i think), at the time, it was really good because taken by surprise(especially for RTS genre), but in that case, i dont really know what they wanted to achieve tbh. Its not full cinematic, and not full in game engine.. its neither version. And reforged came out in 2021 if im not mistaken.
Also, the next cinematic in this video, is the only one was properly reforged in... reforged version. And clearly for pretty trailer purposes. That's why this part looks most modern. Rest of cinematics are just re rendered in 4K, or could be just upscaled compared to original.
I remember finding these in my War3 folder when I was a kid, I was too bad at the game to actually finish it at the time and get to see most of these cinematics, but when I got to watch them without any real context in the game files, I remember being so excited and happy and these cinematics were really what made me eventually a Warcraft fan, they were awesome and seeing people watch them without context always reminds me of my own childhood and it's a fun experience, you just get to appreciate them as what they are.
Just watching these has made me want to pick them up or at least try it out. Thanks for watching fella! KZ
@@kaizammit Well, the first two Warcraft games are ancient and not really worth playing, Warcraft III is an amazing experience if you enjoy RTS games and even if you don't, I would still really recommend it, Arthas' journey alone through War3 and Frozen Throne is something very unique and special, you really fall down a massive rabbit hole of madness with him and since he's often the protagonist while being a clear villain, It really makes you question whether you should like him or not, but the game still has much more to offer than just Arthas' story, but I would say they are heavily overshadowed by his... I guess charisma.
The guy who destroyed the city is known as Archimonde, one of the 2 great demon lords under Sargeras - They generally lead the burning legion most of the time, as Sargeras is pretty much always absent. What he spoke about was the arrogance of humans, how they've mostly just copied others, attempted to control demons, and things like: "Let this signal the first blow against the mortal world."
2:45 Surprisingly enough, there has been quite a few people calling for Henry Cavill to star as Arthas in a Warcraft movie
It looks like it was made for him to play. I couldn't believe it when I saw it. KZ
I feel like with Henry cavills physique and face n stuff, he could probably pull off Illidan, just needs the long hair lol
Actually i want him to play Illidan better
The first scene is Arthas just before he becomes the Lich King (Hence no helmet). The "enemy" he faced was Illidan. That was from a Warcraft 3 Expansion called The Frozen Throne. This is one of the last of the cinematics of the series.
ahhhh! That makes sense, that confused the hell out of me. It didn't look like a first cinematic, no world building etc. I blame the person who made the original video :). Thank you for letting me know fella! KZ
@@kaizammit No problem. Of course the last cinematic as such was Arthas becoming the Lich King.
@@kaizammit That cinematic was one of the remastered ones that looks like it was rendered in the newer World of Warcraft cinematic engine, the original one from the old game looks better IMO
100% meant to have subtitles.
Also love the comment about the cinematic quality going up when you started with the most updated lol
Thank you for watching and hanging out with me! KZ
I love how the king was all bored and no looking them at all, until that dude in the background said "quarranteed" and the king pop up "HELL NO YOU WONT" showing that even when the king isnt paying attetions to what this people said, he actually still sharp as hell.
Terenas was and is my fav character in the game
King Terenas got PTSD from covid lockdowns 😅
Thank you for this; I always like seeing cinematics and stories I've enjoyed through the fresh eyes of others.
Mind, as others have pointed out - trying to gleam the story arc of the game through the final reward cinematic of each separate campaign is like watching the last five minutes of every Lord of the Rings movie, and then writing a book review about it. You don't pick up much of the character development that way. :-p
I'd point towards the cinematics from the first Starcraft game, if you crave more 90s retro feel - but the same problem exists there; they're the "grand finale" moments of long story arcs, meant as rewards for the player - not really for separate viewing.
I feel like these cinematics were all over the place time-line wise. And a lot of the context is out of order.
Arthas is a paladin and the son of the king you saw in the cinematic with the mage transformed into a raven. He goes to investigate the claims of the plague ravaging the outer regions of the human’s kingdom to find that not only is there a plague ravaging the populace, not only had the plague infested all of the grain shipments moving through the country, but that this plague causes the victims to rise again as a legion of undead monsters. Faced with an impossible choice, he opts to purge the city of the still living but infected people so the undead might not be able to spread farther. This caused his mentor Uther and friend and love interest Jaina to abandon him and to see him as a monster.
In his purge of the city he comes across a dread lord, a demon commander responsible for the plague, who tells him to seek the demon in Northrend, the forgotten frozen waste of a northern continent to that Arthas might fight him to get revenge. While Arthas does find the demon he also finds Frostmourne, the great sword you seem him using in the cinematics. The sword is very powerful, but it whispers to him and slowly corrupts him into what we come to know as the Lich King. The demon hoped he would become corrupted and take him on as a commander, but Arthas used the power to strike him down. It was merely a setback, for the demon. When he took the sword, it caused an explosion that killed his good friend (or so he thought) giving him even less of a reason to resist the whispers of power from the sword.
After returning victorious from Northrend, he kills his father like you saw in the cinematic with all the rose petals and throws the kingdom of man into chaos. This would prevent one of the stronger world powers from stopping his next move, going to Northrend and claiming the frozen throne as his seat of power over the quickly spreading undead legion - remember the infected grain.
Without the Lich Kings helm, the Crown of Donination, his possession is incomplete. The first cinematic shows Illidan, a demon hunter, trying to stop his ascension to the Frozen Throne where the crown awaits him. Once defeated, Arthas takes the throne and the crown where he becomes the Lich King in full and loses his last shreds of humanity. Or so we think, until we completed the events of Wrath of the Lich King.
He started as a force for good, a paladin of the light, and a beloved prince poised to take control of a vast kingdom of people who adore him. In a single moment, he is given an impossible situation and makes the best decision he felt he could, losing all of his friends and loved ones respect in the process. In his desire for revenge, he was driven to take up a dark power which ended up destroying everything he had loved and cared for.
Frostmourne*
Glad I found this comment cuz I was laying in my bath, starting in a comment to explain the timeline.😂
@@Pursuerize right, my bad lol
Clicked as soon as I saw this! Awesome to see you go through these already since our chat on your last video with the lich king trailer, wasn't expecting it so soon!
Much love man.
It was between this and Starcraft but that was 2 hours long! As I've not done a video like this before, thought I'd start with a small one. Hopefully I'll do a video like this between each cinematic breakdown. Got to give you guys content! 🙏🏻
Thank you so much for watching! KZ
I'm going to be looking at the in-game cinematics too. It will be my first video like it so I hope you guys like it. KZ
@@kaizammit I know I will be 100% onboard for the in-game cinematics too, even if they end up filmwise not being the most interesting, I believe it'll be super cool seeing you piece the story together like many of us did back in the day. I suppose the in-game cinematics could be the glue to the overall narrative. As the expansions go on, it definitely becomes more fluid with in-game cutscenes in relation to the cgi cinematics.
Cheers!
Id love for you to do the all Warcraft cinematic's every one of them in amazing and so is your commentary!
I will most likely put them in the Cinematic breakdown videos as they are meant to be epic. This style of video is for in-game cutscenes or other content all together. Thank you for watching and taking the time to comment. Means a lot fella! KZ
i so agree! i had been a long time WoW fan and to watch these together is so nostalgic
The Death of Hellscream cinematic is one of my favorite pieces of video game "cinema", period. It's just done SO well. That sequence, and how it played out, single handedly compelled me to start playing World of Warcraft back in the day when it was still in Beta. EVERY time I watch it, I get choked up. It's just so damn awesome.
2:50 haha in the story actually the guy with green is the witcher lol. he's trying to prevent the swordsman from becoming evil which is when he puts on the helmet. and as you said the sword is the evil influence.
You will now gather the entire warcraft audience on your channel! It is very interesting to listen to your reasoning! The phrase "Succeeding you, father" gives me goosebumps all these years. The legendary phrase
I hope so, I just hope you enjoy my reactions and thoughts. My breakdowns are the ones that I really go to town on. Thank you for hanging out with me. KZ
@@kaizammit i love your react^^
Thank you so much, that means so much to me. KZ
@@kaizammit Thank you for your content. It's great^^
starting by the very last cinematic of the game, what a genius
You should let the guy know who made the original video, link in the description. That would make you a genius. KZ
30:06 Great video. As far as the missing story bits, Blizzard does A LOT of its exposition in game, especially Warcraft 3. Starcraft has some of my favorite story beats ever.
After this one you must see the last one that remains from classic Blizzard, and that would be Starcraft. The first game cinematics can be a little too old and basic but theyre filled with emotion and is pretty enjoyable, but the cinematics in Starcraft 2 are really something to see and comment, its purely amazing although like this one, its usually the beginning or the ending to a whole story. I hope you do it soon. Great work there man!
Always enjoy seeing your breakdown on some of the scenes. I think various elements of this have been laid down by some other comments, but I can add a very brief bit of context to each of the cutscenes.
0:43 - This scene is the second to last cutscene. It was re-made in Warcraft 3 Reforged. Arthas and Illidan spent the final mission of the expansion competing to reach the Frozen Throne first, and Arthas wins. This scene is played out in-engine which is why the graphics look so different. While the models are in-engine, they are much more detailed than the standard unit models.
3:22 - This was the teaser trailer for Warcraft 3, but this version was re-made much later based on the original. The human and orc each represent the most basic unit that each race uses, the Footman (human) and the Grunt (orc). In Warcraft 1 & 2 they were the only races, and fought each other. The fire from the sky, and the demons invading were new to Warcraft 3.
5:12 - This was the intro for Warcraft 3, it doesn't really have much plot persay (beyond the broadest strokes), it mostly exists to get you hyped, and the end where he points at the camera leads into some Prologue missions, where that character gives the Orc leader some further plot, while also teaching the player the basic controls.
8:07 - This was the intro cutscene before the Human campaign began. The plague briefly spoken of is a large factor in the plot. The raven/man shows up to some additional characters during the first few missions (including the still-good Arthas)
11:49 - This was the final cutscene after completing the Human campaign. Over the campaign, Arthas has been your main POV, and while he started heroic, he was slowly corrupted. The final mission is where he claims the cursed sword you see him using. The voice it speaks with is the voice of the Lich King (who isn't Arthas at this time).
14:18 - This was the final cutscene after the Undead campaign. The final mission was to summon an Arch-Demon, while defending against waves of enemies. The creature you see is that Demon, who uses his formidable powers to devastate an entire city to show off how big of a deal it is that he's here. He's the big-bad of the game.
16:22 - (This one was my favorite growing up) This was the final cutscene after the Orc campaign. The two orcs were your main POV characters during the campaign. During the earlier Warcraft games, the demon you see here used his blood to both empower and enslave the orcs. The orc with the Axe willingly drank the blood again for power, and the final mission is fighting against his demon-empowered orcs who are slaves once more, as the hammer-orc tries to save axe-orc with magic.
20:18 - This was the final cutscene after the final campaign of the base game (the Night elf campaign). The demon you see is the same demon you saw in the earlier cutscene where he destroyed the city. The final mission involves holding out against his invasion long enough to prepare the big spirit-bomb that defeats him in the cutscene.
23:04 - This was the intro cuscene for the Expansion "The Frozen Throne". It was produced later, and the technology has indeed improved. You see Illidan (a popular character from the Night Elf campaign who was also corrupted) summoning the primary antagonists for the expansion.
26:12 - This was the final cutscene after the Expansion (the expansion only had two pre-rendered cutscenes). Arthas spent the expansion racing back to the Frozen Throne, both he and the Lich King losing power as the game goes on (instead of gaining power like other heroes have been). In the end, he is victorious, but the audio clips you hear are all the dark moments from along his journey, echoes of what he lost. But none of that gives him any pause anymore.
Anywho, these are all core memories for me growing up. Lots of personality and epic moments, and they were great rewards after struggling through a really tough last mission.
If you decide to watch every Warcraft cinematic in chronological order, you have a good 1-2 hrs of content. It's always fun to watch people with no experience trying to piece the story together.
And if you ever decide to watch the cinematics in order and with the added in game cutscenes, well you are gonna have a blast! Especially when you reach the later expansions. Some good 10-15hrs I believe.
Take care! 💪🏻
These clips sure brings me back! What a treat. 😁 Yes, that part does have subtitles. Yes, a lot of story elements are missing from just the cinematics. The story flows well as you play through the game(s). Warcraft 3 and Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne.
Thank you for hanging out with me! KZ
So you're absolutely right that there's a ton of context missing from these as they are designed to play at the end of each subsequent race's story campaign in the game culminating in their specific plot points while driving the overarching story forward. Here's a bit of context that can be fit into a youtube comment.
1:03 - Out of order. Fight actually takes place just before the cinematic at 26:10. Arthas fights the horned elf, Illidan, for access to that cavern with the spire and what is known as the Frozen Throne. This is also the only cinematic that was actually a remaster in any significant way; the rest are mostly slight lighting differences.
3:20 - Real first cinematic - NM actual plot relevance besides displaying the arrival of the Big Bads "The Burning Legion" an endless interstellar demon army.
5:45 - Medivh (Raven Mage Guy) showing a dream vision of the Legion's arrival to Thrall (that orc with the hammer) to convince him to lead the orcs west to their "salvation." That's why you see the orc wake up part way through and then a raven flies off after. Thrall goes on to become the warchief of all the orcs and, along with some other alliances, forms "The Horde" that is known today.
8:15 - Medivh attempts to warn the human kingdoms to also go west to salvation; the plot shows later that he expects the humans and orcs to join forces with the elves who live in "the west" to repel the Burning Legion. The plague that one council guy mentions is a huge plot point of WC3 as it leads to the downfall of the human kingdom.
11:55 - Takes place after human campaign. Arthas, then the crown prince of the kingdom and a righteous paladin (and player character), attempted to stop the plague that was turning the infected into zombies. Fails completely and goes on a downward spiral of rage fueled vengeance against the perpetrators behind the plague of undeath. Ends up finding the evil magic sword and picks it up after making this vow "I will give anything or pay any price, if only you will help me save my people." Sword says "Bet" and consumes his soul. Now soulless, he becomes an ally of the undead and shows up where the cinematic starts and proceeds to assassinate his father and, now as a "death knight" leads the undead invasion upon his own kingdom.
14:15 - Mage dude is one of the top 3 space demons in the Burning Legion and named Archimonde. He just got summoned to our world and proceeded to do that magic trick to destroy the mage city that tried to stop his arrival. He will the go on to lead the Legion's invasion as a whole of the planet. This cinematic was mostly just a flex of his power.
16:22 - Thrall (hammer orc) and Hellscream (axe orc) are chiefs of their people and consider each other brothers. Orcs aren't originally from the human planet. They got ported there by the Burning Legion as a kind of advance invasion force after the orc leaders (led by Hellscream) were corrupted in a bargain for power where they drank the big burny faced demon's blood (Mannoroth); their green skin is proof of this corruption and is hereditary as Thrall was born afterwards and never actually drank. The effects of the corruption caused the orcs to become magnitudes more brutal, violent and savage turning them into berserkers that were enslaved to the will of the demons. All this corruption etc actually takes place during Warcraft 1. Leading up to the events of WC3, the orcs have fought to free themselves of the demons, but the curse from their bargain remains. This cinematic is Thrall and Hellscream confronting Mannoroth as he showed up to corrupt the orcs even further and force them to rejoin the Burning Legion's army. Instead, Hellscream overcomes his own bloodrage and manages kills Mannoroth; though the resulting explosion mortally wounds him. This breaks the orcs' curse of rage and servitude as Hellscream implies when he says "The demon fire has burned out in my veins. I have freed myself." Thanks to his actions here, no more orcs will be forced to bow to the demons and they are a free people once again. Poetic since Hellscream was the first to damn them by drinking the blood on the day of the bargain. Thrall proceeds to join forces with the humans and elves to stop the demons once and for all.
20:22 - Archimonde has grown into a giant and is attack that big tree (The World Tree) to consume its powers and win the day for the bad guys. All the spirits that show up are called "wisps" and they are actually the souls of elves' ancestors that remain on the mortal plane. Any single wisp is largely incapable of causing harm as they are actually the worker unit for the Elves' player race. They have one offensive feature which is a self-destruct that burns mana of anything in the affected area. The amount of wisps in that cinematic proves fatal for Archimonde since he is, himself, a giant magic space demon pretty much filled with nothing BUT mana. The fiery explosion afterwards was the blowback of Archionde's death in response to the wisps kamikazeing him. As Mannoroth showed, demons go out with a bang and Archimonde was one of the biggest.
23:10 - Illidan (the elf with horns and wings) is called "The Betrayer" by his people due to his actions during a previous war vs the space demons causing the death of many elves and he specifically made sure a font of magic called "The Well of Eternity" survived the conflict despite it being the catalyst for the demons' original invasion. He stated his reasons were that we would need it to fend off the demons again, but the elves had had about enough of arcane magic as they outlawed it after the war and he was the first offender. Illidan is the typical edgy and misunderstood anti-hero. Here he summons the naga (the snake people) to serve him as he goes to try and stop Arthas from reaching the Frozen Throne. The reason for the jump in quality that you saw is because these next cinematics were from an expansion to WC3 called The Frozen Throne. It was released almost exactly 1 year after the original game in July 2003.
Insert the 1:03 cinematic here. Climatic fight between Illidan and Arthas as Illidan is all that stands between Arthas and the Frozen throne.
26:10 - Having bested Illidan and with no more opposition to stand in his way, Arthas ascends the spire to the Frozen Throne where he finds that armor and helmet in the block of ice. Said armor is possessed by a ghost named Ner'Zhul. He was placed in the ice as a prison by the Burning Legion (the undead plague turned out to be Plan B for advance force invasions for the demons). This way, Ner'Zhul was their prisoner and master of the undead via telepathic control. He was also the voice in the evil sword (Frostmourne) that corrupted Arthas. The voices you hear as Arthas climbs the spire in the cinematic are all his former allies and loved ones that tried to stop him from falling to darkness; several of which he ended up killing with his own hands. He breaks the ice and Ner'Zhul is freed from his prison and from the control of the demons. When Arthas puts on the helmet (known as The Helm of Domination) their souls merge into a new and even more powerful being known as The Lich King. He then takes his place on the Frozen Throne of his undead kingdom and sits there until the start of the World of Warcraft expansion Wrath of the Lich King where he serves as the big bad for that expansion.
Heck of a comment wall I know, but these are the basic cliff notes of context for these cinematics without getting into a ton of the minute details; such as the specifics of Arthas's many unspeakable crimes or the allies that Thrall meets to form his new Horde etc. All that stuff is learned and experienced by playing through the game. I hope this helps though!
You sir are an animal... I love it! What passion and the fact you spent the time to comment means a lot. Thank you so much. KZ
I love, that you took your time to watch the WC3 replays and I enjoyed the reaction, but trust me, no matter how much you read and learn about it it is just not the same as being there, seeing it for the first time as a fan all those years back.
I'm not going to lie, I'm jealous. I never had a pc growing up, only console. KZ
indeed it feels so weird watching the cutscenes without seeing the in game ones
The orange and blue tones of your studio lights work very nicely
Thanks fella, it's a very popular look in colourgrading. Teal and orange it's called. Instead of grading my footage that way, I thought I'll do it with my lighting. Teal light and a lamp/s at 2700 kelvin. KZ
@@kaizammit I've used Hayden Pedersen's Teal Orange LUT multiple times in my editing job. It does have a nice pop to it
I don't use a Teal and Orange LUT, instead I use a film grade which enhances the blue. However I've set my office to give that look (T&L) without the LUT. If you ever wanted to have a go at using my blue enhancer grade, I'd be happy to share. KZ
20 years later and I still remember all the lines in all the War3 cinematics.
Pointless to say I still play War3 when I have some spare time during weekends.
The voice actor for the wizard Medivh is Michael Bell. Indeed the same guy who voiced Raziel.
And Prowl from Transformers! What a G. Love him! KZ
I'm glad for the reaction and the honest opinion. I've always loved this game so much especially the lore. I'm glad I was born in this generation. This game is a masterpiece and the lore even more.
I think I was born in this prime time too but sadly was only a console gamer. How naive I was. Thank you for watching and hanging out with the channel. KZ
The voice you are curious about (you are right, same voice actor as Raziel)...the character is named Medivh (pronounced med - eve). He is responsible for the orcs being on Azeroth (Warcraft's version of Earth). He opened a portal from a far away world known as Draenor and the orcs flooded through it. He's seen as a prophet, and remains a key lore figure throughout.
At 15:49, the being destroying Dalaran is a Man'ari Erdear. They are the evil cousins of the playable Draenei who are the exiled Eredar group that refused to accept the gift from Sargeras.
For me my favorite scenes were the illidan one and the one where arthas killed his father, I loved the voice acting... I watched it when I was kid back in 2004
That must of blown your mind! It would have for me when I was a kid. Just the visuals alone haha. Thanks for commenting! KZ
In World of Warcraft, if you travel to the Undercity entrance that is in the Throne room of Capital City and turn your volume way up, you can hear the dialogue between Arthas and his father in that cutscene where he kills him, and the bloodstain from the crown rolling across the floor is still there.
Haven't played for centuries but I get the feeling the order isn't right here.
Some information, of course spoilers if you haven't played:
The guy playing with the sand castle is an Eredar, Archimonde, one of the three leaders of the Burning Legion, an other one is Mannoroth, the guy fighting the two orcs, Thrall and Grommash Hellscream.
The first fight should be at the end of the game, I think? The winged guy is Illidan, a night elf demon hunter, who wants to destroy the Burning Legion.
The guy on the tree isn't a giant, it's the same demon playing with sand earlier. The other guy is Malfurion, an other night elf and the brother of Illidan. The ferries are dead night elves sacrificing there after life to kill Archimonde.
It is so damned much lore in the game.
The order is fine apart from the Illidan/Arthas fight, which should be second last, not sure why it was at the front of this compilation.
@@vahdoom but Stratholme and Arthas' life before he got turned is missing, aren't there any ingame cinematics? I think that's kinda important
@@angussharington2374 These are the cinematics that are at the start/end of campaigns, and are CGI. These are not in the per-level in engine cut scenes, which is where a lot more of the story is told.
@@vahdoom ahh I see, long time ago :D
Arthas begins the game as one of the protagonists - Paladin and heir to the throne, surrounded by good people (Uther his Paladin mentor and Jaina his childhood friend and love interest). As he tries to save his people from the plague, he begins to make wrong choices which eventually lead him to his end. Arthas eventually goes for the promise of power that Shadowmourne (the evil sword) offers and it costs him his soul. From that point on he will eventually kill his mentor, father and defeat Illidan (Antihero - winged demon character you saw) and eventually wear the helmet that turns him into the Lich King.
Gonna try to add a bit of context to the Cinematic with the two Orcs and the Demon.
The one with the Hammer is Thrall, who would basicaly become the leader of the Horde which consits of various races like Orcs, Trolls and Tauern (many more later on). Next to him is Grommash Hellscream or Grom, you could call them good friends or even kin but Grom is not only far older but also far more ferocious and impatient. He doomed many of the Orcs to do the bidding of the Demons by drinking their Blood and subsequently succumbing to unpredictable rage. Long story short, Thrall smacked some sense back into his friend and they went for Mannoroth, the demon in the cinematic who is the one who offered his blood to Grom and his people.
Thralls Hammer is a powerful weapon indeed but Mannoroth is close to the top as far as demons are concerned, it took the sacrifice of a very angry orc on demonic steroids to cast him out. Grom freed himself, and all the other orcs who drank Mannoroths blood, from the demonic influence and died as a hero, though you can make the argument that he doomed them in the first place. Twice even depending on which lore you consider as cannon (Blizzard retconned a lot).
You'd get to see a few interactions between Thrall and Grom prior and during the corruption, learning more about everything surrounding this event but that is happening during ingame cutscenes / conversations.
If you feel confused by these cinematics, that's alright. In the game the movies are shown in between of whole campaignes, so story makes huge jumps. In short, old enemies must put aside their differences to defeat even greater threat ("aliens" falling from the sky, and the "troll" that destroys the city with sand magic; they are the Burning Legion btw). In the process heroic prince Arthas, by trying to save his poeple by whatever means necessary, grows in power, looses his humanity and turns into villainous Lich King, ruler of the undead. His story continous in Wrath of the Lich King, where he is the main antagonist. It woudn't be too far off to say, that the Lich King is Warcraft's Darth Vader.
Oh, I like that! Thanks for telling me fella. KZ
You are quickly becoming one of my all-time favorite reactors. Love your stuff, please keep it up.
Oh my goodness, thank you so much! I'm just glad you like hanging out with me because I absolutely love hanging out with you guys! KZ
@@kaizammit You actually made me realize something regarding the storytelling of "The Fall" and how Ornn was basically the narrator through the weaponry. I had never thought of that. It's what convinced me that you're doing very well here, I'd say.
Thank you so much! You got me in the feels there. KZ
Around the 24 minute mark, thats the start of the expansion of Warcraft 3 the Frozen Throne which is basicly the beginning of Wrath of the Kich King trailer. The "kraken people" are Naga. They used to be High Elves that got drowned in a very important event known as "The Shattering" which was caused by their Queen Azshara. They got cursed to become Naga by a deal with one of Warcrafts worst antagonists called Old Gods, N'zoth in particular, who are basicly planet sized immortal space gods with the power to do anything.
The Naga are featured in the 2nd WoW trailer and expansion along side the big horned winged guy (Illidan Stormrage) thats summoning them in the trailer you watched , who also used to be a High Elf, now a demon and even if he looks like the bad guy and is treated as the bad guy, he is actualy the only true hero in the universe. Along side Arthas of course. Arthas did nothing wrong.
Another great video, and I'm looking forward to the next one! 😀
Yay, thank you! KZ
I think the problem is the cinematics that get shown are major lore moments,as in Obi Wan Kenobi holding his lightsaber and "dying" in Star Wars or Luke getting his hand cut off and finding out Darth Vader is his father levels of magnitude. The rest of the story gets told through the gameplay,but i am sure someone brought you up to speed with what's going on. I do hope you realise now how impactful Arthas showing up has been. He is literally the reason WoW and that expansion peaked the entire game series in terms of subscribers and people playing the game (12.5 Million!) ,because we all played Warcraft 3 :Reign of Chaos and Frozen Throne,we all went through the campaign and saw the story for ourselves....and to then see such an important lore character make a return to the story blew everyone's mind! I went to the midnight sale of the game and couldn't wait to get my hands on it to play it and see and experience the story and how it goes on and concludes,and i sure am glad that i did.
Warcraft III is my favorite game from childhood, thank you for bringing these memories, you're great man 🥳
The first cinematic was released after the Wrath of the Lich King one, the original Arthas vs. Illidan Fight was not a CGI cinematic but a real time enginge cinematic from the Warcraft 3 expansion The Frozen Throne.
This Warcraft 3 Reforge game is a remaster of the original game and is infamous for being a bad remaster on every aspect. The remaster was not made by Blizzard but rather comissioned to a third company that made all the in game assets while literally 4 or 5 guys from Blizzard worked on the code.
The story of WC 3 is about Arthas and his journey to become the Lich King, he gains acces to the Helmet after defeating Illidan, thats why he does not have it yet. Not only that, he was being controlled by the magical being that possessed the helmet and planned to just take Arthas body, but ultimately Arthas will and resolve overwhelmed the Lich King and he took control of the combined form and embraced his name: The Lich King.
That's the type of information I was hoping to get by watching these cinematics. Thank you so much for telling me. I bet playing the game as a hero to then see him turn must have been mind blowing back then. KZ
@@kaizammit Indeed, the story arch of Arthas is the best Blizzard has to offer, they have never been able to replicate what they did with Arthas and Illidan, Arthas journey is quite complex, you have to experience it yourself playing the game, even when he bacame a villain, you still feel his actions were justified, everything he did was the logical step no one had the spine to do.
Whatever you felt with the Wrath of the Lich King cinematic, the one when he revives the giant dragon, multiply it by a hundred and that is what a fan of the Warcraft 3 game felt, no amount of technology or better graphics have been able to duplicate that feeling, it was the combination of the best cinematic and story work from Blizzard, no one knew then it was their pick but we really milked all the joy it could have given to us.
While at the same time you can also tell (especially with his later actions) that he knows what he's doing either is wrong or would be seen as such with the lengths he goes to to cover everything up but he's already being influenced by the sword to carry out those actions anyway..
With the cinematic of Arthas killing his father, as you can tell from the celebration and shower of rose petals, his people even at that point see him as a hero because nobody (living) knows what he's done. It pretty much blindsides his people as much as it did his father.
@@kaizammit Even this long after it came out and with the somewhat of a downgrade reforged was, I'd still recommend playing it (or watching the non-cinematic cutscenes if you can find them, preferably the original ones).
I'm glad you got to experience that and he sounds like such a fascinating character. Love it. KZ
6:00
People already probably told you but yes, that is indeed Michael Bell who played Raziel in Soul Reaver
That's his name! I love his voice... do you know if he's still working in the games industry? KZ
Now that you have this background, it's time to watch all the WoW trailers in sequence.
Points up for the the 2 orcs vs the demon sequence. IYKYK.
Keep up the good work. Felt like you were a bit short on the film maker bit in this one but was nice to see your reactions. Used to play the warcraft series so much that it was kinda an obsession. But the wast lore and great characters really sucks you in and really makes you want to see how it ends
Thank you for watching! This is a new type of video series where I react and give my initial thoughts only. It's a way where I can look at other content like in-game cutscenes, music videos, short films, etc, etc. My filmmaker breakdowns are still coming but they take me longer to actually put together so this content is to give entertainment and just an excuse to hang out. Editing a cinematic breakdown right this very second so yeah, keep an eye out.
I'm glad to hear it left its mark on you, sadly I missed this golden age of gaming being a console guy. KZ
It's funny you make the comparison to 90's Mainframe Studios animation(Beast Wars) given many of these were actually from 2002.(I believe the opening cut scene, with the Knight and Orc, was the only one that was completely remade for the 2020 remaster.) It's interesting how we often remember things from a nostalgic stand point as, semi-recently, I went back and looked at the older 90's CG cartoons and it is much, much, rougher around the edges then we often tend to think in our minds eye.
5:00 i remember, that those hands where seperated from the bodies in the original version.
Did Blizzard cut this in the reforged version, or did the uploader of the compilation cut it out?
The human has to be attached as the fingers are moving so I'm guessing they changed it? KZ
A fellow legacy of Kain enjoyer I see. Loved the vid mate.
I would lose my mind if they announced a full on remake of Soul Reaver! Please gaming lords above! KZ
Next up? World of Warcraft Cinematics! I like that you reacted to many in one video and didn't pause. If you keep to reacting with commentary on TH-cam, you can safe the Break Downs for Patreon content. Which I'll be sure to join.
Thank you so much! I don't like to pause it as it will pull me from the experience or I won't be able to get into it. If I start doing movies and TV shows, if... then I may do a Patreon. I decided to go for the TH-cam channel memberships (THE JOIN BUTTON) that way you get a little icon next to your name when you comment and you decide what I put out next. I let you guys control the channel basically. I'm also going to start posting more behind the scenes type thing for the members, BTS on the TH-cam channel and sometimes, my on set life. It also supports me. I'd love to have you as my first ever member but don't feel pressured! Just enjoy whatever is right for you.
Just by watching, liking and commenting is support so thank you! KZ
The thing with watching "just" the cinematics is that they tell the lore only very fracmented. There is like 1 to 2 per campain, which limits what they will tell
I was already subscribed but as soon as you mentioned Beast Wars, I really wanted to subscribe again
Depending on how I move but behind me, you can sometimes see all my masterpiece beastwar transformers. My childhood! Thank you so much brother! KZ
Quick about the Warcraft orcs: Yes, they are quite "savage" by nature, but it was the undead demon Mannoroth (the four-legged, winged dude with a very bad breath), and others, that corrupted them with the "demon fire" Grommash Hellscream (the orc that fell) mentioned. You might have missed Thrall (the orc that had the dream in the beginning, and Hellscream's buddy) replying "No, my friend, you have freed us all", after Hellscream sacrificed himself in taking Mannoroth down. Always brings a lump to my throat.
I love how Blizzard with Warcraft (at least from WC3 onwards) have painted a way more neuanced picture than the black-and-white "these are the good guys, these are the bad guys". Here in WC3, we play as Thrall as he tries to make a "new Horde" from the remnants of the (more definitely "evil") Horde from the first two games, and them trying to find a home in this new world they find themselves in rather than conquering it for conquest's sake (thanks to manipulation and the mentioned "demon fire").
The glowing orbs that surrounds Archimonde (the "giant?") are whisps, elven spirits. This cinematic followed the last mission you do with the elves, culminating in Malfurion (the elf with the horn) ordering all of the whisps to sacrifice themselves and the elves' wold tree in order to defeat the demon lord.
23:11 onwards is from the expansion to the game, The Frozen Throne. In the first clip, we se Illidan, the elf that absorbed demon powers in order to fight fire with fire, becoming the OG demon hunter. This, with the nagas (sea creatures) is continuation of literal tens of thousands of years of in-game lore.
Nice touch, imo, is the spikes surrounding the spiraling stairs Arthas is ascending in the last clip, resembling the King's crown from earlier, as Arthas (literally and figuratively) ascends to the throne as the Lich King, and the very heavy chains "supporting" the throne, since the Lich King himself is not really in controll of his own mind and actions.
One of the most painful things of these scenes is the fact that Medivh could have leveled the entire city on his own, but allowed them to cast him out. He was the cause of it ALL, but was trying to right his wrongs. Had he uttered who he was -- literally everyone there would have at least listened. He was the last Guardian of Tirisfal, and thus the most powerful mage within the entire world. If he saw a threat -- people should have listened.
I didn't realise he was that powerful if it's the character I'm thinking it is?! KZ
unfortunetly all of the cinematics save for the intro cinematics, are all story capstones so without the gameplay that has told the story through dialog they don't really tell you anything. Though even if you arent a gamer Warcraft 3 reforged is actually a pretty good game, even if only to play off stream when you have time.
Counter Strike: Global Offensive trailer is one i think would fit really well for this series.
intense short story, thrilling music, from a filmmaking standpoint it's really cool since the cinematic is run in the engine of the game, pretty much only adjusting the light on a playable map for cinematic effect.
And as always i love watching these video game cinematic/trailer reactions from you, keep it up lad.
OMG, you recognized Raziel's voice actor!
I will always know that voice. As I said, that's a core memory for me that game. I used to write fictional stories about Nosgoth when I was a kid. Thanks for watching fella! KZ
No subtitles, he is speaking in a language alien to this world.
Nice!
love ur analisis, i have learn a lot from!
Thank you so much, if you want to learn, watch my breakdowns as that's where I get my teacher hat on. This type of content is more of me sharing my thoughts. KZ
This is the transcript of the subtitles that should be in the cinematic (beginning at 14:15) where the demon lord Archimonde destroys the city of Dalaran.
"Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world."
"From this seal shall arise the doom of men, who, in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own."
"Blindly they built their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit. Now they shall be consumed by very flame they thought to control."
"Let the echoes of doom resound across this wretched world, that all who live may hear them and despair."
Nice! Thank you for that.
The Battle for Azeroth Opening Cinematic is amazing
You've got me excited to watch it now. Thanks for watching, KZ.
Love the reactions! Would be awesome if you do the Baldur's Gate 3 intro cinematic :D
I've actually got that on my list. It's on my Cinematic Breakdown list so it will be a little while as I've already got 3 on the go but soon, thank you for the suggestion though, means a lot! KZ
Now you have to check out World of warcraft ingame cinematics "Wrathgate" and "Fall of the Lich King"!
Fall of the Lich King! I just might have to now! KZ
The son that killed his king, later became the lich king
The blood on the steps and on the floor from when Arthas killed is dad the king in this cinematic, can be found in world of warcraft.
I love it when games take something from the cinematic lore and put it in the real (game) world. Amazing detail! KZ
W3 cinematics are awesome but what makes them special is the impact on you while actually playing the game.
I've heard this; I wish I grew up on pc so I could have experienced these back in the day. Thank you for hanging out with me! KZ
Man I loved seeing your reaction to the cinematics but as a lot of people already told you this is kinda like watching 5 mins of a large series and then making it into a single video. so much amazing lore is done in the game proper and so many details on who Arthus is what he goes through how it is he becomes the lich king is what makes these cinematics shine just so much brighter and makes the wrath of the lich king cinematic feel so ungodly different. whilst I am not even sure if you will read this message if you have the time and are interesting in how it all comes to be I highly HIGHLY recommend playing warcraft 3 and it's dlc The frozen throne (which was that up in quality you saw) to fully understand the jump to characters and the change the people go through. yes it is pretty decently long and sadly reforced is really bad (it got a 0.4 on metacritic for a reason) the main story is still to this day one of the greatest stories ever told imo and I again HIGHLY recommend you play the game yourself and maybe you could have record the reaction to the story? idk maybe that is taken it a bit 2 far but seeing these cinematics are making me wanna play warcraft 3 again and feel the love for that story just rushing back!
That was indeed Raziel from Soul Reaver. You have good taste in stories. :)
The fact you knew that means you have good taste! We're officially friends now good sir! Haha Thanks for watching and commenting, means a lot. KZ
Great reactions, I would love to see your reaction to Arthas' Betrayal, it was the first legit cinematic I think they made in the warcraft universe. It still burns in my mind, and why the lich king was so big in WoW. Keep doing what you do.
Can you send me the correct TH-cam link? I'll check it out. Thank you for watching! KZ
28:45 Yes. Wrath of a Lich King was basically the sequel to this part of the story.
Illidan is a edgelord's wet dream, but damn does he have some cool lines:
"Sometimes the hand of fate must be forced."
"I am my scars!"
this was my first game, i realy love these cinematics and it makes me feel so nostalgic.
PD: great video, love to se your content
Thank you so much man! KZ
There's many ingame cutscenes/cinematic from WoTLK expansion leading all the way up to the heroes final encounter with Arthas, what happens to him & what comes next for the Scourge (the Undead's that he controls). And then fast forward maybe 10+ years and Blizzard finally decided to come back to the Lich King's story. For example your reaction to the Expansion Shadowlands cinematic will be "Wtf? Where's my boi Arthas? Who's this guy? Wow who's this badass chick?". But Arthas is a good starting point because his story is all tangled up with the Banshee Queen Sylvanas' story, someone who you'll be seeing fairly soon if you carry on watching the WoW Expansion cinematics... Just like Arthas she's a huge figure in the Warcraft community.
Everyone will suggest the WoW Cinematics... I'd recommend the short stories called Harbringers, Warbringers and Afterlives. These are 4-6minute long cinematics which tell the stories of the main figures from some of the later expansions and can easily be bulked together in 1 video per expansion. These characters all have incredible stories in there own right. So I'd suggest just reacting to them after watching the main Expansion Trailer Cinematics. The short stories belong to the follow expansions:
Harbringers (Guldan, Khadgar, Illidan) from Legion expansion
Warbringers (Jaina, Sylvanas, Azshara) from Battle of Azeroth expansion
Afterlives (Bastion, Ardenweald, Maldraxxus, Revendreth) from Shadowlands expansion
Arthas is involved in both Afterlives: Bastion & Sylvanas' cinematics. What makes Bastion very powerful to watch is it's the story of what happened to Uther (someone Arthas looked upto as an uncle of sorts) & his regret over the decision he made at the plague of Stratholme (the first event that set Arthas on his path to turning into what you see in the cinematics).
Ps. Great job on the reacts buddy!
Those who recommended the cinematics, forgot that a lot of context is based on ingame cinematics :c
I just realized Arthas @ 1:34 looks just like Henry Cavill. A live action fall of Lordareon with HC would be epic!
This is Illidan, elf demon hunter obsessed with power. He was imprisoned by the elf's for 10 thousant years. This is the intro to expansion to warcraft 3. Warcraft 3 is mainly about Arthas, human paladin and son of a king. He take the cursed blade Frostmourn to save his kingdom and He fell in the trap of lich king, he became unded knight. Lich king sits on the frozen throne, he dont have body and is imprisoned in the ornament crown. In the main game Ilidan is released to help fight demon's invasion. Combine force of all the races drive back demon's. Arthas remains in the ruin of his kingdom as the king of the unded and Illidan is banished from the land of the elves. In the expansion Illidan is recruited by the demon's to destroy unded lich king who betrayed them, he find new allies, Naga underwater species. Lich king sensing the threat summons to the frozen throne his champion Arthas. At the end Illidan lose and Arthas unite with the lich king by placing the crown on his head. Thats the plot for the two first RTS games, later is WOW and entire diffrent story...
Correct, most of the story is told in gameplay, the cinemátics are like rewards for listening the story in game
I would recommend playing this game sometime. You have only gotten a surface level look so far.
I'm tempted too! KZ
Yeah, you won't pick all that much of the lore from those cinematics (and especially not on Arthas that you desired). Most of the story told through engine-based cutscenes, that's where it's all at. It might not be inline with sort of content you do for the channel, all things considered, but I'd highly recommend to get to know it at least in your spare time.
Also, someone messed up with chronology, putting the second to last (I believe) cinematic of the "The Frozen Throne" as the first here.
Also Also, when the guy destroys the city there are, in fact, should be subtitles. He's not orc or troll, but rather Eredar - a race of powerful magicians in the Warcraft universe.
'Is this the same game?" It's expansion pack that came a year later. So... Kinda?
P. S. voice actor's name is Michael Bell.
To expand on the Eredar, there's essentially 2 sub races Man'ari (meaning twisted or corrupted in the Eredar language) who started as mortals but were turn into powerful demons, the second subrace is called the Draenei (exiled ones in the Eredar language) but they play only a minor role in the story (sort of) and aren't that important. When the Man'ari became demons they gained a power boost to their already powerful magical abilities as Eredar were possibly the first mortals to learn to use magic in Warcraft and Archimonde (the demon guy who destroyed the city is powerful even among his people.
as for what subtitles would have said.
"Let this scar signify the first blow against the mortal world.
From this seal shall arise the doom men, who in their arrogance, sought to wield our fire as their own.
Blindly they build their kingdoms upon stolen knowledge and conceit.
Now they shall be consumed by the very flame they sought to control.
Let the echoes of doom resound across this wretched world, that all who live may hear them and despair".
the thing that destroyed the city with sand was a demon (later world of warcraft made him a different race that became a demon but here he was just always a demon) and yes there are subtitles, he's basically saying that the mages in the city play at magic like children but soon they see true power as it destroys their world
Up next has to be some of the world of warcraft cinematics. Absolutely incredible videos for that game, just like the wrath of the lich king cinematic showed
Thank you for watching fella! Now I've done this I will start my move on the cinematics, breakdowns take me some time so they are much slower to get out. I will try and get them to you as soon as I can. Thanks again, KZ.
Awesome! Really been enjoying this series, it's always cool to get another perspective on things and some info about why the makers do what they do and what effect the shots / cameramovement etc. has. Looking forward to the next one :) @@kaizammit
Thank you so much man! I hope I can keep you entertained and give you interesting nuggets in filmmaking as we continue to hang out together. KZ
Please react to ALL Leauge cinematic breakdowns!!! Except for this year haha.
PLEASE! You have the best reactions! Thank you :-)
Michael Bell, the voice of Raziel (and Medivh) 😍
Im glad im not the only one who only hears Raziel lol.
There's so much context being left out by cinematics. Well, you see it all by playing the game :)
If I may, another great Warcraft cinematic is Illidan Rejection of the Gift
Shoutout to all my boys still playing warcraft 3!
The original has 3 major parts and a ton of half major parts, and also alot of minor parts.
They play out mostly simultaneously witch can be confusing.
The famous ones you see alot and hear alot about is Illidan (a night elf) and also Arthas (human).
Then you also have the Burning Legion, witch is a bunch of different races, most visible is the eredar witch is corrupted Drarneis that turned and joined the Legion and the doom lords serving the corrupt titan Sargeras, that have a part in both stories. There is a red thread running through. Illidan did most things to help the world but got shunned. Arthas armor is actually a shaman that got torn apart and is not the greatest guy so to speak. It's a lot of lore 😅
And yeah, then there is the Naga witch are nightelves almost drowning after the well of eternity (they were in process of summoning the legion as queen azshara was mindcontrolled cind of) blew up the world. So they joined the old God N'Zoth to be turned in to fish people 🙂
I wasn't prepared for the deep feeling of grief I felt watching these. As someone who remembers saving up money they earned cutting firewood to go and buy Warcraft 1, 2, 3, and the Diablo games, it's really sad to see what's become of Blizzard and their worlds. I'd be willing to watch a Warcraft movie with Henry Cavill as Arthas. I reckon he'd do it justice since he played World of Warcraft.
Loved reading about your history there man. I'm hoping they (Blizzard) will return to their roots now they belong to Microsoft. I know a lot of people aren't happy, a certain console audience but I believe it will allow them to return to the old ways. When budgets strings don't matter it can become more about the art again. Who knows though. Thank you for watching fella. KZ
Most of the Overwatch animated shorts are nice to analyse, for example Overwatch Animated Short | “Alive”
I've started and I've got one coming up really soon. Honor and Glory>>? KZ
Bold statement for being a filmmaker. I can do a film anytime. Am I bold enough?
What statement fella? I made this ages ago, please expand. Technically anyone can make a film but doesn't mean it's any good 🤔.
How did I never notice that Raziel and Medivh are the same voice actor??!!!??!
His voice is buried into my core so that's the only way I immediately knew it. Thank you for watching fella! KZ
You should watch all of the Warbringers cinematics and the warlords cinematics from world of warcraft. They have alot of story telling that is very easy to understand.
I'll have to check them out. Thanks man.
The reason you feel like you're still missing a lot of information is because you're basically missing all the information lol. These cinematics cap off entire campaigns that tell the story over the course of around 40 missions and several in-game cutscenes. I would recommend checking out the entire story of Warcraft 3 if you want to understand this amazing world at it's peak. Glad to see you enjoyed the cinematics even out of context though!
I very much enjoyed them but tbh, it's because I'm a nerd and I love it. Anything like this I can enjoy. I also bizarrely enjoyed trying to piece together the story.
Thanks for hanging out with me man. KZ ✌️
There's a LOT of context missing from the 2nd and 3rd cinematic but it tells a compelling yet albeit unoriginal story. Still very good. A classic to be sure.
Thank you for watching and hanging out with me. KZ