Sam "Samwise" Didier is the Senior Art Director at Blizzard Entertainment. He is responsible for creating much of the artwork for computer games in the Warcraft, StarCraft, and Diablo series and is responsible for the name "Warcraft". Amongst the veteran Blizzard employees, Didier has been a consistent artist for many years, his unique style greatly influencing the game art through all of Blizzard's franchises. Didier's art design style has been described as "a striking, pulp sensibility that may be an acquired taste, but one acquirable on either side of the Pacific, side-stepping polarisation of appeal to either eastern or western audiences."
Work
Didier began working for Blizzard in 1991, when the company was called "Silicon & Synapse". "I've never worked for another game company," he joked in 2012. "I never want to. I'm going down with the ship." His early work for Blizzard appeared in The Lost Vikings, Blackthorne, and '. As well as continuing to contribute in-game and manual artwork, he took on increased responsibility in later Blizzard releases: he was a producer for The Death and Return of Superman and Justice LeagueTask Force, an art director and producer for ', an art director for Diablo, The Lost Vikings 2, StarCraft, ', and ', and a concept writer for . As a voice actor, he performed in Warcraft III, World of Warcraft, and Heroes of the Storm. He was credited with additional contributions to Diablo II, Diablo III, and Overwatch. Didier's work intentionally invokes the spirit of pulp magazines and comic books. "We haven't changed our style since the very beginning," he said in 2004. "The first orc we ever did, in Blackthorne, was just a little guy chasing after Blackthorne — but we thought, 'Hey, these guys are cool,' so we used that character for our orcs in WarCraft. Artistically, we've always gone for the same sort of goals: we try to keep everything over-the-top, over-proportioned, and really colorful, then we add in as much 'comic factor' as we can." Didier was responsible for introducing the Pandaren race to the Warcraft series. Among other things, panda icons also appeared accompanying much of Didier's art, and could be seen in Warcraft III as the emblem on the Night Elf demon hunter's glaives, his name is written in the Paladin's book, when he casts a spell, and an unused Icon and two Models have the face of Didier's face, visible only in the Map Editor. In Starcraft II there is a multiplayer portrait, containing a "Panda Marine". In 2017, Didier published an illustrated book of short stories, Grimbeard: Tales of the Last Dwarf.
Music
Swedish heavy metal bandHammerFall frequently turned to Didier for album covers from 2002 to 2009. Didier created the album covers for all of their studio albums in this period as well as for five other releases. Didier also created the cover art for Hammerfell lead vocalist Joacim Cans' 2004 solo album Beyond the Gates. Didier is the lead vocalist for Elite Tauren Chieftain, a band composed of Blizzard employees. ETC has performed at several BlizzCons, performing songs based on Blizzard games. In addition to their music appearing in Blizzard's games, their song "I Am Murloc" was released as DLC for.
