Hearthstone's Hadidjah Chamberlain, Lead FX Artist, confirmed in an interview that a Hearthstone Virtual Reality (VR) prototype was developed internally. This news comes to us courtesy of an interview Blizzard did when PowerUp!.

During Blizzard's annual "Free Your Mind" event, an internal hackathon where developers can work on whatever they'd like,  two developers prototyped a version of Hearthstone that made use of Virtual Reality. It featured:

  • Walking around a Tavern.
  • Sitting down to play a game with someone.
  • Throwing cards at the table.
  • Flipping the table over.

I can certainly say that there have been more times than I can count where I'd love to flip over the table when playing Hearthstone, but that possibly being a reality would be awesome.

Dave Kosak, who was also present for the interview, stated he didn't want to talk about the prototype because everyone would want to see it. You are indeed correct, Dave.

Quote From Hadidjah Chamberlain

They actually prototyped a VR version of Hearthstone during that time. You could walk around The Tavern and sit down to play a game with someone.

They only had two weeks, so they only got as far [allowing you to] throw cards at the table and you could flip the table over!


Hearthstone at Past Free Your Mind Events

This isn't the first time we've heard about Blizzard's internal Free Your Mind event and last year, two features that made it into Hearthstone were because of the event. These two features were added in Patch 14.4.0 (Build 31268) and meant players were able to see their collections offline and reconnect seamlessly to more than just games. Disconnect during deckbuilding? You could return right back where you left off!

This isn't to say that Hearthstone VR will ever become a thing everyone will be able to play, but there certainly is precedent to suggest it isn't impossible to see something from an internal hackathon make its way to the public. 

Quote From Evan Polekoff

Today's Hearthstone patch has 2 new QoL features that I wrote as Hackathon (aka "Free Your Mind") projects over the past two years: Offline Collection and Seamless Reconnect!

https://playhearthstone.com/en-us/blog/22992997/hearthstone-update-june-3-rise-of-the-mech


Would you like to see Hearthstone's VR prototype? Would you be interested in playing Hearthstone in VR?