Way back in 1998, Blizzard developed "Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans" which is a point and click adventure game, but cancelled it before it was released. Recently, however, the cancelled old Blizzzard game, which features the origin of the Horde hero Thrall, has been leaked in its entirety online.
IGN reported that in a post by one Reidor on the Scrolls of the Lore forums, the leak comes with a full pre-released version with in-game cinematics. Blizzard has not issued an official comment regarding the leak, but has recently pulled off the file and it is no longer available for download. It is said however, that the game is remarkable fully formed and that little about it feels incomplete in its beginning stages and most PCs nowadays can run it easily.
"Warcraft Adventures" was a hand-drawn point and click which was created to add humour to the series, to humanize the Orc faction and make them more sympathetic. Upon reaching its full development, it was unfortunately cancelled by Blizzard as it saw it inferior to LucasArts' "Curse of Monkey Island." It was not completely turned to dust, as its canon story was reinvented in to a novel, Lord of the Clans, and served as a large basis for the rest of Warcraft III.
iTech Post noted that it was during the late 90's when Blizzard commissioned Animation Magic to create an adventure game using the point and click, which was popular back then. The commissioned contractor is a US-based company, but most of their projects are done by staff based in Russia. While the game was all set to be released, LucasArts released "Monkey Island III" which was more advanced and that Blizzard could not compete with. Other than that, another project by LucasFilm "Grim Fandango" came out in full 3D, which made the 2D animation of Warcraft Adventures obsolete.
The untimely although really late release of the game happened because Russian contract workers of Animation Magic kept a working copy of the game in their files. Sadly, Blizzard was quick to react and immediately acted upon the leak; although hardcore Warcraft fans hope that Blizzard would allow it to be downloadable again soon.
