Slashdot Mirror


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.

21 of 319 comments (clear)

  1. I'd have gotten first post... by SNR+monkey · · Score: 5, Funny

    ..but I was busy playing WoW

  2. Tag line from the theatrical trialer: by Lethyos · · Score: 5, Informative

    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.
    1. Re:Tag line from the theatrical trialer: by XMunkki · · Score: 4, Informative

      Actually there IS a need to install the CDs, as not all TBC content came with the patches (I suspect mainly the Outland regions). Don't know how it is in the US, but it's like this in the europe. It is true it will re-run a few patches after installing though.

      And yes, you can play the non-TBC regions with a normal unupgraded client even if you have activated TBC.

    2. Re:Tag line from the theatrical trialer: by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 4, Informative

      The European servers died at ten past midnight (the portal opened at midnight). After a server reboot they died *again* about 15 minutes later.

      Oh and blizz sent out a load of duff CDs (many people can't read CD4) and they sent out the wrong keys with the collectors edition so you can't get the 'exclusive' content unless you take a pair of scissors to your box and send bits of it to an address in France...

  3. Outlands fun? Think again. by BelDion · · Score: 4, Informative

    Outlands is a gankfest right now and pretty much every quest mob is being camped...

    Plan B: grind in Winterspring.

    --

    I am BelDion's .Sig; Who the hell is Jack?
    1. Re:Outlands fun? Think again. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      yeah i got my first kill->gather quest done right outside thrallmar last night. Outlands is teh awesome so far, I wouldn't waste much time in winterspring, no phat lewtz, plus I was getting 1000-1100 XP per mob for the lvl 60-61 mobs... The green drops are awesome, time to head back to Orgrimmar and put stuff on the AH for those who aren't level 60 or don't have the xpac yet... mwuhaha!

    2. Re:Outlands fun? Think again. by LordSnooty · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Oooh, I wish I knew what all that meant.

    3. Re:Outlands fun? Think again. by FlopEJoe · · Score: 5, Funny

      Dude! You should have killed 65,340,285 boars in the forest to level up!

  4. Grammar lobe broken. by Lethyos · · Score: 4, Funny

    All you need is the key to upgrade your account using the provided key...

    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.
  5. Sweet, sweet freedom! by airhed13 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Sweet, sweet freedom! by niconorsk · · Score: 5, Funny

      Congrats; I too am enjoying my extra life. Have you been eating green mushrooms again?
      --
      Nothing is impossible. We just haven't quite worked out how to do it yet.
  6. Gender observation. by Lethyos · · Score: 5, Funny

    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.
    1. Re:Gender observation. by mfender9 · · Score: 5, Funny
      Out of nearly 50 people standing around the EB Games where I picked up my copy, I think four were girls.

      If you only think they were girls, then I'm not terribly excited about them.

    2. Re:Gender observation. by Seng · · Score: 5, Funny

      I decided, just for fun, to run down to the local retailer to grab my copy (hell, they shut the servers down for the update just in time for me to get there at midnight!).

      I was a little surprised... Or maybe I shouldn't have been.

      The people standing behind me were SO obviously methheads (gaunt face, bleeding gums, rotting out teeth). There was one kid that was about 12 in there with his mother picking up a copy (wtf? On a school night? I hope to hell when my daughter's 12 I never lose my intelligence and find myself buying a game at 12 midnight with her on a school night!)

      The rest of the people were semi-normal - but about half of those looked like they could've used some personal hygiene lessons *grin*.

      I'm thinking it was the horde release location...

  7. Re:Starcraft? Dongles? by Microlith · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

  8. Finally.. by zyl0x · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ..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.
  9. Re:.1% of earth? by richdun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, he had it right - 8,000,000/6,000,000,000 = 0.0013333... or about 0.1%

  10. Burning Crusade flu? by galfridus73 · · Score: 5, Funny
    Gotta love it...

    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?

  11. If your characters still exist... by StoatBringer · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...can I have all your gold?

    --
    Cress, cress, lovely lovely cress
  12. Re:Somehow, I just don't care by johnashby · · Score: 5, Informative

    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.

  13. 2008 if they rushed every aspect by Paralizer · · Score: 4, Insightful
    FTA:
    "As a Starcraft player I can tell you that I hope it wouldn't go a decade - we launched Starcraft in '98 - I hope it wouldn't go a decade before we stand here and celebrate the next Starcraft together," Itzik Ben Bassat told crowds gathered at World of Warcraft expansion The Burning Crusade's official launch event in London last night.
    Unless they've already done significant work on it, how are they even considering the possibility of shipping it by 2008? I think a development cycle for a blockbuster game takes years, 3 maybe 4, and this guy is talking 1-2?