Blizzard Offers Look Inside WoW At GDC

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Blizzard Offers Look Inside WoW At GDC

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday September 18, 2009 @05:01AM from the belly-of-the-beast dept.

Yesterday morning at GDC Austin, Blizzard's J. Allen Brack and Frank Pearce took to the stage to finally give a peek inside the inner workings of World of Warcraft. Tipping the scales at around 4,600 people utilizing 20,000 computer systems and 1.3 petabytes of storage, Blizzard has created a raging behemoth. The Online Network services group alone has "data centers from Texas to Seoul, and monitor over 13,250 server blades, 75,000 cpu cores, and 112.5 terabytes of blade RAM. [Pearce] points out the picture of the GNOC (Global Network Operations Center) in their slideshow, a data core that even has televisions tuned to the weather stations. They use those to ensure that conditions of the data center are up to their standards; with only a staff of 68 people they ensure connectivity across the globe for the numerous WoW servers."

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Story at 11... by CRiMSON · 2009-09-18 05:02 · Score: 5, Funny

Massive online game requires massive ammount of servers, bandwidth and people to maintain.....

--
oogly boogly!
1. Re:Story at 11... by hesaigo999ca · 2009-09-18 05:07 · Score: 1
  
  ummm...how would I mod this...
2. Re:Story at 11... by CRiMSON · 2009-09-18 05:09 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  With wild abandonment?
  
  --
  oogly boogly!
3. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:12 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  +5 He-Man And The Masters Of The Obvious!!1
4. Re:Story at 11... by Rycross · 2009-09-18 05:27 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  You'd be surprised at the number of people that think you can run something like a WoW server on a spare box underneath someone's desk.
5. Re:Story at 11... by Geoff-with-a-G · 2009-09-18 05:30 · Score: 1
  
  Massive online game requires massive ammount of servers, bandwidth and people to maintain.....
  And a follow-up story at 12 - This just in: Computer nerds find massive amounts of servers, bandwidth, and people maintaining systems to be interesting. Some of them like hearing the details in success stories of large scale infrastructure. Even more so when the company itself is prominent or interesting.
  Tune in tomorrow for our shocking revelation that some nerds also feel the need to mock these stories as uninteresting, yet are willing to take the time to post comments about just what a waste of time it is.
6. Re:Story at 11... by BlueKitties · 2009-09-18 05:32 · Score: 1
  
  While that is funny, the article didn't say "Blizzard unveils little known secret: WoW does -not- run on a single MacBook."
  
  --
  "Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of face the heart is made glad." [Ecclesiastes 7:3]
7. Re:Story at 11... by NYMeatball · 2009-09-18 05:33 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  You wouldn't be surprised at the number of people who DO try to run application servers underneath their own desk in the corporate world.
8. Re:Story at 11... by sopssa · 2009-09-18 05:34 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  You do not need such massive infrastructure to run a MMO, its just being wasteful about resources. Sure, the uptime could suffer a little bit and its possible you would sometimes run over the allowed bandwidth with Comcast, but you CAN run these things just fine on your living room behind the TV. If you want redundancy, you could have another server at your friends place.
  Just because its "cool" and you have some money, it doesn't mean you have to waste it. Hell, even Slashdot runs just fine on CmdrTaco's mom's basement..
9. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:35 · Score: 0
  
  Well sure you can. Given one $1000 system, decently-designed code, and a good net connection, you could probably support 100-200 players. It's not as if most third-party WoW servers have massive infrastructure. It's supporting 1000+ players reliably (including data backups) that gets tricky.
10. Re:Story at 11... by xxuserxx · 2009-09-18 05:38 · Score: 0, Redundant
  
  No, you could not run this from your home. 9 Million + people have active subscriptions to WoW. Do you have any idea what the network traffic is for an app like WoW? No. You dont. Also they do support full downloads for the game as well as updates and thats gigs of content.
11. Re:Story at 11... by Wannabe+Code+Monkey · 2009-09-18 05:40 · Score: 1
  
  Tipping the scales at around 4600 people utilizing 20,000 computer systems
  Can someone explain this to me? I thought there were millions of WoW users? 4600 seems miniscule to me, especially when the same sentence says that they have 20,000 computer systems to serve these 4600 people... I don't understand.
  
  --
  We always knew Comcast was corrupt, here's the proof: http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1909890&cid=34545432
12. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:42 · Score: 0
  
  Talk about missing the point...
13. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:45 · Score: 0
  
  woosh
14. Re:Story at 11... by Korin43 · 2009-09-18 05:46 · Score: 1
  
  I used to run a WoW server on normal slow computer. It worked fine. I'd imagine the hard part is getting decent uptime and speeds with thousands of players.
15. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:50 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  4,600 employees at Blizzard.
16. Re:Story at 11... by plague3106 · 2009-09-18 05:51 · Score: 1
  
  Clearly they outsourced their programming.
17. Re:Story at 11... by sopssa · 2009-09-18 05:53 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  The interesting question with the amount of people working at blizzard is that will indie mmo's stand any change?
  
  World of Warcraft utilizes 20,000 computer systems, 1.3 petabytes of storage, and more than 4600 people.
  That's quite hard to compete with, and it only seems to be growing. Even other big MMO's have trouble competing with WoW, with Eve Online pretty much the only true competitor (and its more targeted for hardcore players)
18. Re:Story at 11... by sopssa · 2009-09-18 05:55 · Score: 1
  
  4600 is the amount of people working on WoW, including the support staff and "two full-time lore historians, keepers of blizzard's past.". I'd like to have a work title "Warcraft Lore Historian"
19. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:56 · Score: 0
  
  And the vast vast majority of those are customer service, so in relation to network infrastructure, how the fuck is that relevant? Pfft.
20. Re:Story at 11... by sopssa · 2009-09-18 06:04 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, WoW coders are actually from GetAFreelancer.com.
21. Re:Story at 11... by moniker127 · 2009-09-18 06:10 · Score: 1
  
  I believe they're referring to the number of blizzard employees involved in the area.
  As far as the millions- it takes 1 normal middle-high end computer to maintain 500 people logged in. If they have 20,000 servers, they can support their entire population (10 million) logging in at once (assuming they're evenly spread between servers).
22. Re:Story at 11... by moniker127 · 2009-09-18 06:13 · Score: 1
  
  You can, actually, so long as no more than about 500 people are on at a time. That is the the average load for a single machine, with medium-high specs. If you get a cluster running, you can do a normal sized wow server. Just look up ascentemu.
23. Re:Story at 11... by Ultra64 · 2009-09-18 06:14 · Score: 1
  
  they are the maintainers, not the players
24. Re:Story at 11... by Rycross · 2009-09-18 06:23 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, implicit in my statement was that you had a number of players equivalent to WoW, along with the uptime, reliability, and latency of WoW. Perhaps I should have specifically said:
  "You would be surprised at the number of people who believe that you can run a WoW server, supporting several thousand players with the same reliability and quality of the official server, on a spare box under your desk."
  I should have expected pedantic replies on Slashdot. :)
25. Re:Story at 11... by An+ominous+Cow+art · 2009-09-18 06:29 · Score: 1
  
  The tags say it all:
  Blizzard games it! Wow, technology story.
26. Re:Story at 11... by Hurricane78 · 2009-09-18 06:33 · Score: 1
  
  The interesting thing to me as a possible future designer of a game of a similar scale, is how much and what is needed exactly. Because massive can differ quite a bit, from the power of a car ("a massive 800 PS") to the amount of atoms in the universe ("a massive 10E79 to 10E81 atoms").
  In other words, it narrows it down a good bit. E.g. from the range of 800 to 10E81 servers. ^^
  
  --
  Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
27. Re:Story at 11... by brainboyz · 2009-09-18 06:48 · Score: 1
  
  That was the case in 2005-2006, but that's not the case anymore. World breaking patches are the exception, not the rule, these days.
  Whatever you need to tell yourself to help break the addiction, buddy.
28. Re:Story at 11... by amplt1337 · 2009-09-18 06:53 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  ...yes. The hard part of a Massively Multiplayer Online Game does in fact come from the Massively part.
  
  --
  Freedom isn't free; its price is the well-being of others.
29. Re:Story at 11... by icebraining · 2009-09-18 07:35 · Score: 1
  
  The best thing in this post is the "Informative" score.
  
  --
  Dilbert RSS feed
30. Re:Story at 11... by Darinbob · 2009-09-18 07:39 · Score: 1
  
  I'm not surprised. I often hear players in some games complain how they can do a better job than the devs, and that if the "server" is down why don't they just get a new computer or replace the ram.
31. Re:Story at 11... by Rycross · 2009-09-18 07:43 · Score: 1
  
  One of the situations I had in mind during my post was the WoW launch, where irate players in queues demanded that Blizzard take some of their money down to Best Buy to buy new servers. Literally, and seriously.
  Of course the same people kept asking why Blizzard didn't hire more programmers, even though they had job postings up for all the relevant positions. Apparently they expected that Blizzard could hire a lead server architect in a matter of weeks.
  Most of these people claimed to be engineers or software developers.
  People are stupid.
  The other group of people I'm thinking are the newbies on sites like GameDev.Net, who expect to write a WoW-killer MMO in 1-2 years, and run it on their spare PC.
32. Re:Story at 11... by OakDragon · 2009-09-18 08:02 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  You wouldn't be surprised at the number of people who DO try to run application servers underneath their own desk in the corporate world.
  
  All you need is a post-it note saying "do not turn off!! SERVER!!!!"
  
  --
  Dark Reflection
33. Re:Story at 11... by Oldstench · 2009-09-18 08:02 · Score: 1
  
  That wasn't the case for me and I got in when it first started up.
34. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 08:48 · Score: 0
  
  also...
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-PIckHrZ0o
  chill out dude, he made a funneh
35. Re:Story at 11... by Jared555 · 2009-09-18 09:20 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Then you find the one person who thinks unplugging the power strip to plug it into another outlet will not shut off the computer
36. Re:Story at 11... by Chad+Birch · 2009-09-18 10:00 · Score: 1
  
  Eve is not a competitor at all. Nothing is even close, but if you're trying to pick a "second place", it's certainly not Eve. Eve is at least 8th: http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/CASTop10.png (from http://mmodata.net/ )
  
  --
  Sturgeon was an optimist.
37. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 11:08 · Score: 0
  
  You also failed to mention the size of the desk, the space located underneath, the specification of said desk, what other items are located underneath or on top of the desk, what is the desk's square footage and how many times you ruined their mother on said desk...
38. Re:Story at 11... by Jarik+C-Bol · 2009-09-18 11:13 · Score: 1
  
  i like how runescape is 4th in that chart. sure does well for a crappy java game, in the world of big time MMO games.
  still it must be mocked.
  
  --
  I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
39. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 11:20 · Score: 0
  
  yeah I'd imagine heat buildup would be a problem.
40. Re:Story at 11... by KermitJunior · 2009-09-18 12:03 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  For instance, I live on the 7th floor, hence that is where my desk is. I know for a fact four people below me have their desk (and computers) directly under mine, and I'm not evening asking to maximize the machines that will fit there.
  
  --
  There is a Universal Life Value Check it
41. Re:Story at 11... by bigstrat2003 · 2009-09-18 15:50 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Whoosh!
  
  --
  "16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
42. Re:Story at 11... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 19:22 · Score: 0
  
  You ran a server emulator, which essentially just told the client what it wanted to hear. On a good day, you might have been able to get 50 people on the server in different zones fighting mobs with next to zero AI or scripts. Now try running something that can handle 10k concurrent users in hundreds of zones/instances all running their own sets of scripts simultaneously, with users joining cross server battlegrounds and 240 players fighting in Wintergrasp with vehicles.
  People who run WoW server emulators and think it gives them any insight whatsoever into how a WoW server actually functions are idiotic.
43. Re:Story at 11... by ausekilis · 2009-09-22 03:57 · Score: 1
  
  Judging from the pain of patch days and server down times due to crashes (post-maintenance errors and restarts), I'd say that the "Online" part has some trouble as well.
Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by eldavojohn · 2009-09-18 05:07 · Score: 3, Insightful

Let's say they have 10 million active subscribers world wide and that each of them pays $12 a month. Wouldn't you expect that sort of protection and insane support on something generating $120 million in revenue for you a month? I would. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a whole lot more to it that we don't know about and never will.

--
My work here is dung.
1. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by CRiMSON · 2009-09-18 05:08 · Score: 1
  
  Considering not everyone pays $12 month......
  Hell if people pay 100/month imagine the money!!!!!!!!!
  
  --
  oogly boogly!
2. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by whisper_jeff · 2009-09-18 05:14 · Score: 1, Offtopic
  
  You're right. Some pay more because they pay month-to-month ($15/month) while others pay for longer (reducing it to $13/month for a six month subscription) while some lucky bastiches don't pay at all. $12 a month, however, is a reasonable _average_ for the point of discussion.
3. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by gblackwo · 2009-09-18 05:20 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  I think he may mean that in countries like Russia and China the subscription rate is tremendously lower due to the local currency.
4. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Tekfactory · 2009-09-18 05:24 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Except ASIA is a large portion of the subscriber base (the 10 million number they like to quote a lot)and doesn't pay much per month at all. Blizzard licenses the game to ISPs and other partners that resell the game service as part of their offerings.
  So that part of it IS known, and you should factor that into your equations. Monthly income off WoW is nowhere near $120 million.
5. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by The+Clockwork+Troll · 2009-09-18 05:26 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  With currency exchange rates fluctuating so frequently, Blizzard has to allow for the possibility that in Russia, World of Warcraft subscribes to you.
  
  --
  
  There are no karma whores, only moderation johns
6. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by dbet · 2009-09-18 05:33 · Score: 1
  
  It's not because the subscription model is very different and MUCH cheaper in Asia where the majority of those 10 million come from.
7. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by damien_kane · 2009-09-18 05:38 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Congratulations, sir.
  That's the first time in a long time that a Yakov Smirnov joke has made me do something other than want to slap people.
  
  You get my vote...
8. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sopssa · 2009-09-18 05:39 · Score: 1
  
  Did you read the article? They employ around 4000+ people on WoW alone.
  Support staff:
  
  Brack went on to talk about the customer support staff, a group with 2,056 game masters, 340 billing managers, and a host of other background staffers. These tireless staffers also work from locations around the world, ensuring that any local variations in culture (or the game) are respected.
9. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by CRiMSON · 2009-09-18 05:47 · Score: 1
  
  But in china they don't pay a monthly fee, it's per-time played.. How does that work into the equation?
  
  --
  oogly boogly!
10. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by pwfffff · 2009-09-18 06:18 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Also add in name changes ($10?), character re-customization ($20?), and server transfers ($25). Oh, and faction changes ($25?).
11. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by jgtg32a · 2009-09-18 06:20 · Score: 1
  
  I thought that the source of that meme was lost in the infinite data-stream that is the net
12. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by xororand · 2009-09-18 06:33 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  "In Soviet Russia, the government controls the corporations."
  is also pretty good, imho.
13. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by ArsonSmith · 2009-09-18 06:35 · Score: 1
  
  I helped build a single datacenter that was a little more than 1/2 the total size of servers and staff they quote. It cost a little under 2 months worth of revenue by your numbers(*).
  * I think the 10 million players is a highly massaged number. Sure there is a lot and they have probably had 10 million people sign up and pay for at least 1 month, but I don't think it's 10 million active paid accounts.
  
  --
  Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
14. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Jerry+Smith · 2009-09-18 06:44 · Score: 1
  
  I thought that the source of that meme was lost in the infinite data-stream that is the net
  I prefer Nietsche as an original source, as in: "When you stare into the abyss the abyss stares back at you." That is, if the translation is correct.
  
  --
  All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.
15. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Jack9 · 2009-09-18 07:04 · Score: 1
  
  And so the labor and data rate tiering are different as well.
  
  --
  
  Often wrong but never in doubt.
  I am Jack9.
  Everyone knows me.
16. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 07:07 · Score: 0
  
  When I lived in Malaysia, we paid the same as in the US. China may have a different rate, but the rest of asia uses Oceanic servers.
17. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sexconker · 2009-09-18 07:42 · Score: 1
  
  Don't worry - it was referenced in the Simpsons.
18. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sexconker · 2009-09-18 07:43 · Score: 1
  
  Only the dumbest of shits pay for those things.
19. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by pwfffff · 2009-09-18 07:47 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, who the hell pays money for things they want? Fucking morons.
20. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sexconker · 2009-09-18 07:52 · Score: 1
  
  Only the dumbest of shits would want those things.
21. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 07:55 · Score: 0
  
  That meme might also be related to the quote "You may not be interested in strategy, but strategy is interested in you" by Leon Trotsky (which would go some way to explain the part about Soviet Russia).
22. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Trolan · 2009-09-18 07:55 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  No, the 11.5 million number is accurate as at least up to 23Dec2008:
  From: http://www.blizzard.com/us/press/081121.html
  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 licenseesâ(TM) territories are defined along the same rules.
23. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by pwfffff · 2009-09-18 08:01 · Score: 1
  
  Your comments are both insightful and of great value to this community. We all appreciate you as a person, and hope you stick around to contribute more. How is it that you are so awesome all the time?
  But I carry on too much... surely you have pressing research matters to attend to or dissertations to grade, Dr. Sexconker.
24. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 08:13 · Score: 0
  
  No, the 11.5 million number is accurate as at least up to 23Dec2008
  Hmm, I wonder why they haven't updated it in almost a year. Maybe because if they did it now, they'd be forced to show that they've lost half (if not more) of their player base. Blizzard will have no where near 11.5 million without Chinese players.
  It would also be interesting to see how many of those are multi-boxers. I reckon the number of actual individual humans playing WoW would be far, far lower than 11.5 million. Of course, Blizzard would never release that statistic, assuming they were capable of figuring it out.
25. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sgbett · 2009-09-18 08:55 · Score: 1
  
  Wait! if you just referenced the Simpson's ... that means ...
  
  --
  Invaders must die
26. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by LiquidHAL · 2009-09-18 11:05 · Score: 1
  
  They have other revenue sources. Name changes, server transfers, now faction changes and soon race changes all cost extra, and they're not cheap. Put those and new game sales into the equation and factor in the cost of each expansion over its life cycle, and hell why not throw in merchandising and Blizzcon sales from tickets, pay-per-view, and internet streaming sales (yes they charge for each, and people pay it because it comes with a unique pet) averaged over a whole year and the figure becomes very hard to say, but could easily reach $120 million/month or higher.
27. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by KermitJunior · 2009-09-18 12:06 · Score: 1
  
  He may have gotten your vote, but the fact that you posted on the thread now makes your mod-point irrelevant!
  
  --
  There is a Universal Life Value Check it
28. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by gmhowell · 2009-09-18 12:34 · Score: 1
  
  Maybe he modded from his sock puppet?
  
  --
  Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
29. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by SupremoMan · 2009-09-18 12:37 · Score: 1
  
  Actually it depends. I know some Asian/Pacific countries are supplied with the US version. Places like Australia, Singapore, and New Zealand come to mind. I would imagine it is possible Malaysia also receives this version.
  Although it may not be the language that has resulted in this decision, it could be that the market for this type of game is small in Malaysia, too small to justify localization. I know that some Gulf States also connect to the US version for this reason.
30. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 16:44 · Score: 1
  
  I would imagine it is possible Malaysia also receives this version.
  Perhaps. I do know that one of my guild leaders plays from Malaysia and we play on a US/Pacific TZ realm.
31. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 16:45 · Score: 1
  
  You figure it out. In China you have people dropping dead from overplaying. How many people in the US have you ever heard suffered that?
32. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 18:21 · Score: 0
  
  Did I miss something? I am from Asia, and I pay USD15 per month subscription. And we dont even have our own Realm Region. There is only Americas,
  Europe and Oceanic. I get kicked out while playing and when I check its because the server is full. I am not sure how they prioritize who gets to play.
33. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by drsquare · 2009-09-18 18:55 · Score: 1
  
  Bear in mind that they can say whatever they like, and no-one can find out if it's true or not. Including a Chinese player who paid cents to log on twenty days ago to check his mail is somewhat disengenuous, but I suppose they all do it.
34. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by ildon · 2009-09-18 19:32 · Score: 1
  
  Those are definitely not revenue streams. The costs of server transfers, name changes, and factions changes exist to discourage abuse and to recoup sunk costs in designing and supporting the systems that allow those features, all of which were added based on player demand.
  Hell the article even specifically mentions Blizzcon as a massive loss for them that they consider a marketing cost.
35. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by JAlexoi · 2009-09-18 20:50 · Score: 1
  
  In Russia the subscription rate is higher than in US. It's the same as in EU. 13 EUR or something like that.
36. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by sopssa · 2009-09-18 22:09 · Score: 1
  
  Those are definitely not revenue streams. The costs of server transfers, name changes, and factions changes exist to discourage abuse and to recoup sunk costs in designing and supporting the systems that allow those features, all of which were added based on player demand.
  Even if they exist for that purpose, they are still extra revenue streams.
37. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by ildon · 2009-09-19 04:58 · Score: 1
  
  I'm saying they're probably a net loss (at least at first).
38. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by brkello · 2009-09-21 06:22 · Score: 1
  
  But you really don't know that. There are more things than just subscriptions. There are also charges for other various things like the ability to change servers or factions. Also, I have seen the numbers more near 12 million but maybe it has gone down since the expansion.
  
  --
  Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
39. Re:Well, Look at Their Monthly Revenue by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-21 08:45 · Score: 0
  
  Either that or I didn't mod him b/c I don't have mod points?
  That's why he got my vote, and not my mod
I knew all of that by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:10 · Score: 0

through scientific experiments performed inside of the game.
Should I Be Concerned... by Logical+Zebra · 2009-09-18 05:13 · Score: 3, Interesting

...that WoW servers are guarded and maintained better than DoD networks?

--
I have a bad feeling about this...
1. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:41 · Score: 0
  
  What part of the article are you basing that assumption off of?
2. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by drexlor · 2009-09-18 05:45 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  I was alarmed when I was searching for a new bank that the major banks do not offer authenticators or usb dongles to use for online banking for normal consumers. Why can I protect my WoW account better than my bank account?
3. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by FooAtWFU · 2009-09-18 06:00 · Score: 1
  
  FYI, E*Trade offers online banking and will let you use an RSA dongle for authentication. They'll charge you for it, mind you, unless you have a boatload of money parked with them, but it's available.
  
  --
  The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
4. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by drexlor · 2009-09-18 06:02 · Score: 1
  
  That's great to know, thank you! I checked out Rabobank, Chase, and Wells Fargo. They all looked at me like I had spoken another language.
5. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Cassini2 · 2009-09-18 06:18 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Why can I protect my WoW account better than my bank account?
  Check out the terms of service on your bank account. You might be shocked to learn the bank isn't responsible for your financial losses. Often, they specifically exempt themselves from all responsibility relating to fraud, mistakes, and/or computer errors. If they cash a bad cheque, you are on the hook.
  There is a reason why people that survived the Great Depression hide money under their mattresses.
6. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 06:18 · Score: 0
  
  Every German bank uses TAN codes. Forget your extraneous electronic gadgetry, they just mail you a sheet of 'em in a secure envelope.
7. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Rycross · 2009-09-18 06:27 · Score: 1
  
  More worrying about Chase is that they don't allow any non-alphanumeric characters in the password for the online banking site. I was kind-of shocked to find this out, because it suggests one, or both, of the following:
  1) They don't salt/hash their passwords.
  2) They don't used parameterized queries to protect against SQL injection.
8. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by ArsonSmith · 2009-09-18 06:31 · Score: 1
  
  Yet I can get one from Bizzard to protect my WoW account for $5.99???
  They even gave them away at Blizzcon this year so I have an extra one...
  
  --
  Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
9. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by tero · 2009-09-18 06:35 · Score: 1
  
  Uh, you should be alarmed and you should complain - All major (and come think of it even minor) banks offer authenticators and one time pads/scratch cards over here.
10. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 06:53 · Score: 0
  
  The site I am familiar with is guarded rather well. First there is the M-16 or M4 armed guard(s) at the perimeter gates. Then there is the actual building that resembles a six or seven story block of cement. Monitored by various alarms, closed circuit video cameras, and a hyper vigilant armed security specialist with an able bodied team. Getting to a SIPR terminal requires passing those safeguards, and at least two passcard and PIN locked reinforced doors. Getting to an actual server would require the same if not more, I've never actually been into any of the server rooms.
  There are a couple hundred employee's that work at that one site I believe and though I couldn't say for sure how many servers, it doesn't suprise me that Blizzard would have more. Think about it, how many millions of customers does blizzard have? And how much load does an individual put onto a game server compared to the load placed by a user on a business server? Most DoD applications are pretty simple in comparison to a modern video game.
11. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 07:01 · Score: 0
  
  Why can I protect my WoW account better than my bank account?
  Because you pay more money every month to Blizzard than the bank?
12. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Conception · 2009-09-18 07:01 · Score: 1
  
  BoA does with their Safepass technology. You can buy a card authenticator for 20 bucks or use your cell phone which they send a code to.
13. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Chris+Burke · 2009-09-18 07:05 · Score: 1
  
  I was alarmed when I was searching for a new bank that the major banks do not offer authenticators or usb dongles to use for online banking for normal consumers. Why can I protect my WoW account better than my bank account?
  The solution seems obvious... convert all your cash to WoW gold to keep it safe.
  On an unrelated subject, I have the best exchange rates between dollars and gold, and the speediest delivery! Money mailed to you within the hour!
  
  --
  
  The enemies of Democracy are
14. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by tehSpork · 2009-09-18 07:21 · Score: 1
  
  Even more worrying is the American Express website - they have a 6 - 8 character limit and disallow special characters. They had better lock people out after a few bad tries as there are a frighteningly limited number of passwords you can come up with that fit those restrictions.
  
  The websites both have terrible usability issues as well but you would think that they would at least be a little concerned about security.
15. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by afidel · 2009-09-18 07:36 · Score: 1
  
  Bank of America and PNC both offer 2 factor authentication.
  
  --
  There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
16. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by tomhudson · 2009-09-18 07:36 · Score: 1
  
  Every German bank uses TAN [wikipedia.org] codes. Forget your extraneous electronic gadgetry, they just mail you a sheet of 'em in a secure envelope
  
  What's that - en envelope without Windows?
  Or an envelope mailed in a safe - wouldn't that be really pushing the envelope on what the mail system can handle easily?
  Unless something got lost in translation, and the envelope really includes a condom - in which case, it's a "safe envelope", and not a "secure envelope."
  Or it could be one of those Soviet Election Secret Ballot Secure Envelopes - "Here is your vote, Comrade: "Why is it sealed?" "It's a Secret Ballot, Comrade".
  Or they could mail them in a plain brown envelope, but then everyone would think you were receiving mail-pr0n. Back-of-the-envelope calculation says the kid next door will steal it too often.
  "sorry, culdn't resist the uns. It's like when someone explained the "Window envelope without a window" - which sounds to me like it should logically just be a plain envelope - it's an envelope with a hole (window) on the frnt for the address, but without a transparent cover (a window) covering the address window.)
17. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by sexconker · 2009-09-18 07:47 · Score: 1
  
  Check again.
  Not only is that bullshit, there are these things called laws that protect you.
  Beyond that, when you're talking about bank failure (instead of fraud or stupidity), you've got the FDIC.
18. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by drexlor · 2009-09-18 08:00 · Score: 1
  
  I'm glad they do support it. I unfortunately had bad experiences with BoA in the past so I didn't even consider them while shopping for new banks. I'll have to re-consider them next time I switch banks.
19. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Chris+Burke · 2009-09-18 08:15 · Score: 1
  
  Beyond that, when you're talking about bank failure (instead of fraud or stupidity), you've got the FDIC.
  True, but a lot of people don't realize that FDIC only covers them in the case of bank failure -- even if the fraud comes from within the bank (embezzlement) and will probably eventually lead to the bank's failure. Just because the law allegedly protects you in case of fraud, that protection works at the speed of justice. If your account is one that the fraud affected, it could be frozen for years while the case is under way.
  
  --
  
  The enemies of Democracy are
20. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 08:15 · Score: 0
  
  None in America do, because our laws are too business friendly - their shoddy security ends up being your problem. :(
21. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by owlstead · 2009-09-18 08:43 · Score: 1
  
  Which is weird since Rabobank is well known to be one of the first banks to offer electronic banking services over internet in the Netherlands, including devices from Vasco for security (one that accepts your bank card with chip/pin currently, and calculates a time based electronic signature for authentication and validating transactions.
22. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by drexlor · 2009-09-18 08:54 · Score: 1
  
  Rabobank may have been just a clerk error. The person who briefed me was a little scatter-brained. I bet it's for a good reason too. Their different plans are very customizable (and confusing) so it must be a challenge to keep all that knowledge straight.
23. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by sexconker · 2009-09-18 09:14 · Score: 1
  
  True - which is why you keep an eye on your finances, and if shit goes down, you get a lawyer and sue sue sue.
  That, and something about eggs and baskets.
24. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 09:24 · Score: 0
  
  ...that WoW servers are guarded and maintained better than DoD networks?
  No, you shouldn't be concerned, you should be relieved. Now, you can rest assured that when "the revolution comes," you'll be able to break up the tedium of hiding in your concrete-reinforced backyard bunker by logging on for some heart-pounding raid action!
  And, if the instance servers lock up from the popularity of doing the above, you can always start an alt! :-)
25. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Chris+Burke · 2009-09-18 09:58 · Score: 1
  
  That, and something about eggs and baskets.
  Yeah I'd say more that, at least as far as protecting yourself from embezzlement goes. If your money isn't just frozen by the government, but gone, you're going to be one little guy in a long line of folks trying to get it back. There might not be any left by the time you get to the front of the line and the government is under no obligation to care. I had a friend who was in this situation... it suuuucks.
  Multiple bank accounts ftw!
  
  --
  
  The enemies of Democracy are
26. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by sulliwan · 2009-09-18 11:32 · Score: 1
  
  Because your WoW account is much more valuable than your bank account on the black market. While someone that steals money from your bank account can be immediately tried by criminal law, it's much more complicated for someone that hacks into your wow account. The risk is smaller and the gains are nearly equal.
27. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by SuperMog2002 · 2009-09-18 15:36 · Score: 1
  
  Or if you have an iPhone or iPod touch, you can download a software one for free from the App Store.
  
  --
  Sunwalker Dezco for Warchief in 2016
28. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 16:55 · Score: 1
  
  Most DoD applications are pretty simple in comparison to a modern video game.
  Um, no. The big difference is that the incoming crap on the screen will kill the operator and there will not be a quick run back to the corpse from a nearby graveyard.
29. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by jonwil · 2009-09-18 17:47 · Score: 1
  
  The answer then is to boycott companies that have poor security (i.e. companies that disallow non-alphanumeric characters)
  My financial institution here in Australia (its a Credit Union, not a bank) has an on-screen keyboard you click on to input your password. Each time you click a letter, it moves slightly. (making it harder to intercept the password just based on mouse clicks)
  They also have a second password (again input with the on-screen keyboard) that you use when you are transferring money to someone you have not transferred money to before (i.e. someone not on your "approved payees" list).
  I have seen other larger institutions that offer security options (including on-screen keyboards and unique SMS codes that they send to your phone and that you have to enter into the online banking) so its not just mine. At least one does offer key-fobs for transaction security.
30. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 21:14 · Score: 0
  
  Hmm, over here in the Netherlands, all major banks use some form of authenticator to protect your online banking. Whether they are sufficient, is a different subject, but we do have them.
31. Re:Should I Be Concerned... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-19 07:09 · Score: 0
  
  Why can I protect my WoW account better than my bank account?
  Your Wow account is worth more.
All I read... by lazorz · 2009-09-18 05:16 · Score: 5, Funny

Additional instances cannot be launched.
1. Re:All I read... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:26 · Score: 0
  
  Why? I haven't had that problem since they fixed it a couple weeks ago or so. Before then, I was getting it constantly -- quite literally EVERY time I tried to get into an instance, even at what I thought were off-peak hours. Now? Friday night, Dalalag chock full o'players, and I can get into any instance I want. Took them long enough, but finally seems fixed.
2. Re:All I read... by flibuste · 2009-09-18 05:47 · Score: 1
  
  Must construct additional servers!
3. Re:All I read... by _Sprocket_ · 2009-09-18 05:51 · Score: 1
  
  His brain is probably still lagging a bit; possibly stuck in a mental Battle Ground.
4. Re:All I read... by Sir_Dill · 2009-09-18 05:52 · Score: 1
  
  I almost had that recipe but I got outrolled by a damn gnome..... I heard the mats for that were obscene though.
5. Re:All I read... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 06:00 · Score: 0
  
  World Server Down....at Raid Time...Again......someone needs to fix The Scryers!
6. Re:All I read... by Skuld-Chan · 2009-09-18 06:14 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  I was told by someone at blizzard that they essentially implemented a fix across all battlegroups (which for those who don't know is a collection of realms at one data center) so you shouldn't see the error anymore. The problem was that each realm had a set amount of blades (something like 14?) for instances. Lower population realms didn't use hardly any of that capacity - whereas high population realms there wasn't enough. Well any good server admin knows you never can tell if a low population realm becomes a high population realm or visa versa so clearly you can't build these realms based off that alone - the app needs to scale accordingly.
  The fix was that now all instances belong to a pool of servers now - which will eventually allow instance sharing across realms (that is - a party of players on different realms) once its switched on.
7. Re:All I read... by lazorz · 2009-09-18 06:26 · Score: 1
  
  I heard something about it already, but not how they actually did it. Thanks for the insight!
8. Re:All I read... by amplt1337 · 2009-09-18 06:56 · Score: 1
  
  ...need more rage?
  
  --
  Freedom isn't free; its price is the well-being of others.
9. Re:All I read... by H0p313ss · 2009-09-18 07:48 · Score: 1
  
  The fix was that now all instances belong to a pool of servers now - which will eventually allow instance sharing across realms (that is - a party of players on different realms) once its switched on.
  That aligns with what I gathered. The biggest problem was that it took almost a month to roll the fix out to all the battlegroups. The solution was "known" for at least three weeks before my server saw any improvements.
  
  --
  XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
10. Re:All I read... by coffii · 2009-09-18 09:09 · Score: 1
  
  You have to be kidding, this has been going on for a year on my server. They did nothing to fix it, just took our money. Their reputation in England is worse than toilet water at the moment. I dont care what their terms of service say, spending between 30 minutes and over two hours trying to get into instances for around a year is totally unacceptable.
  
  --
  Bitter and twisted, DON'T ever FORGET the TWISTED
11. Re:All I read... by Mad+Merlin · 2009-09-18 10:01 · Score: 1
  
  You have to be kidding, this has been going on for a year on my server. They did nothing to fix it, just took our money. Their reputation in England is worse than toilet water at the moment. I dont care what their terms of service say, spending between 30 minutes and over two hours trying to get into instances for around a year is totally unacceptable.
  So cancel your subscription? Dollars speak louder than words.
  
  --
  Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
12. Re:All I read... by H0p313ss · 2009-09-18 13:25 · Score: 1
  
  You are correct that it wasn't really a new problem, it had been going on for months but the ToC instances just put everything over the top so that most high-pop servers were completely overloaded.
  
  --
  XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
13. Re:All I read... by Shinobi · 2009-09-18 13:50 · Score: 1
  
  From what I hear from my WoW-playing friends, it wasn't ToC that broke it, it was the badge drop change that did it, people suddenly started chaining heroics en masse again. One of them was so happy because he managed to kit out his alt with both tier 8.5 tokens from badges in just 3 days.
14. Re:All I read... by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 17:03 · Score: 1
  
  I think they split the instance server. Realms previously consisted of at least three servers, one for the old world, one for instances and one for Outlands/Northrend[1]. I suspect they'll be splitting Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms for Cataclysm.
  [1] I think Outlands and Northrend are on the same server, but I'm not sure.
15. Re:All I read... by ildon · 2009-09-18 19:40 · Score: 1
  
  Whatever they changed was a bit more complex than that, because they were also laying the groundwork for the future cross-server LFG/dungeon system. For example, since they fixed the "additional instances could not be launched" issue, you can no longer share the daily heroic quest with your group while inside the zone. The reason being is that in the near future the people in your instance may not be on the same server as you, and may have a different daily heroic quest than you.
16. Re:All I read... by SL+Baur · 2009-09-19 10:43 · Score: 1
  
  The reason being is that in the near future the people in your instance may not be on the same server as you, and may have a different daily heroic quest than you.
  I think you're confusing server, realm and battle group, but I'm not sure.
17. Re:All I read... by ildon · 2009-09-19 14:27 · Score: 1
  
  Quit being pedantic. You know when I said "server" I meant what Blizzard defines as a "realm"... and EQ defines as "servers", UO defines as "shards", and every other MMO has its own inconsistent nomenclature for.
18. Re:All I read... by goonerw · 2009-09-19 14:53 · Score: 1
  
  For example, since they fixed the "additional instances could not be launched" issue, you can no longer share the daily heroic quest with your group while inside the zone.
  We only get that issue on the Oceanic Realms because the world servers are set to AEST and the instance servers are set to PST so, for the majority of the day due to a 15 odd hour time difference, the daily quest outside the instance is actually different from the one inside the instance. This is due to the fact that you cannot share the daily with someone else if it's not the "current" daily according to that instance. People normally run out of the instance, share the quest, then run back in if someone forgot to pick it up.
  
  --
  LOAD ".SIG"
  PRESS PLAY ON TAPE
"Only" 68 people? by FuegoFuerte · 2009-09-18 05:16 · Score: 2, Insightful

with only a staff of 68 people
How does it take 68 people to monitor that few servers, and most of them BLADES?!? The writers have apparently never worked in a large network environment (not that I'd expect that they would have, being writers and all). But seriously... that's not really that many servers for a large online service, it really shouldn't take that much work to keep it all running unless it's horribly designed.
Eh well, if they have the cash flow to retain that many warm bags of mostly water, more power to them.
1. Re:"Only" 68 people? by Tekfactory · 2009-09-18 05:34 · Score: 1
  
  If you were to assume that those 68 folks are at a central monitoring facility AND spread across multiple datacenters (Yes Timmy I said turn the power button off, pull out the bad blade, replace it with a good one) and you have 3 shifts (+1 Weekend) working 24/7 you might have 17 people on duty at any one time.
  They also said responsible for connectivity, so a few of these guys are rebooting routers and load balancers, not just blades.
2. Re:"Only" 68 people? by Krojack · 2009-09-18 05:40 · Score: 1
  
  I'm guessing its just 68 Blizzard employees. The North American servers are all run out of AT&T data centers thus those are monitored by AT&T employees. I would guess when a servers fails 98% of the time it's from some AT&T employee sleeping at his desk.
3. Re:"Only" 68 people? by Ephemeriis · 2009-09-18 05:41 · Score: 1
  
  How does it take 68 people to monitor that few servers, and most of them BLADES?!?
  The summary:
  
  The Online Network services group alone has "data centers from Texas to Seoul, and monitor over 13,250 server blades, 75,000 cpu cores, and 112.5 terabytes of blade RAM. [Pearce] points out the picture of the GNOC (Global Network Operations Center) in their slideshow, a data core that even has televisions tuned to the weather stations. They use those to ensure that conditions of the data center are up to their standards; with only a staff of 68 people they ensure connectivity across the globe for the numerous WoW servers."
  Is a bit confusing, to say the least. But it sounds like those 68 people are not monitoring a pile of blades in a single location. It sounds like those people are monitoring server scattered across the globe. Further, I doubt if all 68 of them work 24/7 - while the servers will need to be monitored nearly 24/7. So I'd assume there are various shifts through the day/week.
  All things considered... 68 people doesn't sound like an absurd number to me.
  
  --
  "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
4. Re:"Only" 68 people? by xxuserxx · 2009-09-18 05:42 · Score: 1
  
  The work you have to do I would say is relevant to the OS and software that you are running. The ammount of severs is just 1 factor. And the fact that they are blades really does not matter either, you could have 5 virtual servers on each blade and your work load just went way up. Your comment seems directed at your personal experience with another data center not what Blizzard is running.
5. Re:"Only" 68 people? by mypalmike · 2009-09-18 06:48 · Score: 1
  
  It seems about right to me.
  
  --
  There are 0x40000000 types of people: those who understand 32-bit IEEE 754 floating point, and those who don't.
6. Re:"Only" 68 people? by TheRaven64 · 2009-09-18 07:01 · Score: 1
  
  Further, I doubt if all 68 of them work 24/7
  Only the ones in Seoul work 24/7.
  
  --
  I am TheRaven on Soylent News
7. Re:"Only" 68 people? by The+Evil+Couch · 2009-09-18 07:12 · Score: 1
  
  No, 68 for IT operations across multiple datacenters sounds about right. 2 shifts during the week, 2 during the weekend (at least), and a minimum of 2 operators per shift makes for 8 operators needed for a 24/7 environment. Looking around online, it looks like they have 4 US datacenters, 1 Latin America datacenter, 1 European datacenter, 1 Korean datacenter, 4 Chinese datacenters, and 1 Taiwanese datacenter. With a support staff of 68 and 12 DCs, they have an average of 5 and 2/3s operators per DC. They actually seem understaffed to me.
  
  It's probably not the whole story, though. Someone else posted in this story that at least some of their DCs are not ran by Blizzard, but rather by local telcos and ISPs, so the number of 68 operators may not actually include all of their support staff. It's also possible that they're running on 1 operator per shift at some or all locations. It's not recommended, but if the DC is small enough and management doesn't care if Server Foo doesn't get looked at for 2 hours because their lone operator is working on Server Bar instead (or sleeping, because it's night shift and he doesn't have anyone to smack him if he falls asleep), then it'll work out just fine for them.
  
  --
  The World's Worst Webcomic!
8. Re:"Only" 68 people? by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 17:15 · Score: 1
  
  All things considered... 68 people doesn't sound like an absurd number to me.
  Nor to me. The obvious division of labor would be to have a handful of people on shifts monitoring the whole thing from a central location and the rest divided into the datacenters on 24x7 standby.
  Based on my previous experience, there probably isn't a larger team doing the care & feeding of the servers behind the NYSE, for example. There was only about 10 in my group in Tokyo, but we managed to have it back up and running from the offshore tapes remarkably quickly after 9/11.
Not much meat in the article... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 05:19 · Score: 0, Insightful

Not much detailing about their data centers. It seemed more of a Blizzard PR piece than anything else, and without technical details, this is just another Blizzard ad. In the MMO world, WoW serves one good purpose, and that is keeping the bad players there, and not bothering the better players elsewhere.
To be worth having this on /., it would be nice to know more than just "we haz data centerz". It would be nice to know how many zone servers are used per realm, how they are connected, what database they use (guessing Oracle), and so on. This wouldn't be ruining their security because the blackhats already know all this stuff.
1. Re:Not much meat in the article... by sopssa · 2009-09-18 05:41 · Score: 1
  
  Not much detailing about their data centers. It seemed more of a Blizzard PR piece than anything else, and without technical details, this is just another Blizzard ad.
  "The PR and community teams were Brack's next focus, the groups responsible for public interaction. The PR team has helped to ensure some 10,000 articles have been written about World of Warcraft"
  Job well done, PR team!
2. Re:Not much meat in the article... by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 17:19 · Score: 1
  
  In the MMO world, WoW serves one good purpose, and that is keeping the bad players there, and not bothering the better players elsewhere.
  I LOVE the smell of nerd rage in the morning ...
Small programming dept by obi1one · 2009-09-18 05:20 · Score: 3, Interesting

The programming department currently consists of 32 people, and envelopes systems, tools, gameplay, server technologies, and UI.
I know adding more developers can slow down production in the short term, but 5 years on I would think they would have been able to scale their programming staff up a bit more by now. New ui elements (gear manager, quest helper, even voice chat) have tended to be late and light on features, so thats one area I would think could benifit from more bodies in the future.
1. Re:Small programming dept by MarcoAtWork · 2009-09-18 05:39 · Score: 1
  
  I think you need to (re)read 'The Mythical man month', more people does not equal more productivity. Not to mention that some features have been 'late' not because they were difficult to code, but likely because they didn't feel they were necessary yet. Not to mention (2) that every new thing creates more QA, and that the game needs to remain accessible for new players, not only for people that have been there for years.
  
  --
  -- the cake is a lie
2. Re:Small programming dept by Krojack · 2009-09-18 05:45 · Score: 1
  
  "New ui elements (gear manager, quest helper, even voice chat)..."
  Adding various features such as these just takes away from the 3rd party mod developers. I for one don't use the new in-game gear manager and still use the add-on mod outfitter. I find it more useful.
  Voice chat has been in the game for some time now but is a total fail. I don't know of anyone that uses it.
3. Re:Small programming dept by NYMeatball · 2009-09-18 06:02 · Score: 1
  
  From a business standpoint this makes little to zero financial sense - adding developers which come at a cost disadvantage to support what the online community happily does for free? As long as the LUA backend is in place to support these changes, such as equipment manager, etc, and blizzard isn't losing revenue by "Outsourcing" the work - you've basically got an even cheaper, more competent version of India.
4. Re:Small programming dept by mlts · 2009-09-18 06:10 · Score: 1
  
  MMOs have one two weaknesses:
  The first is that every new feature needs to be tested for software regressions thoroughly. Not to mention unexpected code or content interactions that players can use to gain a disproportionate disadvantage.
  For example, there was a bug with one game where if one knew the constants that skills were named, one could try manually type in the skill name and learn it, even if that skill was never a part of that class. So you would have warriors running around who could open a fight with a backstab, keep themselves healed up, and cast offensive spells at the target. Of course, unless someone explicitly looked at the PC database, the only way any devs would find this issue would be someone else ratting it out.
  This is compounded by the fact that it is in the player's best interest to not tell anyone if they discover something (say an ability/item combination that is immensely unbalanced) The QA team will only find out if someone explicitly points it out, or if the logs show that someone is doing a disproportionate amount of damage or healing for their level and gear range.
  In a way, it goes back to adding new features on MUDs back when people were running those almost everywhere. Instead of outright banning exploiters, you log every single action they take, and figure out what exactly they are doing, then start fixing what they do silently. If they are finding a way to stack a certain buff, then add a numeric limit to how many can be stacked, or divide the effect of each buff by the number stacked, so a person can stack 1500 enhanced belches, and it would have the effect of just one belch buff. You may luck out and get someone entering the item as a /bug, but almost nobody wants to have their secret advantage taken away from them, so in reality, you can't depend on this. Some people, it may bring them a lot of real dollars if they are able to create a dupe bug.
  The next biggest weakness is having to trust the client for some actions. Latency is always an issue, so in most MMOs, the client is trusted in keeping charge of where the player is located, and telling the server if the character took environmental damage. Of course, an adept programmer with a disassembler can find where in memory this info is stored, and gain an immediate advantage by having his character warp around terrain or take shortcuts to get places. This is very hard to fix because of latency. One can use a "rubber-banding" algorithm that moves a player back to what the server thinks is a sane spot depending on how much time passes, but that has some problems.
  Usually one solution that almost all MMO makers use is something like WoW's Warden, Valve's VAC, StarForce's FL MMOG, or another program that scans processes for known signatures of hack utilities, as well as watches for programs changing RAM entries in the MMO client. This is not a perfect technology since it ends up a constant arms race, but it pretty much gets rid of all but the top cheaters who are not going to share their "trainer" programs with others.
5. Re:Small programming dept by DerekLyons · 2009-09-18 06:34 · Score: 1
  
  Why would scaling up the programming staff fix those problems? How do you they aren't design problems from elsewhere in the hierarchy?
6. Re:Small programming dept by pwfffff · 2009-09-18 06:40 · Score: 1
  
  If more people doesn't equal more productivity then why isn't WoW coded by one neckbeard locked in a server closet?
  WoW has too much tiny shit broken with it to only have 32 people working on it. They really need to hire some cheap programmer to start at the bottom of the bug list and work their way up. Hell if they were to simply give me the source and tell me to 'fix what I can' I guarantee I'd find and fix at least one annoying glitch per day.
  They could also hire someone to simply copy every popular user add-on and make an 'official' Blizzard version. Someone being paid for their work would probably put a lot more thought and effort into speed optimization and usability, and simply being able to hard-code new features in the game would almost guarantee that the Blizzard version would be better. They've already done this with some of the most popular add-ons (like the new gear manager), but they've done so at an absolutely glacial pace. The gear manager was announced months before it came out, yet the add-on that came before it was modified to be able to save its sets using the new functionality in a matter of days.
  I understand the difficulties of localization and quality control, but despite what you may have read in some book once more people does equal more productivity. If you hand a large project to one QC tester, they're more than likely not going to find everything wrong with it. Maybe the Norse god of quality control was reincarnated and hired at Blizzard, but I doubt that even they are perfect. This means that even after you've made your fixes and sent it back, it will probably return to you yet again with entirely new issues brought up that were there in the project since it arrived the first time. If this same project is handed to three QC testers, the chances of finding all the minor bugs goes up dramatically. This, in turn, decreases the amount of times that the project has to bounce back and forth between programming and QC.
  It adds redundancy, yes, but when your bankroll is the size of Blizzard's I think you can manage to put the extra effort into making your product the best possible.
7. Re:Small programming dept by rainmaestro · 2009-09-18 07:48 · Score: 1
  
  At 5.5 mil LOC, you'd be lucky if you could even *find* the source of one bug a day.
  There is a balancing act involved. I remember an old chestnut that said something to the effect of "A product is good enough to release when it works for 85% of the people trying to use it". Go above 85%, and you start getting diminishing returns on cost. Could they fix every single little glitch? Sure. From a business perspective, is it worth the price? No way.
  The whole point of the Mythical Man Month is not that more coders never means more productivity, it is that there is a balance point at which going beyond it does not increase productivity. 3 is better than 1, but 3000 is not always better than 1000. At this point, 32 is probably enough. Maintaining a codebase and adding new features requires a lot fewer devs than the initial development of the product. Most of the leg work (back-end, tool suite, etc) has already been completed.
8. Re:Small programming dept by pwfffff · 2009-09-18 08:12 · Score: 1
  
  The COBOL portions of the code I work in daily reaches 4 million lines of code alone. That's not counting any of the other three languages we use. It's not like you have to print it all out and walk to the lines you want to look at.
  85% is a horrible number to be satisfied with, and reflects what's wrong with most of society today. 85% of American's currently have health insurance. If you watch the news you realize that this isn't enough for most people. I hope Blizzard's CEO sleeps soundly knowing that instead of making a better product he gave up the profits that could have been used to improve the product to Activision instead (though I'm sure his larger paycheck helps).
  Blizzard should be doing a lot more 'initial development' then you think they are. Because the game doesn't have actual new releases, most of the changes to the game engine come with expansions. Each of these changes is redoing the 'initial development'. This should also happen a lot more, and could with more coders. I mean, have you seen the freakin' trees in that game? They look like they were cut out of paper.
9. Re:Small programming dept by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 17:40 · Score: 1
  
  If more people doesn't equal more productivity then why isn't WoW coded by one neckbeard locked in a server closet?
  You miss the point. Productivity does not scale linearly with the number of people. 9 people can not do 9 times the work of a single person. It's somewhere in between. How close you can get to a linear increase depends upon how much the job can be compartmentalized and how much communication is required between each individual. The famous Brooks example is the extreme - you can assign 9 women to give birth to a baby, but it's still going to take 9 months to produce a baby. Software isn't like that.
  It's not all or nothing, it's somewhere in between.
  
  They really need to hire some cheap programmer to start at the bottom of the bug list and work their way up. Hell if they were to simply give me the source and tell me to 'fix what I can' I guarantee I'd find and fix at least one annoying glitch per day.
  Heh. If I were younger and not married, I'd sign up for the same thing if it existed.
  
  They could also hire someone to simply copy every popular user add-on and make an 'official' Blizzard version.
  That's a good idea but ... what makes you think they're not already doing this? I think they are, they're just doing it at a (very) conservative pace. At least that's what I've noticed.
  I support an enterprise software project at roughly the same personnel per user that Blizzard does. I think they do pretty good.
10. Re:Small programming dept by ildon · 2009-09-18 19:49 · Score: 1
  
  I hope Blizzard's CEO sleeps soundly knowing that instead of making a better product he gave up the profits that could have been used to improve the product to Activision instead (though I'm sure his larger paycheck helps).
  I'm pretty sure he's content with being the best on earth.
Pictures? by citylivin · 2009-09-18 05:32 · Score: 1

So wheres the pictures?

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As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy
Brack?? by kungfugleek · 2009-09-18 05:44 · Score: 1

FTA:

Production Director Brack and Game Director Tom Chilton are...
All hail Brack!!!!
1. Re:Brack?? by cfalcon · 2009-09-18 06:39 · Score: 1
  
  DON'T TOUCH ME
Bosses by Idiomatick · 2009-09-18 05:46 · Score: 4, Insightful

Apparently the programmer's boss is also a programmer, the artists boss an artist and they are expected to work together. So so SOOOO much better than the bureaucrats most of us get stuck with.
1. Re:Bosses by Krojack · 2009-09-18 05:59 · Score: 1
  
  Oh so true.
2. Re:Bosses by julesh · 2009-09-18 06:04 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  Apparently the programmer's boss is also a programmer, the artists boss an artist and they are expected to work together. So so SOOOO much better than the bureaucrats most of us get stuck with.
  Yeah. You say that now. Then you'll get a job where your boss is a programmer, and it'll be like "Why haven't you finished that task yet? I could have done that in 2 hours, and you've been 6...", and no matter how much you argue about how long such a task takes, you'll never win, because he'll _know_ exactly where your time is going.
3. Re:Bosses by Darinbob · 2009-09-18 07:44 · Score: 1
  
  I've had programmers and engineers as managers for more than a decade. I always thought the days of working directly for a generic manager were over. Even my manager's managers tend to be knowledgeable about things, or were engineers. Usually true all the way up to the CTO
  
  Of course these low level managers have much more stress than people who work for them. Not only do they do the typical manager bureaucratic nonsense, but after attending 6 hours of meetings a day they still have another 6 hours of programming to do since they tend to be the person who knows the most about the code base, plus they have to solve and the conflicts that arise in the group, deal with the headaches of branches and release schedules, and be the group's scapegoat. Ie, the manager and technical lead are the same person.
  
  Of course you can't bamboozle this sort of working manager. Saying "I tried switching the polarity but that didn't work, so I'm going to consult with my colleagues on slashdot for a couple of days" doesn't usually succeed as an excuse.
  
  I've always thought it would be better if the most incompetent programmer who happened to have social skills was made the manager, as the code quality could likely improve; whereas they often make the best or most knowledgeable programmer the manager, and then the code starts to lose out.
4. Re:Bosses by Dog-Cow · 2009-09-18 10:39 · Score: 1
  
  I once worked in a group where the previous supervisor was a coder. He was known for coding anything he thought his employees did too slowly or poorly.
No... by Junta · 2009-09-18 05:54 · Score: 1

It can hurt in the long term and the short term. You get too many bright people on a project and it takes forever to reach consensus on entirely too much. Particularly if each is passionate about the entire product beyond their small piece and have strong opinions/vision about how it should be done. Especially if they are users/fans of their own software.

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XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Zorak Rules by Dareth · 2009-09-18 06:22 · Score: 1

Forget Brak. Zorak kicks major ass.
And don't knock him just because he is a virgin, and has never been eaten by a female. The same is true for the majority of Slashdotters too!

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I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Imagine what these guys are like... by dan_sdot · 2009-09-18 06:43 · Score: 3, Funny

The creative development team is the hub for the company's history. They have two full-time lore historians, keepers of blizzard's past. They are the liaisons with the novelists, work to create shared art resources, act as an archive for every piece of art that's been created for Blizzard Entertainment, and currently maintain 100,000 art assets.
I wonder what those two guys are like. I'm pretty sure they must be nerds of EPIC proportions. And I don't mean that in a mean way, I'm just sayin....
1. Re:Imagine what these guys are like... by Slime-dogg · 2009-09-18 08:46 · Score: 1
  
  Dude... Metzen is more fashionable than Paris Hilton.
  
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  You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button.
Still can't... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 06:58 · Score: 0

play Crysis
Not mentioned in the summary by bonch · 2009-09-18 08:12 · Score: 1

Not mentioned in the summary is the fact Blizzard is currently tracking about 180,000 bugs in WoW. Lovely.
1. Re:Not mentioned in the summary by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 16:37 · Score: 1
  
  They have 180k bugs in their tracking system. That's not the same thing. Considering their size and longevity, that's a remarkably low number ...
2. Re:Not mentioned in the summary by bonch · 2009-09-18 16:42 · Score: 1
  
  What I said:
  
  Blizzard is currently tracking about 180,000 bugs
  What you said:
  
  They have 180k bugs in their tracking system.
  No difference whatsoever.
3. Re:Not mentioned in the summary by ildon · 2009-09-18 19:28 · Score: 1
  
  You don't "currently" track closed/fixed/wontfix/invalid bugs.
4. Re:Not mentioned in the summary by bonch · 2009-09-22 08:00 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, you do. Blizzard even used that wording in their presentation. Next.
5. Re:Not mentioned in the summary by ildon · 2009-09-22 19:31 · Score: 1
  
  Regression tests must be fun where you work.
Ob. ctrl-alt-del by DarthVain · 2009-09-18 08:17 · Score: 3, Funny

How it REALLY happens behind closed doors:
http://ctrlaltdel-online.com/comic.php?d=20090916
Imagine... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-18 08:18 · Score: 0

... a beowulf cluster of these!
How? by ShooterNeo · 2009-09-18 08:25 · Score: 1

Interesting part in the article : the programming team only has slightly over 30 developers. The QA department has 6 times that. One would think that a product so complex would need more coders.
1. Re:How? by HoboCop · 2009-09-18 10:07 · Score: 1
  
  Nine women can't have a baby in one month.
2. Re:How? by chromatic · 2009-09-18 10:10 · Score: 1
  
  Their constraint is very likely QA. If QA is perpetually busy, it doesn't matter how many more programmers they add.
  
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  how to invest, a novice's guide
Weather Stations by danielk82 · 2009-09-18 10:05 · Score: 2, Funny

a data core that even has televisions tuned to the weather stations.
That the night shift promptly changes to Family Guy at 8 PM when everyone else goes home.
I admit it! by SL+Baur · 2009-09-18 17:45 · Score: 1

At 5.5 mil LOC, you'd be lucky if you could even *find* the source of one bug a day.
That's what a defect tracking system is for ...
I'm talking out of my ass. I just want to see the code that causes Hunter's pets to go into Prowl when Prowl isn't assigned to the pet bar. Uber annoying.