Heroes of the Storm's Honest Trailer Goes After Its Heritage, Business Model

Much as it has in the past for releases like Bloodborne and Destiny, YouTube channel Smosh Games has published a new entry in its "honest game trailers" series. This time around, it's for Blizzard's newly released MOBA, Heroes of the Storm.

These videos seek to present the brutal truth about games, while poking fun at their more inane aspects. You might believe that to be a challenging task for a game whose own tutorial tells players "not to think so hard" about what's going on, but there's still plenty of material here. That includes the game's inspirations--games like League of Legends and Dota 2, which were themselves inspired by a mod for Blizzard's own Warcraft III--and its microtransactions.

Heroes of the Storm officially launched earlier this week following a lengthy alpha and beta testing phase. It was originally announced way back in 2010 as Blizzard DOTA, when it was to be a small, free map for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty's arcade mode. The project grew in scope over time, changing its name to Blizzard All-Stars in 2012 due to a legal dispute with Valve before finally becoming Heroes of the Storm in 2013.

You can now download Heroes of the Storm for free from Blizzard's website or the Battle.net client. Play during the first few weeks and you'll be able to earn things like a special in-game portrait and bonus experience.