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Blizzcon Writeup 276

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the only-363-days-till-next-year dept.
This past weekend I braved the tangled web of deceit and lies that is commercial air travel to haul myself out to Anaheim, CA for Blizzard Entertainment's first attempt at a convention, "Blizzcon". Like any con there were good times and bad times but considering they had turnout on par with other major conventions and the fact that this was their first pass at a solo con, the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard.

It is very obvious that the developers have been working overtime to bring a TON of new features to World of Warcraft and Starcraft Ghost. I was impressed by the amount of care and attention to detail with so many of the new features. It is quite obvious that the developers have been listening to the general population and life is good.

Starcraft Ghost players were in the definite minority when it came to pure obsession but it should be no less exciting to fans of Blizzard games and console games in particular. Amidst the sea of Xbox consoles that they had set up for players to use I managed to find a seat (briefly, after all, without WoW every couple of hours I get the shakes) and kill a few space marines. The main thing to be noted about Ghost is the aiming interface (or lack thereof). This seemed to be the most talked about aspect of the game after the excitement of playable zerg wore off. Yes, don't let that be too much of a side note, there are playable zerg in all of their infinite sexiness. My corrupted space marine killed more than a few of his previous brethren. The aiming interface, however, made me feel like I was playing with oven mitts on, a fact that the developers also commented on. The promise is that this particular piece of functionality is nowhere near where it will be before they release and seems to be one of the main things that they are working on. The only other complaint that I heard among a sea of praise was that the Terran faction seemed to be horribly "under balanced". At first I couldn't help but agree with this assessment. My FPS skills, especially on the console, are about as bad as Jonathan Wendell's are good. Even with my lack of skill I seemed to be able to dominate over the Terrans most of the first day of the con. However, coming back the second day this was certainly not the case. The Terran faction is a much more "cerebral" gaming experience, you have to learn how to aim, drive vehicles, protect your assets, and work together. Once you are able to master these facets however the Terrans become a horribly lethal race. Definitely keep an eye out for this title as I'm sure it will provide countless hours of entertainment through both a solid single player campaign and a running tally of turning your friends into pixelated giblets.

The World of Warcraft expansion "The Burning Crusade" made its debut this weekend and promises a new race for each faction which was actually a point of quite a bit of resentment from alliance players. The horde's new race, Bloodelves were an incredibly polished race with a promising future in the overall WoW universe while the alliance were left with empty speculation as to what their race would be. The press room seemed to be an endless stream of people trying to squeeze even the smallest piece of information out of the developers about the alliance race to no avail. Do not despair alliance, you may have met disappointment in your new race but patch 1.9 will be your salvation. The rest of the expansion also promised raising the level cap to 70, the opening of the Dark Portal revealing the continent of "Outland", flying mounts, several new instances, Jewelcrafting (the newest profession on the block), socketed items, and quite a bit more. I feel like I am back in the days before beta, waiting on the edge of my seat for any news and counting the days until release.

The upcoming patch also offered quite a bit of excitement for the future of Warcraft. Paladins, who many have considered the longest running joke in World of Warcraft appear to be getting a breath of fresh air. (CT: /dance) The announcement was made and it was as if a million angry shaman cried out in terror and then went silent. The class discussion panel actually spent about 2/3 of the alloted time talking about and answering questions regarding the paladin. The highlight of the new paladin abilities seem to be a greater separation and enhancement of the three talent trees allowing paladins to further specialize into their role as a healer, a tanker (aggro management abilities ala taunt were promised!), or a damage dealing machine. The one announcement that drew more cheers and applause than any other during the weekend was the news that Paladin's would be receiving new blessings that would last 15 minutes in duration. This news alone was enough to draw the complete adoration of every alliance player in the room but when the noise quieted down the developer on the stage was able to further clarify that these 15 minute blessings would be castable by class over the entire raid! This means that if a paladin casts this "group blessing" of might on a rogue, every rogue in the group would get that same buff for 15 minutes. After this the crowd seemed to disintegrate into a gibbering mass of disbelief and excitement seeing nothing but stars for the next few seconds or days, it was hard to tell. The only other thing that could rival this news in terms of excitement was the promise of linked auction houses in every major city. It is very clear to me that a lot of overtime and TLC has been worked into the upcoming additions to the World of Warcraft universe and I cannot wait to see what else they have in store.

Each panel seemed to be custom tailored to fit one or several of the developers consuming obsessions so the level of "exciting news" in each panel really helped to drive the convention at the same frenzied pitch the whole weekend. The "Items and Professions" panel was certainly no different. Some of the more exciting news was that both Tailoring and Alchemy will be getting specialization trees akin to the Blacksmith/Weaponsmith/Armorsmith setup. Word on the street is that Alchemy will get three choices (Elixers, Potions, and Transmutations) but still no word on what tailors will get. There was a shouted suggestion from the back of the room for "Shadoweave Tailoring" followed by a great pause from the presenter and a mumbled "duly noted" which elicited quite a laugh from the crowd. More news on the items and professions front was that epic items will now disenchant into "nexium crystals" for the new high level enchants, new caster items will have a "proc on cast" ability, spell penetration vs spell resistance will be much more pronounced, new tier two graphics (no more placeholders!), enchanters will be getting a new UI for sorting their recipes (thank god), and the new dungeons will offer upgrades to existing spells based on your items. The only other major news to come out of this panel was the unveiling of their new profession "Jewelcrafting" which will have the ability to make necklaces, rings, crowns, and mystic gems that you can place into the new socketed items. The amount of customization and variation that the new items being worked into the game offer is quite exciting and seem to promise that World of Warcraft will remain (at least in the near future) a very dynamic experience for everyone from the casual player to the seasoned power gamer.

The general con floor offered many other distractions once I was able to tear myself away from the individual shiny bits that could have held me enthralled for several days. The vendor area was relatively small compared to most cons (especially for the amount of potential consumers) but Microsoft was in attendance and bought popularity through a live DJ, comfortable couches, and a fully stocked snack bar complete with what can only be called a butler-esque attendant. Intel, Creative, and NewEgg all had booths with computers allowing you to playtest their hardware with the new expansion which was one of the best kept secrets of the con by the players who didn't want to wait in the 3 hour expansion line. NVidia had a green screen where you could get your picture taken with your friends in one of six locations around Azeroth. Western Digital had a few shiny boxes to catch your eye, a coupon to tempt your wallet, and a flashing bouncy ball that you could annoy your hotel roommates with until the wee hours of the morning. The Penny Arcade crew was there in force with enough t-shirts for an army and indeed many of the con denizens were sporting "Rogues do it from behind" or "/spit" shirts after the first few hours of the con. Unfortunately (or fortunately I suppose) for the Penny Arcade guys, Blizzcon came equipped with TWO armies and they were pretty much sold out long before the con ended.

My last panel of the weekend was the combined Penny Arcade, PVP, and GU Comics event. The guys jumped right into questions, handling the crowd with an ease born of time in the webculture limelight. The quick wit and topical humor held the audience enthralled and laughing right up until Caydiem (one of the Blizzard moderators) called for the last question. The questions that they fielded covered a wide range of aspects but most people seemed to want to know where each of the artists drew their inspiration from. After the third or fourth rephrasing of this question Mike "Gabe" Krahulik chimed in that when looking for inspiration on a comic about a dinosaur raping someone he generally looked to Charles Shultz. Krahulik's usual deadpan delivery drew a hearty laugh from the audience and pretty much laid that particular line of questioning to rest. These panelists proved once again that they continue to keep their thumb on the pulse of the gaming community and are rewarded with the respect and adoration of many.

Regardless of how you felt about the convention itself the wrap-up concert on Saturday really helped the con go out with a bang. The act started out a little slow with an in-house act called "Level 60 Elite Tauren Chieftain" (say that 10 times fast) who seemed to be an old axel rose impersonator turned death-metal band. I admit it wasn't exactly up my alley but they made a good showing as a garage band in their first ever live performance. What a way to start, too, playing as an opening act for The Offspring and getting to use some of their cool toys. The second act was comedian Christian Finnegan who seemed content to perch himself firmly on the fence between insulting the crowd and identifying with growing up as a geek. He drew quite a few laughs but proved to be a poor segue between two pretty intense acts. This was something he commented on when he mentioned that Blizzard had put a heavy metal band on the stage to whip the crowd into a frenzy and then tossed the "worlds biggest pussy" in front of them. I am glad that he put the crowd in a generally good mood because we were forced to wait almost an hour with no explanation before The Offspring were able to take the stage. Once they took the stage, however, it was pure showmanship and excitement until the end. Approaching this concert from a geek perspective there was one thing that I couldn't help but notice, the lighting was fantastic. Now, many people may laugh at this observation but in addition to a great performance by The Offspring their lighting tech looked more like an artist painting his masterpiece than some random roadie who was just along to make the band look good. He freehanded almost as much as did with cues and it was tough to decide what to watch, the main stage or the tech stage as they were equally impressive.

Blizzcon was a great experience and a hell of a "first try" for a convention. One of the real strengths of this con was the ability for the core of Blizzard (the developers and upper management) to really make themselves available to the common man. I even noticed the president and lead developers wandering the showroom floor and stopping to talk to J. Random Citizen. This meeting of the "old guard" of Blizzard also made something that has been rather intangible in the past very clear. While the core of Blizzard that has weathered so many storms together is still just as strong as ever their "public face" is really struggling to keep up. I remember the days of beta and even early launch when the in game GM's were helpful, courteous, and knowledgeable. I even sent several glowing letters of review to their superiors because it was such a welcome change from the Sony mafioso in Star Wars Galaxies that I had just come from. A prime example of how the public relations folk are really struggling was the press/vip line during con check-in. A regular con badge could be accessed and retrieved in a matter of seconds due to a neat little database check-in program written by one of their technophiles. A press/vip pass however could only be found by thumbing through each and every pass, they didn't even have a list of who was authorized. This led to the "loss" of my badge and if it hadn't been for the use of my wife's badge (general admission) I would have missed the unveiling of the expansion, waiting until noon before they could figure things out.

We all need to remember that Blizzard is still the new kid on the MMO block and in many ways is still trying to "find themselves." The public relations department is working overtime to try and catch up to the overwhelming demand that WoW has generated and they are not doing a bad job. However, the problem comes in the fact that due to their inexperience they are trying to emulate other companies that have had some measure of success on the MMO scene, this is the worst thing that they could do. Blizzard gained a large degree of success from not doing things the same old tired way that other companies had already tried. It is my hope that Blizzard came away from this con with just as much learned as their fans did. If, in true Blizzard fashion, they were able to come up with a public relations solution that is all their own and no one else's their fans would love them for it.

I imagine that next year their organization will certainly be much more adept and they will be able to shorten their lines and wait time for many of the different attractions. Given the overwhelming attendance and success of this con I foresee many different vendors trying to get on board possibly leading to a separate vendor hall entirely which I think would help to alleviate some of the lines along with bringing more money into the con. Blizzard may be playing to a very limited audience in terms of scope, but sheer numbers and overwhelming loyalty seem to be more than enough to ensure that Blizzcon will continue to be a successful con for years to come.
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Blizzcon Writeup More

Blizzcon Writeup

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  • sniffle (Score:5, Funny)

    by orson_of_fort_worth ( 871181 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:08PM (#13918066)
    All that text and Firefox's Find function (it's not like I was going to read the whole thing) couldn't locate one single reference to Diablo. Oh well.

    • Re:sniffle (Score:3, Informative)

      by Surt ( 22457 )
      As a hint, you might note that they just recently shut down blizzard north. Since blizzard north was responsible for the diablo series, it would be reasonable to expect that no new diablo title is forthcoming in the next couple of years.

    • couldn't locate one single reference to Diablo.
      Doesn't the whole world get destroyed (or something to that effect) at the very end of the Lord of Destruction expansion, anyway?
    • My qualms arise from the fact that game makes expect me to pay $50 for their game (give or take a few dollars depending on the title) and then pay to play it every month. Frankly, I flatly refuse to do it. If you want me to pay by the month, fine - sell me the game for cheap. It should cost well under $20 and the monthly fee should be reasonable. While the monthly fee to pay WoW is fairly reasonable (about $15/month), paying $50 for the game so that I turn around and pay another $15/month to play my gam
    • LOL - this was the first thing I did as well. Great minds think alike.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Oh The Other Hand... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by EXTomar ( 78739 )
      Bliz seems to like integrating "real world" cultural themes into their games. Dwaves are somewhat Scottish (in speach and faciniation with alcohol ;)). Trolls have a touch of Jamacian. Tuaren definately have that Naitive American tribal thing going. Why not have a strongly eastern themed race like the Panderan?

      Besides I bet a Pandaren Warrior can fend for itself and doesn't need the WWF (that is not the wrestling guys!) to help out. I personally hold out the Allience race is our favorite anthrophoric p

      • Re:Oh The Other Hand... (Score:3, Informative)

        by ejito ( 700826 )
        The east Asian themes run throughout. Many of the NPCs have asian names (Takata Steelblade, Marukai/Mitsuwa [names of markets], Ping, and other more subtle ones), as real-life races are considered neutral in Warcraft races.

        Here's some (just off the head) comparisons:
        • Night Elf architecture is a combination of ancient greek/roman plus japanese/chinese design. The culture is similar to Navajo Indians.
        • Trolls do have Jamaican accents, but their culture follows closer to the South American and East African ci

    • About the horde... (Score:3, Informative)

      by nacs ( 658138 )
      Penny Arcade has an opinion posted [penny-arcade.com].
    • I'm betting it'll be the Nagas.

  • Real life "pvp" (Score:4, Funny)

    by TimeSpeak ( 873865 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:11PM (#13918089) Journal
    With foam lances in hand, the jousters did their best to not lose their balance while trying to knock each other off of a three-foot-wide square platform
     
      Not knowing the soft "gel like substance" they landed in after being defeated was nothing but the melted transmorgified corpses of their fellow defeated gamers.

  • Blizz should've taken a page from id's book (Score:5, Interesting)

    by daVinci1980 ( 73174 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:12PM (#13918096) Homepage
    This is a post that I made on WoW's general forums a ways back, but which was silently deleted after it received several pages of responses.

    ---

    Blizz should take a page from id's book

    It really irritates me (and several people I know) that Blizz is charging $120 for a ticket to Blizzcon. Why? A little history...

    Back in the 1990's, there was this company (which still exists today, actually) called id software. id had some really kickass people, and wrote several wildly popular games. You might have heard of several of them; they're names were generally single words, things like "Quake" and "Doom" (and several sequels). After id made their millions (and millions, and ...), they decided that they would start throwing an annual event to celebrate the people that had made them successful, their fans.

    And thus, Quakecon (http://www.quakecon.org/ [quakecon.org]) was born. Every year around August, id software throws a big ass, multi-day con for their fans. For free. FOR FREE. This past year, there were approximately 10-15,000 attendees. Over 6000 brought their computers to enjoy the largest LAN party in the western hemisphere. Attendees heard keynotes from key personnel at id, Raven, as well as many other companies, browsed through companies' newest products and got to play--for the first time ever--id's newest title Quake 4. For free.

    Blizz, take a page from id's book. With revenue in the millions every month from all of your subscribers, the $120 per ticket isn't just wrong. It's plain greedy. And it's disgusting.

  • "Excellence" (Score:2, Funny)

    by schon ( 31600 )
    the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard

    You mean they had you sign a release promising them the right to run spyware on your comptuer, then filed a bogus copyright lawsuit against you? :o)
    • No, he means there were long lines, and whenever they got near the vendors they ended up walking really slow, people would appear out of nowhere, and there were lots of pink haired mostly naked short people dancing.

    • Re:"Excellence" (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Thats_Pipe ( 837838 )
      Why do people still believe Blizz is running spyware on their computers? It was shown(months ago, by the way) that the alleged program just makes a hash of your running proccesses to check that they weren't altered to allow for cheating in WoW. No personal info of any kind can be retrieved from a hash, NONE; it is not spyware like the crap 180solutions will install on your PC. It says in their EULA that they do it and that they will prosecute anyone they find by this method that is trying to cheat. Learn th

      • Re:"Excellence" (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Peter La Casse ( 3992 )
        Why do people still believe Blizz is running spyware on their computers?

        Exactly. The problem is that the license lets Blizzard do so if they wanted to, and that most people simply click "I agree" without reading what they're agreeing to, not a case of actual spyware being installed, as far as we know.

        Personally, I think the license thing reflects less poorly on Blizzard than the bnetd lawsuit, but that's just me.

    • Coincidentally, a mailing list I'm on had a posting pointing to the following
      BBC Article URL [bbc.co.uk]

      Warcraft game maker in spying row
      By Mark Ward Technology Correspondent, BBC News website

      Screenshot of dwarves on ram mounts from World of Warcraft, Blizzard Warden watches as gamers explore Warcraft's world.
      Game maker Blizzard has been accused of spying on the four million players of World of Warcraft.

      Net activists branded software used to spot cheats "spyware" because it gathers information about the other progr

  • BNetD (Score:5, Informative)

    by s0abas ( 792033 ) <shadowphoenix&gmail,com> on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:14PM (#13918119)
    ...the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard.

    Need I remind everyone of the BNetD [eff.org] case?

    For those to lazy to read TFA, Blizzard took these guys to court for reverse engineering and creating a Battle.Net client. In the end, it was ruled that the EULA overrides personal rights. Rediculous IMO.
    • You can try.

      Sometimes it even works, until the next game comes out. Then you might as well ask most of us to give up a limb.

      At least as far as western culture goes, short term interest is the only consideration on the table. It takes a little dignity to stop buying from a company that offends you, but you'll find none here -- people would rather come to the point of arguing in favor of the EULA rather than recognizing their hypocracy... or heaven forbid going to the extreme of finding another game to

    • Yeah, isn't it funny how in one article, all the Slashdotters will bitch and complain about "evil corporations" (never mind that Slashdot is owned by a Linux-selling corporation), copyright, DMCA, etc. Read all the rallying cries in the Bnetd articles of the past. But in another article, they become 12-year-old gamers again and jump up and down over anything Blizzard says?

      But hey, they're throwing a Blizzcon, and you're just so addicted to WoW! Better write a long-ass article on Slashdot about it! Free

    • Re:BNetD (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Omestes ( 471991 )
      Boohoo!
      I didn't care then, I sure as heck don't care now.

      Oh no! Some asshats violated a contract! Oh no! They had to stop doing it!

      Damn Blizz for protecting their IP! How dare they!
    • " Blizzard took these guys to court for reverse engineering and creating a Battle.Net client."

      Your summary should include the bit where BNetD ended up circumventing Blizzard's copy protection scheme. I'm supposed to boycott Blizzard even though these guys had absolutely no reason to act surprised for both being sued and losing the case.

      • Re:BNetD (Score:2, Insightful)

        by narfbot ( 515956 )
        You don't know what a copy protection scheme is if you think Battle.net was one.

        All battle.net was, was a game match-making service. It only came out after the lawsuit that they said it was any different. But in reality there are only two types of copy protection.

        1) CD-KEY
        2) A very convuluted method of checking if the disk is in the drive.

        To pirate a copy of the game all you need to do is
        1) Copy the game
        2) Obtian a sufficiently working key
        3) Apply a no cd crack

        That's it. You can play multiplayer, single

        • Re:BNetD (Score:3, Informative)

          by NanoGator ( 522640 )
          "That's it. You can play multiplayer, single player all you want. YOU DON'T NEED BNETD, YOU NEVER DID. It's a lie that bnetd enabled pirating."

          Um. Heh. BNetD didn't authorize any keys. Pirated copies could be played on it without any challenges.

          "All battle.net did was check to make sure you weren't logged in twice, that doesn't constitute any towards a protection"

          Blizzard frequently blacklisted keys.

    • Re:BNetD (Score:4, Insightful)

      by VGPowerlord ( 621254 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:51PM (#13920217)
      ...the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard.

      Need I remind everyone of the BNetD case?

      For those to lazy to read TFA, Blizzard took these guys to court for reverse engineering and creating a Battle.Net client. In the end, it was ruled that the EULA overrides personal rights. Rediculous IMO.

      No, Blizzard took them to court for creating a Battle.Net server. The Battle.Net client is built into the games that support it.

      I can see why they sued, too. Most of a Blizzard product's life cycle is as a multiplayer game. Battle.Net is a free online service that you could connect to... provided you had a real CD key, as, unlike the game itself, Blizzard has a list of valid CD keys, rather than relying on an algorithm to check them.

      BNetD, on the other hand, had no CD key requirement. Surprise! The DMCA says that you can't bypass anti-circumvention technique, of which Battle.Net's CD key check qualifies.

  • There were some pretty excellent images taken, especially those of the booth bunnies who secretly laugh at the con fanboys. check out www.worldofwarcraft.com for the gallery.

    As a side note, I certainly hope that PLDs can lend a little help tanking. It will let me focus on being a fullforce DPS whore warrior that is just dying to be unleashed.

    There are, I noticed, far more adults at the con than I thought. But maybe its because of the guild I run with on Sargeras.

  • It was a rager... (Score:4, Funny)

    by ankarbass ( 882629 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:16PM (#13918142)
    Well, at least this guy [blizzcon.com] thought so. I think in this photo the G [blizzcon.com] indicates that this is a girl.

  • Name tags (Score:5, Funny)

    by Kelson ( 129150 ) * on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:18PM (#13918158) Homepage Journal
    the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard

    Hey, as long as they didn't make you replace your name badge, it's all good!

    • Re:Name tags (Score:2, Flamebait)

      by DAldredge ( 2353 )
      If CmdrTaco had read/followed the damn WoW TOS he would never have had to change his name. Don't blame Blizzard for CmdrTacos inability to follow the rules.

  • And now the horde shall feel the 13-yr olds wrath! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    As a mature Alliance player in a mature guild I just can't WAIT for the expansion. Every 13 year old 3l33t dud3 is going to flock to the horde now.

    You just wait, Horde. Just wait for the idiots join your side!

    Ahahahahahaahhahahahaahahahhaaaaaaaaaaa!

  • The level of what? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Minwee ( 522556 ) <dcr@neverwhen.org> on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:18PM (#13918161) Homepage
    "the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard."

    You mean Blizzcon looked great, but came out eighteen months after it was originally scheduled?

  • WOW (Score:5, Funny)

    by SparafucileMan ( 544171 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:20PM (#13918176)
    the result was nothing less than the level of excellence that we have come to expect from Blizzard.

    ahhhhh... the sound of fanboys rolling in the warm morning mud is always so unpleasant to watch.

  • Ahh, Blizzcon, You have never seen a more wretched hive of geeks and horde in your life. As a longtime fan of Blizzard, (after all what other company does hybrid disks for both Macs and PCs, I ask you, now if only they supported Linux), I have to say it was wonderfully put together, and fully embraced the Blizzard style of not neccesarily adding anything new to a genre of gaming (or in this case a convention), but rather concentrating on polishing the elements; the bits and pieces of which the whole convent

  • Pretty Sure (Score:4, Funny)

    by Shadow Wrought ( 586631 ) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .thguorw.wodahs.> on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:23PM (#13918195) Homepage Journal
    It's the first Blizzard that has ever visited Anaheim. Though my Grandpa once told me that it snowed there once (I think he said in the 50's).

  • Alliance Vs. Horde (Score:3, Insightful)

    by rampant mac ( 561036 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @04:26PM (#13918218)
    "The horde's new race, Bloodelves were an incredibly polished race with a promising future in the overall WoW universe while the alliance were left with empty speculation as to what their race would be."

    So, kinda like an exact role-reversal from which the Horde is normally used to?

    /plays Horde
    /misses the "fit and polish" the Alliance side seems to take foregranted.

    • I dont know what he meant by "Bloodelves were an incredibly polished race" when the race has yet to be released and is mostly Night Elves with a different set of textures, in fact some textures are the same with a different color pallet. I play on horde side and am really skeptical that when this race comes out it will be how it was displayed at blizzcon. So let me get this straight the horde get an AoE stun and AoE silence racials?

      There will be far too many alliance (the majority of the players of WoW" c
  • air-travel...
    web of deceit and lies that is commercial air travel

    Open-source air-travel only!

  • So, what's the over/under on how many next generation console systems will be released before this game sees the light of day? Quickly followed by, how much of an additional delay will ensuring xbox 360 compatibility introduce?

  • Why is Vivendi/Blizzard worthy of Slashdot? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 31, 2005 @05:06PM (#13918590)
    Could someone explain why Slashdot did not declaired a boycott on all things related to Blizzard and Vivendi long ago?

    Honestly, [slashdot.org] what does [slashdot.org] it take [slashdot.org] for them [slashdot.org] to be [slashdot.org] labeled as [slashdot.org] worthless [slashdot.org] assholes? [slashdot.org]

    • " Honestly, what does it take for them to be labeled as worthless assholes?"

      Conventional Wisdom says that as long as their games are fun, people will find reasons to not dislike the company.

    • Re:Why is Vivendi/Blizzard worthy of Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)

      by kwerle ( 39371 ) <kurt@CircleW.org> on Monday October 31, 2005 @06:04PM (#13919056) Homepage Journal
      Could someone explain why Slashdot did not declaired a boycott on all things related to Blizzard and Vivendi long ago?

      How about a reasonable complaint?

      Honestly, [slashdot.org]

      Original link dead.

      what does [slashdot.org]

      Hard to believe they shut down Freecraft - golly...

      it take [slashdot.org]

      Follow the clearly stated rules?

      for them [slashdot.org]

      Return the box, eh?

      to be [slashdot.org]

      Who'd have thunk they'd shut down bnetd - golly.

      labeled as [slashdot.org] worthless [slashdot.org]

      Software shipped and was not bug/issue free! Now there's a shocker.

      assholes? [slashdot.org]

      Failing to anticipate how many copies would be sold hardly seems to qualify as a mortal sin.

      But, really, one of the newest and most popular MMO's just did their first con. Even if the company running it were complete assholes, it'd still be newsworthy.
      • They didn't shut down freecraft. The lead maintainer left and others picked up the project. It's now named stratagus.

        I remember the lead developer of Bnetd saying the same thing as the freecraft maintainer, he was done with supporting blizzard products. So the lawsuit was meant nothing, more like a facade over suing the ISP of bnetd. Of course fair use rights are gone. But the same thing that happened with freecraft a year later happen with bnetd earlier, somebody else picked it up. Bnetd still exists
        • I remember the lead developer of Bnetd saying the same thing as the freecraft maintainer, he was done with supporting blizzard products.

          You're using "supporting" in a funny way here. It seems to mean "impelenting some portion of the game so as to circumvent some part of blizzard's system". I call BS.

          ... So it's all about being backstabbed by twelve year olds who think they should be proactive and over protective of a company they idolize, and the rest of us are doing it for fun, but suddenly there is no
  • A friend of mine showed me a week or two ago a password protected post on his guild's forum. It stated blood elves would be the new horde race and dranei the new alliance race. It also said that northrend would be a 80 man raid with 40 alliance and 40 horde working together with the Argent Dawn to take down Arthas.

    I dunno about the rest, but the blood elves at least turned out to be right.

    The new class is supposed to be the spellbreaker, with talent trees doing different crazy things. One is a talent that t

  • The best place to get information from BlizzCon. (Score:3, Informative)

    by antdude ( 79039 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @06:08PM (#13919095) Homepage Journal
    WorldofWar.net [worldofwar.net] posted new and confirmed information and media such as photographs, screenshots, and movie footages (including panels and presentations) of the BlizzCon [blizzcon.com] (year 2005). The video presentations are quite funny to hear the fans yelling. Here are some samples of videos:
    • Expansion Blood Elf Warrior gameplay Movie [28Mb]
    • Sound-alike Contest Movie [86Mb]
    • Original Song Contest Movie [35Mb]
    • Dance-Alike Contest Movie [29Mb]
    • Costume Contest [129mb]
    • BlizzCon floor walkabout video [30.22Mb]
    • Interviews and many more.


    Reposted from an earlier comment [slashdot.org].
  • For that Diablo 3 goodness, try Guild Wars.

  • Anyone who went to "Blizzcon" is an asshole (Score:3)

    by Ath ( 643782 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @07:44PM (#13919821)
    This is a company that sues their customers for "violating the DMCA". What the fuck happened to slashdot to post such a butt-licking story? Pathetic.

    There are plenty of companies with cutting edge technology and the ethics that match up with what people want. If you went to Blizzcon or pay them a single cent for their games then you are just a whore for their crap. You pay for the lawyers that represent them in court, suing people who make a non-commercial alternative to their control of your life. Be ashamed. Be very ashamed.

  • Level 60 Elite Tauren Chieftain not a garage band (Score:3, Informative)

    by AHumbleOpinion ( 546848 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:31PM (#13920120) Homepage
    "Level 60 Elite Tauren Chieftain" was not exactly a garage band, they were Blizzard employees. That was part of the fun of it.
  • When they migrated to that stupid CD/DRM scheme. Kids love Blizzard. I have kids. But they are not allowed to play with the originals. No backups, no purchase. I have all my original game media since 1979.

    $400 worth of Blizzard games and I get from Blizzard support, 'You can't make a copy, but your allowed one backup'. Screw them, I'm not a re-occuring fee customer.

    End rant,
    Enjoy.

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