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New WoW Map Uses Google Local API

Posted by Zonk on from the don't-forget-to-look-up-to-see-the-kobolds dept.

Lord Satri writes "The WarCry Network lead me to the world's only ultra-high resolution map of the World of Warcraft universe. From WarCry: 'The site leverages the powerful Google Maps API to create a revolutionary scaled map with detail and precision never before seen on the Internet. A user can display any number of ore, herbs, or, treasure. Currently there are more than 15,000 resources in the database. All this, on one easy to navigate page.'"

16 of 58 comments (clear)

  1. Site FARK'd by llamalicious · · Score: 3, Informative

    Site was FARK'd before it could be slashdotted (at least the map images are).
    Good luck trying to view anything now.

  2. mapwow.com by MapWoW.com · · Score: 5, Informative

    Thanks for the /.! We just got digged and then farked. We've disabled all dynamic php content, so much of the useful functionality isn't available right now. If you want to see how useful the site is normally, please feel free to bookmark/delicious the site and come back tomorrow. :)

    The site is up for now, let's see how we last!

    -- MapWoW.com Team

    1. Re:mapwow.com by TeamSPAM · · Score: 2, Interesting

      This looks pretty cool. I didn't think you could use alternate maps with the Google Map API. I would love to do something similar for the BattleTech Universe. Would you mind giving pointers on how to get your own map setup for this?

      P.S. Any other BTech players interested in trying to develop a Google Map for the Inner Sphere?

      --
      Brought to you by Team SPAM! where we believe: "Information in the noise!"
    2. Re:mapwow.com by KiloByte · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Well, the Google Map API isn't that complex.

      I've once created a simpler thing for my T2T map page -- it doesn't have zoom and uses only one image instead of a bunch dynamically fetched, but generally it works in a similar way. And I'm a complete beginner in JS.

      I would say, an experienced programmer would be able to recreate the API in less than a week. It's not the complexity what is cool -- it is the idea.

      --
      The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
    3. Re:mapwow.com by Ryan+Amos · · Score: 2, Informative

      The gold selling ads are from AdWords. One of the few profitable businesses built around WoW (other than selling boxed copies of the game itself) is selling gold. Gold probably has a higher profit margin than selling the game. So obviously gold sellers are going to pay the most for the keyword "World of Warcraft." It sucks, but these guys have to pay for hosting somehow.

      Preventing gold selling in an MMO is next to impossible anyway, and WoW is far better at mitigating its effects than any other MMO I've played. By comparison, FFXI's economy was totally screwed after about 6 months (over 1,000,000 gil for midlevel items? yah right.) WoW is over a year old and prices haven't jumped more than 25% since launch, except for certain specific items made more desirable by changes in the game mechanics.

      Yatlas is actually a nice replacement for the default map screen. Bonus is it's smaller so you can actually see/control your character while looking at the map.

  3. But does it leverage... by Yst · · Score: 5, Funny
    The site leverages the powerful Google Maps API to create a revolutionary scaled map with detail and precision never before seen on the Internet.

    But does it leverage the power of insufferable marketing lingo to pro-actively develop a synergistic user-oriented information transaction? Yes, yes, I think it does.

    --
    Karma: Chameleon (comes and goes)
  4. No by lbmouse · · Score: 5, Funny

    '... All this, on one easy to navigate page.'

    All this, on one smoking server.

  5. Hmm.. by SeekerDarksteel · · Score: 5, Funny

    Resources, herbs, thats great...but what I really want to know is...

    Can I zoom in on Darnassus to look down Night Elfs' shirts?

    --
    The laws of probability forbid it!
  6. CL by photojunkie · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Gnomish Spy Satellite" Crafter Lvl: 335

  7. Used google api, but not their servers by 192939495969798999 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I wonder if even Google's servers could've handled the load fired at that poor site. Then again, I wonder what they were thinking, to make a WoW interactive app, post it on the internet, and then allow just everyone to go use it. Of course, now that all the WoW people know about it, it'll just be slammed forever. I'd love to see a graph of their traffic:
    satuday: 9 hits
    sunday: 10 hits
    monday: 9999999 hits
    tuesday: 999999 hits
    wednesday: 9999 hits + holding, ka BOOM! goes the server...

    --
    stuff |
  8. Donate by Onan · · Score: 3, Insightful


    If this seems like a cool idea, and something that you're glad someone did, give 'em a few bucks through that donation link on the right. Encouraging and facilitating nifty things helps produce future nifty things.

    (And no, I'm not affiliated with the creators or ISP here. Just sayin'.)

    1. Re:Donate by dswensen · · Score: 2, Informative

      This is Slashdot, we'd much rather sneer at them derisively for having too much time on their hands and / or no girlfriends (actual facts concerning social or sex life notwithstanding).

  9. Re:Instances. by SydShamino · · Score: 3, Informative

    This was my favorite site for instance maps, when I played:
    http://worldofwarcraft.gameamp.com/game_map/viewGa meMaps/0.php!orderBy=17

    --
    It doesn't hurt to be nice.
  10. Copyright Infringement by Sparr0 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Has anyone considered the legal ramifications of them ripping media from the game and distributing it online? Unless I am mistaken, this map is generated from the minimap's textures. Problems arose in the same sort of online maps for other games (EQ, DAOC, AO).

    1. Re:Copyright Infringement by Loco3KGT · · Score: 3, Funny

      wow grammar surprise.

      If your name really is Bob then my last name is Chang.

      --
      Blessed be he who reads this post, Cursed be he who tells my boss.
  11. Re:Face on Mars by MapWoW.com · · Score: 3, Informative

    The site does have bookmarking, but it's half-way disabled for now because of the load.

    To use the bookmarking, first scroll to your face on mars or where-ever. Then at the bottom of the right-hand menu, you'll see a small "Link to this Location" link. Copy the URL for this link (vis right-clicking, clicking on the URL, or reading the Ethereal dump). Once the site is back to using PHP, then this link will take you to the location you visited. For example, this is the future-link to Darnassus:

    http://mapwow.com/?lat=-179.69959259033203&lng=85. 03840665961734&zoom=2