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Blizzard Hints At New StarCraft, Launches Burning Crusade
Game Developer Blizzard Entertainment's long-anticipated expansion to World of Warcraft has gone live. Initial impressions are ... not available, since all 8 million players are currently in the Outlands. I'll take that to mean the servers for the most part have not melted yet. At a Burning Crusade launch party, a Blizzard exec revealed we may see a new StarCraft game very soon. But today is all about WoW. If you're not playing, and want to live vicariously, check out WarCry's extensive preview of the expansion. You could read designer Jeff Kaplan's comments on new features at FiringSquad, or Shane Dibiri's talk of inspiration at Next Generation. One new expansion a year, eh? Some folks are already looking to the future, where we probably won't see WoW on consoles, but may see it with security dongles. 0.1% of the Earth's population can't all be wrong.
..but I was busy playing WoW
Your servers are not prepared!!
Serious aside: once you get your copy, there is no need to run the installer from the discs. All you need is the key to upgrade your account using the provided key—you already have all the content as of the 2.0 patch series. If you run the installer, it rolls your local copy back to 2.0.3, and once you start the game, you would go through two patch cycles back to 2.0.5. Save yourself some time and just upgrade your account directly at https://upgrade.worldofwarcraft.com/expansion/.
Why bother.
Outlands is a gankfest right now and pretty much every quest mob is being camped...
Plan B: grind in Winterspring.
I am BelDion's
Brain not working. Late night last. Up, leveling new Blood Elf. Damned if they are not the gayest video game characters ever.
Scrunchie? Scrunchie? Scrunchie!?
Why bother.
You have no idea how glad I am that I finally don't care about this story. I uninstalled the game last weekend, and I've moved the CDs to my "never gonna play that game again" spindle in the back of my closet.
That's one addiction that I'll never regret kicking.
Uh... they barely gave enough time for the "hardcore" guilds to get through the newest content (Naxx)... nevermind the casual players that had -no- chance of ever seeing the majority of end-game content that was out for 2 years.
Now they are promising 1x expansion every year?
Well, I guess that ensures everyone that they won't have a life for years to come.
For the first time ever, World of Warcraft players meet in public. In real life. This allowed us to collect some interesting data about the demographics. Out of nearly 50 people standing around the EB Games where I picked up my copy, I think four were girls. Just saying. Something to think about next time you /flirt.
Why bother.
You'd think they'd make the game free since theres no single player action. Even if they lose $50 because they let you download it, they'll make up for it with your lifetime addiction.
Congratulations, you missed the point.
The idea isn't to prevent piracy, but to provide some means of more secure authentication because people are getting their accounts "hacked" where "hacked" means they had an easily guessed username and password, or their machine is riddled with trojans and someone captured their password.
sorry but a PvP environment in any MMORPG doesn't hold a candle to the standard FPS environment. Any game where your skill can be overriden by someones accumulation of stuff by simply being in game longer isn't good PvP.
I could never understand the fascination with PvP in MMORPGs, let alone "white servers" where people go PvP on a whim, till I realized they don't want a challenge, they want to win. "Real challenge" - sheesh, if they wanted one they wouldn't be doing PvP in a MMORPG!
As far as Eve goes, yeah its great if you been in there forever, but new players aren't going to be much more than cannon fodder.
Obviously more people prefer WOW than Eve, so where's the desire for a "real challenge"?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
..a new StarCraft game. It's been a while since I've seen anything that isn't WarCraft-related come out of that company. I know I'm not the only one that's eagerly awaiting more SC news.
Blerg.
"All in all, this is more of the same ... "
I have to tell you all that I absolutely hate this game. It is annoying and tedious ... and no I don't wanna join your bloody guild!
World of Warcraft is simply a pretty world where all players are pampered all along the way... :)
:P
If you're looking for a real challange, try out EVE Online at http://www.eve-online.com/ [eve-online.com] .
You can also visit my eve-related blog at http://www.eve-pirate.com/ [eve-pirate.com]
I would, but I'm reading this thread while waiting for today's extended downtime to be over...thanks so much for actually pointing that out to me
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
(Slashdot won't show me the reply links on replies now... So I'm starting a new post. Firefox2/Linux, btw.)
So, is this the first time in the history of dongles that the 'security' provided by the dongle is for the USER and not the company? -boggle-
I actually think this is a great idea, IF it's optional. Example:
You buy New-RPG. You install New-RPG and plug in the dongle. At that point, you have the option to create a username and password, or use the dongle as your authentication mechanism. Later, if you want to change, you simply insert the dongle and go to the config and change it. (Needed to enable AND disable, for obvious reasons.)
If (huge IF) I ever write an online game, I'm going to seriously consider this. I tend towards 'free' games, so I'd probably make it write the authentication to a USB drive.
Thoughts: Lost/broken USB drive? Any backup means I can think of is another backdoor for a 'hacker'. (I use that term loosely.)
Copied auth data? Use the hardware ID of the USB drive as part of the auth?
Hacked executable to send any auth data they wish? Troublesome.
At any rate, I'm astonished at the thought of a dongle actually protecting the user instead of the company.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
No, he had it right - 8,000,000/6,000,000,000 = 0.0013333... or about 0.1%
The second I get home from work, I'll be working on Leveling to 60. Just thinking of all the XP I could have had at 60 running instances, at least now we'll get XP for them.. My rest bar better be blue all the way to 61.
Never mind, I was wrong: World of Warcraft's Subscriber Definition World of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees' territories are defined along the same rules.
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
I have two employees, both WoW players, who are out today with "the flu" (of course they both picked up their copies of BC at midnight and didn't come down with their illness until 4 or 5am...). ;)
Anyone else have a similar situation?
Damn Blizz leeches. Seed damnit Seed!
...can I have all your gold?
Cress, cress, lovely lovely cress
Warcraft II was delayed, Warcraft III was delayed 4 years (original release date was Q4 1999, was pushed back to September 2003 to change the game engine to 3D), Diablo II and its eventual expansion were both also delayed, as well as the Brood War expansion for Starcraft.
None of those had monthly fees; Blizzard has a history of delaying games in order to ensure that their customers get the best product available. Don't be so quick to assume the delay of Burning Crusade is just a conspiracy to milk more money out of subscribers.
> Sit back, release an expansion once per year, and enjoy the torrent of cash.
For the next 3-4 years, sure. WoW is probably enjoying its popularity peak around now. You remember Everquest, and how it looked like nothing would ever topple it, and how much money Sony was making off each expansion? Look at the mess Sony's in now; Everquest 2 did fairly poorly (compared to the original), Planetside was a near-disaster in MMO terms and SWG keeps getting redesigned in an attempt to appeal to people more.
MMOs don't last forever. They're going to need a sequel, and given the development lead time, had better be well into the design/possibly into actually implementing that sequel.
Actually, you get: 7 new outland zones and 4 new Azerothian zones. Something like 15-20 new dungeons for everything from 5-man parties to 25-man raids 2 new races, complete with the final merger of the class differences between the factions Team arena PvP combat An entire new profession(Jewelcrafting) is not something to scoff at...it's a fairly major addition Now, 500 hours is not an insignificant amount of time, but consider that it takes 250 hours to get the average character to 60. Since you say you raided MC, I assume that was your only character since the other 250 hours were spent there, no doubt. The game's flavor changes significantly even when you do simple things like play a new class. This expansion is quite large...but I sympathize with your viewpoint. Given that we've paid $15 a month for 2 years, I'd think the disc should cost $20, or if it's $40 it should include a free month of playtime.
I preordered my copy of the Burning Crusade, and showed up at the store at about 10:30 (I was the 5th person there). I spoke to the fine people of Taverncast, chatted with other gamers about raid strategies, and shuffled around as we formed Alliance and Horde cliques (not really on that last one). After I got my copy at 12:01 (it payed to show up early. There were about ~200 people behind me in line) I rushed home and installed.
I must say, the process was amazingly smooth. I had no delay upgrading my account, and although the client required a patch out of the box, the patch files were already downloaded. Last weekend, my guild transferred over to the new Sisters of Elune server, and it's held up incredibly well. I played from midnight to 6 AM, and there were no crashes or lag spikes.
As for the content, my guildies and I ran through the dark portal and started questing around Hellfire peninsula. Immediately, we were greeted with the beautiful, surreal vista of Hellfire peninsula, where a massive battle is being waged between Alliance and Horde forces in uneasy truce against the Burning Legion (with hordes of demons and giant mechs called Fel Reavers). This conflict feels very dynamic and intense (partly because the front has just opened), but the scale of warfare on Hellfire peninsula really puts all the ongoing "battles" in Azeroth to shame. Within the first hour or two, you'll have the opportunity to sabotage the Legion war machine and fly an armored Gryphon (or I assume a Wyvern if you're Horde) on a bombing run (which is extremely fun). Obviously, I haven't had a chance to try out new raids or venture beyond Hellfire peninsula, but so far, Burning Crusade is gorgeous, massive, and intense. Good job, Blizzard!
Anonymous Luddite: "What do you think of the dehumanizing effects of the Internet?"
Andy Grove: "Not Much."
Every time it's brought up, just start asking them how the grind is going. WoW, a great single player game with about 350 hours of play in it (only takes 13 days played to get to level 60... I did it several times) but after that, it's nothing but grind.
Ask them how many crypt thing legs they've gotten on the way to the 1200 (gotten ~20 per trip into an instance) to get the 30 tokens needed to buy the stuff from the faction person *AFTER* you've killed the 1000s of mobs to get the faction to actually buy it.
Or, how Blizzard nerfs the amount of honor you get from PvP because people are "earning it too fast".
Or, ask them how many times they've done Molten core (Onyxia/BWL/ZG/etc) in the past month and how was it different every time.
Pretty soon, they'll shut up and/or stop coming over.
Some folks are already looking to the future where we probably won't see WoW on consoles, but may see it with security dongles. 0.1% of the Earth's population can't all be wrong.
Why doesn't Blizzard just make their own hardware? The ultimate dongle is a single game console. Cheap enough to capture an entirely new market, and since it's really the per month payments they want they can cut the price. Plug in your ethernet and a USB keyboard/mouse/joystick and away you go.
I know Blizzard isn't a hardware company, but this seems like an obvious "Apple"-esc move.
I guess that would be great if I were still interested. I got over Starcraft 6 years ago, and while I think it was the perfect RTS and had a very compelling story, I don't understand why they feel the need to come back to it now, after 10 years, for a sequel to a game with such a rabid following? I think it's impossible that it could be a better playing experience than the original or Brood War for multiplayer. Why is it that Blizzard can only seem to develop one game at a time when they certainly have the resources to do more? They have three solid gold game franchises, and two of them have languished for the better part of a decade: Starcraft for 9 years, and Diablo for 6. I can understand their commitment to quality, but it's not as if there aren't enough good developers, project managers, and producers out there to make a quality game.
Remember the Alamo, and God Bless Texas...
Starcraft? I can't stop playing Masters of Orion 2! God I need sleep.
offtopic ? maybe, maybe not. working on starcraft means less chance they will announce diablo3 any time soon, seeing that blizzard keeps only 1 game in the center of attention.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
Gee... Blizzard, a big company, makes extremely good, genre defining games. But for some bizarre reason, they choose to only work on one game at a time, focusing on that one game to make it really good.
Crazy.
You know, and this is just a wild stab in the dark... maybe the quality of their games is because they only... no... no, that's crazy talk. I mean, EA develops tons of games at once, and their quality is...
Hmm.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
On a scale from average metrosexual to Richard Simmons, I would say Blood Elf males are somewhere around Tom Cruise, bordering on 80s Depeche Mode.
Why bother.
Your description makes me think of EA. I don't know how others view EA, but I think that company tends to make games with great potential, but then they round off the details at the end, cut a few corners, and ship it to save costs and time. My point is, when your company is focusing its energy in many directions, your visions can get dilluted, and your desire grows to ship now rather than later in an attempt to get paid now.
Sort of like: why strive for one 10/10, when you can ship two 9/10's?
Let me start by saying that Starcraft 2 will undoubtedly be wildly popular and successful and that I'm not disputing that. My real question is whether it will be any good. A number of the developers of the original left to form ArenaNet and made Guild Wars. Warcraft 3 completely lost the dynamics of Starcraft, instead becoming a contest of who-outnumbers-who. Is there anyone left at Blizzard who can make a worthy successor to Starcraft? I fear there isn't.